State of the WWE

[Guest OnlyMe]

This isn’t another whinging post about why I’ve gone off the WWE and why I’m never going to watch again. In fact, I’ve pretty much already stopped watching, which is not something I want to do. Raw and Smackdown used to be a weekly pleasure for me, and I would never look at the spoilers. PPV night was always great, with a few friends getting together and having a few beers.

 

Over time, this has pretty much stopped happening. I rarely make the effort to watch the weekly shows, and watch the PPVs alone. If I was supposed to pay for the PPV, then I know that I definitely wouldn’t bother.

 

Now this saddens me a lot. I’ve always been a wrestling fan. Ever since I was a kid, and got worried for the Big Bossman after Nailz handcuffed him to the ring and gave him a beating. Or there was Wrestlemania 9, with Doink cheating and Giant Gonzales. I was hooked on it.

 

Over time though, I moved away from wrestling, as I didn’t have the chance to see it, but near the end of ’99, a friend turned Raw on. It was wrestling, but different to how I remembered it. The first recent PPV I saw was the Royal Rumble 2000. I’d always loved the Royal Rumble, but this had such a cool mix – boobies, tables, the sheer violence of Foley / HHH, and the quite cool Rumble itself. I was a wrestling fan again.

 

From 2000-2003, my interest has fallen and fallen. I’m a wrestling fan, and I always will be. But I’m just not a fan of the WWE, and what is being shown on TV. And dammit… I WANT to like it. I want to watch. I want to spend my money on the WWF.

 

I’ve been thinking about it a lot, and I’ve identified a few things that have put me off.

 

1. The HHH factor

 

Booker T had no chance. Anyone that has been following Raw should know the formula: HHH says he is better than someone, then beats them in a match. It’s been done to death with Kurt Angle, Chris Jericho, Rob Van Dam, and now Booker T. The only exceptions to this lately have been Scott Steiner (HHH loses the first match (although it was through him being “smart” and deliberately losing to retain his title) and then wins the rematch), and Shawn (HHH barely loses the first match, then loses in the Elimination chamber, but comes out the winner at Armageddon). Every feud he has, he wins in the end.

 

If he was insanely over, then it would be justified. But then again, he isn’t. At this point, I’d like to make it clear that whatever happens backstage, be it fighting, influencing or fucking – I don’t care. I don’t see what happens backstage, just what’s on TV for two hours a week. So I don’t care what Jericho’s morale is, or whether RVD will make the same money for being on HeAT as he would for Mania. Doesn’t matter one bit.

 

But having HHH win over and over and fucking over gets really boring. It’s like Hulk Hogan from the 80s, but without justification. Maybe he doesn’t win all that much, but when he does, it gets pushed and pushed. But when he loses, it’s kind of swept under the carpet.

 

I’m bored of every feud that he is in, and it’s a self fulfilling prophecy – he beats people because they aren’t “over” enough to beat him, and as a result they don’t get over. Which puts them into “lower” matches, and thus aren’t on my TV as much. Like RVD – he was main eventing within a couple of months of his re-debut. Now he can’t even make it onto the main Wrestlemania show. I’m not blaming HHH for this, but had RVD been given the chance to look strong, he would be much higher up the card.

 

2. The HBK Factor, or The Legend Factor

 

They were great once, so they will be great again. Hogan. Shawn. Undertaker. Nash. And to a lesser extent, Flair. All of these men were great in their day. Kevin Nash and Scott Hall carried WCW to the top (and brought them down again, admittedly). Hulk Hogan carried wrestling all the way through the 80s (as an aside – does his win last Sunday mean that it was him that created Wrestlemania?) Shawn Michaels helped the transition from hosses to smaller champions, and Ric Flair is responsible for some of the best matches ever.

 

None of these men (with the exception of Shawn, but we’ll see how long that lasts) have got it any more. None of them can carry the goods in a match any more. Yet all of them (except the injured Kevin Nash, who is returning to a main event feud with HHH) played a role at Wrestlemania. Flair’s was most reduced – the irritating, repetitive lackey of HHH, but it was obvious that he played a deciding role in the Booker T vs. HHH match.

