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2021 The WWE Purge, Part 2


Pete

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14 hours ago, tbarrie said:

I'm excited to see him join AEW's commentary team.

Schiavone: we are proud to once again have Autism-friendly sensory isolation rooms and support staff at this pay per view! Up next, we have Nyla Rose in action!

Strowman: [is fired mid-sentence]

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26 minutes ago, Greggulator said:

 And it was even worse to try her out as a sympathetic, overmatched babyface. She doesn't have the chops to pull it off, and that's a hard transition to make for everyone in wrestling. (Alexa Bliss pulled it off with her pairing with Nikki, which shows just how talented she is.)

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). 

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I don't have a lot of meaningful things to add about specific wrestlers released and where they might end up. I sort of find the idea of WWE as an IP farm in some sort of sale fascinating. With the MGM sale, they talking about ways of spinning out Bond or Legally Blonde or Rocky or whatever. If we liken WWE to something like Marvel Comics, where the source material is an IP farm for various different projects, I think the most insane logical progression is adapting something like Austin vs McMahon or The Mega Powers Explode, not as a documentary or docudrama but as a narrative adaptation in another format. Or "remaking" it somehow. Like how Infinity Gauntlet the comic was loosely adapted into Avengers: Infinity War the movie or whatever. "We have fifty years of stories and thousands of trademarked characters that can be adapted." That sort of thing. I feel like most of what is attempted so far is a more sports-like (30 for 30 style or list-making or behind the scenes reality shows or memorabilia based) and this would be taking it entirely the other direction. Or, you know, trying to, because it's such a bullshit idea.

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11 hours ago, Wyld Samurai said:

He's clearly a rube.

Country strong, country smart.  Also, LOOOOOOL @ "7 year veteran." 

10 hours ago, Greggulator said:

That mentality got Vince a company currently valued by the market at $4.4 billion and one that made over $200 million in profit during the pandemic. How is he wrong here?

Others have already answered this pretty well but come on, man.  That mentality (that WWE can cover all bases, comedy, drama, whatever, well enough to fill your needs and that they can "be Marvel") is so stupid that you'd have to do some serious mental gymnastics to defend it.  There's a reason WWE studios doesn't exist anymore (I hope).  There's a reason every outside-wrestling endeavor Vince has tried failed.  This guy can't make shit except wrestling and now he can't really make that.  But he runs the established brand and just keeps shoveling out content, and we live in an age where network and streaming services' leadership is chock full of fart-sniffers, all high on their own bullshit, all extremely risk-averse and just doing whatever the other guy is doing, all fellating themselves over "brands" and "content," only focused on numbers and not quality.  Kind of like your post.  Anyway, that's not sustainable.  At some point, numbers go down (1995 WWF says hi) and someone in charge looks into that content and realizes it's shit. 

I could sell 10,000 new hours of CONTENT~! to Netflix, all consisting of footage of a dude getting kicked in the nuts on loop.  They'd tout all that new content but someone would figure out the scam eventually.

 

Edited by Technico Support
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What do midcarders like Riott and Buddy Murphy make?  I've never had a good idea what the ballpark is.  Last night, Dave was talking about how Stroman's contract made him expendable and he commented that if they're paying you $250,000 and not doing anything with you, they can throw you out for the 24/7 title stuff but you can't do that with a guy making a million.  So is that the ballpark for the Murphys, Gulaks, and Taminas of the company? 

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25 minutes ago, Technico Support said:

I could sell 10,000 new hours of CONTENT~! to Netflix, all consisting of footage of a dude getting kicked in the nuts on loop.  They'd tout all that new content but someone would figure out the scam eventually.

Side note but considering that we've been heading more and more towards Idiocracy a 24-hour version of "Ow, my balls!" isn't as farfetched an idea as it once was.  Not saying I want that but it's more an observation than anything else.

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I was thinking more that the wrestlers and their personas are the IP - a company pays not only for wrestling shows, but Stone Cold BR Sessions-style interviews, wrestler docs, and reality shows like the Divas one.

But if we can get, like, Vince Gilligan to write the Mega Powers explode or Austin/Pillman WWF feud as a scripted mini-series, I will watch the hell out of that. 

