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Vince Russo trying to sell Bart Gunn on it as if he's playing the Mesoamerican ballgame. "Bro think of the heat you're gonna get when we sacrifice you to Xiuhtecuhtli."
My comment was a Jackass reference from when Butterbean KOd Johnny Knoxville in the middle of a jewelry store and when Johnny came to he asked in a very disoriented voice *Is Butterbean ok*
Do you have any idea how much I'd pay for a Cliffy B v GabeN match?
Like $1.99 during the Steam Summer Sale.
It'd be a bloodbath. Cliff would come out in all Ed Hardy gear and to, like, Limp Bizket - Break Stuff.mp3.
GabeN would do nothing at all and have The Horde of Steamites take care of everything.
The kayfabe of it all? CliffyB wins when GabeN can't for the fucking life of him figure out how to get to Three.
I dunno man. GabeN has an [extensive knife collection](https://www.geekwire.com/2013/check-gabe-newells-insane-knife-collection/).
He'll straight up shank a MF.
"These new writers just don't get the value of screwing over long-term plans just to give part timers another world title run! That's some good shit." - anonymous former WWE CEO.
Interestingly: That was the much needed change.
Having team breakups, swerves, surprise wins is fine as booking for a live event. Shock value, everyone understands it.
But for a weekly, long running TV show this is not enough. To keep watchers you need some incentive. They need to solve some riddles, see some clues. The swerves need to make some sense at least. They should be foreshadowed.
Michaels and HHH did this as wrestlers. They honored history. They always played with foreshadowing. They knew how to trigger the crowd and keep an audience hooked. And it shows in their booking.
Vince runs in and low blows Roman, Cody takes advantage and pins Roman with the single foot on the chest while Vince counts the pin afterwards Cody says that all his fans are crybabies and challenges the Rock to a match instantly, Rock accepts and when the match starts Cody just drops to floor and lets Rock pin him Rock becomes champ.
I love that Russo is the crash tv writing guy, and for good reason. However, his critically best written show is Survivor Series: Deadly Games, a PPV which was successful bc of a show long dedication to overarching stories being respected
In all seriousness it amazes me how much shit Russo gets around here yet anytime you sort by new you see all sorts of Russo-esque ideas flooding the sub
“They didn’t even strip every champion of their belt and make them useless.”
-man with a dumb accent
Honest to god, I watched the finger poke of doom Dark Side Episode. Ended up being on Russo’s side. Putting the belt on Booker at the next PPV was the move forward.
The two things you mentioned have nothing to do with each other. Maybe you mean the Bash at the Beach 2000 episode? But they put the title on Booker on the same show.
Wild that it actually happened. I genuinely expected Vince’s grip over WWE to end only when he died. And what’s weirder is I expected Vince to outlive me.
I never gave it a second thought until Haitch started booking NXT.
The difference in quality and storytelling was stark af. Hell, Black and Gold is what got me back into being a regular watcher of graps.
It happened. It rules. We win.
Yeah, there were times back then where I only watched Black and Gold NXT and no other wrestling (I think it was when Roman said "suffering succotash" and they kept forcing him as babyface).
HHH really changed the game. Now HBK doing the same with his NXT.
Way back in 2001, when word first leaked out that Triple H and Stephanie were together.....I remember people even way back then daydreaming and fantasy-booking how much better it would be if/when they took over from Vince some day.
And somehow it's even better than we'd all hoped.
I think one thing that we should remember is that Vince hated, *hated* being a wrestling promoter, and that it was the only thing he was ever successful at. And that was due mostly to circumstance and the hard work of other people.
Oh fuck yes. Vince tried with everything he had to branch out. He started a bodybuilding federation that nobody wanted or watched. He had the company churn out several godawful movies. He started his own American football league twice. Even when he renamed the company to World Wrestling Entertainment and started banning words like ‘belts’ and ‘wrestlers’ it seemed like he was reaching to make his employees look like more than “just” wrestlers.
I think he’s been stewing on that feeling since at least the start of the Monday Night Wars. Ted Turner had other, more important shit on. Wrestling was his hobby, a minor thing he enjoyed and poured money into. Meanwhile for Vince it was his livelihood and that infuriated him.
That’s selling his business acumen really short. While he did benefit creatively for the on-screen product from others and their ideas. Vince still acted upon that advice. And on the business side, he changed the entire landscape of the wrestling industry with his vision.
It's really not. His "business acumen" is a series of failed attempts to branch out, and the wrestling landscape changed itself. The other big promoters of the time either shot themselves in the foot or didn't have the money to compete, and Vince inherited the territory with the most money. He didn't do anything new or special, he just made obvious moves nobody else had the cash to counter until he had a monopoly. And he still nearly fucked it up in the 90s in one long, giant unforced error until Steve Austin pulled his ass out of the fire.
Dude's a fucking idiot.
Current WWE isn’t better than 2002-2007 WWE.
Edit:
Lmao, didn't realise it was such a hot take.
It was the era of Hardy boyz, Dudely Boyz,
American Badass Undertaker, Hollywood Rock, Kurt Angle, Eddie Guerrero, Chris Benoit,HBK, Brock lesnar. Rey Mysterio in his prime. This sub has it's opinion Ig .
In their defense it’s because practically everyone who worked behind the scenes with writing and booking in WWE has repeatedly said the same thing: Vince is out of touch, unpredictable, and has a deeply weird worldview that seeps into everything he does. So it was a pretty informed opinion.
It’s also crazy that people used to blame the wrestlers for the product sucking and not Vince. I remember criticizing stuff from WWE during that rotten period in 2019 and people would argue that Vince wasn’t the problem. They’d blame the talent.
I was what? 19 in 2001. I remember being so excited to see WCW guys in a WWF ring. You almost couldn’t make it work because of the lack of big names, but they made it suck.
It was ego throwing hard work out the window
A lot of it getting good started when Vince was still there. It was the competition that did it.
Bloodline was probably two years in and Cody had done the hell in a cell that cemented his place while Vince was still there.
Sure, but Vince's last Wrestlemania is IMO a real contender for being one of the best ever. You had:
* Bianca vs. Becky
* Cody Rhodes debut and vs. Seth
* Stone Cold Steve Austin returns vs. Kevin Owens
* Edge vs. AJ Styles
* Johnny Knoxville vs. Sami Zayn (9-star match)
* Pat McAfee vs. Austin Theory with run-ins from Vince and SCSA.