 

Undertaker (lacking the definite article), defeated A-Train and Big Show in a handicap match – despite the WWE wanting to push both Train and Show. And lets face it, despite anyone’s feelings on the Big Show and A-Train, they have a hell of a lot more of a future in WWE than Undertaker. So why cut them off at the knees and make them look like pussies?

 

Undertaker and Hulk Hogan were given title runs in 2002. Both bombed like motherfuckers. And there’s a reason: THEY SUCK. It’s fairly simple. Nobody wants to see old men that can’t wrestle in the ring. When you see how many people they could have put the title on, it is insane that these two held it. Wrestling shows are usually built around the champion. So to have Hulk Hogan carrying the entire WWE about 10 years after he was good for anything is ridiculous. He hasn’t had a semi-decent match since his return at No Way Out 2002, other than the hopelessly overrated match with the Rock at Mania. So why was he given the chance to be on top of the company? To stroke his ego? Great. No one person is bigger than wrestling, and it would serve Vince well to remember that.

 

Goldberg has name value. He also, from what I’ve seen, has little wrestling ability. Yet he’s been put in a position of one of the top faces in the company. This is a slot that could be taken by any number of better wrestlers. (By “better”, I mean that they will put on better matches.)

 

Hulk Hogan, on WWE.com said that “I'd love to see Bill Goldberg in the ring with Brock Lesnar -- see who the man really is.”. This is Brock “only been in the WWF for a year” Lesnar. After a year of a “Jesus and his father” push, Brock Lesnar is the man that Hulk Hogan sees as “THE man” in the WWF. After one year, Brock has the same “name value” that Goldberg has. Goldberg has a few years left in him as a wrestler, whereas someone like Brock potentially has a very long time.

 

So why waste time on older wrestlers, instead pushing for the future? Start getting younger wrestlers over, and more importantly – NEW ONES. With the right handling, quite a few wrestlers have the Name Value potential, but it is just having the balls to pull the trigger on their push – not a half hearted effort to get them onto the brink, and then pulling them back – Booker T, Jericho, RVD…

 

3. The Vince McMahon Factor

 

Vince McMahon is arguably a genius. Equally arguably, he’s a ruthless businessman and a risk taker. One thing he is not is a professional wrestler. At least – not a good one. So why the hell is he booking himself into 20 minute “brawls”?

 

You know that he only uses brawls because they can kill time – the anticipation of a chairshot followed by one looks a lot more devastating than a few punches. And well, he’s not good for much else.

 

Did you notice that all the hype going into Mania was on one match? All the t-shirts? All the celebrity predictions (which I’m sure were genuine)? All the fighting between the silly Miller Lite girls? It wasn’t worth putting all the WM eggs into that particular basket. It wasn’t even the best match on the SmackDown side of the show.

 

Post Mania, reports are that Vince / Hogan was the best match on the PPV. Who would have thought it? It was a horrible match, and had pretty much no redeeming features – apart from McMahon’s fucked up bloody face, which was enough to give nightmares. Still – not worth paying $40 to see him live out his masturbatory fantasies.

 

4. The WHY factor

 

Goldberg hates the Rock. HHH hates Booker T. The Undertaker hates A-Train. Austin hated the Rock, but now doesn’t. In fact, at one time or another, most of the WWF have hated each other.

 

Sadly, the amount of WWF TV that is shown, as well as Russo’s patented Crash TV has led to everything happening so quickly.

 

Bret vs Owen at Wrestlemania X was built up over several PPV matches from the Survivor Series, leading to a gradual heel turn by Owen. The heel turn was gradual, and made sense, with his resentment towards Bret just building up over time.

 

Compare and contrast with Goldberg vs the Rock. Look at this from a “wrestling is real” perspective – something I think the writers don’t do often enough. It’s Goldberg’s first day in the WWF, and he wants to make an impact. So he interrupts the Rock and attacks him. Why? Do we get an explanation? No. I think this is a sign of weak writing, and really lazy booking. A couple more weeks of attacks, and there’ll be a PPV match, with the justification being that Goldberg has made the Rock’s life hell or something. “Why” someone does something is one of the most important things when building a character – Stone Cold was a clear character, with clear motivations and he did what he did because he wanted to show people that he was the boss. Simple.

