Timothy Thatcher Reacts To WWE Walking Through The Forbidden Door

Earlier this year, All Elite Wrestling and New Japan Pro-Wrestling held hands while walking through the "Forbidden Door" together to put on the AEWxNJPW Forbidden Door pay-per-view. As promotions across the globe seek to form positive working relationships to execute something similar, Shinsuke Nakamura is set to return to Japan to wrestle The Great Muta at his retirement event for Pro Wrestling NOAH — a rare move on WWE's part by allowing one of its talent to appear for another promotion. In response to WWE taking one step through the "Forbidden Door," former "WWE NXT" star Timothy Thatcher shared his thoughts on the matter with Wrestling Inc. Senior News Editor Nick Hausman in an exclusive interview.

"After I got signed, I was allowed to go back to Germany and have one more match in WXW, which is greatly appreciated. But then that kind of stopped, obviously COVID kiboshed a lot of stuff," Thatcher said. "But as you move up the thing, obviously Nakamura is a big SmackDown star and all that stuff. That's a different thing than allowing some of your 'NXT' stars to go out to different places," he added. "So it is incredible that it happened. Yeah, that's very amazing. So it'll be great, January 1 will be, that'll be an epic contest I think."

Nakamura's match against The Great Muta will take place on January 1, 2023. It will be the first time that Nakamura has wrestled for a promotion other than WWE since 2016, and it will be the first time Nakamura has faced Muta since their battle over the IWGP World Heavyweight Championship at the NJPW Destruction pay-per-view in 2008.