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1 hour ago, Technico Support said:

There's a reason WWE studios doesn't exist anymore (I hope). 

WWE Studios still exists, dude.  They still primarily produce content with WWE personalities, but they have also co-produced a few of movies with studios like Blumhouse, Universal, and Warner Brothers.  I think that WWE Studios lost money last quarter, but that can partially be blamed on the pandemic.

I don't think that Sleight, Term Life, or Oculus had any WWE workers in the cast, but David Otunga was in The Call for a minute or two.

Edited by J.T.
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4 hours ago, Greggulator said:

Trying to make her a wrestler didn't work.

Here is the issue with this mindset and the ones of those who assume Lana can just be a manager in AEW or elsewhere, she wants to wrestle. Lana has worked hard to improve and clearly wants to actually be in the ring. There is only so much that can be done to dissuade her. She might work AEW to be with her husband if an offer is made, but she will absolutely be wrestling matches just like Brandy.

7 hours ago, AxB said:

The entire WWE Women's roster:

Image

The main roster divisions are clearly too small and could use another 5-9 people on each brand for freshness alone. This has been the case since the split. They have never moved up/hired enough women to work an actual roster split.

NXT has plenty, but taking 10 out would massively fuck over one of NXT's strongest draws. Have to keep in mind around a third of women on NXT tv have only been around 2-3 months. They aren't remotely ready to carry the brand. Offhand there are only a handful of people here I would say should be moved up (Io, Toni, Indi, Candice, Frankie). Honestly, it makes no sense for Frankie to be on NXT. A couple of months at the PC should have left her more than ready for the main roster with her experience. The thing is I suspect we haven't seen many women move up for the same reason guys like Ciampa, Gargano, ex-UE, etc. haven't moved up. They don't want to. WWE may offer the most money, but the creative outside of NXT isn't remotely appealing. I can easily see several rather fucking off and leaving WWE than having to put up with main roster bs. People like Toni and Io for instance have options in their home countries, AEW, and Stardom. Same with Frankie/Taya.

Edited by Eivion
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12 hours ago, Greggulator said:

I would say that Vince's primary goal is to make money and build up the value of his company. And I would say a lot more people agree with his idea of what's entertainment than wrestling message boards and diehard fans responses on Twitter would have you believe, with the evidence being how consistently profitable his company is.

WWE's programing (Raw specifically) is so homogenized I no longer consider it professional wrestling. It's SNL with a few matches. No one is denying WWE the brand and corporation have maximized profits and become a global juggernaut. What people are arguing is that it's a dog shit on screen product, if you enjoy professional wrestling. And for a long time there was nothing anyone of that opinion could do to get their fix. Grit your teeth and just be happy Roman is having good matches. Vent your frustrations online and just be thankful  for Daniel Bryan. But now they have real viable competition from a family with 4x the wealth of the McMahons.

You can disagree with all of this if you like. But time will tell. When the tipping point comes, it comes fast. If wrestling fans don't like the wrestling show you're producing, then who is gonna watch it? Certainly not non-fans. Raw hour 3 got 1.1 million viewers this week. The lowest hour in the 40 year history of Monday night wrestling. They've set themselves up to be fail-proof... until they're not. If people keep checking out at the current rate, how much is USA going to give them from a program drawing in under a million viewers when Raw is up for a new deal in 2024? Success is a mirage. No one is full proof.

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59 minutes ago, J.T. said:

WWE Studios still exists, dude.  They still primarily produce content with WWE personalities, but they have also co-produced a few of movies with studios like Blumhouse, Universal, and Warner Brothers.  I think that WWE Studios lost money last quarter, but that can partially be blamed on the pandemic.

However - to Technico's point, I believe the only upcoming movie they have is Rumble (the animated movie with Roman and Becky Lynch doing voices) and that movie has already been delayed again to Jan 2022

Everything else is docuseries type things (like Lost Treasures and the Vince documentary with Netflix)

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3 minutes ago, Eivion said:

She might work AEW to be with her husband if an offer is made, but she will absolutely be wrestling matches just like Brandy.

It’s settled: all matches on Dark are now trios.

