Chris Jericho recently spoke with Chris Van Vliet about his faction, The Inner Circle.
The Inner Circle is one of the most dominant forces in All Elite Wrestling. During his discussion with CVV, the Demo God spoke about how the group was formed, who else was considered to be an original member and more.
In the lead-up to the first AEW Dynamite one year ago, Tony Khan approached Chris Jericho and said he wanted him to be part of a faction. Jericho was a bit reluctant at first, but grew to like the idea.
Jericho said he wanted the members of his new group to include a tag team, an up-and-comer and a heater/enforcer. For the tag team, he first looked at the Lucha Bros. before going with Santana and Ortiz. MJF was a great fit for the up-and-comer spot, but Cody had a longterm program in mind for MJF, so Jericho hand picked Sammy Guevara. Boxer Anthony Ogogo was suggested as the enforcer, but Jericho had Jake Hager in mind since he had so much untapped potential from his WWE days.
Before going with the name Inner Circle, Jericho thought about calling the group The First. During a cameo appearance on Being The Elite, Jericho casually mentioned his ‘inner circle’ and the Young Bucks loved the name. It stuck and the rest is history.
The Inner Circle officially formed at the conclusion of the premiere episode of AEW Dynamite. They did a photo shoot backstage after the show. Jericho says they looked like early Guns ‘n Roses, since they were 5 guys that don’t look like they belong together, but “it just works.”
Jericho is proud that the Inner Circle is still going strong one year later. He thinks WWE does not have the patience for longterm storytelling and would have broken them up after 3 months. He loves working with the group and says they’ve become really good friends thus far.
He finished by saying that he would “absolutely” consider adding new members to the Inner Circle.
You can check out Chris Van Vliet’s full chat with Chris Jericho in the video player embedded below:
