"Aw, Dude": A Brief Adam Copeland Remark That Became A Meme

All Elite Wrestling headed to the Huntington Center in Toledo, Ohio, for the October 14, 2023 edition of AEW Collision, with advertised matches including Brian Cage vs. Komander, Samoa Joe vs. Willie Mack, Kris Statlander vs. Skye Blue for the TBS Championship, and Christian Cage vs. Bryan Danielson for the TNT Title in their first singles match in a decade.

While the matches are seldom remembered today outside of that Cage vs. Danielson main event, it is two talents that didn’t wrestle on the show that have made this particular edition of Collision infamous or famous, depending on your persuasion within pro wrestling fandom, with the opening segment going off-script after a WWE Hall of Famer with decades of experience appeared to be rattled when Ricky Saints fired a quick comment his way during a promo primarily focused on Bryan Danielson.

This is the story of “Aw, Dude”: A brief Adam Copeland remark that became a meme. 

The AEW Collision Segment

It all began on the October 14, 2023, episode of AEW Collision, which took place just two weeks after Adam Copeland made his All Elite Wrestling debut to close out the October 1 WrestleDream pay-per-view. 

Copeland opened the show and focused upon his budding issues with Christian Cage after trying and failing to bring about a reunion with his former storyline brother, with Christian having told the former Edge to go "f*ck himself."  

Cope's promo brought out Christian with a whole security team, and then Bryan Danielson, who was set to challenge Cage for the TNT Championship in the main event of AEW Collision in a hotly-anticipated match-up. Copeland remained around, though, with Ricky Starks backed up by Big Bill then heading to the ring, with Starks joining Christian behind Cage’s security detail before he cut a promo on Danielson. The American Dragon had stepped in as the replacement for CM Punk in Starks’ feud with the two-time AEW World Champion after Punk was fired for a legitimate brawl with Jack Perry backstage at AEW All In 2023. Danielson and Starks first faced off in a Strap Match at All Out and then a Texas Death Match on the September 23 episode of Collision, with both matches being won by Danielson. 

While Starks was cutting the promo on Danielson, though, he suddenly switched his attention to Adam Copeland, saying: "Stop looking at me with those bug eyes sir, I’m talking to this guy," to which Cope fired back, "It's your stupid silk slacks, dumbass." Starks then retaliated: "Yeah well, sadly you didn’t take style from the other place."

Starks turned his attention back to Danielson, but Copeland, clearly rattled by this point, chimed in with, "And you took it from The Rock. Good job. Can't help that you’re a vanilla midget version of that, but shut your mouth and talk to him instead of me, kid… know your role!"

The viral moment then came into existence as Starks took a second and replied, "Wow, that really sent me over the edge!" in a reference to Adam Copeland’s long-time WWE name. Copeland just fired back with a simple, "Aw, dude," before the segment, mercifully, got back on track. 

Soon after the "aw, dude" remark, Ricky Starks challenged Adam Copeland and Bryan Danielson to brawl with himself, Big Bill, Christian Cage, Nick Wayne, and Killswitch due to the numbers advantage, but that numbers advantage was immediately squashed as FTR headed to the ring, confronting Ricky Starks and Big Bill, who defeated Dax Harwood and Cash Wheeler for the AEW World Tag Team Championships one week earlier on Collision. 

Bryan Danielson then talked about fighting right now, which led Danielson to challenge Christian to hold their match immediately instead of in the main event. Cage, however, pushed one of the security team towards Danielson in response and everything broke down, in storyline this time, as the babyfaces beat down the security guards as the heels bailed up the ramp, which included future AEW talent Myron Reed, with the segment ending as Danielson made a security member tap out to the LeBell Lock. 

Starks and Copeland then interacted following the main event of Collision, after Ricky Starks had already interfered and decked Bryan Danielson with the AEW World Tag Team Title belt to cost Danielson the TNT Title and allow Christian to score the tainted victory.

Starks, Bill, Cage, Nick Wayne and Killswitch moved to beat down Danielson after the match until FTR and then Adam Copeland made the save, during which Cope immediately punched Starks and followed up with a rough-looking kick into the ropes, with the babyfaces ultimately standing tall to end the show. 

Ricky Starks And Adam Copeland Address Their Off-Script Segment

The segment, particularly Adam Copeland’s reaction to Starks, immediately fuelled discourse within professional wrestling amongst fans and commentators, and the skit went viral on multiple occasions as an example of how a segment can quickly go off the rails.

