Well, WWE Worlds Collide 2025 is officially in the books. The event featured more fancy high-flying than an air show and may have made a few new lucha libre fans along the way. As has been the norm for WWE's recent supercard events, we got five matches, with this afternoon's bouts pitching the luchadores of the recently acquired AAA vs. WWE stars from both the main roster and NXT.
Three of those matches all tag-team bouts were essentially exhibitions, with no real stakes in play. Fans got to see 2 six-man tag matches featuring WWE vs AAA stars and a women's tag match between NXT's Stephanie Vaquer & Lola Vice againstChik Tormenta and Dalys of AAA.The two remaining matches, however, definitely had more than pride on the line. Incoming NXT North American champion Ethan Page's title was on the line in a fatal four-way and the main event featured a clash of styles with AAA Mega Champion El Hijo del Vikingo defending his title against WWE star and Olympic grappler Chad Gable.
The following features the (likely strong) thoughts, feelings and/or opinions of Wrestling Inc's writers and editors on today's festivities, so if you know who won and want to know what we thought, you're in the right place. If you're still unspoiled and want to read what happened sans input, check out theresults of WWE Worlds Collide 2025.
It was always going to be weird to have Stephanie Vaquer work a AAA show, considering AAA is the company that couldn't muster anything more than boilerplate corporate-speak when one of its stars was arrested for domestic violence against Vaquer. It's doubly weird making her work a AAA show despite having also booked her for Money in the Bank. The weirdest thing, though, is making her do all this just so she can work a perfectly cromulent tag on the second match of the show which wasn't really about Vaquer at all. It oddly turned out to be sort of about Lola Vice, Vaquer's partner, who wore Cuban flag gear to the ring and made an emotional speech afterward.
As I write this, the women's Money in the Bank ladder match is currently ongoing, and commentary absolutely will not stop reminding people that Vaquer has worked three matches in 24 hours. To me, that makes her Worlds Collide match even more egregious. There was absolutely no reason for her to be there, and she shouldn't have had to be.
Written by Miles Schneiderman
Let's be real: a lot of us didn't know what to expect from this event; Wrestling Inc's Worlds Collide predictions had us confidently incorrect on the six-man tag match between WWE's Legado Del Fantasma and AAA'sEl Hijo de Dr. Wagner Jr., Pagano, and Psycho Clown and split down the middle on the six-man bout featuring AAA's Octagn Jr., Aero Star, and Mr. Iguana against WWE's Dragon Lee, Cruz Del Toro and Lince Dorado. Some of the matches on this card involved unknown quantities, and while we're realistic about the nature of professional wrestling, it's not always easy to predict how certain performers will be booked, especially when world's are literally colliding. For luchaphiles not all of whom are thrilled with WWE's acquisition of AAA it would be easy to be pessimistic and expect a near shutout from WWE's wrestlers over the luchadores from AAA c'mon, no one can be so jaded they thought WWE was going to take the Mega Championship off a generational luchador and put it on a dish of Midwest meat-and-potatoes like Chad Gable. Oh wait, we're wrestling fans; being jaded goes with the territory.
Instead of WWE going 4-1 over AAA, we got a much more respectable 3-2, with AAA book-ending the show with an incredibly colorful and acrobatic six-man tag victory byOctagon Jr., Aero Star, and Mr. Iguana and El Hijo del Vikingo retaining in the main event. In a bygone era, WWE might have booked this card with every AAA talent jobbing out to their WWE opponents. Fortunately we live in a time where World Wrestling Entertainment is part of a publicly traded company, meaning business moves need to serve more than one man's ego. Are those facts directly tied to the outcomes we witnessed today? Who knows? But it was important that WWE demonstrate a modicum of respect for AAA on this show and booking the luchadores to win one of the six-man tag matches obviously Stephanie Vaquer & Lola Vice weren't taking the L accomplishes that somewhat, as does Octagon Jr's post-match skirmish with Dominik Mysterio leading to an IC title match on the Money in the Bank card.
Not every crosspromotional show has to be about one brand against the other, but WWE Worlds Collide chose to make itself about WWE vs.AAA, with commentary (CoreyGraves representing WWE and Konnan representing AAA) tracking the two promotions' win-loss records en route to declaring a winner. The problem is and I hate when they do this, and Vince used to do this all the time with "SmackDown" vs."Raw" the "contest" was over before the main event.
