Of course Anderson and Gallows had Fale and Tama with them in The New Beginning in Niigata 2016. They saw what happened the previous month with Styles when the two Tongan cousins weren't around as well as two years ago with Devitt in his last match. They wanted to make sure they either won the titles back or went out standing on their own terms and they trusted Fale and Tama to have their backs.
When Kenny Omega stole both AJ Styles and Shinsuke Nakamura's finishing moves on their way out of NJPW as a form of "taking their mantles" for heel heat, he renamed Shinsuke's Boma Ye running knee the V-Trigger. Obviously the name is a Shout-Out to Street Fighter V, but there's also the fact that triggers are what you pull to fire bullets from guns, so it stays faithful to the Bullet Club motif.
Also related to the V-Trigger, it's occasionally used as one of Kenny's signature moves, usually done in the middle of the match or as a lead-up to his One Winged Angel. It actually makes sense considering how the V-Trigger works in its namesake game: Kenny builds up to the move by receiving damage over the course of the match and uses it as a way to turn the tide in his favor. He rarely spams it either (only on certain occasions), considering how V-Triggers need to be built up again before they can be used again.
Omega taking Styles and Nakamura's finishing moves also plays into Omega being a Mega ManFanboy – having "defeated" Styles and Nakamura in the same night, he followed in the Blue Bomber's footsteps and obtained their signature "weapons" in the process.
In his G1 Climax final victory, Omega once again used the Styles Clash, but alongside Prince Devitt's Bloody Sunday. Being that the parallel involves the finishing moves of both the club's former top guys, this changed the nature of his use of AJ's move from a Take That! for Cheap Heat to a respectful tribute. A few months earlier AJ had just turned back heel in WWE to cement his union with Anderson and Gallows and the Young Bucks promptly "forgave" him on Twitter. AJ was not only back in the good graces of Anderson and Gallows, but all his Bullet Club brothers including The Elite, hence Omega regarding his mantle with respect now.
In light of The Elite vs. BCOG schism and separation in the ensuing years, this takes on a more disappointing meaning in the eyes of Bullet Club, in that Omega using Devitt's move next to Styles' only gave the appearance of respect so BC could be more assured of The Elite's loyalty. This is almost given away in how The Young Bucks were the offenders in the issue with Styles yet they were the ones who claimed to forgive him, indicating a stealth jab. During The Elite's ejection from Bullet Club, Tama attempted to hit Kenny with a Styles Clash during their match at the G1 Climax tournament, only to have the chair he wanted to do it on kicked away by the referee.
Why would Omega push through with his plan to kick out Adam Cole? It's all because he very well knows that keeping Cole long enough inside when the alliance between them was starting to fracture would put him in the position to overthrow Kenny with the Young Bucks' help. Compare this to AJ's departure — Kenny had managed to do the same thing with no (kayfabe) clues or build-up, mainly because he honestly respected AJ but had to cast the Phenomenal One aside when it was time to implement his vision. Unlike then the dissent with Adam was much more obvious, as Cole was outright telegraphing his intentions from the moment Kenny lost to Okada on January 4. Kenny wanted to make sure that he wasn't going to be the victim of a hostile takeover himself.
