Former AEW Star Says WWE Return ‘Felt Like Coming Home’

AEW/WWE

A former AEW star has commented on their recent return to WWE, saying it “felt like coming home”.

The April 25, 2025 episode of SmackDown saw Aleister Black make his long-awaited return to WWE after four years away from the company, kicking off a new chapter in his career following his AEW departure at the beginning of 2025.

Speaking to The Atomic Drop to promote WWE Clash in Paris on August 31, 2025, Black described the mixed emotions he went through ahead of his return, feelings that would soon dissipate as he settled back into the company.

Black said:

“I’ve been thinking about that a lot and I feel like it happened very organically. I think the first day that I came back, like physically being backstage, you know, walking around and talking to people and being quote/unquote reintroduced to the company and stuff like that. It’s strange, right?

“Because it’s like a mixed feeling of nostalgia and familiarity whilst there is something unknown, because obviously as much as the setup is the same, internally, its guts have been like rearranged if that makes sense, because it’s no longer the same people in charge, but at the same time, it’s the same people that I connected with the first time around.

“And I remember being very nervous, but then realizing that everything felt the same in the most positive sense and then I was like, why are you so nervous? You know all these people. And then at that point it was really strange. It was like all my like anxiety just kind of dropped. And I’m like, yeah, this time around it’s even better, you know what I mean?

“Because I’ve always had a good relationship with Triple H, and I get along great with Nick Khan, and the locker room is something that I’ve always preached about, how fantastic the boys are in WWE.

“And it just really felt good, it felt like coming home, and I know that sounds somewhat cliché, but I’ve never experienced that feeling of coming home in that sense, and I think that was the first time I could ever say it felt like coming home and everything made sense again.”

“I was in that system for eight years and it is a completely different system than anything else. Nothing is like WWE, no locker room I’ve ever been in, and it just felt like this is what it’s supposed to be for me, you know?

“I was really excited to be back, of course, and like I said initially it’s a little bit anxiety driven. But then once you walk around and you get a feel of everything, you’ll say to yourself, ‘hey man, you know all these people, you know all this and everybody’s just going around doing what they always do and everything is just right’, it works, everything runs so smoothly.

“Then, we get ready for the show, and here we go, rock and roll, everybody’s heading in the same direction and that’s just a really good feeling.”

After picking up wins against The Miz and Carmelo Hayes in his first three weeks back in WWE, Black tasted defeat on last week’s SmackDown as both he and Shinsuke Nakamura were bested by LA Knight in a Money in the Bank qualifying match.

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• Aleister Black
• AEW
• wwe

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