When Malakai Black made his debut at AEW's Road Rager in July of 2021, it felt like an inflection point in the promotion's history.

Sure, Tony Khan had signed ex-WWE guys in the past, with three of the top guys on the first televised edition of Dynamite, Jon Moxley, Cody Rhodes, and Chris Jericho, having drawn paychecks from Vince McMahon's company in the past, but the addition of Black was interesting because of just how recently the man once known as Aleister Black was a top guy in The Fed. A casualty of the great “budget cuts” of 2020 and 2021, Black was part of the Seth Rollins-Rey Mysterios feud that also featured Buddy Murphy-now-Matthews and had just parlayed a successful run as NXT Champion into a successful tenure on RAW that was just getting good.

While he was written off of television from November of 2020-through-April of 2021 due to a mix of Kayfabe eye injuries at the hands of Rollins and a lack of creative ideas, WWE spent weeks hyping up the return of Black with a new, more sinister attitude and even established the spooky eye injury that the performer brought along with him to AEW and beyond.

Whether due to hubris or sheer lack of foresight, WWE built up a new superstar to hand him off to their biggest competitor in years, and TK's company was afforded a chance to reap the benefits of what Mr. McMahon and company sewed.

And for a time, things went really, really well. Black had a fun program with Rhodes that maybe went on a bit too long for some people's tastes and saw his influence grow exponentially when Brody King, freed from his Ring of Honor contract, made his AEW debut and reformed the Pro Wrestling Guerrilla tag team Kings of the Black Throne in Black's new home promotion. Matthews made his debut one month later after a trio of impressive KotBT matches, and suddenly, AEW had a new, impressive trio capable of going toe-to-toe with any team the promotion had to offer, especially once Julia Hart rolled over to the dark side to serve as the team's devilish flower girl.

And yet, less than six months after the trio debuted together in a proper trios match during the buy-in for Revolution 2022, they are no more, as Malakai Black was granted his “heavily conditioned release” according to Fightful that will all but certainly keep him out of action for the foreseeable future, maybe even when his contract comes to an end in 2027.

So what gives? Are the pushes of King and Matthews suddenly toast too, or can they stick it out and find a new life outside of their fearless leader?

Fortunately, King's organic feud with Darby Allin may be the key to his future success in an AEW ring.

Grand Slam could help to define House of Black's future in AEW.

King has wrestled against Allin almost as many times as he's been in the ring with Matthews. They first wrestled at Evolve 99 all the way back in January of 2018 in a 10 minutes time limit draw, and have since gone on to wrestle in AAW, SFP, PWG, and AEW on four occasions. Though they presumably weren't supposed to enter into quite as vicious of a feud as what ultimately transpired when King won the Royal Rampage to secure a championship bout versus Jon Moxley back in June, the combination work/shoot nature of the beef, with Allin routinely being thrown through tables at Comic Cons, signings, and Zumiezs, caught on in a major way with fans and created some intrigue over whether or not the duo would one day team up and form a trio of their own with Sting.

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Adam Copeland is wearing a Tom Brady Tampa Bay Buccaneers jersey next to Tom Brady with the AEW logo as the background.

Matty Breisch ·

Rhea Ripley with a text bubble reading “If I’m winning, he’s winning” with the WWE logo behind her next to Buddy Matthews with the AEW logo as the background.

Matty Breisch ·

Rhea Ripley with a text bubble reading “Thanks” next to the blacked-out silhouette of Adam Copeland with the RAW logo as the background.

Matty Breisch ·

With Black now gone and King clearly too good/over to simply fade off into obscurity on Dark/Dark Elevation until his contract runs out, the House of Black – which ironically had its trademark approved within a day of Black's release – has its first test at AEW's Grand Slam, where the duo will wrestle Allin and Sting once more, only this time, without their fearless leader.

After watching Allin take care of Matt Hardy in a solid match on Rampage, King and Hart killed the lights and appeared in the ring to call out the Sting and his partner for yet another match. “Darby, Sting, get your a—‘s down here,” King declared on Rampage. “You think this is over? You think, just because you bit the head off the snake, there isn’t plenty of venom left in the fangs? Next week, Arthur Ashe, Grand Slam, Darby, and Sting versus the House of Black – No Disqualifications.”

Will the House ultimately win in the end? Or will Allin and Sting secure the win once more? Either way, if King and Matthews can put on the match of their lives, it will only spell a good omen for their AEW futures, both together and solo.