AEW Collision notes: Challenges, Max Caster, in-ring returns, Don Callis Family

Saturday’s Homecoming edition of AEW Collision featured a pair of challenges, a new Max Caster open challenge, and a trio of in-ring returns.

Challenges

Following he and Brody King’s tag team victory over the Gates of Agony, Buddy Matthews decided to challenge reigning AEW Continental Champion Kazuchika Okada after Okada laughed at the newly-christened Hounds of Hell in a backstage segment.

Okada had no interest to which Matthews retorted that him being turned down made Okada a bitch which the champion didn’t care for. Earlier in the night, Okada defeated Komander in a champion vs. champion match.

Later in the show, Penelope Ford challenged former AEW Women’s World Champion Thunder Rosa to a match after they got into a verbal disagreement, and Darius Martin called out Lio Rush given the issues between their respective teams.

In all cases, no date or location was announced with this Wednesday’s Collision TV taping following Dynamite as a strong possibility.

The Max Caster open challenge series

After former AEW Tag Team Champions The Acclaimed split up last week, Max Caster is now on his own and declared on Saturday that he is holding his own open challenge series. He called himself a survivor and he wanted to see who the other survivors are even though they can’t beat “the best wrestler alive.”

AEW continues to get healthier by the week with three wrestlers making their announced in-ring returns after long absences:

  • After being out for more than half a year, former AEW World Champion and former TNT Champion Samoa Joe opened the show with a win over Nick Wayne. He was taken out by Chris Jericho in a street fight last July as a storyline cover for him returning to work on the second season of Twisted Metal for Peacock
  • In a trios match, Cool Hand Ang/Angelo Parker returned to the ring for the first time since last August, getting pinned in a trios match that featured himself, Daniel Garcia and Matt Menard against Adam Cole, Roderick Strong and Kyle O’Reilly. It was his first AEW match since last April while he wrestled three times in ROH from June through August. He and wife Ruby Soho got married and celebrated the birth of their first child in October.
  • Yuka Sakazaki returned to AEW for the first time since last September and made it an impactful return, earning a TBS title shot this Wednesday against Mercedes Mone.

Don Callis Family expanding?

In a brief taped vignette before AEW International Champion Konosuke Takeshita’s title defense against Katsuyori Shibata, Don Callis noted to his family that there might not just be five of them, insinuating more members could be coming.