Kev

On the WWE as Marvel thing, I don’t think it’s a like for like at all, but my interpretation on that is WWE should be building a meaningful WWE universe where the different brands represent their own little worlds and characters can crossover. Theoretically, they’ve got this already but the issue is there’s just not enough thought behind any of it. Each brand should really have its own identity (I don’t know what these should be, maybe a hardcore show as a quick example, just something tangible that sets them apart) as it stands everything is largely homogenous, moving between brands doesn’t really represent any different kind of challenge. I feel like they just need more logic all over. If NXT is a developmental/minor league then frame it such and have some rules around how/why people can move up/down. But even the rules they have about people appearing on Raw/Smackdown quickly get forgotten or changed on a whim. I think they really need to try to get back to more long-term storytelling as well. I’ve largely stopped watching now but when I do I’m struck by how meaningless a lot of it feels. It just doesn’t feel like there’s long term story arcs in most cases and they seem to beat anything good into the ground so quickly. I got off on a tangent about my frustrations with WWE but there’s a point in there about how they should be making the WWE Universe more than a pointless marketing slogan.

Oh they definitely did neuter the character pretty quickly but I remember a brief few month run when he initially turned face, from earning Benoit’s respect at Survivor Series through to beating Show for the US title at Mania, where the character retained the edge but shifted to facing heels.

I dunno, if someone is charismatic/funny/cool then that in itself tends to make them likeable enough. Very early face Cena (I’m thinking late 03-early 04) is actually a good example of how to do it, he was still basically the same character but he’d started to back it up in the ring and fought heels. If you went back to when The Acclaimed fought then face Young Bucks and imagine the face/heel roles were reversed, would Caster’s rap still work? I can’t actually remember (something about Nick’s hairline maybe), but I’m gonna guess it still would.

I think their characters can easily work as faces. Just have them face heels and stop the cheating, I don’t think they’d need to lose any of their edge. Stopping the cheating even works as a natural progression of their characters as we’ve seen them getting better to the point they don’t need to cheat to win. It’ll be interesting to see how this sort of stuff plays out over the next couple of months (Baker being a similar case) as, because of the pandemic, I don’t think AEW have ever really had to deal with a situation of a crowd turning someone. Cody’s always talked of not being concerned about mixed reactions and heel/face distinctions so we’ll see how much they stick to that.

I pretty much agree with all your other points but I’m not sure this bit works. I think Lana’s recent role and Alexa’s in the Cross team aren’t really comparable. Alexa’s generally been booked overly strong comparative to her size and in-ring ability and I’m not sure she was ever booked as overmatched in that team, Cross was always positioned as the no. 2. They were sympathetic but I think that was based more on the audience seeing their friendship develop (which I think was initially being setup as an Alexa manipulation thing).

Yeah, he played a pretty traditional babyface role in the MJF feud that followed and it produced some good stuff. The initial TNT title run was also pretty good, with him slowly becoming a bit more cocky and showing heel tendencies, but it never paid off. The return after the first Brodie match seems to have been the real turning point, his character work has been pretty consistently bad since then.

Thoughts from elevation. I’ll preface by saying I enjoyed it mostly, was nice to see some of the crowd reactions and thought the out of ring was simple, effective stuff to build up some lesser matches. Now to the nitpicking. Caster seems like he’s gonna be mega-over, I think Bowens needs to show something more or he’s gonna quickly become the other guy. Maybe if he threw in some power spots as he feels very generic at the minute. His finish, while not totally bad-looking, is kind of needlessly complicated. Hirsch is missing presence for me, she is really small and, despite her in-ring being decent, she just doesn’t project enough threat to make up for her size. It’s been suggested before but I could maybe see a move to Team Taz working, ECW Taz vibe of mini no-nonsense shooty ass-kicker is what I’d be aiming for. Thunder Rosa’s finish is a bit weak, bit of a convoluted setup and it’s not obvious enough how it actually hurts. I still think Pillman looks too sleazy for his current role, get rid of the beard and mullet. I tend to skip Swole matches but from what I saw here there hasn’t been much improvement. It feels like the division has passed her by after being quite well featured earlier on. Nyla also feels like an afterthought. I think she’s maybe been AEW’s biggest booking failure, they had her lose too many big matches too early and she’s lost the monster aura now. I suppose there’s still some value in her as a sort of gatekeeper but I think they could have stretched out her arc more. Vickie also adds nothing to the act and her signing really feels like a misstep.

To me this shows how shitty the WWE booking philosophy is cos I’m seeing a pretty big roster there. Get rid of a couple of the unnecessary titles, cycle the women round, mix up the matches more (plus I’m sure there’s PC women they could be using as jobbers) and that really shouldn’t be considered a small roster. Its also a mostly really good roster as well, but I have little desire to seek out matches because so many of the combos feel totally played out (mostly on the main roster).