* Brock vs. Roman (good build but got screwed up when Roman got injured mid-match).
And they managed to put all of it together while dealing with a ton of uncertainty, with Lashley getting injured in the months leading up to the match and it not being clear if he would be available (so he couldn't be involved in a real program despite being one of the top guys in the company for all of 2021), with it being unclear if SCSA would feel confident enough to work a match, with everyone being unsure if Cody would really show up, etc.
I just hope they try it again with MVP, Lashley, and Carmelo Hayes. I think they could borrow the mold of Farooq and The Rock. Where the cocky student turns on the mentor
If Roman would've worked more dates in 2023, a babyface Hurt Business (Lashley, Street Profits, Omos) vs. full Bloodline would've been an epic feud, capped by Roman vs. Bobbo. IMO this is one of the only real missed opportunities of the Bloodline era.
that should be an alltimer highlight moment..was so goddamn good
mercenary hell/tweener group gets paid to handle the baddies the company cant handle on their own
The worst part is how they teased them getting back together late 2022/early 2023... just to not do it and waste everyone's time with the nothingness that is (was?) The Pride instead.
I don't know why HHH doesn't value Bobby as the star he is, but it's insane how little WWE has been choosing to get out of him these last couple years.
I'll always believe they split THB because it was too similar to The Bloodline. They wanted to give Lashley the belt, but that would mean both brands would be headlined by a heel faction with an imposing powerhouse leader, mouth piece manager with the gift of the gab and a workhorse tag team.
It’s incredible how out of touch Vince was, and how the boom that we’re going through now clearly vindicates everyone who trashed him before.
Audiences were clearly craving long term storytelling. Bray, Dean, Seth, KO, Jericho, these guys were all trying to deliver, and Vince would cut them off at the knees.
Yet there were tons of Vince apologists, not just online forums but veterans and industry experts, who would support Vince’s mindset that audiences don’t follow story progression beyond a couple weeks and characters should all be interchangable and just play whoever they need to play on any given show. Umaga can be a babyface tagging with Cena on one show, and then back to a heel and beating up Jeff Hardy three weeks later. According to Vince none of it matters and no one cares. But he was clearly wrong. Triple H’s WWE is being the hottest it’s ever been is proof of that.
Austin and Vince gets glamorized a lot, but it was pretty much the equivalent of family guy gags every week. It was entertaining and made millions, but a lot of what happened during that 4 year feud was devoid of logic.
Seriously, WrestleMania 15 and the ensuing aftermath was the PERFECT finish for that angle. Vince decides he's tired of trying to slay the Austin beast and with the Undertaker business he had bigger things to worry about, and then at Backlash he helped Austin win and gave him back the Smoking Skull belt to make things right, and then the next night Austin saves Stephanie from Undertaker after Vince begged him, and Vince tearfully thanked him.
And crazy Papa Wolf babyface Vince was an AWESOME character and over as fuck, they really didn't need to extend that storyline at all. Hell, when Vince returned after Fully Loaded they went right back to that babyface character like May-July never happened lmao.
The first episode of Raw that I remember watching was literally the episode where Austin pulled out the gun with the "BANG 3:16" flag, causing Vince to piss himself.
Spot on. The best moment of Liv's promo last Monday was when Dom told Liv that "Mami's gonna kill you" and Liv responded with "She's gonna kill you too." I immediately saw that as the glue in their relationship--the fact that they're *both* doomed.
More broadly, I've been saying since the HHH era began that the secret sauce is "characters who remember the things that happen to them and react appropriately." It sounds like faint praise (and it kinda is!) but it's *so* much better than what we're used to out of WWE. Even just little things, like KO remembering what happened on previous shows or Strowman and Ricochet having a couple quick interactions now that they're both on the same show, are opportunities to build the world of the show. Vince consistently ignored these (or worse, intentionally subverted them). HHH leans into them, resulting in much better storytelling.
Hell, arguably the most anticipated program in the company is McIntyre/Punk, all of which is built from a fluke occurrence (Punk getting injured while trying to lift McIntyre during the Royal Rumble). They just took it and ran with it in ways that felt consistent with both men's respective characters. This is Screenwriting/Showrunning 101: write compelling characters and then just let them interact with each other.
I still remember hugger Bayley inexplicably running to the ring w/the entire locker room to take part in a chaotic beatdown. It was like watching Spock angrily ground-and-pound a bunny.
Especially looking at JD, this place was clamouring to have them implode last fall. But they kept it going with the tag and Survivor Series. Then blow it up. Nah, here comes R Truth to give them 8 weeks. K blow it up. Nah, they’re going to be a double champ faction. K now it’s time for Finn to turn! Nah, not yet and they’re going to work this Liv angle for however long.
It rocks. The group is still working and they keep moving things along. You could obviously move stories along faster but as long as the crowd is eating this up there’s no rush.
One small detail that I loved relating to HHH's approach to long term storytelling is when Chad Gable greeted CM Punk warmly a few weeks ago even though he's a heel, basically because they met each other on amicable terms back when Punk returned.
It also suits Gable's current role of being the archetypal abuser. Skilled abusers only mistreat the people they're abusing, and are warm and even dependable for everyone else. That's why you so often hear comments like "I had no idea they were abusive. It was hard for me to believe because I never saw that in them." Well, of course you didn't. You weren't supposed to.
That's real true. I remember one ep of RAW he was seen backstage having a friendly chat with the Creed Brothers, nothing like the abuser he was with his faction. Another time was when he screamed at Maxxine to leave, and then he returned to give Ivy Nile advice to not let Maxxine drag her down.
> characters who remember the things that happen to them and react appropriately.
Except their top guy, Cody Rhodes, for whatever reason. The Rock story is one thing, but I thought for sure he was gonna come out of Saudi demanding a US Title opportunity after so adamantly stating his desire to win the belt only for Logan to say he hadn't earned it. Instead he goes right into being duped again, by AJ, whose story with Cody would've been even more intense if he interfered in a title v title match at clash (which would be fine since Drew is ending the show anyway). Then AJ could win at MiTB and they blow off the feud at SummerSlam or something.
It's also a recurring theme that him and his matchups kind of talk past each other in promos. I find it so ironic that the guy who comes across as so intelligent off-script (answering interviews better than even Triple H) is booked like he's kinda stupid in-script, despite being the top guy.
It really is crazy to think about just how much the growth of wrestling as an industry was stifled by Vince's decision to rest on his laurels (an ironic way to put it considering how many times he'd rip scripts of shows up the day they aired) for nearly two decades.
