All Elite Wrestling

[C.S.]

2 hours ago, Al said:

No mention of the neck tattoo? I feel like that completely killed his vibe.

This was the beginning of the end.

Everything else is just fallout from that.

(I still like Cody though. And I'll defend the reality show as a worthwhile risk. Time to expand past the useless "workrate" audience. It's a gamble and could fail, but there's relatively little downside, so why not try?)

[funkdoc]

My thing is that reality shows feel like aping WWE. Something like collabs with really huge Youtubers or such would seem more on-brand in my eyes.

EDIT: Not the bro kind that everyone hates, that’s also WWE territory cf. Jake Logan or whatever his name is

[El-P]

They need gamers from Twitch. Youtube is almost for boomers at this point. Is WWE still streaming stuff on Facebook ? 

[strobogo]

Another thing with Cody that makes people roll their eyes is that every match of his has to have some kind of fuckery finish.  They can't just end like a normal match. There has to be some bullshit with Arn or a turnbuckle or foreign object or or or. Strong Double J vibes. 

[Jmare007]

1 hour ago, Matt D said:

I'm fine with the MMA guys being there. Masvidal has a big following. Van Zant has a pretty big following. She's relatively young and seemed to be enjoying herself at least so if she wanted to get into wrestling more, good for her. I think Wednesday ratings showed us the limitations of the current market for AEW if they're just going to put on the best wrestling they can to their core audience. It's a good number but they're not going to grow if they don't leave that comfort zone in ways like smartly using Shaq or these guys or Rosario Dawson or whoever. One segment a show to try to draw in new fans who you can then hook with everything else is going to be more of a net positive than a negative.

Not sure about that. The match everyone wanted to see gave them 1.5 million at some point (after the break when word of mouth began to spread). I agree that 1 segment a show to try to grab "outsider/more casual" audience can be very useful if done right, but I'm no sure they've reached the limit of what they core audience will give them with just the best wrestling they can imagine.

[sek69]

Honestly, as more people become comfortable with the idea that AEW is something worth investing your time in (as in won't keep making you feel like an idiot for getting invested like WWE programming tends to do) you'll see even higher growth. Wrestling fans at this point tend to be like abused animals where they just expect the promotion to kick them in the ribs so it was always going to take some time for AEW to earn the trust of the fans that they aren't going to get fucked over for becoming invested. They went from a million viewers as a potential high level benchmark to something that is expected every week real fast. People are starting to realize everything leads to something, everything will usually make sense, and if they have a misstep when something lands with a thud, they'll usually course correct and get it fixed quickly. 

IMO, that's when the fans turned on Cody. His jingoistic feud with Ogogo didn't go over well and when he just kept fucking that chicken it left a bad taste in the mouths of their audience who very much saw that as a WWE style "you're gonna like it no matter what" move. 

[C.S.]

6 hours ago, funkdoc said:

My thing is that reality shows feel like aping WWE.  

Because WWE invented reality television, right?

I always found this reasoning bizarre and complete bubble-think.

[sek69]

In a wrestling context, they did. The last thing people looking for an escape from WWE is something like Total Divas being advertised on their show.

[funkdoc]

Yeah i just meant that other wrestling promotions didn’t embrace reality TV like that, when WCW very well could have in its decline phase for instance. Well, TNA but nobody cared about them anyway 

EDIT: i also feel like Youtube has become more prominent in the past couple years as some really big names actually stream on there instead of Twitch. Vtubers might have started the streaming trend there, and one of them was in a Super Bowl commercial this year!

[KawadaSmile]

Problem is not that they are doing reality TV. They absolutely could have their own creative spin on it. The issue is that Rhodes to the Top feels like Miz and Mrs without the charm. Miz and Maryse, regardless of what one has to say about their in-ring work, are very damn charismatic and come off looking likeable.

The other thing is that Rhodes is also the EVP of the company. It feels like overkill him having essentially his own universe in the company, an executive role AND  a reality show dedicated to him. It's overexposure.

[Coffey]

The question is, will Cody Rhodes also get a Rhodes to the Top action figure?

[sek69]

7 hours ago, KawadaSmile said:

Problem is not that they are doing reality TV. They absolutely could have their own creative spin on it. The issue is that Rhodes to the Top feels like Miz and Mrs without the charm. Miz and Maryse, regardless of what one has to say about their in-ring work, are very damn charismatic and come off looking likeable.

I think you nailed it Bubba. Cody just comes off as unlikable, as opposed to Miz and Maryse, or the Bellas on their shows. I never watched any of the WWE shows, but I heard a lot of folks saying how someone like Nattie came off as a sweetheart on Total Divas and it helped draw more of an audience to the main programming since people wanted to see these characters they liked. Based on all the ads I've seen Cody comes off as a douchebag and I can't imagine anyone wanting to check out AEW because of it. 