Ricky Starks addressed the segment for the first time just a few months after it happened, telling Hold the Mayo in February 2024:

"You know how it is. It's just like - trying to really choose how I want to navigate my career at this point. I did say it off the cuff, but to me it wasn’t a big deal. But the response afterwards, I want you to know, you know how you’re going back and forth with your partners all night roasting each other and you can tell they they got a little bit hurt by it? If you watch it back, I’ve got my glasses on, and I said, ‘Okay.’ Then you can see by my response I was just like, ‘Um, wow, that really set me up with Edge.’ Then I kept it moving. I’m too cool with that sh*t... I promise you, I did not get eaten up by his response. He didn’t eat me up. If anything, he looked stupid calling me what he did. I really wish I would have hit him back with like, I thought about it after, I really wish I would have said, ‘Hey dog, I’m actually Black. So you’re wrong. Sorry.' But yeah, it was funny." 

Starks continued to echo the sentiment that he didn’t come out of the segment looking bad, telling Chris Van Vliet in November 2024: "That clip goes viral all the time. It’s so funny because at the end of it, I wanted to say more but if you see me smile and say, ‘Well that really sent me over the edge,’ I only did that because I knew this was about to get off track. Here’s the thing about that, you might as well call me a great heel because I got somebody so flustered on live TV they stumbled and stuttered their way into one of the worst insults that you could say. That’s so passé, that’s so 2000s. A vanilla midget? I could have hit him with the, ‘I’m black you idiot.’ I could have did that. I didn’t. Personally, out of all that, I don’t think Ricky Starks came out of that looking very bad. It wasn’t me that looked bad in that whole situation. It is what it is."

Those comments, if anything, only added to the mythos around the October 2023 segment, and the moment continued to go viral, even after Ricky Starks exited AEW and signed with WWE in 2025, being repackaged as Ricky Saints.

It would take until June 2026 for Adam Copeland to be asked to provide his own thoughts on the segment, however.

"We got out there, he started cutting a promo on me. I was like, ‘I’m not in an angle with him. Okay.’ That was it. It was just like 1000 promos in the Attitude Era. By the next day it’s like, ‘Okay, now what we got?’ I don’t [have bad blood]. I’m sure Ricky doesn’t. I don’t care," Copeland said to SHAK Wrestling.

Ricky Saints responded again, speaking to The Sun in July 2026: "Well, I think for that, that night, we had like a little something at the end of the night with a match, so, I mean, you asked me, it is what it is. Everyone wants pro wrestling ’til they don’t want pro wrestling, and then all of a sudden people pick and choose what they like and don’t like. To me personally, that really wasn’t even the issue to me, the promo. There was other stuff that was, but... I just had a guy tell me today, he [Adam Copeland] said, 'I didn’t care and Ricky didn’t care.' I was like, yeah. I know how it played off and that’s fine, but it’s live TV. Who cares? Shoot an arrow, see where it lands."

"Aw, Dude" Takes On A Life Of Its Own

The viral clip of the Adam Copeland-Ricky Starks segment settled down somewhat after Saints jumped to WWE, but it would come back with a vengeance and reach another level of viral entirely in early September 2026, very much taking over pro wrestling Twitter as fans began creating their own edits of the exchange, with just a few of the viral versions of the segment being Persona 5, iCarly, WWE 2K14, SmackDown 2000, Drake & Josh, Family Guy, and Doki Doki Literature Club.

AEW wrestlers also joined in, and so did Ricky Saints himself, tweeting “Aw dude” alongside a photo of his iced drink spilt all over the pavement on September 7. The edits slowed down massively, however, seemingly after Danhausen joined in with an image of Saints with the caption, “Aw dudehausen.” 

"Aw, Dude" The T-Shirt

The viralness of the moment would become official AEW canon on September 16, 2026, when ShopAEW released their own "Aw, Dude" t-shirt for Adam Copeland, even referencing the viral segment in the advertisement for the merch by writing, "Go places in style with this new Adam Copeland - Aw, Dude t-shirt that will really set your look over the edge. Available now on ShopAEW."

Adam Copeland wore the t-shirt on the September 16 edition of AEW Dynamite and brought back the “Aw, Dude” during a backstage segment with Christian Cage, Darby Allin, and Steven Borden when Christian Cage began to express his condolences for the loss of Sting’s in-ring career. 

As of the time of writing, this is where the history of “Aw, Dude” has reached, but there is always the potential for more “Aw, Dude” viral moments in the future.