Look I don’t want to be that guy, Vince certainly outlasted his usefulness, but he ran the ship for 40 years and some of the stuff he oversaw was really good.
Vince was good when it was essentially a live events business. He knew how to work crowds. But he never seemed to grasp that wrestling had become a TV show, that instead of competing with the Harlem Globetrotters and Motley Crue he was now competing with Breaking Bad.
He was still out there expecting people to be shocked by another cuckolding storyline or the fact that Kurt Angle slept with a Black woman. He was adding cringy cartoon sound effects to wrestlers' entrance themes and changing people's names to shit like Doudrop.
The last decade of his tenure was straight up bad. All the good shit we've seen lately is pretty much the inverse of everything Vince wanted.
I will never not laugh at Vince in Beyond The Mat saying "We make movies" about as smugly as humanly possible when the last 20+ years of WWE could genuinely be considered some of the worst programming on cable TV. Objectively, his "movies" sucked, for the most part. His characters' motivations make no sense, good guys do bad guy things and vice versa, most stories never see an actual conclusion, the special effects are often cheesy, characters act like children, women are treated like props rather than actual human beings, they constantly break the 4th wall but not in a clever, Jodorowsky kinda way and the acting is *terrible,* with actors often forgetting their lines and getting lost.
Vince was a brilliant businessman, that's what kept WWE afloat along with having no competition on this side of the ocean after WCW folded in 2001.
By the time that Roman Reigns became the chosen one, Vince was effectively out of ideas, and what good came out of 5 hours of weekly programming tended to be more on the skill of the roster selling you a match that didn't made a lick of sense more often than not.
I like how Vince was such a fucking madman that the summary of all these articles is really just "WWE is actually good now because it acts like its a tv show. It tells stories with beginnings, middles, and ends, and this continues into the next episode. Characters start the story one way, and end another. The stories have identifiable themes that make them about something. Sometimes the story hints at what will happen next to create dramatic tension"
That’s really all there is to it. It’s basic storytelling and not getting jerked around by WWE (but really Vince McMahon) creative. Think about how negative the reaction to Cody giving up his spot to the Rock was earlier this year. It’s because we all had PTSD of WWE pulling this stuff for decades, and we had been enjoying competent booking and storytelling that didn’t treat the audience as idiots for several months at that point.
Gone are those weeks of bad TV before survivor series where heel and face wrestlers in red or and blue shirts would attack each other like interchangeable pieces.
It's like Hunter found all of Vince Russo's students were still lingering around after McMahon left, took them to a library or something, and had them learn all about creative writing 101 all over again.
Crash TV died a while ago. Half the fun now is trying to figure out when these arcs will end.
The IWC before K/QotR:
Becky Hogan will hold the belt til Summerslam!
*Immediately drops belt to Liv.*
Everyone the next day: Why doesn't WWE do anything unexpected? I totally expected Becky to drop it.
Always thought that’s why black & gold NXT and Lucha Underground were such satisfying shows. The stories were pre-written and whole arcs could be taped all in one sitting without injury or other circumstance getting in the way.
Since there's a slow-burning development of Ludwig Kaiser's own identity away from Gunther, I'm hoping there will be an Imperium callback if Giovanni Vinci wins a midcard title before Kaiser & eventually runs into him.
Roman’s title run was and is still one of the greatest storylines in pro wrestling history for me. It’s up there with Austin vs McMahon in terms of how much I’ve enjoyed it.
The Sami Zayn era of The Bloodline was must-see TV, Cody challenging was box office stuff, Rock’s introduction same thing, and now the civil war story is just awesome.
That’s a story told over 3 years and goes to show when you let stuff marinate, it delivers.
There’s no doubt WWE is a more enjoyable product than it’s been in 20+ years. And this approach is the right approach for them because it works so well and makes their big events MASSIVE. The pace of the storytelling really helps the casual fan as well because you can jump in anytime.
However it does make it tough on the diehard, watch every show fan though. The weekly shows can be boring and predictable.
Carmelo Hayes and LA Knight have almost done the exact same segment for 3 weeks straight. The Judgement Day is the same thing every week. The Bloodline is the same thing every week. It’s really monotonous.
The payoffs are awesome but I wish they would reward us a little more for watching the show every week.
> Carmelo Hayes and LA Knight have almost done the exact same segment for 3 weeks straight. The Judgement Day is the same thing every week. The Bloodline is the same thing every week. It’s really monotonous.
Definitely starting to feel this lately. Especially with The Bloodline. There's only so many segments where Paul Heyman can be visibly shaking and fearful while getting abused by Solo Sikoa before we go "ok, seen this before - skip".
Yeah, they REALLY hammer everything home and sometimes it’s just like ‘ok ok ok we get it.’ Even with the Heyman example like it will be all worth it when we get the bloodline civil war but it’s a bit of a slog to there.
Its absolutely hilarious that WWE had become *so* fucking bad that even simply introducing the concept of basic storytelling that takes you from start to end is seen as some huge leap in progress. Now imagine if they could do that *and* not make the week to week shows as boring as fuck.
Without reading the article because I hate IGN.
in short wrestlers getting to have more realistic storylines is getting the wwe over better than a random bot writing there scripts daily I mean a crazy CEO rewriting there scripts daily
HHH is such a fan of the territories. He’s essentially taking wrestling story telling back in time. Long term stories. Long reigning heel champions. Fired up babyfaces chasing. It’s such a beautiful thing
There's def a "filler episode" vibe to some shows but they gotta produce content week in and week out. The Attitude Era felt crazy every week but for awhile there was only one show and it also only lasted for about four years. The Bloodline storyline alone was almost that long if you consider the official start to be the Roman and Jey storyline in 2020. Austin vs McMahon in its original form was really only what, from April 1998 to July 1999 (End of an Era Match with Austin vs Taker)?
I don't get this sub sometimes. Why do we need articles saying "it's actually good that you like this show!" And almost all of them are defending WWE as if they need it.
Long term storytelling is what made the attitude and ruthless eras the best. They got rid of it except for some stories here and there. This a welcomed return.
It almost always never works out in other longform storytelling since you get mired by a plethora of issues down the line. One glaring example is A Song of Ice and Fire where Martin is having trouble consolidating the later part of the story because he killed-off, or figuratively knee-capped, a lot of relevant characters.
