Adam Copeland Enters AEW Revolution On A Mission To Tell One Last Great Story [Exclusive]

There are the small elements of the road life that become institutions of normality for someone like Adam Copeland.

Maybe it’s the TSA line at the one-terminal airport in Bangor. Perhaps it’s the Waffle House along South Semoran Blvd. in Orlando. Today, it’s the people who stop him every two minutes on the sidewalk in Brisbane to tell him how much he meant to their childhood.

To most, he’s WWE Hall of Famer Edge. In AEW, he’s Cope. But even when the name changes, the view remains the same.

“All of those things that over the years have been ingrained pretty quickly come back, and you just realize how well prepared you are for travel, because you've literally seen everything,” he tells The Takedown on SI, as he sips coffee in his living room days removed from AEW Grand Slam in Australia.

You may say the usage of “literally” is hyperbole, but for the 51-year-old Copeland, it’s really not all that disingenuous to suggest.

After all, who among us hasn’t danced in an oversized Elvis costume, speared a dangling man off of a 20-foot ladder, beefed with someone over a Japanese shampoo commercial, shaved a different man bald, cosplayed as a badass vampire in a literal ring of fire, earned an Emmy nomination for acting, collaborated with Rob Zombie and Alter Bridge, leaped off a towering steel cage, propelled yourself headfirst through a flaming table, and, most notably, intimated intercourse on live global television?

Well, I suppose it’s possible your Elvis costume is collecting some dust in the basement bins. But the memories remain vivid, even as Father Time draws nearer.

“I’ve understood that it's all fleeting. You know? It ends,” Copeland said. “And last time, I didn't know it was going to end when it ended. So I didn't necessarily soak it in, maybe appreciate it to the extent that I needed to if I knew that was going to happen. This time, I know, I know, ‘Okay, this is winding down. There's only so much more I can keep doing this.’ Which means I need to really appreciate every aspect of it.”

His most recent surgery was substantial. “Another plate and seven more screws,” as he says. Sure, rehab wasn’t like clawing back from the neck injuries that stole more than a decade of his career and legacy, but recovering from a fractured tibia (the result of jumping off the aforementioned “towering steel cage”) tested his tenacity at this moment in life. After all, what more does an 11-time world champion need to give to an industry that rarely gives back?

He was motivated to not let an ailment dictate his farewell this time though, and seven months of rehab set him up on a three-month excursion in pursuit of Jon Moxley’s AEW World Championship at AEW Revolution.

“I realize, like, this is pretty crazy to be trying to pull off at this stage of my career. But again, it's a challenge, and I just, I love that,” he said. “And, at the base of everything, I want to help the show. I want to help AEW. And if at this juncture, it feels like this can try and help it, okay, cool.”

His approach to doing so is pragmatic. He is the embodiment of an aging veteran whose team equity remains valuable. But unlike Rodgers with the Jets or, more appropriately, Jagr with the Flames, there is a practical payoff in play for a legend of the game.

“I think it felt like the right time to go, ‘Okay. If we're going to, you know, do a title program, this is probably the time to do it. Moxley seems like the right guy.’ I also feel like, you know, they're a group that need a strong babyface, especially to establish what they are,” he said. “You go back to 30 years on television and people just kind of recognizing your face or like, ‘Hey, I think I know that guy,’ like that kind of thing. It felt like I was the right babyface right now to try and really help establish what they're trying to get across.”

He takes pride in what he considers to be stronger AEW television over the last couple of months, pinpointing it on not only the roster getting healthier, but a more concerted effort into the basis of all he loves about pro wrestling: the storytelling.

“Everybody can have a good match if you're at this stage, you know? And people can do wrestling holds. It’s when to do them. Do you know the right place? The right time? All of those things. And that becomes easier when you have a storyline built into it,” he said. “And so you look at like, Ricochet and Swerve. And yeah, they can have a spectacular match. But man, it's going to mean so much more now because of Nana and Jimmy Rave’s robe. So you add that element of story to it. That, I've always said, makes the match that much more”

“Hogan and Rock didn't do a whole lot of wrestling moves in their match because they didn't have to. They had the people with these [poses], and they had them with just the enormity of it. But it was story. It wasn't about moves. And at the base of it all, it's still got to be about story. The moves are garnish.”

Don’t mistake his conviction for arrogance. He is amazed by Will Ospreay’s aerial acrobatics, and believes it’s his turn to be “the guy.” He even enjoys the patented Japanese wrestling fireup and no-sell comeback now and then. In his eyes, wrestling is a palette of colors that, when mixed, creates expression.