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4 hours ago, J.T. said:

That begs the question why isn't the WWE taking advantage of alternate platforms like YouTube like AEW has?  I am personally surprised that they haven't revived their old B-Shows like WWE Superstars and made them YouTube only in order to exploit their deep roster.

WWE is spending too much money on something they want to continue spending money on if all they can think to do is trim the roster.

Maybe Mr. McMahon is unable to oversee more hours than he already does, and quickly loses faith in giving anyone autonomy and the final say for any other content? --*insert Boomer out-of-touch canard*(ending in "PAL") here*-- Really a question, not a snarky rhetorical one...

- RAF

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I didn't check the thread to see if anybody else noticed this but the radio commercials for the Monday Night RAW in Kansas City namedropped Braun Strowman. If that tells you anything about how unexpected releasing Strowman is.

Unless they reinstate Strowman over the summer

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Today (in the UK) the new WWE Slam Attax cards were released. On the starter pack they sent to my shop, one of the free card packs had Lana right up front.

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2 hours ago, J.T. said:

WWE Studios still exists, dude.  They still primarily produce content with WWE personalities...

CONTENT~!  Good lord.  Considering Vince's point of view in that "we have Santino!" story, I guess he figures why would anyone want to watch the next Fast and Furious movie when they could watch WWE Superstar The Miz in Marine 11: The Marining.  Why listen to any of today's popular music when you can dig The Wrestling Album out of mothballs and listen to Nikolai Volkoff's heart-rending version of Cara Mia?

I joke but that's the point I was making.  These delusional rubes think they can "be Marvel" when everything they create outside pro wrestling is fourth rate trash not even fit for ironic consumption. 

1 hour ago, NoFistsJustFlips said:

WWE's programing (Raw specifically) is so homogenized I no longer consider it professional wrestling.

As soon as I heard that their Superstars(tm) painstakingly go over every match, move for move, with the TV production people to make sure there are no surprises and everything is shot perfectly, I realized that this is no longer pro wrestling. 

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Everyone thinks they can "be Marvel," but when they get down to it, they all fucking fail miserably. Many have tried and nearly all fail out of the gate. The only exceptions I'll make are the DCEU, which is beyond fucked anyway, and the Fast serious, which isn't much of a Marvel-like universe. That this is WWE thinking they want to be like Marvel, it'll be a bigger flop than Universal's Dark Universe.

The ONLY way it would remotely work is if Vince was completely disconnected from every facet of it.

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"Exploiting our catalog of IP to create an interconnected universe" is 2021's version of 1991's "Synergy between our hardware and software divisions."

It sounds great and gets a lot of people to pay for access to your content, but it usually fails miserably - see Sony's attempts at synergy between Sony Pictures and their hardware division and compare that to WB's attempts to exploit their ownership of DC's IP across multiple films and how uneven that's been. 

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21 minutes ago, Craig H said:

Everyone thinks they can "be Marvel," but when they get down to it, they all fucking fail miserably. Many have tried and nearly all fail out of the gate. The only exceptions I'll make are the DCEU, which is beyond fucked anyway, and the Fast serious, which isn't much of a Marvel-like universe. That this is WWE thinking they want to be like Marvel, it'll be a bigger flop than Universal's Dark Universe.

The ONLY way it would remotely work is if Vince was completely disconnected from every facet of it.

It took Marvel 10 years of films to culminate in Endgame.    Vince tears up the script for Raw at 8:53pm on a Monday and can no longer book a program to peak at Mania.

Everyone wants to be Marvel but nobody really wants to put in the effort.  Everyone looks at Marvel's success, sees dollar signs, and says "we have the IP (~!) and the content (~!) to do that!"  and nobody thinks about the time, vision, and creativity that's needed.

Aside from being creatively bankrupt and as impatient as a goldfish who just snorted a rail, WWE is missing out on another key ingredient Marvel had.  Marvel has these characters that exist on a massive, multi-generational cultural level, and these characters can be exploited across films, tv, games, etc.  Vince stopped trying to create larger than life characters after one too many left him.  And wrestling characters really don't translate outside wrestling, regardless.  The whole idea that WWE can be just like Marvel is absurd.

Edited by Technico Support
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