AEW Rumors: Controversial commercial not the company's idea

The Wednesday Night Wars continued to heat up this week. TNT aired a commercial for All Elite Wrestling this week that directly called out its competition. It featured quotes from outside outlets that said things like “AEW Dynamite crushes NXT” and "AEW Dynamite Buries NXT".

They were all real quotes from Forbes, The Wrap and others, but they were taken out of context. All of the quotes were from back in October, and were referencing Dynamite's ratings win over NXT the first time they went head to head.

All Elite Wrestling has taken a number of shots at WWE programming during its brief tenure, including having Britt Baker recreate her "shocked face" from when she was shown in the crowd at NXT Takeover: WarGames. Apparently though, the company is not the one responsible for the commercial; the call to create and run the ad reportedly came from the network.

According to Dave Meltzer on the latest episode of Wrestling Observer Radio, the ad was created by TNT. That suggests it's not just the promotion that's looking to one-up WWE in the banter sweepstakes; the network is willing to get its hands dirty too.

The timing of the commercial is telling as AEW has dropped behind NXT in the overall ratings the previous two weeks. That said, AEW continues to win the battle in the 18-49 demographics, and it goes without saying that that is good news for both the promotion and the network.