Of all the people Omega chose to take out Adam Cole, why Marty Scurll? Simple: the prestigious Best of the Super Juniors tournament is coming up, and since Kenny "graduated" from the division Bullet Club hasn't had a proper Junior Heavyweight ace in over a year. (Ironic considering the club's founder and original leader cemented himself as one of the most decorated juniors in New Japan history and is a two-time winner of the tournament himself.) Not only would the debuting Scurll make a formidable entrant for BOSJ, he's also a worthy foil for arguably the two top threats in the tournament, Will Ospreay (last year's winner, Chaos's representative and a longtime Arch-Enemy of his from the UK indie scene) and Hiromu Takahashi (the current IWGP Junior Heavyweight Champion and something of a lunatic himself). Cole himself could've filled this role, but was more focused on using the Club to take back over ROH from the start, and then completely lost the plot with his Big Bad Wannabe ambitions which Omega had already picked up on. Scurll, on the other hand, is much like Cody Rhodes; a high-caliber wrestler who fits the Club's aura, can command respect within the brotherhood as well as represent them in other territories, is already in prime position to spearhead the Club's ROH takeover anywaynote Scurll was the ROH World Television Champion at the time, while Cody had already surpassed Cole as a contender for the company's World Heavyweight title and soon became said champion shortly after Cole's exodus by beating the man who beat Cole, yet, this is important, does not need to take over the leadership to maximize his role. (Omega would end up torpedoing the last part of that idea, though, with Cody becoming an obvious Starscream after enough disagreements between the two.)
The "Bone Soldier Will Return" vignettes were referring to the return of both the Bone Soldier gimmick as well as former NJPW Young Lion and Super J-Cup participant Taiji Ishimori.
Tama Tonga naming Jay White the new leader of Bullet Club following the ousting of The Elite seems like a questionable decision, going against both the Firing Squad's claims of Bullet Club being a leaderless group, and even Jay's own claims that he detests faction members complacently falling in line as well as knows better than to order around the dangerous Tongans. However, this makes sense in several ways.
While the Club's previous frontmen (save Kenny Omega) never pulled rank or treated the others as beneath them, with AJ Styles outright denying being called leader while Prince Devitt and Karl Anderson simply never said they were, it was clear that the group's interests revolved most heavily around the guys who were likely to pursue the IWGP Heavyweight Championship. Tama acknowledged this in his response to complaints about the announcement of White's new position, bestowing a leadership title upon White while describing him as a frontman spearheading the charge and going after the main title rather than an absolute commander, similar to his predecessors. Take note, the whole time White has been claiming that pro wrestling is entering his new era, even following Tama's announcement, he still has yet to proclaim himself the leader of Bullet Club (though he did acknowledge the "vote of confidence" on Twitter).
Jay White's treason of CHAOS was something he called from the very beginning, stating openly that his problems with faction-enforced complacency underneath the company's stable leaders also applied to Kazuchika Okada the very same day he joined the Okada-led group. He constantly needled Okada for months before ultimately making his move to act against Okada by first defeating the Rainmaker through cheating in the very first match of the G1 Climax, then by convincing Gedo and Jado to join him in betraying Okada and CHAOS. This, combined with his earlier dethroning of Omega for the United States Championship as well as defeating Tanahashi in his very next G1 bout after Okada, both cemented him as dangerous enough to compete for the IWGP Heavyweight Championship as well as made clear that he would accept taking a backseat to no one. Naming him as the leader ensured that that wouldn't be an issue, and the past several months' reinforcement of the notion that Bullet Club leadership is a trusted responsibility rather than a seat of command is a great way to keep the next leader honest in a way that Jay himself has advocated.
Bad Luck Fale and Prince Devitt were the men who brought Jay White into NJPW as a young boy through a process that had begun just months before Devitt left the company — which, going by an interview on NJPW's English website, Fale acknowledges they all knew would happen. Furthermore, despite being largely tormented by Bullet Club as a young boy and generally claiming that he hated them, Jay continuously maintained a respect for the Tongans as the vast majority of his problems with BC came from the Elite contingent who the Tongans were planning to kick out. In fact one could say that The Elite and CHAOS were ultimately the main targets of The Switchblade's treachery, putting him directly in concert with the Firing Squad even before he joined them. This adds credibility to Fale's claims that Jay's initiation culminated a four-year plan, in effect making him Prince Devitt's chosen successor.
