Mason Madden: WWE Reject to AEW Anime Icon

• Mason Madden transitioned from WWE to AEW.
• He blends anime with wrestling, inspired by Dragon Ball Z.
• Created signature moves like Nico Nico Knee.
• Faced creative control challenges in WWE.
• Uses Twitch to maintain fan engagement.

Entertainment: How Mason Madden Went From WWE's Undesirable Superstar to AEW's Undeniable Anime Wrestler

The professional wrestler chatted with us about the power of Twitch and anime.

Professional wrestling in many ways is a love story. Sometimes it's a love story about a 6'6" black otaku making good on a 9-year-old promise he made on a video game podcast to make professional wrestling into an anime.

AEW wrestler Mason Madden is a testament to how the two seemingly very different forms of entertainment are actually quite similar.

To learn more about the fascinating crossover, Streamers Visuals chatted with Madden via Discord to chronicle how his steely anime protagonist's resolve helped him overcome being laid off from WWE to fulfill his dream.

Early Beginnings

Mason Madden, whose real name is Brennan Williams, got his start in wrestling much like Roman Reigns and The Rock. He was a former football player who felt a calling to sports entertainment.

Williams was also a jock who liked anime before it was cool for athletes to admit as much. He hoped to marry the two forms of entertainment inside the squared circle.

As fate would have it, Williams would get his chance after making contact with fellow Texan and WWE Hall of Famer Booker T in 2015.

Developing Anime Wrestling Moves

While training for the WWE, Williams declared that he would make wrestling more like anime. He felt it lent itself to Dragon Ball Z-style storytelling by incorporating cultural touchstones into his moveset.

• Modified swinging neck breaker: Cruel Angel's Thesis
• Drifting football tackle: Initial D spear
• High-leg kick: D4C

The most famous one was the Nico Nico Knee. Unlike his other moves, which he conceptualized after hearing a remarkable anime phrase, Williams credits the Nico Nico Knee to former SBFC member-turned-game developer Liam Allen-Miller.

During Williams' first appearance on the podcast, Miller suggested the Love Live inspired name on a lark. Nine years later, the Nico Nico Knee is now a signature move in Williams' repertoire.

Challenges in WWE

On paper, it would seem like an incredibly high hurdle to climb to get WWE officials to read up on the minutiae of Williams' anime moves. However, Williams says it was never a concern as long as the commentator was told what the move was called ahead of time.

The only hurdle Williams struggled with was WWE management's need for creative control over a wrestler's onscreen character.

Outside of a brief onscreen scuffle with Brock Lesnar and a tumultuous run in the failed-upon-arrival gimp faction Retribution, Williams never got an opportunity to properly show off his anime love in the ring.

In WWE, there's a handful of people that get to be cool and get to win. That was never my job in WWE. I was usually given something and then I had to find my truth and what resonated with me in that character, Williams said.

Post-WWE Career

Williams finally got an opportunity to be a cool anime wrestler in the twilight months of McMahon's WWE era in July 2022 when he joined a tag team with Mansoor as the Zoolander-esque duo Maximum Male Models.

In this new stable, Williams took the metrosexual gimmick primarily played for laughs as an opportunity to be as camp as possible and embody a JoJo's Bizarre Adventure character for real.

Unfortunately, Williams' long-awaited anime dream would be cut short in September 2023 when he and Mansoor were part of WWE's wave of mass layoffs.

Fortunately, the pair used the unique situation of their layoff to their advantage by mutually agreeing to tackle the indies together and continue their run as the zesty male model tag team.

Williams also strategically used his Twitch channel InsideMxM to maintain an online presence and keep fans engaged.

Joining AEW

Repackaged as MxM Collection, the pair hit the ground running in what Williams likened to a Dragon Ball GT-esque grand tour across the world's indie wrestling scene.

The duo captivated audiences at Deadlock Pro Wrestling in the US, Gleat in Japan, and Soft Ground Wrestling in Uganda.

Williams says the team caught the eye of AEW president and CEO Tony Khan who reached out to them with plans to bring them into AEW as soon as possible.

The team officially signed with AEW's subsidiary wrestling company Ring of Honor and have thus far wrestled on a handful of AEW shows.

When Williams started his wrestling career, it was hard to envision making it at any company outside of WWE thanks in no small part to WWE's monopolization of wrestling territories across the US.

They've been very open to our ideas, allowing us to pitch stuff and making our ideas work, which is really cool. It's very gratifying to see your brainchild show up somewhere, have people be able to see it, and then have people react well to it, which is a completely foreign concept to us, Williams said.

It's a great problem to have people want to see you more. Having a platform where we can showcase our art in any capacity that anybody can see anywhere in the world has been a great boon to us because I think people are really starting to be able to see what we can do.

Legacy

Having fulfilled his lofty promise to make wrestling more like anime, Williams wants his legacy in professional wrestling to continue the tradition of performers unabashedly letting their nerdy freak flag fly.

Our thing has always been to have fun and be the most entertaining segment we can be. So if our legacy can be anything, it'd be bringing fun and joy to wrestling in some capacity.