I saw someone on Twitter sum it up best by retweeting a pic the AEWonTNT account posted of Cody and Brandi advertising the show and pointing out that to non fans it probably looks like a show about a former Proud Boy turning his life around. 

[NintendoLogic]

Didn't Total Bellas make John Cena look like a self-centered OCD weirdo?

[C.S.]

3 hours ago, NintendoLogic said:

Didn't Total Bellas make John Cena look like a self-centered OCD weirdo?

Yep. He came across like an uncaring, unfeeling OCD cyborg. It was very odd.

11 hours ago, KawadaSmile said:

Problem is not that they are doing reality TV. They absolutely could have their own creative spin on it. The issue is that Rhodes to the Top feels like Miz and Mrs without the charm. Miz and Maryse, regardless of what one has to say about their in-ring work, are very damn charismatic and come off looking likeable. 

You know I love your posts, Bubba, but you're acting like you're stating absolute facts when we both know you haven't seen one minute of this show yet - no one has, since it premieres tomorrow night.

[sek69]

14 minutes ago, C.S. said:

You know I love your posts, Bubba, but you're acting like you're stating absolute facts when we both know you haven't seen one minute of this show yet - no one has, since it premieres tomorrow night.

You can easily come to this conclusion from the commercials, which it should be noted, are the parts they chose to include to paint the show in the best possible light. 

[Coffey]

I saw this going the rounds on the Twitta Machine & wanted to say a comment:

 

 These are the crazy kind of replies that you hear about people making where it feels like it'll always be an "Us Vs. Them" or this side against that side situation. Like the stuff gets so territorial & outlandish, I can't even tell when someone is just fucking around or if they're being serious anymore. I can differentiate trolls from actual fan opinions anymore.

Personally, I don't think the Young Bucks are the best team in their own company, let alone in the world. I would have them firmly behind FTR, The Usos & The Briscoes, but that's just me. I just find it fascination how differing opinions are nowadays. 

And Roman is more entertaining than Kenny by a mile lately. That match with Daniel Bryan is the best thing Kenny Omega has done in AEW. 

[sek69]

I think both the Bucks and Usos have great matches, but the Bucks have meant more in terms of business than the Usos probably ever will. Not that it's the Uso's fault because they are in a company that doesn't see any value in tag teams, but it's telling that the only way they get to be relevant in WWE is because of Roman. If it wasn't for him, they'd be on every PPV pre show facing like the Viking Raiders or some shit. 

[MoS]

I posted this in that thread and I think it encapsulates my feelings: 

 

 

[El-P]

The Young Bucks are the GOAT tag team.
Kenny Omega is a GOAT contender.

All three have pushed pro-wrestling forward in more ways than one (stylistically, building upon teams like the MCMG but also bringing that meta aspect we talked about before; building upon the deep modern Japanese style created by Tanahashi & Okada with a twist from the geeky culture of comedy wrestling via DDT)

The Usos are a good tag team, they are better than the GoD for sure.

Roman Reigns is a good wrestler, he's also the most protected pro-wrestler in the last 10 years so like Orton and the likes, we'll never know exactly what he could be all about outside of the overproduced, overpatterned, and in his case, overprotected environment. With his physical attributes and charisma and tendency to be game, I think he would have done pretty damn well, probably be more interesting even.

Young Bucks & Kenny Omega are part of the foundation (including in term of in-ring style, but also in term of relating to an audience that has been dying for a main alternative product) for the hottest new pro-wrestling product in 20 years.

Roman Reigns will always be synonymous with WWE fighting and trolling his own audience and has been the Top Dog in an era ratings and attendance have dropped (of course, being pushed forever as the Top Dog makes him still the biggest "mover" by default, as showed by last Monday). John Cena he ain't (in any way shape of form).

Usos have produced lots of good matches and many DUIS but are protected because they are not related to Samoa Joe.

There. I think this is about the fairest picture I can paint.  (and I do mean everything I wrote here)

[NintendoLogic]

I'm not super-high on either team, but I can at least see why people consider the Young Bucks all-time greats. With the Usos, I just don't see it at all. Then again, the house style makes most modern WWE tag matches unwatchable for me due to the insistence on simultaneous tags. More to the point, if the Bucks had never existed, the pro wrestling landscape today would be unimaginably different. If the Usos had never existed, it would be exactly the same. The same with Roman. He's a fine talent who's had to overcome some awful booking, but he's not an all-time great like Bret Hart or Bryan Danielson or Kenny Omega. And this Head of the Table shit is unbearable.

[JRH]

Here's an interesting suggestion for the Dynamite after Full Gear

 

 

[El-P]

That would be pretty cool. And have Brian Pillman Jr. work against Rey Fénix or something.

[NintendoLogic]

That'd be the perfect spot for someone to make a Lex Luger-like debut.

[El-P]

Sure ! Who's left who's out there though that would make a big impact ? And no, Braun Strowman is not a good answer.

[sek69]

Doesn't have to be an ex WWE guy, maybe a New Japan guy could show up.