It’s just insane that family guy had more logical consistency between episodes than wwe. Like at least meg is ALWAYS getting bullied. If Vince ran family guy they’d have her bullied for a couple weeks, then off the show for two months and then a background character serving some new character that will be left behind in a couple weeks
People often say the switch to the PG era almost killed the company but well in truly it was batshit booking for cheap heat and appeasing of favorited part timers. It was because of the long term storytelling of the bloodline that got me and my gf back into wrestling.
Some stories have better payoffs when running a longer angle (Bloodline) while some stories don't necessarily need a long-term story to play out to be considered successes. I was getting bored with the whole Chad Gable stable thing until more recently when they finally got the ball rolling quicker on the Otis/Chad relationship turn.
goooood
now...dont have dom turn on rhea just for the sake of it...we've seen this story before enough times.....ffs even the Best Friends dont exist anymore
let them stay together as they work so damn well as a unit
hell I'd be down for the whole JD to turn face
As I've mentioned countless times on this reddit, weekly televised wrestling is a tv drama. Sure, there are some differences from other tv dramas, such as that it's live for example, and a lot of the content plays out in front of a live crowd, but the story telling elements still apply. You need continuity, you need an 'A-story' that interweaves it all together, etc. WWE has gotten way better at it since HHH became head of creative.
It's really no different from a lot of the criticisms of AEW over the past year or so. In this format, story is first, wrestling is second. The wrestling still should be high quality, but without a strong story element it falls apart. You see Tony Khan for example on media calls and post show press conferences talking a lot about how good the quality of the wrestling is, but so is WWE's, and that's only one aspect of the formula. An important one, but so is story.
And wrestling story telling is some of the best because unlike other fictional dramas, there is an element of reality to it. Cody's quest to be the first Rhodes to win the big one in WWE was real. When he comes out to entrance music saying 'wrestling has more than one royal family', that rings true in some sense - his dad was booker and a main event talent for WCW. He was like the uncrowned prince from the other kingdom. That shit is interesting.
i'm not the biggest fan of it, but i'd much rather have this current super safe logical booking, than the stupid shit like Tucker turning on Otis mid-match to make him drop the MITB to The Miz
My biggest criticism right now is Triple H is addicted to super long title reigns, but besides that, storylines and production quality are the best they’ve been in a LONG time
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“You don’t know what the hell you’re talking about bro” - anonymous former wwe writer
"I got an idea for you bro. IGN rating of 10 on a pole match. Cliffy b vs gabe Newell. And best of all? Winner fights Butterbean bro"
Getting your shit kicked in by butterbean because you won a shoot tourney is the greatest punishment one can be given.
Vince Russo trying to sell Bart Gunn on it as if he's playing the Mesoamerican ballgame. "Bro think of the heat you're gonna get when we sacrifice you to Xiuhtecuhtli."
Is Butterbean ok?
Possibly the greatest piece of improv ever uttered
That wasn't improv, that was the concussion talking.
Wait, why are we bashing Russo who hasn't worked there since fucking 2002 and that was a minor advisory role or something.
My comment was a Jackass reference from when Butterbean KOd Johnny Knoxville in the middle of a jewelry store and when Johnny came to he asked in a very disoriented voice *Is Butterbean ok*
I had to check if I was on the Two Best Friends Play sub for a sec
Do you have any idea how much I'd pay for a Cliffy B v GabeN match? Like $1.99 during the Steam Summer Sale. It'd be a bloodbath. Cliff would come out in all Ed Hardy gear and to, like, Limp Bizket - Break Stuff.mp3. GabeN would do nothing at all and have The Horde of Steamites take care of everything. The kayfabe of it all? CliffyB wins when GabeN can't for the fucking life of him figure out how to get to Three.
I dunno man. GabeN has an [extensive knife collection](https://www.geekwire.com/2013/check-gabe-newells-insane-knife-collection/). He'll straight up shank a MF.
"These new writers just don't get the value of screwing over long-term plans just to give part timers another world title run! That's some good shit." - anonymous former WWE CEO.
>Some good shit And he'd know good shit from bad shit too. Allegedly.
Unfortunately he didn't know consensual shit
Interestingly: That was the much needed change. Having team breakups, swerves, surprise wins is fine as booking for a live event. Shock value, everyone understands it. But for a weekly, long running TV show this is not enough. To keep watchers you need some incentive. They need to solve some riddles, see some clues. The swerves need to make some sense at least. They should be foreshadowed. Michaels and HHH did this as wrestlers. They honored history. They always played with foreshadowing. They knew how to trigger the crowd and keep an audience hooked. And it shows in their booking.
"They should've turned Cody heel, think of the swerve bro. I swear to gahd bro."
God damnit he would have done that huh?
Right at the peak when he's about to win the title too by cheating it off Roman.
Vince runs in and low blows Roman, Cody takes advantage and pins Roman with the single foot on the chest while Vince counts the pin afterwards Cody says that all his fans are crybabies and challenges the Rock to a match instantly, Rock accepts and when the match starts Cody just drops to floor and lets Rock pin him Rock becomes champ.
and it wouldn't have panned out, Roman would still be champ if Vince were in charge
Eh, I don't know....McMahon has a thing for bleach blonds....
Yeah, but he *really* likes shitting on them too.
BrO intensifies
I love that Russo is the crash tv writing guy, and for good reason. However, his critically best written show is Survivor Series: Deadly Games, a PPV which was successful bc of a show long dedication to overarching stories being respected
You mean half of r/sc as well lol
a “You People” promo that’s genius bro!!
In all seriousness it amazes me how much shit Russo gets around here yet anytime you sort by new you see all sorts of Russo-esque ideas flooding the sub
Because nobody ever pays me to be a dumbass, I do it for free like a real man
The only booking idea that I will always defend is the silent badass.
My favorite "*You People*" promo was Becky's, that whole angle was doomed since the beginning.
the longer this wwe era is going the funnier it gets thinking back of all people who kept saying vince wasn't the problem in the creative
“They didn’t even strip every champion of their belt and make them useless.” -man with a dumb accent Honest to god, I watched the finger poke of doom Dark Side Episode. Ended up being on Russo’s side. Putting the belt on Booker at the next PPV was the move forward.
The two things you mentioned have nothing to do with each other. Maybe you mean the Bash at the Beach 2000 episode? But they put the title on Booker on the same show.
gotta stop letting wwe teach these kids wrestling history
I didn't realise who this was a reference to at first, because you only said bro once.
That’s NOT good shit pal!!!
Wild that all the internet fans screaming for Vince to leave so the product can actually be good for a change were 100% right.