Again, I don’t think that’s an indictment on the PC though, it’s an indictment on how WWE uses (or rather wastes) so many of their wrestlers. Realistically, NXT is more super-indy/third brand than actual developmental. I wouldn’t class Ricochet as having really been in WWE developmental. He was a 10 year plus vet when he signed and was pretty much immediately put on TV in a featured role. I assume his time at the PC was largely about learning production stuff, where the cameras are, etc. Has Ricochet became a worse worker since 2017? I think that’s unlikely. If he’s having worse matches I think that’s because of the role he’s playing. I think there’s various criticisms of WWE’s general shitiness which are being conflated to make a point about the PC being a failure.

Yeah, so this talking point seems to have mainly been brought up about Conti, but as you say, there’s plenty of examples of good PC-developed talent. If anything, the Conti example is more an indictment of how bloated the WWE roster is. Conti’s basically gone from no more than a name jobber in NXT, to a more featured role in AEW and she’s stepped up to it. But look at all the women that were above Conti in NXT alone. If AEW had all that talent would Conti really have been given this opportunity. The mammoth pandemic Dark tapings have also helped here as it’s unlikely Conti would have had as much time to shine pre-pandemic. I do think there’s legit criticisms to be made in how WWE transitions some of their PC talent to TV and more featured roles, but the Conti talking point isn’t the gotcha that people seem to think it is.

Ah that makes sense. It’s a weird little thing that almost feels like it should totally kill kayfabe or suspension of disbelief, but I’d never really given it a second thought. On the topic of hair, what about the Bret-style wet look? Would that be a similar ‘it helps the illusion’ explanation or do guys just think it looks cool?

Random thought - why do so many long-haired wrestlers not tie their hair up for matches? I’ve never really thought about it, until recently realising how stupid it looks. Surely it’s inconvenient. Especially when you have someone like Reigns who seems to mainly tie his hair up outside the ring, why would he decide to wear it down when going into a fight. Is it a Vince thing that just became the norm or have wrestlers always done this?

Assorted thoughts from what I caught of this week’s Dark shows. Why have Private Party started wrestling in dress clothes? It’s a pet hate of mine, it’s just one of those things that screams ‘this is fake’. Their previous gear was a great douche heel look as well (albeit unintentional as they were wearing it as faces). Speaking of gear, the jobber team that Scorp & Page beat should really change their gear as they totally look like a knock-off Street Profits. Daniel Garcia looked like he has potential but needs some work. His stuff all looked good but he had some really goofy selling and mannerisms, which I think stood out more as he has a very bland serious wrestler look. Is that Janela DVD one of those death moves that is actually relatively safe (like is Janela actually taking most of the impact and protecting their neck) or is it a broken neck waiting to happen? I’ve been more impressed with Cage recently. He seems to be working a lot smarter. He still got plenty of shit in against Mike Sydal, but he was mostly playing with him and didn’t give him any kickouts. He got the balance right of showing some vulnerability (mainly through his own cockiness) and letting the undercard guy get some hope spots in while still looking dominant, rather than making himself look ineffective and turning it into a my turn/your turn kickout contest. Also threw in a new (for AEW) finisher, which means he can build a big near fall into bigger matches without killing off the drill claw. Although the move itself is overly convoluted shit.

That whole opening to the Mox/King match was really fun, from Wild Thing to Caster’s rap to Mox smashing Bowens mid catchphrase. I feel like they use some variation on “you’re a bitch/I’m gonna make you my bitch” far too often as an ‘edgy’ cheap pop line. Hager and Archer pulled it out this episode. It also feels kind of out of place/cliche in 2021. I did like Miro’s reaction though, calmly brushing it off. Despite the criticisms of Miro’s early run with Kip (and I don’t want to open up that discussion again), I think his character is more well-rounded for it. He’s this charismatic, normal, chill dude who plays video games with friends, expect he’s also totally not chill and will absolutely wreck your shit. I thought Spears was pretty good in the Pinnacle segment. I think somebody suggested it here already, but shifting his character to a real of piece of shit sociopath is a good fit, rather than just being another cocky guy. Although it was mostly a foregone conclusion, I liked them building the Blondes with the quick highlight package and promo time. Griff is someone who does nothing massively flashy (by modern standards) but pretty much everything he does looks great. The sharpshooter always feels a bit out of place in the Bucks move set to me so I wasn’t a massive fan of the finish. I’m liking their heel work, but I still think they’re miscast as ‘the best wrestlers’. Oh and thought the Kenny-OC segment was low-key really fun. Kenny absolutely should be using the EVP role to lean into the power trip thing.

I noticed Harwood shaking his head and showing off his wedding ring as well when Tully was offering up the ladies. The bit did seem a bit out of place in 2021, especially when it’s pretty openly known that at least two of those guys are married. I suppose openly cheating on your spouse on tv would be a dick heel move.

