Is AEW Overbooking Its Wrestlers?

This article is a follow-up to our article on WWE misbooking their talent.

Creative Freedom, Narrative Excess, and the Limits of Decentralized Control

If WWE is routinely accused of mis-booking through excessive control, All Elite Wrestling (AEW) faces a different but equally persistent critique: over-booking. Since its launch in 2019, AEW has marketed itself as an alternative to WWE’s centralized creative authority, promising wrestler autonomy, long-term storytelling, and respect for fan intelligence. For many viewers, particularly those disillusioned with WWE, AEW initially delivered on that promise.

Yet as AEW has matured, critics increasingly argue that the promotion suffers from narrative sprawl, inconsistent character arcs, and uneven payoffs. Wrestlers appear and disappear without explanation. Feuds escalate rapidly, then dissolve. Championships circulate frequently, sometimes without a clear hierarchy. What fans once celebrated as creative freedom now risks becoming structural incoherence.

This article argues that AEW’s booking challenges stem not from incompetence but from a counter-hegemonic philosophy that prioritizes autonomy, abundance, and responsiveness over discipline and hierarchy. Where WWE misbooks due to restrictions, AEW often overbooks due to excess. Understanding this distinction illuminates broader tensions in professional wrestling between control and freedom, structure and improvisation, labor discipline and creative expression.

AEW’s Foundational Ethos: Anti-Monopoly as Creative Identity

AEW emerged not merely as a new wrestling promotion but as a cultural critique of WWE’s dominance. Its booking philosophy explicitly rejected WWE norms: scripted promos, rigid hierarchies, and centralized decision-making. Tony Khan positioned himself less as an authoritarian booker and more as a facilitator, while high-profile wrestlers The Elite, Jon Moxley, Chris Jericho, and Kenny Omega received significant creative latitude.

This ethos, aligned with fan desires shaped by independent wrestling culture, New Japan Pro Wrestling, and online wrestling discourse, shaped by independent wrestling culture, New Japan Pro Wrestling, and online wrestling discourse. AEW treated wrestling as a collaborative cultural space, where performers contributed to narrative direction, and fans were expected to track intertextual references across promotions and platforms.

However, this model introduced new structural problems. Without firm narrative gatekeeping, AEW increasingly struggled to balance depth with clarity.

Case Study I: Hangman Page and the High-Water Mark of Long-Term Booking

Hangman Adam Page’s ascent to the AEW World Championship represents the promotion’s most successful example of long-term storytelling. His arc from insecure Elite member to isolated outsider to triumphant champion unfolded over two years, integrating factional dynamics, personal failure, and audience empathy.

Crucially, this story worked because AEW exercised selective restraint. Page’s absences, losses, and delayed coronation enhanced rather than diluted his momentum. The payoff felt earned precisely because AEW resisted the temptation to accelerate.

Yet Page’s reign also exposed AEW’s difficulty sustaining narrative focus. After winning the title, his character lost narrative specificity. His feuds lacked thematic continuity, and his championship presence often felt secondary to broader factional chaos. The issue was not mis-booking in the WWE sense, but over-saturation of too many stories competing for narrative oxygen.

Case Study II: The Women’s Division and Structural Neglect

AEW’s women’s division reveals how creative freedom can mask institutional shortcomings. While WWE has often been criticized for over-scripting women’s wrestling, AEW faces accusations of under-investment. Wrestlers like Hikaru Shida, Thunder Rosa, and Kris Statlander experienced abrupt momentum shifts, limited television time, and inconsistent character development.

Here, over-booking manifests paradoxically as absence. AEW’s sprawling men’s roster and faction-heavy storytelling crowd out sustained women’s narratives. Without firm structural prioritization, women’s storylines become episodic rather than cumulative.

This problem underscores a key distinction between AEW and WWE. WWE’s mis-booking often reflects ideological control; AEW’s reflects organizational diffusion.

Case Study III: CM Punk, The Elite, and the Perils of Creative Pluralism

The CM Punk–Elite conflict exemplifies AEW’s most public booking crisis. Punk’s return initially symbolized AEW’s promise: a disillusioned star reclaiming agency. However, overlapping creative visions, unresolved backstage tensions, and inconsistent authority structures culminated in public meltdowns and suspensions.

From a booking perspective, AEW attempted to incorporate real-life conflict into on-screen narrative without sufficient mediation. The result blurred boundaries between performance and organizational dysfunction. Rather than enhancing realism, the storyline fractured trust among performers and audiences alike.

This episode reveals the danger of under-centralized authority. Where WWE suppresses conflict, AEW sometimes amplifies it beyond the bounds of narrative containment.

Case Study IV: Championship Inflation and Narrative Flattening

AEW’s proliferation of titles, the World Championship, TNT Championship, International Championship, Trios titles, and ROH titles defended on AEW television illustrates another form of over-booking. While intended to provide opportunities and variety, the abundance of championships dilutes symbolic hierarchy.

In contrast to WWE’s rigid pecking order, AEW’s title ecosystem often lacks clear stratification. Wrestlers hold belts without consistent narrative framing, and title changes sometimes feel interchangeable rather than transformative.

This abundance reflects AEW’s democratic impulse but undermines wrestling’s reliance on symbolic scarcity.

Comparative Analysis: Mis-Booking vs. Over-Booking

When paired with WWE, AEW reveals a structural inversion:

WWE:

Centralized authority

Narrative discipline

Performer constraint

Hierarchical clarity

Stability over risk

AEW:

Dispersed authority

Narrative excess

Performer autonomy

Hierarchical ambiguity

Risk over stability

Neither system is inherently superior. WWE’s model ensures coherence but suppresses emergence. AEW’s model enables creativity but struggles with sustainability. Fans experience both as “bad booking,” but the underlying causes differ fundamentally.

AEW does not over-book because it misunderstands wrestling. It over-books because it consciously resists the mechanisms of control that define WWE. In doing so, it exposes the paradox at the heart of professional wrestling: compelling storytelling requires both freedom and constraint.

Paired with WWE’s mis-booking practices, AEW’s challenges demonstrate that booking is not simply about choosing winners and losers. It is about managing labor, audience expectation, institutional authority, and cultural meaning. Wrestling promotions do not merely tell stories; they govern creative worlds.

Understanding these dynamics allows scholars and fans to move beyond partisan debates and toward a more nuanced critique of professional wrestling as a modern cultural industry.