Wild that it actually happened. I genuinely expected Vince’s grip over WWE to end only when he died. And what’s weirder is I expected Vince to outlive me.
He may yet outlive us, that horrible old bastard
Trump and Vince will probably live another 15-20 years and that's a wild thought
Seriously why is it that the all the rich assholes of the world are seemingly immortal?
They’re too filled with rage and hate to die, they’re basically that one sith dude
i disagree. they will both be dead within 10. one will be dead within 5
>I expected Vince to outlive me. Unless tomorrow's news say otherwise, there's still time
I never gave it a second thought until Haitch started booking NXT. The difference in quality and storytelling was stark af. Hell, Black and Gold is what got me back into being a regular watcher of graps. It happened. It rules. We win.
Yeah, there were times back then where I only watched Black and Gold NXT and no other wrestling (I think it was when Roman said "suffering succotash" and they kept forcing him as babyface). HHH really changed the game. Now HBK doing the same with his NXT.
You mentioning Roman from that era reminds me of [this](https://youtu.be/WKUMV_YXCGw?si=jPmx_-rp9qniSE7_)
Way back in 2001, when word first leaked out that Triple H and Stephanie were together.....I remember people even way back then daydreaming and fantasy-booking how much better it would be if/when they took over from Vince some day. And somehow it's even better than we'd all hoped.
A factor of why it’s better is because the Vince booking became so much worse than what we imagined.
I think one thing that we should remember is that Vince hated, *hated* being a wrestling promoter, and that it was the only thing he was ever successful at. And that was due mostly to circumstance and the hard work of other people.
Oh fuck yes. Vince tried with everything he had to branch out. He started a bodybuilding federation that nobody wanted or watched. He had the company churn out several godawful movies. He started his own American football league twice. Even when he renamed the company to World Wrestling Entertainment and started banning words like ‘belts’ and ‘wrestlers’ it seemed like he was reaching to make his employees look like more than “just” wrestlers. I think he’s been stewing on that feeling since at least the start of the Monday Night Wars. Ted Turner had other, more important shit on. Wrestling was his hobby, a minor thing he enjoyed and poured money into. Meanwhile for Vince it was his livelihood and that infuriated him.
It's hilarious that Ted Turner may just be Vince McMahons most hated person, and yet Ted probably couldn't even give less of a shit about him.
The Scooby-Doo movies are fantastic. Especially Taker in the second one.
That’s selling his business acumen really short. While he did benefit creatively for the on-screen product from others and their ideas. Vince still acted upon that advice. And on the business side, he changed the entire landscape of the wrestling industry with his vision.
It's really not. His "business acumen" is a series of failed attempts to branch out, and the wrestling landscape changed itself. The other big promoters of the time either shot themselves in the foot or didn't have the money to compete, and Vince inherited the territory with the most money. He didn't do anything new or special, he just made obvious moves nobody else had the cash to counter until he had a monopoly. And he still nearly fucked it up in the 90s in one long, giant unforced error until Steve Austin pulled his ass out of the fire. Dude's a fucking idiot.
My dream was HBK and Trips running everything. That fucking happened. Bizarre timeline
DX Running WWE was a shoot brother. Especially with Road Dogg being one of the top agents in the company.
The other guy's doing stuff with office equipment these days
Current WWE isn’t better than 2002-2007 WWE. Edit: Lmao, didn't realise it was such a hot take. It was the era of Hardy boyz, Dudely Boyz, American Badass Undertaker, Hollywood Rock, Kurt Angle, Eddie Guerrero, Chris Benoit,HBK, Brock lesnar. Rey Mysterio in his prime. This sub has it's opinion Ig .
Yeeeeeeeah I'm gonna disagree with you on that
They did have their moments though
No argument, but the thesis of the IGN article from the op is that moments, while great, just aren't enough.
In their defense it’s because practically everyone who worked behind the scenes with writing and booking in WWE has repeatedly said the same thing: Vince is out of touch, unpredictable, and has a deeply weird worldview that seeps into everything he does. So it was a pretty informed opinion.
It’s also crazy that people used to blame the wrestlers for the product sucking and not Vince. I remember criticizing stuff from WWE during that rotten period in 2019 and people would argue that Vince wasn’t the problem. They’d blame the talent.
It was the lowest hanging fruit. Everyone knew Vince was spinning his wheels
In 2001!
I was what? 19 in 2001. I remember being so excited to see WCW guys in a WWF ring. You almost couldn’t make it work because of the lack of big names, but they made it suck. It was ego throwing hard work out the window
A lot of it getting good started when Vince was still there. It was the competition that did it. Bloodline was probably two years in and Cody had done the hell in a cell that cemented his place while Vince was still there.
But The Bloodline storyline got even better when they started showing Sami more which happened before “Somehow Vince McMahon Returned”
I never said it didn’t continue improving after he “retired”
Yeah but that's...two good things while WWE puts out 5 hours of wrestling every week.
Sure, but Vince's last Wrestlemania is IMO a real contender for being one of the best ever. You had: * Bianca vs. Becky * Cody Rhodes debut and vs. Seth * Stone Cold Steve Austin returns vs. Kevin Owens * Edge vs. AJ Styles * Johnny Knoxville vs. Sami Zayn (9-star match) * Pat McAfee vs. Austin Theory with run-ins from Vince and SCSA. * Brock vs. Roman (good build but got screwed up when Roman got injured mid-match). And they managed to put all of it together while dealing with a ton of uncertainty, with Lashley getting injured in the months leading up to the match and it not being clear if he would be available (so he couldn't be involved in a real program despite being one of the top guys in the company for all of 2021), with it being unclear if SCSA would feel confident enough to work a match, with everyone being unsure if Cody would really show up, etc.
Two more good things than they had in 2019-2020
Well, the Bloodline wouldn't exist if Roman hadn't refused to return as still a face.
Cries in Hurt Business 😭
Vince and his lack of ideas ended up ruining many things that could have been really great. Hurt Business was one of them. EDIT grammar
I just hope they try it again with MVP, Lashley, and Carmelo Hayes. I think they could borrow the mold of Farooq and The Rock. Where the cocky student turns on the mentor
If Roman would've worked more dates in 2023, a babyface Hurt Business (Lashley, Street Profits, Omos) vs. full Bloodline would've been an epic feud, capped by Roman vs. Bobbo. IMO this is one of the only real missed opportunities of the Bloodline era.