Caster’s rap has been getting the attention but I liked the Acclaimed vs Janela/Kiss match on Dark, and it feels like you can really seeing the Acclaimed getting better. Thought it was nicely worked around Janela’s leg. The execution wasn’t always there but some good ideas. Sonny is partly dreadful, partly decent. Shoehorning the splits into half his offence looks consistently bad, but the rest of his stuff looked pretty good here.

Did anyone else notice that Miro pulled out that king-sized gutwrench after the gif of Nathan Jones wrecking Jarrett was going around this week? For maybe the first time ever something can be described as Nathan Jones-esque and it’s a positive. On the point about Cody being disconnected from the rest of the show. Isn’t it a bit strange that he’s not being brought into the Kenny/Bucks angle at all? There should surely be some tension there with the other EVPs becoming total dickheads.

I think, in theory, that’s right. The issue is it’s such a non-event and ultimately feels pretty meaningless. Contrast with AEW (who’s booking is far from perfect), Adam Page beating Matt is on ppv and has a multi-week story wrapped around it. Beating Jeff should feel like an achievement in a similar way (and probably moreso as Jeff, in kayfabe at least, is a bigger deal than Matt).

If we’re gonna be pedantic about that spot the issue isn’t with the leap frog (I mean it’s hardly high up on the list of athletic spots in 2021), but the drop down. The leap frog makes sense as a getting out the way thing, but isn’t a drop down meant to be a trip attempt. The ref was clearly trying to sabotage whoever that is by hitting a drop down.

Raw April 21 Austin Bret promo starts, setting up a street fight later and they announce Austin vs Taker for the next ppv. Not a lot more to say on this, these two are nailing their character work each time out. Ahmed vs. Sultan. Some peak Vince ridiculousness as he says that Ahmed galvanised an entire nation last week in S. Africa, something even Nelson Mandela couldn’t do. This is decent while it lasts, Ahmed with a nice pump kick and axe kick early. Sultan pulls out another nice piledriver. Ahmed gets a couple of power spots before the inevitable NOD appearance. It ends on a dq as Ahmed uses the 2x4 on Sultan to scare them off. Outside of the obvious guys, Ahmed is the guy I’m most impressed with on these shows, and not in an ironic way. They air the Vader Kuwait talk show clip, it seems slightly strange that they frame it as him being held hostage as he awaits trial, were they not risking antagonising the Kuwaitis here? Shamrock does a promo setting up his Vader match and also challenges Mike Tyson. Were they already in talks with Tyson at this stage? Was there ever serious talk of him working a match? The street fight starts with a Owen/Bulldog ambush, leading to HBK coming out of the crowd with a chair to chase them off. It then seemingly settles into a match but it’s more of an extended angle. Austin takes over and works Bret’s leg with a chair then puts him in a sharpshooter. There’s no real ending as officials come out to get him off and they work an injury angle with Bret. Tiger Ali Singh vs Sal Sincere, this is Tiger’s Raw debut having won the Kuwaiti Cup. He gets the win but doesn’t look good and this feels totally unimportant as they cut to a split screen of Bret getting treatment three times. Austin attacks Bret in the ambulance. I like the contrast between Davey and Owen in the buildup, with Davey sort of encouragingly rushing everyone “c’mon, lets go guys”, while Owen shouts and calls everyone idiots. This angle feels very Attitude era, but it’s on the right side of wrestling ridiculous, still feels violent and gets across the hate between them. JJ vs Rockabilly again. Vince not understanding the meaning of literal as he mentions bombs going off both literally and figuratively. This gets a good 10 mins and is almost an extended squash for Billy, as he comfortably picks up the win with the Honky swinging neckbreaker. JJ attacks like a dick afterwards and gets a guitar shot for his trouble. Its strange how much time they’ve dedicated to this Honky angle, but at the same time it’s given no real importance. They do the WCW thing of subliminally burying the match by talking about the NWO throughout, just replace NWO with Stonecold. A quick Mankind promo where he talks of Bearer’s handsome face getting disfigured. Taker vs HHH, this is worked slightly strange with face Taker working in a chin lock and nerve hold at points, leading to heel HHH comebacks. As seems to be the theme for Raw main events of this time, it’s inevitably building to a non-finish, which happens as Mankind attacks with a blow torch. Taker fights back before he can burn him. Marlena and Dustin (without makeup) then attack HHH/Chyna from the crowd. The visual here is cool with Terri just hanging off Chyna’s back as she chokes her with a bag. They kind of spoiled this though by showing them sitting in the crowd a couple of minutes earlier. Austin back out and kind of heels it up a bit. Not sure whether this was a deliberate attempt to a set him up as the heel for the Taker match but a highlight of this stage in Austin’s run in that there’s just no compromise or pandering with his character. Owen/Bulldog attack, before HBK makes the save. Pillman then attacks Austin and sets him up for a pillmanizer before HBK saves again. It’s almost bittersweet seeing Pillman here as you inevitably think what could have been with him in a featured role as the attitude era grew.

