Teddy Long

[NintendoLogic]

I don't really get why any company would want to promote the idea that the people who run it are indifferent at best and actively hostile at worst to what its fans want.

[Matt D]

I think the reason that Teddy vs Johnny is so over is that it's getting twice the time as anything else. Almost any mid-card match is involved somehow. Then on smackdown they even had the Bellas randomly talking about it.

[Victator]

I don't really get why any company would want to promote the idea that the people who run it are indifferent at best and actively hostile at worst to what its fans want.

Worked pretty well in 98. The board of directors are Crom.

[NintendoLogic]

Lots of things worked in 1998. That doesn't mean they have much value in determining what will work in 2012.

[Victator]

The point is dramatically a world with uncaring or hostile gods works better. It makes triumph all the sweeter.

[Coffey]

Agreed as well. The heel authority figure is way, way overdone. It rarely even makes logical sense for the person to be in that position of power.

Not even just heel authority figures: I wish wrestling would do away with on-air authority figures altogether. No more GM, CEO, COO, President, etc. Hell, it was terrible in WCW just when they mentioned "the powers that be."

 

It's just another thing that has become a staple over the years. I remember President Jack Tunney, but he didn't eat up massive amounts of time from the shows. Not like how WWE is nowadays. Holy shit. Another thing I wish they would get rid of is having cameras backstage. I'm not sure when that started but as a viewer, we should never be able to see the promo sets, or Gorilla position or guys standing in the background of a hallway during a promo and shit. I *hate* that. Either put a guy in front of a drop screen, or put him in the damn ring. Now the stupid GM's have offices and shit and it's terrible.

[NintendoLogic]

The point is dramatically a world with uncaring or hostile gods works better. It makes triumph all the sweeter.

Does it really? In such a world, any triumph is necessarily going to be fleeting and tenuous.

[Loss]

The point is dramatically a world with uncaring or hostile gods works better. It makes triumph all the sweeter.

Does it really? In such a world, any triumph is necessarily going to be fleeting and tenuous.

 

As it probably should be. Things are way more interesting when the heel gets the upper hand more often than the babyface. It makes the babyface moments of revenge stand out more and makes them satisfying. Fleeting for sure, but that's really the whole point.

[NintendoLogic]

Here's the thing. Wrestling is largely about good vs. evil. I don't think wickedness going unpunished and virtue going unrewarded as a matter of course really works with genres like wrestling and comic books that have open-ended narratives. It's one thing to have a storyline where Thanos acquires the Infinity Gauntlet. It's quite another for him to have it all the time and every heroic triumph be solely at his pleasure.

[Loss]

Is that what I said?

 

And yes, if wrestling was like other narratives, heels would lose the blowoff match and never be seen again. It's not. It can't be. The heels have to be protected if they're going to mean anything.

[Matt D]

Is that what I said?

 

And yes, if wrestling was like other narratives, heels would lose the blowoff match and never be seen again. It's not. It can't be. The heels have to be protected if they're going to mean anything.

Now, if we were in the territory days. Is there a coherent moment where the shift happened? Piper at Wrestlemania I? Orndorff turned shortly thereafter so he didn't need to be protected as a heel.

[NintendoLogic]

"Villain appears, loses decisively and is never seen again" isn't how comic books work at all. Every superhero of note has an extensive list of recurring adversaries. Heels can be protected while still eventually getting their comeuppance.

[khawk20]

I miss the days where the mere suggestion of possible impropriety within a territories "higher ups" was enough to get you thinking. Nick Bockwinkel being awarded the AWA title by Stanley Blackburn in 1981 after Verne retired is a good example of that. Heels, faces and the magazines of the time all publicly decried the decision and suggested there were shenanigans afoot. No on-air maniacal GM or President to confirm it, rather a few very politically worded interviews on air and in print from the possibly corrupt person.

 

The rest was left up to your imagination. I liked that.

 

Dusty's first title win over Harley Race in 1979 and the ridiculous stips attached to his rematch is another example.

[cm funk]

A heel big brother figure needs to be overthrown eventually for the plot to work. When it's Vince McMahon it works because everyone knows he runs the show. When it's Johnny Ace and everyone but the board of directors recognizes that he's a piece of shit , and he's on camera being a piece of shit with no remorse it really stretches credibility. Stories like that need a beginning, a middle and an end. Ace gets job, Ace is a scumbag, Ace loses job. WWE just puts a character like Ace in place as a lazy plot device, and there is no subtlety to it. I find it impossible to believe a global, diversified and publically traded company would allow these things, and the complete lack of logic disengages me from the stories they are trying to craft. Like, couldn't they have pulled off some sort of power play angle to explain why Ace is in the position he's in? Their writing is beyond lazy. And don't even get me started on the "mystery GM" angle which dominated RAW for a year and will never be paid off.

 

I try not to bitch about WWE booking too much and enjoy it for what it is, but this is one of the quirks that comes close to ruining my enjoyment

[JerryvonKramer]

I, for one, don't really understand it.

 

Look at all the other managers from that era: Heenan, Jimmy Hart, Slick, Mr. Fuji, Jim Cornette ...

 

None of them are on the WWE product or have been since the 90s. Would Heenan have a prominent role if his voice still worked? I doubt it.

 

And then all of the talented promo men who have retired (e.g. ARN, DiBiase, etc. etc.) and then think, Teddy Long still has that spot.

 

It's insane when you think about it, absolutely insane.

[Jingus]

The point is dramatically a world with uncaring or hostile gods works better. It makes triumph all the sweeter.

Does it really? In such a world, any triumph is necessarily going to be fleeting and tenuous.

 

As it probably should be. Things are way more interesting when the heel gets the upper hand more often than the babyface. It makes the babyface moments of revenge stand out more and makes them satisfying. Fleeting for sure, but that's really the whole point.

 

You guys are making wrestling kinda sound like a Ravenloft campaign.

 

 

"Villain appears, loses decisively and is never seen again" isn't how comic books work at all. Every superhero of note has an extensive list of recurring adversaries. Heels can be protected while still eventually getting their comeuppance.

Yeah. Superhero comics are probably the closest analogy to wrestling in terms of how their storytelling methods work. And people completely accept that the heroes win most of the time, but the villains usually keep coming back anyway. I've never understood the whole old-school mentality of "if you do one job it completely destroys all your heat"; that's total bullshit, the fans don't see it that way.