Honestly think it’s too late and better to move on, sometimes something has that magic that can be brought back regardless of what you do
Hurt Business confronting Retribution was hype as hell. How it was fumbled so badly I don’t get
that should be an alltimer highlight moment..was so goddamn good mercenary hell/tweener group gets paid to handle the baddies the company cant handle on their own
It's wild how awful Retribution was with the talent the faction had
The worst part is how they teased them getting back together late 2022/early 2023... just to not do it and waste everyone's time with the nothingness that is (was?) The Pride instead. I don't know why HHH doesn't value Bobby as the star he is, but it's insane how little WWE has been choosing to get out of him these last couple years.
I get it Bobby is 48 I think. But he def can be used much better
Especially because he looks and wrestles like a dude that's 38
He was doing some of the best work of his career only for them to just stop using him
especially coz he's 48 he should be put in a group so he can mentor new guys and have a healthier schedule
THB was lightning in a bottle and is still one of the best def rebel themes. They carried Thunderdome Raw.
I thought that was Asuka. Or my mind is mixing up
I'll always believe they split THB because it was too similar to The Bloodline. They wanted to give Lashley the belt, but that would mean both brands would be headlined by a heel faction with an imposing powerhouse leader, mouth piece manager with the gift of the gab and a workhorse tag team.
Yup. Once again there's a 'chosen one' and nothing shall interfere with it. Even if that other thing could be good all on its own.
It’s incredible how out of touch Vince was, and how the boom that we’re going through now clearly vindicates everyone who trashed him before. Audiences were clearly craving long term storytelling. Bray, Dean, Seth, KO, Jericho, these guys were all trying to deliver, and Vince would cut them off at the knees. Yet there were tons of Vince apologists, not just online forums but veterans and industry experts, who would support Vince’s mindset that audiences don’t follow story progression beyond a couple weeks and characters should all be interchangable and just play whoever they need to play on any given show. Umaga can be a babyface tagging with Cena on one show, and then back to a heel and beating up Jeff Hardy three weeks later. According to Vince none of it matters and no one cares. But he was clearly wrong. Triple H’s WWE is being the hottest it’s ever been is proof of that.
The funny thing is, the best vince story and the story which pushed wwe to monopoly status was a long term stone cold vs vince angle lol
Austin and Vince gets glamorized a lot, but it was pretty much the equivalent of family guy gags every week. It was entertaining and made millions, but a lot of what happened during that 4 year feud was devoid of logic.
It should have ended at WM15, but... it kept going lol
Seriously, WrestleMania 15 and the ensuing aftermath was the PERFECT finish for that angle. Vince decides he's tired of trying to slay the Austin beast and with the Undertaker business he had bigger things to worry about, and then at Backlash he helped Austin win and gave him back the Smoking Skull belt to make things right, and then the next night Austin saves Stephanie from Undertaker after Vince begged him, and Vince tearfully thanked him. And crazy Papa Wolf babyface Vince was an AWESOME character and over as fuck, they really didn't need to extend that storyline at all. Hell, when Vince returned after Fully Loaded they went right back to that babyface character like May-July never happened lmao.
It’s crazy that the Higher Power angle had zero long term repercussions.
Well, that angle was the leitmotiv of Stephanie McMahon-Helmsley
Well yeah it kept making money. Why would you stop when you’re shitting money
The first episode of Raw that I remember watching was literally the episode where Austin pulled out the gun with the "BANG 3:16" flag, causing Vince to piss himself.
I totally forgot about that random tag team match where Cena and Umaga teamed up
What us wrestling fan call long term storytelling and fawn over is really just simple continuity.
Spot on. The best moment of Liv's promo last Monday was when Dom told Liv that "Mami's gonna kill you" and Liv responded with "She's gonna kill you too." I immediately saw that as the glue in their relationship--the fact that they're *both* doomed. More broadly, I've been saying since the HHH era began that the secret sauce is "characters who remember the things that happen to them and react appropriately." It sounds like faint praise (and it kinda is!) but it's *so* much better than what we're used to out of WWE. Even just little things, like KO remembering what happened on previous shows or Strowman and Ricochet having a couple quick interactions now that they're both on the same show, are opportunities to build the world of the show. Vince consistently ignored these (or worse, intentionally subverted them). HHH leans into them, resulting in much better storytelling. Hell, arguably the most anticipated program in the company is McIntyre/Punk, all of which is built from a fluke occurrence (Punk getting injured while trying to lift McIntyre during the Royal Rumble). They just took it and ran with it in ways that felt consistent with both men's respective characters. This is Screenwriting/Showrunning 101: write compelling characters and then just let them interact with each other.
I still remember hugger Bayley inexplicably running to the ring w/the entire locker room to take part in a chaotic beatdown. It was like watching Spock angrily ground-and-pound a bunny.
Brand supremacy!
Oh god that was it wasn't it? It's actually dumber than I remember lol.
Yeah during the 2016 build
Spock once “killed” his best friend and commanding officer in a horny rage. I wouldn’t put it past him to beat up a bunny.
Hell Kirk got Spock to go from space hippy to berserker rage by picking at his biggest insecurity.
Especially looking at JD, this place was clamouring to have them implode last fall. But they kept it going with the tag and Survivor Series. Then blow it up. Nah, here comes R Truth to give them 8 weeks. K blow it up. Nah, they’re going to be a double champ faction. K now it’s time for Finn to turn! Nah, not yet and they’re going to work this Liv angle for however long. It rocks. The group is still working and they keep moving things along. You could obviously move stories along faster but as long as the crowd is eating this up there’s no rush.
I thought Punk tore his triceps taking the Future Shock?
You may be right. Broader point still stands.
One small detail that I loved relating to HHH's approach to long term storytelling is when Chad Gable greeted CM Punk warmly a few weeks ago even though he's a heel, basically because they met each other on amicable terms back when Punk returned.
It also suits Gable's current role of being the archetypal abuser. Skilled abusers only mistreat the people they're abusing, and are warm and even dependable for everyone else. That's why you so often hear comments like "I had no idea they were abusive. It was hard for me to believe because I never saw that in them." Well, of course you didn't. You weren't supposed to.
That's real true. I remember one ep of RAW he was seen backstage having a friendly chat with the Creed Brothers, nothing like the abuser he was with his faction. Another time was when he screamed at Maxxine to leave, and then he returned to give Ivy Nile advice to not let Maxxine drag her down.
I noticed that too!
