Malakai Black Tells AEW Fans To Expect Changes To His Character

AEW star, Malakai Black recently spoke with Fulton County Post about the development of his character. During that interview, Black teased that there are some interesting changes that will be coming in the next few weeks.

"There's a lot of things that I put into Malakai that I haven't even shown," he teased. "The interesting thing is that in the next two weeks you're going to see a very interesting change within the aesthetics and the behavior of said character."

Creativity is a big part of what Black has done with his gimmicks throughout his career. He revealed why he chose AEW to be the next step of his run after his time with WWE ended.

"When my release happened, I wasn't done. I was on the verge of having a massive creative wave that I was about to express within the realms of WWE. Yeah, I sat home for eight/nine months and I had eight/nine months to think of stuff," Black said. "So when I got released and we didn't pull the trigger on what we initially set out to pull the trigger on, I was left with those ideas and a lot of those things that I wanted to show the world and wanted to still do within the realms of my craft. There was only one company that I felt that I could truly do that in a way that I would not be tarnishing the essence of who I am as a performer, who I am as a wrestler."

He then dove into the aesthetic of his current character and where he gets his inspiration from. Black revealed it is all to do with a God that was the gatekeeper of the Underworld.

"The aesthetics I have based off a God from more tribalistic times, when the lower Celts, basically from countries such as the Netherland or Belgium and France. But more from the time that Julius Ceasar was around. The cool thing about him is that he is, or was, worshipped as a God that was basically in between realms," he stated. "So he was a gatekeeper of the Underworld but he lived within the Twilight so he was not in the day or in the night, but he was right in between, he was a gateway between the two worlds. Which I felt very fitting for this character."

Black then discussed the detail that is placed into his character via the lighting. This is something that all links back to his original character inspiration.

"If you look at my entrance the first thing you see is the light coming up behind me, like a sunset," Black said. "Then the second light you see is the light coming from above when I'm on the turnbuckle, almost like it's 3 in the afternoon. Then the last night is almost like a fading light, almost like moonlight. So it goes from the day right into the night when you see my entrance."

The AEW talent noted that he wants people to talk about him and try to unravel the Easter eggs he places in.

"The character itself sits cross-legged, there is a lot of symbolism in that. If we get into that then this whole conversation is going to be swallowed up by me talking about all the little details that this character has that I reference within the realms of Malakai Black," he said. "But as always, I like to keep a lot of things also hidden and there's a lot of Easter eggs and a lot of stuff for me that I hope that within the next 10, 15, 20 years that people will unravel.

"The cool thing is a lot of people have already been unraveling a lot of the stuff and a lot of the symbolism that I have been using for Malakai, a lot of references, a lot of Easter eggs. Even as far as my WWE stuff, people have been trying to pick it apart which I think is great because that's what I want people to have with these characters," Black stated. "I want them to have more than just a wrestler, I want them to have something that they can sit and study and dissect have it more than just being, 'oh that was a cool wrestler.'"

If you use any quotes from this article, please credit Fulton County Post, with a h/t to Wrestling Inc. for the transcription.