Top AEW Star Chris Jericho recently took to his Talk Is Jericho podcast, where he discussed the Blood And Guts Match. Jericho first addressed the complaint of several huge moments taking place during the commercial break and how he resolved that issue by taking things slow and working the crowd as he saw how much time they had left in the match before they got back from the commercial break.
This is what Chris Jericho said:
“The problem was when that happened, it was during the commercial break, and I knew it.” “And I was tell him ‘slow down’, but it’s hard to do that. So he eventually just started climbing, and I was like, well, I’m not going to be coming back from break with me being on top as well.”
“So I’m just going to climb really slow, and I was looking at Aubrey [Edwards] who’s telling me, ‘You got 30 seconds before we come back from break.’ And I knew that we had about 10 minutes left because I can see that clock. I was just like, I’m just going to stand right here and just work the crowd so when we come back from break, they’ll all be chanting and cheering and then they’ll be yelling for me as I’m climbing to the top of this cage.”
Jericho then talked about who came up with the idea of the finish of the match when Sammy surrendered to MJF, but MJF still tossed him from the top of the cage. Jericho also discussed the thought process behind the match finish.
This is what Chris Jericho said:
“We thought, ‘How much of a piece of s**t move would it be if the guys do surrender and you throw throw me off anyways,’ and that’s kind of where it all came from, which was a combination of a Tony Khan idea, a MJF and a Jericho idea.” “And listen, I don’t pretend that I want to take crazy stunts bumps. I didn’t want to take a bump into the thumbtacks in the Ambrose Asylum match, and I didn’t really want to take the bump from the top of the cage to the floor, but it was best for the story.”
“What’s best for the story? What was best for our angle and our story considering that we started with Blood and Guts and didn’t finish with it was this piece of s**t. The Inner Circle was up. They were winning. Everything was great, until MJF cheated, and then all he had left was threatening to kill me because we said, ‘You’re going to have to kill us to make a surrender.’ And when he threatened that, Sammy some surrendered.”
“The original plan was for Santana and Ortiz to do that, and then Santana had the idea for Sammy to do it, which is much more of a babyface thing for Sammy. Once again, we’re always working together with each other to try and think of the best moments and the best ideas for what’s going on with the story and the characters, and that was it.”
Jericho then talked about the planning behind his huge fall of the top of the Blood And Guts cage and his mindset behind the planning as well as to what extent he and everyone else were willing to go.
This is what Chris Jericho said:
“I’ll be honest with you, I was really, really nervous about this all day long.” “We thought it was the best way to go for the finish, and I’m not about taking crazy bumps like that, but it was the perfect way to continue the story. So a few weeks prior, a month prior, six weeks prior, kind of came up with the idea along with Tony and MJF and said, ‘Well, what do we have to do to make this happen?’ Now obviously, here’s the thing, when you’re doing kind of a live stunt show, which is what wrestling is.”
“People use the word ‘fake.’ That’s a word that’s very, very unacceptable because that’s not something that’s ever the case. Obviously, we’re telling a story, and we know what’s going to happen to a certain extent, but it is also a live show with a live element to it. We’ve seen instances where stunts do go wrong, where they go very wrong. I mean, all you have to do is just think about Owen Hart to think about a stunt that went wrong live. There is no second take. There is no camera angle take. It’s live, and I think that’s something that’s very unique about pro wrestling.”
Jericho also talked about how everything was prepared for the big Blood And Guts Match from the stage to the landing pad and every other detail to make sure everything was as safe as possible.
This is what Chris Jericho said:
“So earlier in the day, when they were kind of building everything, actually, the day before, they had a big giant air mattress that was probably, I don’t know, a big yellow mattress that was about 10 feet high let’s say.” “And I was thinking, ‘Wow, that looks like a pretty easy thing to fall on. Maybe they’re just going to put a sheet over it or whatever the hell they’re going to do.’ So Sammy Guevara was falling into it from the cage, and they’re like, ‘Do you want to try it?’ I’m like, ‘No, I don’t want to try it. I’ll just save it for later,’ and it turns out that it was one of those things where like, well, you’re not going to be falling into that.”
“We’re just testing that for the trajectory of how the body’s going to fall and try and figure out where we want to put the actual apparatus that you’re going to fall onto. And I’ll expose it. I’ll tell you guys right now what it was. It was a black gym mats that was about, I’d say, six foot high that was at the bottom, then there was a bunch of cardboard boxes. That’s right. Empty cardboard boxes. I’m like, ‘Are going to fill these things with anything?’ They’re like, ‘No, just empty cardboard boxes.’ That’s what professional stuntmen fall on.”
Jericho then addressed the criticisms of the Blood And Guts Match finish and how different it is when people are actually there to watch it live compared to those fans who watch it at home.
This is what Chris Jericho said:
“And I was like, ‘This is great. What a perfect finish for this,’ and it took the wind to completely out of the sails of the crowd.” “They just went completely silent, and I just laid there, until they basically took me away on a stretcher. And when they took me away on a stretcher, people started clapping like when somebody gets hurt on a football field, and they finally pick the guy up and take him off the field and everybody starts clapping. That’s what happened. The people were believing and buying into it and as was I, and it was only later I started hearing oh, people thought that the fall was on a crash pad, and it didn’t look great.”
“And for me, I watched it back. I thought it looked amazing, and the thing that was really scary is that if you watch it back, I barely missed hitting my head on the lights at the back of the stage. I went so far back that I almost over shot everything. So once again, everybody in the business knows how dangerous this can be, how terrifying it is and just the margin for error is so slim. There’s some hardcore wrestling fans that were bagging on it. That’s fine. I mean, you have the right to bag on it and out of the 1.3 million people that watched it, if 3,000 people didn’t like it, that’s a very small percentage. Most people just thought it was crazy, as did I.”
“Once again, I’ve got very thick skin, and and it really doesn’t bother me if people didn’t like something because we move on to the next week, but once again, everybody has opinions, and I appreciate that and I appreciate feedback. But for me, I always go back to what did I think about it? How do I feel about it? And what I watched it back, man, I was like, this is absolutely insane. It’s terrifying. It’s a little bit exhilarating, but it’s one of those things that I hope you enjoyed it because you’ll never see me do it again ever. And I’m glad that it turned out the way it did, but oh my gosh, I was really really, like I said, it was weighing on my conscience all day long. And when it finally happened, it was cool and looked as great as it did. I wouldn’t change anything.”