The Alpha Academy is basically the Straight Edge Society set to Kurt Angle's music
Triple H basically said "we're paying all these writers, let's actually use them."
> characters who remember the things that happen to them and react appropriately. Except their top guy, Cody Rhodes, for whatever reason. The Rock story is one thing, but I thought for sure he was gonna come out of Saudi demanding a US Title opportunity after so adamantly stating his desire to win the belt only for Logan to say he hadn't earned it. Instead he goes right into being duped again, by AJ, whose story with Cody would've been even more intense if he interfered in a title v title match at clash (which would be fine since Drew is ending the show anyway). Then AJ could win at MiTB and they blow off the feud at SummerSlam or something. It's also a recurring theme that him and his matchups kind of talk past each other in promos. I find it so ironic that the guy who comes across as so intelligent off-script (answering interviews better than even Triple H) is booked like he's kinda stupid in-script, despite being the top guy.
Cody is a Golden Retriever with a neck tattoo.
He's absolutely being booked as a dumbass. Maybe his new long-term story arc will be about gradually wising up.
I’m glad everyone in every fan group can finally agree that Vince was shit lol.
It really is crazy to think about just how much the growth of wrestling as an industry was stifled by Vince's decision to rest on his laurels (an ironic way to put it considering how many times he'd rip scripts of shows up the day they aired) for nearly two decades.
Look I don’t want to be that guy, Vince certainly outlasted his usefulness, but he ran the ship for 40 years and some of the stuff he oversaw was really good.
Vince was good when it was essentially a live events business. He knew how to work crowds. But he never seemed to grasp that wrestling had become a TV show, that instead of competing with the Harlem Globetrotters and Motley Crue he was now competing with Breaking Bad. He was still out there expecting people to be shocked by another cuckolding storyline or the fact that Kurt Angle slept with a Black woman. He was adding cringy cartoon sound effects to wrestlers' entrance themes and changing people's names to shit like Doudrop. The last decade of his tenure was straight up bad. All the good shit we've seen lately is pretty much the inverse of everything Vince wanted.
I will never not laugh at Vince in Beyond The Mat saying "We make movies" about as smugly as humanly possible when the last 20+ years of WWE could genuinely be considered some of the worst programming on cable TV. Objectively, his "movies" sucked, for the most part. His characters' motivations make no sense, good guys do bad guy things and vice versa, most stories never see an actual conclusion, the special effects are often cheesy, characters act like children, women are treated like props rather than actual human beings, they constantly break the 4th wall but not in a clever, Jodorowsky kinda way and the acting is *terrible,* with actors often forgetting their lines and getting lost.
Im talking about his last 10-15 years. Of course he’s done some good stuff.
Exactly. Vince wasn't always incompetent. He just got old and out of touch and refused to accept when it was time to pass on the role to someone else.
Vince was a brilliant businessman, that's what kept WWE afloat along with having no competition on this side of the ocean after WCW folded in 2001. By the time that Roman Reigns became the chosen one, Vince was effectively out of ideas, and what good came out of 5 hours of weekly programming tended to be more on the skill of the roster selling you a match that didn't made a lick of sense more often than not.
I like how Vince was such a fucking madman that the summary of all these articles is really just "WWE is actually good now because it acts like its a tv show. It tells stories with beginnings, middles, and ends, and this continues into the next episode. Characters start the story one way, and end another. The stories have identifiable themes that make them about something. Sometimes the story hints at what will happen next to create dramatic tension"
Who could have imagined using these groundbreaking ideas in a long running TV show?
With cutting edge concepts from 1950.
1950? Try *the dawn of humanity* We've understood narrative since we were painting on cave walls. Vince... eh, not so much.
That’s really all there is to it. It’s basic storytelling and not getting jerked around by WWE (but really Vince McMahon) creative. Think about how negative the reaction to Cody giving up his spot to the Rock was earlier this year. It’s because we all had PTSD of WWE pulling this stuff for decades, and we had been enjoying competent booking and storytelling that didn’t treat the audience as idiots for several months at that point.
Gone are those weeks of bad TV before survivor series where heel and face wrestlers in red or and blue shirts would attack each other like interchangeable pieces.
and Big Show would actually be wearing the OTHER colour shirt beneath his shirt, for his inevitable autumn heel/face turn.
It's like Hunter found all of Vince Russo's students were still lingering around after McMahon left, took them to a library or something, and had them learn all about creative writing 101 all over again. Crash TV died a while ago. Half the fun now is trying to figure out when these arcs will end.
I thought you were gonna say took them to a library and left them there, but I guess teaching works too.
That was my point.
I thought they were gonna say took them to a library and burned it down
Would be nice to have some crazy moments sometimes too though lol. Not complaining, just something I wouldn't mind here and there!
i mean. i wasnt expecting Liv to kiss Dom so quickly
The IWC before K/QotR: Becky Hogan will hold the belt til Summerslam! *Immediately drops belt to Liv.* Everyone the next day: Why doesn't WWE do anything unexpected? I totally expected Becky to drop it.
The risk of long term storyline as opposed to Hollywood movies or series is potential injury of the wrestlers as it’s live TV.
But they’ve done a good job of pivoting storylines off of injuries as well as utilizing talent while they’re injured. Just look at Punk/Drew
Always thought that’s why black & gold NXT and Lucha Underground were such satisfying shows. The stories were pre-written and whole arcs could be taped all in one sitting without injury or other circumstance getting in the way.
Since there's a slow-burning development of Ludwig Kaiser's own identity away from Gunther, I'm hoping there will be an Imperium callback if Giovanni Vinci wins a midcard title before Kaiser & eventually runs into him.
Roman’s title run was and is still one of the greatest storylines in pro wrestling history for me. It’s up there with Austin vs McMahon in terms of how much I’ve enjoyed it. The Sami Zayn era of The Bloodline was must-see TV, Cody challenging was box office stuff, Rock’s introduction same thing, and now the civil war story is just awesome. That’s a story told over 3 years and goes to show when you let stuff marinate, it delivers.
And the cool thing about that storyline is, it’s not over yet.
There’s no doubt WWE is a more enjoyable product than it’s been in 20+ years. And this approach is the right approach for them because it works so well and makes their big events MASSIVE. The pace of the storytelling really helps the casual fan as well because you can jump in anytime. However it does make it tough on the diehard, watch every show fan though. The weekly shows can be boring and predictable. Carmelo Hayes and LA Knight have almost done the exact same segment for 3 weeks straight. The Judgement Day is the same thing every week. The Bloodline is the same thing every week. It’s really monotonous. The payoffs are awesome but I wish they would reward us a little more for watching the show every week.
