AEW All In review: Hangman Page frees us from the Death Riders

After months of speculation and dread regarding whether AEW was going to send fans home happy at All In, the answer ended up being obvious: of course they did.

Hangman Page defeated Jon Moxley on Saturday to finish his story and finally take away the AEW World title from Jon Moxley and the Death Riders. After spending a year lost in his own hate and self-pity, he overcame everything to finally defeat Moxley, who since October has held the AEW World Championship hostage in a stuffy, stifling briefcase. It was a fantastic, bloody, and downright painful match that was booked perfectly, exactly what it needed to be.

Of course, there was copious amounts of interference. After Samoa Joe was injured earlier in the night, Will Ospreay also fell to the Death Riders, who interfered constantly throughout the match. The arrival of the Young Bucks also seemed to put a damper on things. But the returns of Bryan Danielson and Darby Allin helped even the odds once more. Swerve Strickland ended up being the deciding factor, helping Hangman by striking the Young Bucks with a chain and tossed it to our hero, who then used the chain he left in Swerve’s locker room on Collision to hang Moxley off the ropes, eventually earning the submission win.

Tony Khan thinks long term, very long term when it comes to storylines so sometimes it’s hard to see what the endgame is. The rise of the Death Riders and their rampage across AEW will be remembered as divisive, to say the least. While Moxley’s run as AEW World Champion can be credited for AEW’s upswing in 2025, the matches he defended the title in were a mixed bag, and the promos stopped being interesting a few weeks in. But in the end, after months of sour endings and fans wondering if he should piviot away, Khan stayed true to his vision and delivered the ending he wanted. And it can’t be labeled anything other than a success.

This was a grittier, bloodier version of Cody Rhodes’ WWE Championship win from last year. Some people will be upset about that comparison, but it’s true! It’s okay to copy ideas that work really well, and booking a long-term storyline leading to a cathartic-like win, as we witnessed Saturday, always works when everything comes together. With Page’s win, it does feel like a new era in AEW has begun, and while it’s not immediately clear what the future holds, it does look bright after a show like this.

I don’t think this was the best show of the year, as I thought Revolution was a tad better. And also, at six hours, yes this was a very long show. But the main event and its conclusion will likely be remembered by fans around voting time.

My other thoughts from the show:

• The Trios titles opener was fine, but seemed like more of an angle to ensure there would be hijinks in the main event after Samoa Joe was taken out on a stretcher. And sure enough, it was. I kind of wish for the days where these titles seemed like a big deal, they’ve really fallen by the wayside. But don’t get me started on AEW and its titles.
• MJF won the men’s Casino Gauntlet match, earning a future world title shot. I liked this mostly, it featured a ton of good workers like Konosuke Takeshita, Mistico, Mark Briscoe and Josh Alexander going at it and the mystery people coming in kept things going well. The finish pretty much means we’ll see the long-teased MJF and Hangman Page match, though if it’s like last year where people can cash in at any time, you know MJF’s going to use that to his advantage.
• Dustin Rhodes won the TNT title in an impromptu four-way match to crown a new TNT Champion after Adam Cole gave an emotional speech questioning his career status after vacating the title earlier in the day. This was a solid match that was overshadowed by Cole’s emotional announcement, but people reacted to the surprise win for hometown hero Rhodes. This was all designed to give fans something to cheer for, and they did.
• The Young Bucks are no longer EVPs, losing that status to Will Ospreay and Swerve Strickland in what I thought was a fantastic match. It’s not just that The Young Bucks are one of the best tag teams ever, but Ospreay and Strickland gel very well as a tag team, their synchronicity are top notch. There were some sequences here that were just incredible. The Young Bucks losing is probably a way to keep them off TV for a while until they pop up once again later this year.
• Athena ended up winning the Women’s Casino gauntlet match, giving herself a future chance at the AEW Women’s title. This was pretty good, everyone worked hard. Syuri from Stardom made her debut and looked great, as did Alex Windsor. Athena winning makes it seem like we’ll see a future match between her Toni Storm soon enough, which sounds good to me.
• To nobody’s surprise, The Hurt Syndicate retained the tag team titles over JetSpeed and Christian Cage & Nick Wayne. This took place long into the show and no one really reacted to the work here as nobody thought the Hurt Syndicate, who had been booked like demigods in the weeks leading to this match save for this last week, was going to lose the titles here. They didn’t.
• The match was also overshadowed by Nick Wayne turning on Christian Cage, which was a weird dynamic was it was Christian being mean to Wayne in the weeks leading to this match. Wayne, Kip Sabian, and FTR were about to take out Cage with the conchairto when Adam Copeland made his return, taking out everyone. He then helped Cage to his feet and told him to go…find himself. Deep. All Out is in Toronto so they will likely be buddies again by then, but this all seemed abrupt.
• Mercedes Mone was not successful in winning the AEW Women’s Championship, as she sustained her first AEW loss to Toni Storm, who won with an avalanche storm zero. This was fantastic with a lot of great nearfalls and submission attempts toward the end. Between the entrances and the work, this felt like a big time main event. Don’t know where they go from here as I feel this is just the start of a series that could eventually see Mone win the title.
• Kazuchika Okada emerged victorious over Kenny Omega in what I thought was his best match since arriving in AEW last year. The question coming in here is what kind of Okada were going to get — an Okada that works at a 5 or an Okada that works at 10? We got something closer to the latter, probably a 7. With that in mind, this was not as good as their matches from several years ago in NJPW as their bodies are battered, but this was still a great match. With Omega’s loss, he may be taking some time off as he continues on his road to recovery.