Loss

I should be crystal clear that I absolutely want AEW to succeed. I want them to be as successful as possible and make tons of money and demonstrate that there's more than one way to be successful presenting pro wrestling in America on a national level. I don't expect them to ever overtake WWE, but I do think they can make life uncomfortable for WWE in some interesting ways. It's not out of the realm of possibility that they could eventually beat them consistently in 18-49, and that TV executives will then wonder why they're paying more for less ratings. In fact, I would have even said a few months ago that seemed likely to happen at some point. It was just a matter of when. No, WWE has continuously shifted its business model away from fans over the last two decades. It has worked out for them, but they are also an arrogant company that seems to always get the last laugh, and it would be nice if every once in a while, that didn't happen. It's petty, but that's the main reason I root for AEW. I've only even liked a handful of matches, but I appreciate that at their best, they are working hard to give their fans what they want, and they seem to do it most of the time. It's nice that someone somewhere still tries to do that.

Much of the time, yes, although some Bret-Shawn matches did deliver.

I was talking to someone about this last night. Lots of great wrestlers have one other wrestler who stands out where for whatever reason everything just never clicked and it was disappointing compared to how it looked on paper. For Steamboat, that was Muraco. For Windham, that was Larry Zbyszko. For Bret, that was Rick Martel. For Austin, that was Undertaker. There are probably lots of other examples.

A lot of that dread I think came from people who had been having those conversations for 15-20 years and felt like they were going in circles. Some people had just been around too long and participated in two GWE projects and by the end of the second one they felt like there was nothing new to discuss. It's not anyone's fault, it's just that some people entered wrestling message boarding at different points. I can assure you that if I participate this time, there are a lot of topics where I'd just want to not engage at all. There are only so many times you can talk about some of these things. I've been responding to the "Ric Flair worked the same match with everyone" criticism too long and I don't want to talk about it anymore. That doesn't mean that if others want to that they shouldn't.

I do mind it. Glad we drilled down to the big difference. I should have just posted "I don't like the meta/non-meta mix of AEW." You could have responded "I don't mind it" and we both could have saved a lot of time.

It was subtle for the time. Jim Cornette wasn't Adrian Street, although the brilliance there was that he had Miss Linda with him and clearly wasn't gay. It's possible he was bisexual (more likely pansexual, and even more likely just into some kinky shit), but fans went there because they didn't know how else to make sense of Adrian Street. I say "brilliance" because I suspect they knew the only way small-minded fans would be able to process him was to chant homophobic slurs at him. Asking bigger questions would make them too uncomfortable.

I don't know how many more times I can repeat myself when my point is misconstrued or misunderstood, so I'm going to stop. For the last time, I focused on who turned off the lights as a singular example of internal inconsistency, not because it in itself was the single most important thing in the world. Not once has anyone who disagrees even tried to engage me on the point that they have swung hard back and forth between trying to make sense of things and not caring instead of committing entirely to one approach or the other, and maybe when they do, I'll come back to the thread. Until then, I don't know what else I can say.

They didn't like that Mistico carried himself like someone who had already made it and had been somewhere when he came in, but he had already been somewhere and made it.

The middle initial was added that isn't even his real middle initial. "James E. Cornette" was taken from "James E. Barnett". The Cornette character was more of a mama's boy than someone who was probably in the closet, but they wanted fans to wonder if he was gay if that might make them angrier. It was never a sledgehammer thing, which is what we're used to in wrestling now. It was very subtle and left open to interpretation. I think they just wanted fans to ask the question.

Of course he did. I don't think a soul alive thought Jerry Lawler was invading ECW. They thought it was being booked for their entertainment. There was an implicit understanding with everything ECW that someone was manipulating everything. It's why the response was not to boo Lawler, it was to chant for ECW. It's probably also true that no one thinks MJF and Sammy Guevara really hate each other, which again raises why they would switch between trying to explain a camera and not trying to explain it. In that environment, I don't know if I'm supposed to wonder as a viewer who turned off the lights or if it's important. And again, if they don't want to answer those questions, they don't have to answer them. I mean that! It would have never bugged me in the least if they hadn't also done that one segment with Sammy wanting a cameraman present a few weeks ago. That's old-style wrestling. If that's not what you're doing, fine. Don't explain the cameras. No pun intended, but pick a vision and go all in or all out.