 

Why does HHH do what he does? (insert Smark response) The Rock? Christian? Maven? Each of these people needs a clearly defined character. It doesn’t have to be overly complex – Maven is the rookie that wants to win to prove himself. Christian wants to prove he is better than his brother Edge. That took me all of 5 seconds to come up with, whereas the WWF is paying people thousands of dollars a year to come up with, well, nothing.

 

Sadly, face / heel turns are happening so frequently now that they are pretty much meaningless. The Undertaker had his big heel turn at the end of 2001, but fairly soon, he’d had a face turn again. There was no specific event that turned him face, but it was part of a new trend of having a heel wrestle another heel, or tag with a face until it is just accepted that they are cheered.

 

5. The amnesia factor

 

Once a month, everything is reset in the world. You forget who your friends are, who you hate, and everything that happened the night before. At least – that’s what the WWF would have you believe.

 

That was a slight over exaggeration, sometimes feuds do continue for more than one month, and people do make references to beating Booker T on PPV the night before. The point I am attempting to make though is that storylines are “reset” all the time, with no reference to the past.

 

HHH is feuding with Booker T now, but a little over a month ago, he absolutely hated Scotty 2 Steinery. Now, the two of them never interact. Their feud was, admittedly, crap, but for the levels of hatred that were shown, two months is not an awful long time.

 

More foresight with the booking, as well as not banking so much on Steiner would have seen the WWF take a much better direction. Throwing someone like Steiner (who has name value, after all) into a main event feud was a pretty bad decision, since if he screws up (which he did), he’s in a high profile mess. A nice mid-to-low card feud would have settled him into the WWF well, and then moved onto a big match with HHH.

 

As it happens, the feud with HHH was terrible, and now Steiner is stuck in pointless-matches-to-fill-time-on-Raw mode. If he feuds with another main eventer, it’ll suck again. If he feuds with a midcarder, it’s a demotion and makes him look like shit (see: Jericho, Christopher).

 

The WWF wants itself to be realistic and to “not insult our intelligence” (Vince McMahon). Are they serious? Where in the world do people “feud” for a month and then not do it again until it becomes profitable again? McMahon cannot have it both ways – either be a realistic TV show, or just go all out. What’s happening at the moment is just insulting. Which leads nicely to…

 

6. The Katie Vick factor

 

Remember Katie Vick? You know, just before you turned off the TV when HHH was talking? Yeah, the girl that Kane raped while she was alive or dead. I think that everyone pretty much agrees it was a Bad Idea.

 

But why?

 

It’s not entirely unfeasible that the following events happened:

 

We come back to find Kane in the ring. Katie Fick was a friend of his, and she is dead. But it was an accident. He is not a murderer. Katie and he were friends back when he first started wrestling. She was probably the only one who cared that he was getting beat up. He cared about her too. They went to a party, and Katie had too much to drink.

 

He decided to drive her home. He wasn't familiar with driving stick-shift, but Katie insisted they take her car. It was dark and the roads her slick. An animal jumped in front of them and he swerved to avoid it. The car spun out of control and crashed. He broke his arm. She was killed instantly. It was an accident, but he has to live with it. He has to live with it everyday. The only thing he can say is what he said to Katie's parents: he's sorry.

 

Triple H comes out on stage and says it was a touching story. But since he's out here bearing his soul, why doesn't he tell the whole truth? Why doesn't he tell them about how, when the police questioned people at the party, they all said he was drunk too. And why doesn't he tell them about all the empty beer cans in the car and around the accident scene? And why doesn't he tell everyone about when the coroners did the autopsy, they found his semen inside of her.

