Matt Hardy has joined All Elite Wrestling. He’s just not The Dark Order’s Exalted One.
Hardy’s debut closed an “AEW Dynamite” on Wednesday night, during which former WWE superstar Brodie Lee (Luke Harper) was earlier revealed as the Exalted One. Both had been rumored for months to be joining the promotion.
Hardy, 45, appeared as his “Broken” character in the upper level of Daily’s Place in Jacksonville, Fla., during an event held without fans due to the coronavirus. It came after the Inner Circle beat The Elite in a match to determine which faction would get the advantage in the “Blood and Guts” match (AEW’s version of WarGames) that will take place on the next episode of Dynamite. He was a described by Young Bucks member Matt Jackson as a friend who owed The Elite a favor. Hardy, whose WWE contract ended March 1, is likely taking the place of Nick Jackson in the match after he was injured last week in storyline.
The 40-year-old Lee, who lasted wrestled for WWE in October, arrived first on Dynamite after a short vignette, attacking SoCal Uncensored member Christopher Daniels in the ring with the rest of The Dark Order faction. Hardy’s and Lee’s arrivals ends a build that lasted more than a month and included 12 episodes of Hardy’s “Free The Delete” YouTube show – the last of which air shortly before he arrived on Dynamite.
Over the past month, AEW sent out numerous cryptic social media messages that included hidden words, number puzzles and images to supplement the on-screen build to The Exalted One’s arrival in the company, making it unclear whether it would be Hardy or Lee. Hardy, who had Matt and Nick Jackson on two of the “Free The Delete” episodes, even posted words to Twitter early Wednesday where the first letters backward spelled EXALTED just to add to the swerve.
Matt’s brother Jeff, who has battled legal and substance abuse issues, is still under contract with WWE after suffering a knee injury that led to the extension of his contract. Jeff Hardy returned to action after a nearly 11 months last week on “Friday Night SmackDown.”
Matt Hardy, during a YouTube video posted on March 2, praised his time with WWE and said the company has “treated me great as an employee.” He also addressed why he did not sign back with the WWE.
“The reason I needed to leave WWE is because when it comes to my creative stance and my creative outlook and my career, where I wanted to go for these last three or four years that I have to spend as an active in-ring career, I just feel that WWE and I are on different pages,” Hardy said. “And that’s very important to me because I love this business, man.”
AEW and its talent hasn’t been shy talking about the wrestler-driven creative process they have without the writing teams present in WWE. On his way out of WWE, Hardy lost in numerous squash matches and was beaten down by Randy Orton as part of a WrestleMania storyline.
WWE did allow Matt Hardy to use his “Broken” persona – which he started in Impact Wrestling — for a short time, but the character peaked with the Ultimate Deletion on “Monday Night Raw” from the Hardy compound in March 2018. Hardy will be given a chance to reinvigorate it in AEW.