No, Dusty left WCW when Russo came in because Russo wanted to do a storyline playing off of his real-life problems with Dustin at the time, which Dusty didn't want to explore on television.

Nash probably told that story when he was in TNA in 2005ish. At the time, he was having problems with the booking and was trying to rally everyone against Dusty, but I don't remember specifics. Anyway, he suddenly had a problem with him when he never had before that. But in his Torch Talk around that time, he was burying Dusty on early career stuff he'd talked about plenty of times and had never framed even closed to that.

Sullivan booked until June of 1997 when Terry Taylor took over and everything suddenly became about titles and longer undercard matches. The balance on top also started to suffer around that time, as that's when you started seeing WCW wrestlers presented as stupid, not making saves for no apparent reason, etc.

To my earlier point, WCW was completely obsessed with the tiniest of details then. Every NWO segment was presented as paid programming until they created a storyline reason that it didn't have to be anymore. They even had their own merchandise phone number. They combined that with telling casual fans, "Hey, we know you're here for the NWO and you're going to get them. In the meantime, enjoy this sampling of the most exciting wrestling happening all around the world."

The good news is they don't tend to push people who don't deserve it or set up feuds no one wants to see, so we don't have to talk about that. That we're talking about this is a sign of something itself, because opening this door with WWE would be pointless. They are incapable of change. I don't believe AEW is incapable of change. I think they're still trying to find themselves, and deserved the honeymoon period to figure things out. I think that time is about up, at least for me.

Also, the point I was trying to make is not just about the trope of lights going out. It's that I'm hoping AEW will become more deliberate and intentional about all of these things, because they have a clear idea of who they are and what they're trying to be. It's been so long since we've had a real evaluation of why everything in wrestling is done the way it is and assessing if it still makes sense to do it that way. Some things are just with us now because that's how it's always been, but it's not necessarily because that's what's best. Something for everyone is great and I love that, but hopefully, there's still room in that approach for it all to still be tied together and make sense, for various programs not to step on each other, for internal consistency, etc.

To elaborate, in ECW, it was pretty strongly implied all the time that Paul Heyman was the invisible hand manipulating and controlling everything. I think most people who watched ECW understood that, even if they never came out and said it bluntly. On the contrary, AEW is viewed more as a collaborative effort than it is the brainchild of a single person. So that's why ECW having lights go out is a little different. ECW was controlled chaos and Heyman, even when he did appear on camera after 1995 or so, was treated that way.

It was internally consistent. AEW is not internally consistent. It doesn't make sense to me to have musical numbers on the same show that people are demanding a camera be present so their conversation is captured for the audience watching at home.

For better or worse, ECW had a clear identity and it was always obvious what it was and what it wasn't. They didn't abandon that. AEW seems to be trying to be all things to all people -- giving nod to the idea that wrestling should be logical without ... making it logical. If they don't think it should be logical, just don't give the nod.

I think I responded to that in my post. I even mentioned ECW specifically and why it's different.

I could accept that if they weren't dabbling in explaining the presence of cameras. When you open that door, you have to enter and start filling all the logical plotholes. If you don't want that level of scrutiny, keep the door closed.