 

Truth is, Katie was much more than a friend to Kane. Kane loved her, but Katie only liked him. Katie didn't share his same feelings. After all, who could love a burnt up freak like Kane. Trips knows Kane was never charged with murder, or even manslaughter, but the fact is, everything points to Kane. The whole world can see it. Kane killed Katie Fick. But the question is: did Kane force himself on Katie while she was alive, or did he wait until after she was dead? Fade Out.

 

(thanks to rajahwwf.com)

 

It’s possible that Kane was once a drink driver that caused a fatal car accident. It’s possible that he had sex with Katie. (Why was the possibility that she consented never brought up?)

 

BUT (and there’s really two “but”s)

 

Kane was killed in a fire when he was a child, and brought back to life and his father is the Undertaker’s mother, or something. When Kane debuted in 1997, there was a huge backstory built up between him and the Undertaker – indeed, the storyline reason for his debut was Paul Bearer trying to get one over on the Undertaker.

 

We are meant to believe that Kane, despite all this horror in his childhood, and the mental asylum that he was in, he still went to parties and fucked around? His scarred face that he is too ashamed to show other than under a mask was clearly visible at the time – and he managed to “get the girl”. It just doesn’t ring true.

 

BUT (part two)

 

The entire tone of the segments was WRONG. If you’re writing a TV show, and you want one character to accuse another of being a corpse-fucker, there’s ways of doing it. Having a huge crowd laughing, your accuser smirking, and no substance whatsoever is totally wrong.

 

And after their match at No Mercy, it was forgotten. Never mentioned again. Kane is a good guy, and getting reasonable reactions, and nobody TALKS ABOUT HIM BEING A MURDERER!

 

Surely this falls foul of the realism edicts?

 

7. The “Is this TV” factor

 

Why do Terri and the Coach have jobs? Neither of them wrestle, and neither of them are particularly good on the mic. If you want to have someone pretend to interview people twice a week, then just employ an actor. It’ll increase the believability of the shows a LOT.

 

A running joke on the internet is that “It’s a shame that Wrestler X isn’t watching TV, or he’d know…” There needs to be a justification for this. Seriously. Hell, even if it is something as silly as wrestlers staying focussed in their locker rooms. But then how do they know that The Rock is in the ring calling them out?

 

There’s too many small contradictions, small mistakes that need to be rectified. It’s not like they are deal breaking when it comes to watching wrestling, but it would encourage me to watch – at least I’m not having my intelligence insulted. Which, other than the matches (usually), is all the WWF tends to do.

 

Conclusion

 

Overall, I don’t think that writing this will change anything, and it’s silly to think it will. What the WWF needs to do is step back and be objective. Realise their mistakes, and more importantly – make decisions. Is the show “real”, are the wrestlers aware of the cameras? Why does the Rock hate Goldberg?

 

And put entertainment over egos. The Rock has looked second best to everyone and their mother, yet is the most over heel (and face) on Raw. Even in losing, he looks good, and in winning, his opponents look good. They need to look at what is working, and more importantly – what isn’t. Look to the future, while learning from the past.

[Guest dreamer420]

I'd choose todays WWE over the WWF's attitude era which everyone seems to want back. There is much better wrestling going on today than then and that is what matters to me.

[Guest IB2BLACK]

I agree with you Dreamer. It's more wrestling on TV, now than it was back in the Attitude era.

[Guest Jobber of the Week]

Katie Vick is just an extension of the Vince McMahon factor you mentioned.

 

Things will ease up once Vince eventually retires, although that might not happen for a few years yet since he has reportedly no real life beyond business and thus will find himself with nothing to do.

 

Wait until Shane/Steph take over things and stuff will calm down on the stupid angle front.

 

 

I really don't care about the HHH thing myself. He could sit and squash guys for the next five years and cut promos calling the rest of the locker room pathetic shells of humans who don't come close to matching his greatness blah blah blah, and I won't give a damn because the wrestling on the undercard will still be far greater than whatever he's doing.

[Guest IB2BLACK]

Vince will never retire. Why should he, anyway. He has his good & bad days, who doesn't. And besides there is nobody and nothing to compete with him, except himself.

