Why Darby Allin Feels At Home In AEW

Unlike most of his peers, Darby Allin is not your prototypical "All I ever wanted to do was this" modern-day wrestler. In fact, Allin — admittedly not a huge fan of wrestling growing up — does not watch WWE or any promotions outside of AEW, and his passion for skateboarding supersedes his day job. As such, for Allin to feel "at home" in a wrestling company is probably a tribute to AEW's work culture, which has allowed many others like him to stay true to themselves. 

"It's definitely home — 100 percent," Allin told "Lost Signals." "From day one, [when] I heard AEW was gonna announce as a company, I heard the term 'creative freedom' and I knew I needed to be there. Because what you see out there is 100 percent Darby Allin — I'm not acting like anything, I'm not being told what to do. What you see is what you get, and I love AEW for it." When asked to provide examples of his "creative freedom" shining through on AEW programming, Allin revealed that he convinced AEW CEO Tony Khan to produce the pre-debut vignettes introducing Nick Wayne, adding that he wanted the AEW audiences to familiarize themselves with the young wrestling prodigy, whom he mentored on the indie circuit.

"I didn't want [Wayne] to be thrown out there as a random guy," Allin stressed. "I wanted him to have a backstory. I come up with a lot of stuff, let's just say that. But that's the beauty of it — Tony lets me take the ball and run with it. That's all I've ever wanted in life, not just wrestling, but life. It's just the opportunity to do something with myself."