I have been trying to figure out my problem with AEW for the last few days, and I think I finally figured out the simplest way to explain it. Who turned off the lights? MJF had his clever one-liner when he was about to get beaten up by the Inner Circle, the lights went out and then they came back on and his new stable was in the ring. Fine, ok. But who turned off the lights? In WCCW, the heels turned off the lights so that no one could see them interfering, and then they'd come back on to Iceman King Parsons covering Kerry Von Erich to win the WCCW title. In ECW, the answer to that question was always implicitly that Booking Genius Paul Heyman turned off the lights. The biggest star in ECW was ECW itself. It's what fans chanted when they liked something, so fair enough. Whatever you think of that type of self involvement, the point was that there was a consistency to it. The genius booking turned off the lights. In WWE, it's the production team that makes things happen, whether they are starting entrance music for run-ins or cameras are everywhere they need to be at all times and their presence is never explained. It's not the choice I'd make, but it's the choice they've made. They stick to it, and whether fans love it or not, they've grown to accept it. I'm not clear who in AEW turned off the lights. The answer to that question matters. They explain the presence of the camera in one segment when Sammy Guevara wants a cameraman there for his confrontation with MJF, but then MJF records his words, presumably to use against him later, and Sammy is upset by that. Why? He brought a cameraman there. The next week, MJF asks the cameraman to leave so he can have a conversation with the Guevara-less Inner Circle. Ok. What came of that conversation? What did they talk about? Are we ever going to find out? If they tell Jericho everything, as we learned on Wednesday, why didn't they tell him sooner? They allowed MJF to team with Jericho at the PPV. Wouldn't that have created a real quagmire if they won the tag titles when the Inner Circle knew MJF was plotting against Jericho? Are we to assume Jericho knew before the PPV but just didn't care? It seems like his plan before everything happened was to just add a new member anyway. So MJF talked to Santana and Ortiz earlier that day and convinced them to turn on Jericho that night. But ... I thought MJF had a stable of his own? Was his plan for Santana and Ortiz to join his new stable? Why did he tell them that if he was forming his own group anyway? Was he planning to run two stables at the same time? So now it's time for the big angle. The lights go out. Who turned off the lights? Was it the heels like in WCCW? I don't think so. They were all in the ring when the lights came back on. Was it booking genius Tony Khan? Possibly, although that would go against the identity of AEW to this point. Or is it like WWE where production keeps the show going, cameras are always where they are supposed to be, and entrance music and lighting is always perfectly cued up? If it's that and that's the understanding with the audience when you watch AEW, okay, fair enough, but then Sammy Guevara doesn't need to make sure he has a cameraman with him, and MJF can't twist his words to use against him later because it's all being filmed anyway. Who turned off the lights? That doesn't even get into why the lights were turned off. The beatdown didn't commence until they were all facing off with the lights back on anyway. Are they not able to make entrances in light? I don't understand. Why not just run to the ring and attack them from behind? Why not just attack them while the lights were off? If AEW has production-assisted logic, which it certainly did when MJF and Jericho broke out into a musical number, that's fine. If AEW is supposed to be more of a classic pro wrestling product, which is what it was when Sammy Guevara insisted on a camera being present when he confronted MJF, that's fine also. But trying to be both is a real problem, because it's not clear what they are aiming for. We established with this angle that wrestlers talk during the week, not just on camera during Dynamite. That's great! So why did Matt Hardy assume all was well after not talking to Hangman Page for days when Page pulled the contract switcheroo? Who turned off the lights? If they don't want to answer the question, that's fine. Don't answer it. But don't set up scenarios where you train me as a viewer to expect these things to make sense either. If they do want to answer the question, that's fine. Answer it. Who? This is all stuff that reminds me of 1999 WCW, when the camera kept switching points of view during their backstage vignettes and there was no coherent viewer experience. I'd like for AEW to be something better than that, and in some ways, they are. The big thing -- the important thing -- is that they set up some intriguing feuds out of that angle for the month ahead. But it would be cool if after 20 years of a national wrestling scene that doesn't respect its audience or care about the details, they would take a different approach. If they're not going to, that's fine, but I'd like them to be consistent there too. Pick a path. Stick to it. If not, I want to know who turned off the lights.

In modern times, Cornette would cut a promo about how Arn Anderson "jerked the curtain at Center Stage" and would be called a midcard loser and that would be considered a really good wrestling promo.

I wish he'd at least add another show to the lineup where he leaves the gimmick at home and just talks about the wrestling he loves and gives history lessons. Whether that Cornette can draw or not, that's absolutely the best Cornette. We see him less and less.

Cornette tends to think any insult against a person you don't like is justified because you don't like them. He's wrong, but that's been true about him as long as I can remember.