“You can tell stories with moves, especially if it's a cold match and it's a one-off. You can,” he said in admittance. “But give me those three, four-month stories with a culmination, or a six-month story, or a year-long story.”

It’s not entirely clear if he was intended to be the folk hero in the Death Riders story originally. Even so, his inclusion has become a microcosm of Adam Copeland’s glorious purpose. Yet unlike the God of Mischief, crafting cohesion throughout the program bears no burden.

It is here, you will learn in startlingly transparent fashion, storytelling truly is his magic trick.

“Well, for me, it was just, it was confusing at first. Like, I didn't fully understand what was happening,” he said of the Death Riders. “So I wanted to try and figure that out along with the audience, I think, and then go ‘Alright, what can be the story here? The story can be you take them out, because it's always the numbers that they have the advantage with. Okay, let's do something about that. Let's tell a story there.’ And more than anything, the beginning of the thing is, ‘Okay, you attacked all of my friends on television, right? Okay. So, yeah, I'm coming back. Time to step in and give this a shot’”

“Anything I'm involved in, I try to at least add some layers to it. And when putting the things together, going, ‘Okay, here's the package for the match.’ You got to build in beats for that package to sum everything up, so if you watch that two minutes right before the match, you're caught up. You got it, and know, ‘Alright, and now I'm looking forward to this thing.’ I think more than anything, that's my mentality, is just trying to craft something or be a part of helping craft something where you get those beats, those tentpoles throughout that you can just insert in a package and get everybody caught up, before, you know, they watch the actual match. But still, that to me is what hooks me.”

He confesses it did not start as an easy process. The beginning of the Death Riders angle was on a significantly different track than where it sits heading into AEW Revolution. The former TNT Champion credits a team commitment to getting the story in the right direction for setting up the collision course with Moxley properly, a bout he believes will be a “gnarly and gritty” wrestling match.

“They had other business to take care of first, so it kind of diluted things, right? But once we were able to bear down and say, ‘Okay, this is the program now, now let's get to work, let's get to business.’ And once we did that, I feel like it changed,” Copeland said. “And I feel like that was just, it was going to happen. It just couldn't happen until everything else was kind of fleshed out. But [Tony Khan]’s great to work with. He's super collaborative. He listens, and he trusts people with experience, people who have been there, people who have been put in these positions before. So I've just, it's been really fun to collaborate and create.”

Naturally, you hear the noise in wrestling discourse, and so does he. There are the veterans-turned-podcasters who claim there is no storytelling in AEW. There are the fans who say no one in today’s game understands its importance like Copeland or his best “frienemy” Christian Cage do, relics of a bygone era.

He disagrees. In fact, he’s inspired by what he witnesses within the ranks of AEW.

“I see a guy like Hangman do it in every one of his angles, you know, Swerve, you know, and I see what Ricochet has gotten from coming over and having some freedom to be able to start trying to create. And obviously, it was there that whole time,” he said. “To see Toni Storm create this just amazing character, this fun, vibrant thing that's totally different. So it's not old, you know, it's always there. It's always going to need to be there.”

That’s why this weekend’s match hits a little differently for him in comparison to when he was on his ascent as “The Rated R Superstar,” cashing in his Money in the Bank briefcase and validating his intricate approach to his trade. The prize isn’t the end goal this time. While Cope the character wants nothing more than to become AEW World Champion, Adam Copeland is more concerned about ensuring he is doing his part to help stick the landing. Sure, he thinks it would be cool to win the belt and add it to his list of 1,004 accolades. Hell, he may even pose with it for a few seconds (let’s say, hypothetically, five).

But in a world where “finishing the story” toes the line of becoming trope, the premise itself is a calling card for Cope.

“This is one of the most positive people you’re ever gonna have in a locker room. One of the greatest leaders you’re ever gonna have in a locker room. Somebody everybody wants to rally behind, get behind. And that’s why we’re so excited to have Adam Copeland in AEW challenging for the AEW World Championship this Sunday at Revolution,” Khan said on Thursday’s pay-per-view media call. “He’s just a fantastic person, a great leader, a great wrestler, a great man, a great family man.”

They are the small elements of the pro wrestling institution Adam Copeland has become, from Bangor to Brisbane. He will be remembered among pro wrestling's greatest storytellers, one who once thought his own was written to completion.

Now, he’s penning his own epilogue.

“All of this was not supposed to happen. So I look at it as it's all extra. It's all like, it's all your wonderful, sweet toppings on the sundae, you know? So because of that, I don't really get melancholy about it because none of this, like, nobody's come back from this injury,” he said.

“So the fact that I was able to, and to be able to do what I've done in that time, and the dance partners that I've been able to get in there with and try and create some stories with me, it's all bonus.”

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