AEW star Adam Cole loves The Bullet Club.

Though he was only a member of The Club for a short while, as he signed with WWE early in the talent-share agreement between Ring of Honor and New Japan Pro Wrestling, Cole has remained fiercely loyal to the faction since leaving NXT for AEW in 2021, despite, you know, being fired from the club in an over-the-top ritualistic removal by the Young Bucks, Marty Scurll, and then-leader Kenny Omega.

While reuniting with Bullet Club members like Karl Anderson and Doc Gallows and Bullet Club-turned-The Elite members like the Young Bucks and Kenny Omega has proven incredibly fruitful for Cole in AEW, as, despite losing to “Hangman” Adam Page on multiple occasions, he's still been on the right side of the pin in 81.25 percent of his matches with the promotion, the addition of his fellow former Undisputed Era performers, when coupled with the absence of “The Cleaner,” creates the potential for swerves in the not-too-distant future.

Add in the fact that The Elite quite literally attempted to kill Cole via a poisoned Monster Energy can on Being the Elite, and there's good reason to believe that an Elite Civil War may be in the faction's not-too-distant future, even if ReDRagon's side of the split would need to settle on a new name due to copyright issues.

But what if that isn't the way Tony Khan and NJPW booker Gedo want to go on AEW's Forbidden Door? What if, instead, Adam Cole is the one getting double-crossed by his good friend Jay White and his non-fired members of The Bullet Club?

Is Adam Cole heading towards a Bullet Club beatdown at AEW x NJPW's Forbidden Door?

After winning the IWGP World Heavyweight Championship at NJPW's Dominion Pay-Per-View, Jay White had a lot to say during his post-show press conference. He called out “Hangman” Adam Page, called out Kenny Omega, and suggested that AEW, and all of the wrestlers who work for the promotion, wouldn't be where they were today without him.

One person, however, who wasn't the target of White's ire was none other than Adam Cole, though he was mentioned by name. After making his case for being the “Catalyst of Professional Wrestling”  – an apt nickname if there ever was one – White gave a short and incredibly condescending congratulations to Cole for winning the Owen Hart Cup, informing the AEW star that he is “very proud of you.”

Now granted, later in his speech, which you can watch here, White suggested that fans at home, and Tony Khan in the booking office back in Jacksonville, wouldn't have “Adam Cole, Bay Bay” without him, but that had more to do with his braggadocious musings on Bullet Club's expected victory at Forbidden Door than any more knocks against his former – current? – Bullet Club cohort.

With that being said, something just feels off about White's interactions with Cole. Again, Cole was very much kicked out of Bullet Club by Omega and company well before White joined the unit, and his CHAOS faction wasn't exactly close with their “Bone Soldier” clad cohorts. Of the two occasions where Cole and White actually did share the ring, both of which came in Ring of Honor back in 2017, the duo were always on opposite sides of the vs. symbol, with the former holding a singles and a four-man tag win over the latter.

Has White really forgotten about those Ls? Has White fully overlooked Cole using the Bullet Club name despite being dishonorably discharged from the group and simply wants to be friends with a performer who doesn't actually help him in his pursuits one way or another? Or is this all building towards a swerve where Cole takes a beating from foes he thought were friends?

For the second time in his professional career, is Cole about to take a beatdown from the Bullet Club?

Adam Cole has gotten a bad rep as of late. He's been compared to The Miz, been criticized for everything from his physique to his love of video games, and been accused of having the worst thing in all of professional wrestling television: X-Pac heat. While some of that criticism has been sort of earned, as Cole has been floating around directionless since his feud with Adam Page despite his Owen Hart Cup victory, Forbidden Door is a perfect opportunity for TK, Gedo, and company to shake things up and enter into a deeply personal feud, either between the Bullet Club and the Unduspited Elite, or an Undisputed Elite Civil War. Buckle up, friends; this is going to get interesting.