The "DOC" in Gallows' name is short for "Director of Chaos". Back when Gallows was a member of Bullet Club, they were one of the two stables whose feuds with CHAOS turned that stable from solid heels to tweeners, partially by stealing members from them. The same thing would occur with Jay White's shenanigans in 2018, as he ultimately dictated the direction of CHAOS despite being rejected in his "bid for leadership"; this time taking out the last vestiges of the stable's heelishness and allowing them to get along almost in a mesh with NJPW's main unit. One could say the "director of CHAOS" in times of significant change, and ultimately a primary catalyst in Kazuchika Okada's development from arrogant prodigy to confident hero, is feuding with Bullet Club.
Tama Tonga backing both Jay White and EVIL seems like a dangerous strategy courting another civil war similar to The Elite situation, especially after EVIL introduced his new House of Torture initiative. However, this may be by design for the benefit of Bullet Club in a number of ways. By amassing what's more akin to a small army than a single wrestling group, The Club seems to be becoming a supergroup capable of taking power in both NJPW itself and the numerous North American companies associated with the "Forbidden Door" crossover led by AEW. (Though Tama denies this is the intention, indicating that at the very least the timing isn't yet fitting, the possibility still looms high.) In addition, supporting both Kings serves to avoid a civil war for as long as possible by making the success of BC as a whole paramount and not just affirming the authority of one individual. This effectively makes it so that if Jay and EVIL do come to blows, the situation will be of their own making, allowing for a more objective judgment of, for example, who's the most at fault or whose foundation is the weakest, making it easier to decide who should be removed.
From a booking standpoint, the angle being run this way actually allows Bullet Club to function as a strong group during the buildup to any pending Jay and EVIL feud, as well as protects plausible deniability in case said feud is delayed or even aborted, unlike the out-and-out blatant division and insular focus of the Elite era civil war.
Unfortunately this only ended up blowing up in Tama's face. A combination of Tama only now deciding that he might want to take over if Jay White will continue being absent (due to the COVID-19 Pandemic limiting travel to Japan), and Jay being Genre Savvy enough to recognize the inevitable conclusion of Tama's social level grind within the group, persistent grudge towards Anderson and Gallows for associating with The Elite, and insular focus on The Club's activity in Japan completely precluding the longstanding BC goal of expanding American influence, would all lead The Switchblade to make a preemptive strike, take out G.o.D., and reinstall The Good Brothers into Bullet Club officially, establishing absolute command as the first step to implement his own vision onto BC.
Despite David Finlay's claims in 2023 that he and Bullet Club kicked Jay White out of New Japan, the facts bear out a case that Finlay is being an Unreliable Narrator in order to assert control whilst Jay establishing Bullet Club Gold with Juice Robinson in AEW is entirely legitimate. For one, Jay was exiled from NJPW due to clean losses in Loser Leaves Town matches to Hikuleo, a defector, and Eddie Kingston, a non-member. Finlay jumping him from behind after the latter was nothing more than insult to injury, as the real damage was already done. Secondly, Finlay was not known as a member of Bullet Club until several weeks later when he returned to Japan with dyed hair and Gedo, and comments from both El Phantasmo and later Finlay himself confirmed that Gedo only contacted David to join The Club after seeing the attack. Thirdly, White linked up with Robinson, who is still officially a BC member, and set the seeds for the Gold unit before Finlay removed Phantasmo from the home-based BC. Thus, Bullet Club factually did not kick Jay out of NJPW, Finlay's attack on Jay was not an official Bullet Club action, and by the time Finlay removed the member who questioned his claims in a bid to force the issue on both counts, BC Gold had already been established with another actual Club member. (Finlay later attempted to say that Juice as well as Jay was not part of the real Bullet Club, but this too was after the fact. Furthermore, Clark Connors, the first recruit to Finlay's "War Dogs" inner circle, has admitted in half-kayfabe shoot interviews that Jay and company "got the rights" to Bullet Club even whilst denying their claim to the faction and trashing them as a knockoff.)
" him on Twitter. AJ was not only back in the good graces of Anderson and Gallows, but all his Bullet Club brothers including The Elite, hence Omega regarding his mantle with respect now.