[Guest Super Pissed Smark]

You guys are in luck because, if this crap keeps up, you'll be able to enjoy that better wrestling up close and personal as the WWE tours high school gymnasiums throughout the U.S. and Canada.

[Guest SupaTaft]

I'm pickin' up what you're layin' down man. Most of your points are good and valid and if anyone in charge of the WWE now would read that, we'd have a better product within a month.

 

One thing though, I completely disagree with point 2, the Legend Factor. The WWE isn't about who deserves it more, only about who will make more money for the company. Booker and Jericho dont draw as much as Taker and Hogan. Bottom line.

 

Vince wants money. That's why he built the company.

 

-Taft

[Guest Bruiser Chong]

Things will ease up once Vince eventually retires, although that might not happen for a few years yet since he has reportedly no real life beyond business and thus will find himself with nothing to do.

 

Wait until Shane/Steph take over things and stuff will calm down on the stupid angle front.

Um you do realize that once Vince retires/dies, WWE is in even bigger trouble than it is right now? Say what you will about him, but Vince has always managed to keep the company going and although he's done a lousy job lately, Shane and Stephanie clearly have NO idea how to run a promotion.

[Guest NoCalMike]

That was a pretty good read. Most if not all of those points have been brought up a million times on this board individually, but I liked the way you made it sound half-way decent without coming off too bitter and as a wwe-hater. Good Job.

[Guest Star Ocean 3]

That should be WWE, not the WWE.

[Guest RavishingRickRudo]

They don't care.

 

They don't care if you stop watching, they don't care if I stop watching, they don't care if each single individual poster on this board stops watching. They don't care about your dedication and passion to their product, they don't care how saddened you are, they simply don't care.

 

They don't care.

 

Does this sicken anyone else? The detatchment the WWE - that Vince McMahon - has from it's fans. If you go up to a WWE employee and say "I've watched wrestling for over 10 years but I've stopped, I've stopped watching your product after 10 years" what do you think that employee would say? Shit, he/she wouldn't say anything, they would just shrug. They don't care.

[Guest Jobber of the Week]

Say what you will about him, but Vince has always managed to keep the company going and although he's done a lousy job lately, Shane and Stephanie clearly have NO idea how to run a promotion.

Not a problem if they give positions to the people who do. When enough money is lost off their backs, they'll wake up and hire people with more experience than themselves.

[Guest RavishingRickRudo]

I'm sorry, but if Steph hasn't realized that she's a complete dolt of a writer and on-screen performer then she won't wake up...ever... Besides, she'll just give it to Hunter.

 

I don't see where all this faith in the boy-wonder has come from. He's a McMahon, he has the Evil Gene in him - not to mention the dumbass gene.

[Guest Kahran Ramsus]

The writing is actually better than it was two years ago. There are problems, but if you think about it, titles mean more than they have for years and guys like John Cena & Matt Hardy have gone from nothing to semi-credible challengers in relatively little time at all. It is no longer the Invasion where there was a 100 titles with switches every week.

 

The big problem is the wrong people on top. This was the problem in 1995 as well. Diesel/HBK was a can't missed storyline, that missed simply because nobody wanted to see Diesel. Mabel/Diesel could have been big, simply if instead of Mabel/Diesel it was say Bret/Razor. Sure the gimmicks of the lowcarders sucked, but nobody pays to watch them anyways.

 

Smackdown has it right for the most part. I have an issue with the screen time, but they are using guys like Vince & Hogan as special attractions, while showcasing guys like Brock, Angle & Benoit as the top wrestlers in the brand.

 

RAW has Goldberg, HHH (who I don't have that much of a problem with if his matches/feuds weren't so predictable), Nash, HBK & Rock (who is good, but won't be around long) on top. That is the main problem with World Wrestling Entertainment right now.

[Guest godthedog]

Booker and Jericho dont draw as much as Taker and Hogan. Bottom line.

how can anyone say that when vince has never put booker or jericho in a position to be a top draw?

[Guest The Amazing Rando]

it's kinda wierd that alot of wrestling fans got hooked by Wrestlemania 9 ...