Not to be a downer on this thread but this is a genuine question. What is the point of Main Event? It just seems to have been completely inconsequential for years, with maybe a couple of months pretending it was relevant after launching however many years ago. And I suppose the same goes for various C-level shows over the years - Velocity, Jakked, Metal, Superstars, etc. My understanding with a lot of these shows was that it was about fulfilling contracts for international markets. But in the era of 3 hour Raws, Smackdown, NXT, NXT UK, 205 live, plus the random Network content they could use, it’s seems strange that there’s still a need for producing this stuff. Is Main Event the only main roster C-show or is there still a Smackdown equivalent?

On a Cody note, having just caught up. In a wrestling landscape that’s full of finisher killing, he’s got to be one of the worst guys for it. He still ended up winning pretty decisively (which I think is totally the right call), but there’s no way QT should be kicking out of a tombstone and a Cross Rhodes. If a Cross Rhodes doesn’t finish QT, what level of guy can it even beat? Glad they seem to be pivoting that feud into more of a launching pad for Ogogo and Commorato. Keep QT as their coach but he really doesn’t need to be elevated as a wrestler. Although the announcement was a bit out of nowhere, now that OC vs Omega has been teased I’d be totally up for a short OC title run. Just do a big clusterfuck finish with Best Friends and Mox/Kingston playing spoilers on Bullet Club interference. Can easily have Omega win it back within a few weeks.

IYH: Revenge of the Taker 5 match ppv and 3 end on some-sort of non-finish. LOD vs Owen/Bulldog - this is kind of worked as a sprint (as much as a 97 LOD match could be), with no big heat segment. LOD get the win but it’s on the illegal man, restart for a couple of mins, Doomsday Device and Bret in for the DQ. Rocky vs Savio for the IC title, there’s a split screen with Farooq on commentary for most of the match and the match just comes across like an afterthought. Ends on a count out after Crush heart punches Rocky, they tease some NOD dissension before a beat down on Rocky and Ahmed save. Rocky really starting to look like a lame duck, after getting beat by Savio on Raw, now only keeping the title in this manner. Doesn’t do much for Savio either as he looks like an idiot not getting Rocky back in the ring. Jessie James vs Rockabilly. The Rockabilly gimmick is just DOA, Billy keeps spamming Honky’s taunts which is all the gimmick appears to consist of, then loses on a roll up. Taker vs Mankind, this is the best match on the show, typical sense of chaos with these two and some big bumps, most notably Foley going off the apron head first into a table. Taker throws a really shitty drop kick which I don’t think he ever tried again. This is almost worked no dq with various weapon shots right in front of the ref. Vince calls it out and wonders why there’s no dq but doesn’t offer any explanation. This is a bit of a recurring theme, with the hardcore elements starting to bleed in. Without any explanation for why it’s allowed it just makes the refs look incompetent. Austin vs Bret, decent match but not on the level of their previous stuff, ends on a dq with Owen/Bulldog run-in as Austin has Bret in the sharpshooter. The non-finishes are getting a bit much, it’s bad enough on Raw but there really shouldn’t be this many on PPV. A lot of feuds are being progressed quite well, but the lack of clean wins kind of makes it feel like the matches are secondary to the stories rather than what they’re built on.

Yeah, I made a similar point in an earlier post about Flash Funk and Honky. This still feels like a bit of a transition period, the presentation has changed enough that the more gimmicky stuff feels out of place, but there’s still a fair bit of it - Flash, Honky, Roadie, Godwins, Bearer, Truth Commission, Sultan - and not all of them are just holdovers from previous eras. I think late 97/early 98 is when they fully commit to ‘attitude’, which I think is when they first start using the branding. And by mid-98 all those gimmicks are gone, even Bearer drops the cartoony look in the build up to Kane.

I think there was good and bad examples of the slow-burn, roster rotation style of booking on the show. The Scorp stuff was good as you say. Well foreshadowed, without being completely obvious so the attack still had an element of surprise. Then there was the SCU thing, which was just a bit flat. The outline of the story is good - SCU announce the break-up stip, friendship/history with the Bucks established on screen, win streak leads to them becoming no.1 contenders, nicely aligning with the Bucks heel turn. The problem being that the win streak has pretty much all happened away from Dynamite, with the only meaningful SCU appearance I can remember in months being Kaz’s Christian match. In this case SCU have been out of the picture too long and they don’t feel like credible challengers, I was actually wondering recently whether they’d dropped the angle. Throw in a couple of Dynamite wins against the likes of Private Party and hype up their Dark win streak and I think this works better.