Tama Tonga has broken his silence over the recent Bullet Club reunion and is seemingly displeased with the new movement.
In recent weeks, former members of the legendary New Japan stable have been appearing together onscreen on both AEW and IMPACT. Karl Anderson, Doc Gallows, The Young Bucks and Kenny Omega are all former members of the stable and have been affiliating with each other, alluding to their former Bullet Club days.
One of the founding members of Bullet Club, Tama Tonga, took to Twitter last week to voice his displeasure with the reunion. This week, talking on his podcast, ‘Tama’s Island’, it appears Tonga is less than thrilled at the new incarnation of the stable. In particular, he takes umbrage with Kenny Omega’s use of the name:
“What got me triggered, is when I heard Kenny Omega going ‘B-B-B-Bullet Club.’ You son of a bitch, you. The one guy that tried to dismantle us from the inside. Split us into two, The Elite and The Bullet Club. The guy who really tried to ruin Bullet Club is now using Bullet Club as an angle.”
This new alliance of old Bullet Club members comes dripping in gold. Combined, this new stable hold the AEW World Championship, AEW Tag Team Championships and the IMPACT Tag Team Championships. The merger of these inter-promotional wrestlers creating a team also continues the cross-branding between AEW and IMPACT Wrestling.
Bullet Club formed in New Japan Pro Wrestling in early 2013. The founding members Karl Anderson, Bad Luck Fale and Tama Tonga were led by Prince Devitt (Finn Balor). The team would become wildly successful in Japan, and soon became a leading stable worldwide.
Bullet Club has featured such prominent names such as AJ Styles, Adam Cole, Hangman Page and Cody Rhodes. Of the four founding members, only Bad Luck Fale and Tama Tonga remain today.
Although a reunion of Bullet Club members has been teased on AEW, Tonga is quick to remind audiences that the original faction is still very much alive:
“How can it be a reunion if Bullet Club is still here [in NJPW]? We ain’t never went nowhere. They should have called it something else, like the ‘Ex Members’, right, the ex members reunion. Because all of y’all have gone, and when I say all of y’all, every single one that was in that different company, was indifferent other companies trying to do the same thing with Bullet Club. But they called it ‘The Club’, ‘The OC’, ‘Balor Club’. I mean, no matter what you guys try to do, you’re just not Bullet Club.
Now here you are trying it again. Now, when you’re hash tagging that and calling it Bullet Club, that’s a slap in the face to us that’s still riding with Bullet Club in Japan.”
You can listen to Tama Tonga’s full podcast here.