 

I don't even know why...but 10 years later I can look back and watch that and still be entertained

 

as for today's product...it can be entertaining enough that I can watch it ...and I can make fun of it quite well...i'm a MiSTie for a reason

[Guest Kahran Ramsus]

Jericho & Booker don't draw as much as Hogan & Taker now. Yet, the drawing power of Hogan & Taker is declining. What they should do (ignore the split for this example) is put Jericho & Booker against Hogan & Taker and have them win. This way you get the better draw for having Taker & Hogan in the main event, and give Jericho & Booker cred so that their drawing power increases. Thus you get Booker & Jericho as draws.

 

The way Vince does it is keep Hogan & Taker on top as long as he can. What happens is either their drawing power drops to the point that it is as bad as Jericho & Booker or they leave and you don't have them at all.

 

The new consumes the old in order to become stronger. It is the way of life.

[Guest Coffey]

I like the part where you act like you said something original.

[Guest Bruiser Chong]

And I like the part where you came back with the cliche "shit on everything he just said with one sentence." I'm guilty of doing that every now and again, but some people on this board just live for that shit.

[Guest Coffey]

Yeah yeah yeah. People bitch. People counter bitch. People counter the counter bitches.

 

What's your point?

[Guest Bruiser Chong]

Just gets a little old but maybe that's just me.

[Guest Coffey]

You mean it gets a little old? Yeah...so does reading the same topics every five minutes. What's your point again?

[Guest Bruiser Chong]

It may have touched upon several topics that aren't strangers to this folder but it was done in a dare I say more intelligent matter than what you usually see. It seemed thought out and not just, "OMG HHH IS DE DEVIL~!!" He certainly didn't touch on too much that was new but at least it was done differently and not like how everyone else goes about it.

[Guest Coffey]

I'll give you that. I didn't think it was a bad past, nor did I say it was a bad post. I was just expressing my distain for the unoriginality of the board as a whole lately.

[Guest RavishingRickRudo]

His issue with Motivation is kinda original. By that I mean 'hasn't been beaten to death'.

[Guest Bruiser Chong]

I'll give you that. I didn't think it was a bad past, nor did I say it was a bad post. I was just expressing my distain for the unoriginality of the board as a whole lately.

Lately? Hell, I'd say damn near a year now, but I don't wanna start off on another topic that's been beaten to death.

[Guest RavishingRickRudo]

Has the "beaten to death" topic been beaten to death yet?

[Rendclaw 0]

It's like you said, Rudo. They don't care, as long as they make $.01 of profit. Never mind that if they gave the fans (the smarks included) what they wanted, they could make even more money than what they're doing.

 

It's the American pastime of "fat, dumb, and happy". Why change things and make an effort to make a quality product when the average fan will go to the shows, spend X amount of dollars and be pissed when he/she doesn't get what he/she wants or get it in a way that isn;t as palatable, said fan gets pissed off, only to fall for the same crappy build-up in time for the next PPV?

 

Smarks are blown off as "know-it-alls" and for the most part they;re right in that we see the answer as being completely obvious, yet we don't have any experience in the business, so any suggest is shot down almost before we can say/type it.

 

I've said it before and I will say it again. Vince McMahon is going to totally destroy professional wrestling, not just dominate it.

[Guest Bruiser Chong]

Has the "beaten to death" topic been beaten to death yet?

 

Not yet, but I'm workin' on it.

[Guest Coffey]

If you go up to a WWE employee and say "I've watched wrestling for over 10 years but I've stopped, I've stopped watching your product after 10 years" what do you think that employee would say? Shit, he/she wouldn't say anything, they would just shrug. They don't care.

Boy, that really hit home. It's like, I've gave 15 or more years of my life to watching and attending wrestling shows. I've got nothing to show for it except for some useless wrestling knowledge...yet if I try to say something, it falls on deaf ears as if I'm just a piece of sand in a desert.

 

That's one reason why I liked ECW so much. It seemed like the entire crowd was smarks. It made the live events better because they were all there to have a good time. That and ECW was more geared towards it's fans. At least I think it was.