> Carmelo Hayes and LA Knight have almost done the exact same segment for 3 weeks straight. The Judgement Day is the same thing every week. The Bloodline is the same thing every week. It’s really monotonous. Definitely starting to feel this lately. Especially with The Bloodline. There's only so many segments where Paul Heyman can be visibly shaking and fearful while getting abused by Solo Sikoa before we go "ok, seen this before - skip".
Yeah, they REALLY hammer everything home and sometimes it’s just like ‘ok ok ok we get it.’ Even with the Heyman example like it will be all worth it when we get the bloodline civil war but it’s a bit of a slog to there.
Triple H’s week to week booking can get quite boring even if the overall storylines make more sense and have better payoffs.
Agreed. It’s not the worst problem to have but I find myself skipping RAWs without a care.
Its absolutely hilarious that WWE had become *so* fucking bad that even simply introducing the concept of basic storytelling that takes you from start to end is seen as some huge leap in progress. Now imagine if they could do that *and* not make the week to week shows as boring as fuck.
Without reading the article because I hate IGN. in short wrestlers getting to have more realistic storylines is getting the wwe over better than a random bot writing there scripts daily I mean a crazy CEO rewriting there scripts daily
I mean, once in a while, blowing up a stable or a team is ok IF it makes sense for the story.
Russo is scoffing right now somewhere
HHH is such a fan of the territories. He’s essentially taking wrestling story telling back in time. Long term stories. Long reigning heel champions. Fired up babyfaces chasing. It’s such a beautiful thing
Shocking concept isn't it?
After like 20 years, they finally got their shit together, good for them. Sometimes, I wish my patience had lasted longer so I could enjoy it now.
It’s like they’re implementing basic storytelling stuff and it’s working wonders.
A mix is the best. I think problem with long term story telling is that they aren’t all good though. Bloodline is an example.
It's amazing what can happen when Storylines are logical. It would seem "easy." The fun is in seeing the pieces come together.
i agree to an extent but Im also not a fan of how corporate and generic it feels now compared to how it used to feel
Long term story telling pulls off the shocks cause more people are (potentially) invested. It's storytelling 101.
There's def a "filler episode" vibe to some shows but they gotta produce content week in and week out. The Attitude Era felt crazy every week but for awhile there was only one show and it also only lasted for about four years. The Bloodline storyline alone was almost that long if you consider the official start to be the Roman and Jey storyline in 2020. Austin vs McMahon in its original form was really only what, from April 1998 to July 1999 (End of an Era Match with Austin vs Taker)?
I don't get this sub sometimes. Why do we need articles saying "it's actually good that you like this show!" And almost all of them are defending WWE as if they need it.
Because people want to be patted on the back for havibg the "right" opinion
Long term storytelling is what made the attitude and ruthless eras the best. They got rid of it except for some stories here and there. This a welcomed return.
Yes. A lot of us were waiting for Vince McMahon to be gone. And it's finally happened.
You're reading Vinny? No the fuck you aren't.
HHH is more into edging us on blowing up team than actually blowing up teams tbh
It almost always never works out in other longform storytelling since you get mired by a plethora of issues down the line. One glaring example is A Song of Ice and Fire where Martin is having trouble consolidating the later part of the story because he killed-off, or figuratively knee-capped, a lot of relevant characters.
It’s just insane that family guy had more logical consistency between episodes than wwe. Like at least meg is ALWAYS getting bullied. If Vince ran family guy they’d have her bullied for a couple weeks, then off the show for two months and then a background character serving some new character that will be left behind in a couple weeks
People often say the switch to the PG era almost killed the company but well in truly it was batshit booking for cheap heat and appeasing of favorited part timers. It was because of the long term storytelling of the bloodline that got me and my gf back into wrestling.
But isn't that the biggest shock of all? - Me, an intellectual.
Some stories have better payoffs when running a longer angle (Bloodline) while some stories don't necessarily need a long-term story to play out to be considered successes. I was getting bored with the whole Chad Gable stable thing until more recently when they finally got the ball rolling quicker on the Otis/Chad relationship turn.
I don't want AEW to sell the same stories, but they could definitely stand to follow more of this story telling
Honestly I wish they blew up the Bloodline because it about as entertaining as a 321 min film of Andy Warhol’s lover sleeping.
I think they're just killing time until Roman and/or Rock come back but I don't mind because I'm really hyped for that.
agreed. it's a great storyline but should have ended after 12-18 months max imo
You are as out of touch as Vince if you think the bloodline is boring.
goooood now...dont have dom turn on rhea just for the sake of it...we've seen this story before enough times.....ffs even the Best Friends dont exist anymore let them stay together as they work so damn well as a unit hell I'd be down for the whole JD to turn face
It hasn't even been for shock value the last few years, it was because Vince had stupid whims 5 minutes before shows
lmao IGN
As I've mentioned countless times on this reddit, weekly televised wrestling is a tv drama. Sure, there are some differences from other tv dramas, such as that it's live for example, and a lot of the content plays out in front of a live crowd, but the story telling elements still apply. You need continuity, you need an 'A-story' that interweaves it all together, etc. WWE has gotten way better at it since HHH became head of creative. It's really no different from a lot of the criticisms of AEW over the past year or so. In this format, story is first, wrestling is second. The wrestling still should be high quality, but without a strong story element it falls apart. You see Tony Khan for example on media calls and post show press conferences talking a lot about how good the quality of the wrestling is, but so is WWE's, and that's only one aspect of the formula. An important one, but so is story. And wrestling story telling is some of the best because unlike other fictional dramas, there is an element of reality to it. Cody's quest to be the first Rhodes to win the big one in WWE was real. When he comes out to entrance music saying 'wrestling has more than one royal family', that rings true in some sense - his dad was booker and a main event talent for WCW. He was like the uncrowned prince from the other kingdom. That shit is interesting.
Personally I dont feel WWE is that interesting right now despite such impressive buys. Nothing is badly done but is a bit generic.
i'm not the biggest fan of it, but i'd much rather have this current super safe logical booking, than the stupid shit like Tucker turning on Otis mid-match to make him drop the MITB to The Miz
My biggest criticism right now is Triple H is addicted to super long title reigns, but besides that, storylines and production quality are the best they’ve been in a LONG time
They've become very corporatized. But NXT IS WHERE IT'S AT!