(saw you got a spam scam ask so I felt like sending you a real one)
I could probably Google this, but I figured I'd ask the resident Kip expert, when exactly did he start wearing the box and sitting in the crowd? I heard he did it for a long time, but he stopped shortly after I became aware of him doing it, and I hadn't been watching AEW for very long so I think he started before I had even began watching.
aaaa thank you for asking! honestly the boxman era is my favorite one, cryptid man my beloved, so i definitely have an answer on this for you!!
so for a little bit of background, kip got out of action around may 2021 with a shoulder injury that took him out for like a solid 12 months (i think that was the original timeline after which he was cleared to return to the ring, however they took a few more months to introduce him back to the programming). during the time he struggled with mental health stuff a lot along with recovery and other physical issues as at this point he was pre-diabetic etc., so it just kinda left its mark on him and his mental health negatively, which he then forwarded into his creativity to deal with it - hence how the boxman was originally born (at this point without a box, but the building blocks for the character were there), as it was his character to project all those negative feelings into to create this kind of like mentally scarred horror villain creature it was originally supposed to be
the box itself came around september 2021 when he was allowed back to the shows to just do his character thing and hang out in the venues - he says he took a lot of inspiration from shia labeouf with his "im not famous anymore" bag thing and wanted to do something similar, but at the time couldnt find a bag so he got a box on the way to the venue and scribbled the text and designs on it on the go. and then tk allowed him to just hang around, do these unadvertised meet and greets with fans, and slowly around the beginning of 2022 he moved into sitting in the crowds. at first it was less obvious and then week by week he moved closer to the front row, placed himself strategically with camera angles etc. until he returned in late august by attacking pac while having a fakeout boxman sitting in the crowd for him
andddd tragically somewhere before 2023 we lost the box in an accident (i think the story is that it got lost backstage and someone from the cleaning crew threw it out, but its unconfirmed? alternatively it might have gotten lost when they moved houses at that point idk) and its been gone since. however kip has been talking and teasing about bringing it back so. we wait. impatiently 👀
sorry this got long and probably added on way more than what you actually asked for, but heres a brief history of boxman for you!! 💜