Yes, AAA won the opening trios match, but that was it until the main event. Three wins for Stephanie Vaquer and Lola Vice, Legado DelFantasma, and Ethan Page later, and it was 3-1, with Konnan having to spend a third of his time on commentary during the main event selling that a moral victory is still technically a victory. Obviously the AAA Mega Championship match still had stakes, but because they couldn't bear to have their own stars take a third loss, WWE wasted an opportunity to both sell the drama of a 2-2 tie heading into the main event and make AAA look good by winning 3-2. Instead of taking his home promotion over the finish line, Vikingo's successful title defense against Chad Gable brought AAA to a belated 2-3, with WWE winning anyway. Much fun, so drama.
If you don't want crosspromotional bragging rights stakes to actually mean anything, next time just don't do that at all.
Written by Miles Schneiderman
With Stephanie Vaquer, Giulia, and Roxanne Perez all called up to the main roster, there's a bit of a hole in the "WWE NXT's" women's division and Lola Vice proved this afternoon that she can help fill it. Vice had an impressive showing alongside Vaquer in their victory against AAA'sDalys and Chik Tormenta. The match was set up really well, where Vaquer did get the pin on Dalys, but for the first half of the match, Vaquer was kept out and it was Vice doing all the work. While fans of course wanted to see "The Dark Angel," putting Vice out there to show off what she can do before putting her partner in there was a really smart move, and the pair worked really well together. Vice and Vaquer hitting the Devil's Kiss at the same time was a fun little spot, too.
Commentary did a good job of putting over how Dalys and Tormenta are the in-ring veterans compared to Vice, but she held her own against them. She's not exactly known for a Lucha Libre-style of wrestling in "NXT," as her experience outside of the PerformanceCenter is inTaekwondo and MMA, and her "NXT" character and style rely heavily on her Bellator experience, but at no point did she look like she wasn't keeping up with the other women in the match.
Vice proved tonight she is absolutely crushing it. She looks fantastic and she has obviously been putting in the work at the PC behind-the-scenes to get even stronger in the ring. Putting her beside Vaquer was a good move for Worlds Collide, as the former NXT Women's Champion only made her look even better. Hopefully Vice can take the momentum of the big premium live event victory back to "NXT" and bring the fight to current Women's Champion Jacy Jayne.
Written by DaisyRuth
While I loved the fact that Santos Escobar got his first televised victory since last summer and Legado del Fantasma got a victory overall as a trio, which I'm not sure has ever happened before, WWE must think we're dumb. There had been recent dissension in the faction, with Berto not on board with what Escobar and Angel were up to. I noticed this last night on "WWE SmackDown" when they played the vignette where the three men were all hyped up to take onPsycho Clown, El Hijo de Dr. Wagner Jr. and Pagano today with seemingly no issues between them. Just a few weeks ago, they were all sitting around a table discussing their future plans in another video, and Berto walked out on Angel and Escobar as the pair toasted to the future. While Escobar was confident that Berto would "come around," we didn't see what officially brought him back into the fold 100%. I guess we're to presume it was Escobar getting the faction this match.
So, while I pondered this last night during "SmackDown," part of me thought maybe something would happen between Legado today where Berto would get upset at Escobar and refuse to tag in or something, screwing the faction over. Or perhaps Berto would take the pin, enraging Escobar. I was surprised when Escobar got the victory and the men celebrated together in the ring like nothing ever happened.
I suppose that's not necessarily anything wrong on the end of Worlds Collide, but it's certainly an issue with WWE's storytelling. It's almost like they decided Legado wasn't important enough that the fans would remember the story they were starting to tell or, dare we, expect closure. I'm also not sure where Legado del Fantasma goes from here, especially if everything is back to sunshine and rainbows with them. It seemed like a good time to split them back up, with Escobar going his own way and Berto and Angel getting in the mix of the stacked "SmackDown" tag team division. While I enjoyed the match overall, the ending just had me confused as to where we're going on "SmackDown."
Written by Daisy Ruth
There were two main concerns going into the Worlds Collide main event, the first being whether the slower and more methodical style of Chad Gable would mesh well with the high-octane and frankly insane acrobatics of El Hijo del Vikingo, and the second being whether WWE was going to leave its mark on the world of Lucha Libre with one of its superstars winning the AAA Mega Championship. I have nowhere near been a fan of any of Gable's "deep dive into the dark arts" or his escapades as Mr. America 2.0, but truthfully the main event managed to do everything right for what it was.
Gable worked really well in slowing the match down and garnering heat from the crowd while doing so, and it paid off for Vikingo as he came back and played his greatest hits, including a 630 Splash to the floor. There was also a table spot, paying off for the fan demand throughout the night even if Konnan hilariously didn't get it as Gable delivered a clean moonsault to put Vikingo through it on the outside. I'm not going to pretend it was the very best of Vikingo, Gable, or what AAA has to offer. But it was a fitting way to end an event that had served well as an introduction of AAA to the WWE audience. And really that is all that you could have wanted from it.
Written by Max Everett
