Impact wrestling thread - It's a Don West tribute thread now!

[garynysmon]

28 minutes ago, Accident Prone said:

However, this whole Scarlett Bourdeux character is a step in the wrong direction. It reeks of cheap Attitude Era titillation and will only encourage the writers to throw in more of that badly aged dirge.

I'm interested to see how it will all pan out. But personally speaking, even Attitude-esque cheap titillation makes a nice change of pace from what everyone else is doing at the moment. Wrestling needs to be fun again.

I prefer that to some of the OTT supernatural skits they're doing. I know it worked with the Broken Hardys but thought the brawl in the woods between Eddie and Sami and the Madison Rayne/Su Yung casket stuff was a step too far for my tastes.

Edited July 30, 2018 by garynysmon

[Accident Prone]

Personally, I think wrestling is still fun but that's because I'm one of these sad acts who watches the indies and NJPW blah blah blah uninteresting indy wank blah blah.

So I can see why, to a casual fan or even just to someone drifting away from the 'E (not directing that at you, I mean just in general), stuff like that can still be appealing as it's totally different to what's mainly on the telly now. 

For me though, it just lowers the tone. I've never seen the point of mixing wrestling with an issue of Loaded, it just makes me feel uncomfortable. I'm not watching wrestling for that; i'm watching for the characters and stories and the combustible elements surrounding that. Oh, and the wrestling too I suppose.

Of course, have your femme fatales but have them show their sexuality in a more mature manner, and I don't mean having them strip off a bit more kit for the lads. 

Edited July 30, 2018 by Accident Prone

[RIDDUM_N_STYLE]

Apparently Scarlett is being used as Impact's version of Sable and the promo had a dig at the Evolution announcement from Raw last week, showing that for all the apparent good Impact are doing they still can't quite stop trying to be like WWE

[ColinBollocks]

Slammiversary was surprisingly un-TNA. Not flawless, but a solid wrestling PPV, and despite not having watched their telly since Magnus made Sting tap out in front complete silence, their stories were very easy to follow and pick up on.

I was genuinely delighted when I found out Austin Aries is their champion. In this environment he really thrives.

The Mask v Hair match was really good, despite initially groaning when I saw bloody Solomon Crowe pop up. Again, just a really well told story, which made it easy to follow.

It's probably garbage on the telly most weeks, but as a one off, I really dig the Su Yung character and all the gimmicks they've thrown into it. It's proper cartoon, but I quite enjoy that sort of thing when the presentation is this good.

Pleasingly, a chunk of their roster come across as stars.

[Syl]

Impact have announced two matches for their event at Wrestling MediaCon next month in Manchester. 

Jimmy Havoc v Sam Callihan

Tag Team Title match

LAX (c) v Jonny Storm and Jody Fleisch

Eli Drake, Matt Sydal, Eddie Edwards, Rich Swann and Su Young, amongst others, are also due to appear 

[Ambulance Chaser]

Good episode this week I thought, 2 solid matches given decent time, Impact have done great with Pentagon. Killer Cross has something pretty special about him, it's in the eyes!!!

I have no clue when, where or if it happens, but Cross vs Cage is the money feud for me.

[uklaw]

Impact are in a bit of a tricky situation, ratings and philosophy-wise. After years of being perceived as a cheap imitation and not having anything akin to an identity, the product, for the first time in a while, appears to have forged something resembling their own identity for 2018. 

At least an alternative to WWE. Punctuated by what seemed to be a pivotal Slammiversary...

And they are now haemorrhaging viewers and fans. About 168,000 viewers in the U.S this week. And the panic and despondency among the Impact faithful even takes into account the NFL preseason games. 

The next set of tapings in Toronto this weekend are selling poorly and I am fairly confident they are not going to shift Bound For Glory tickets for the Melrose Ballroom quicker than MLW did for Battle Riot.

This brings up a question about what they do going forward to grow (or even just keep) their viewership/fanbase. Is another philosophical change in order? Will they need to go, begging bowl in hand, to known risks who have been shown to raise viewership, such as Alberto El Patron?

There is even a suggestion that “rather than people recognising the character type that Scarlett Bordeaux represents in the time of women’s evolution and the inevitable comeuppance due to her, people are protesting the character in itself as a regression to a time of objectification and have boycott the show”.

Or maybe it’s further proof that Wrestling on TV (bar WWE) isn’t making a commercial dent. Or any other dent. To casuals, WWE is wrestling and nothing else compares.

Or perhaps to some, when Bruce Pritchard declared on air “TNA is dead...” their screens went off before he got to “... long live Impact Wrestling”.?

Whatever the reason(s) there has been a fall in viewership that could be addressed by a further changing of what is on screen.

[CTXRussomark]

They should just keep doing what they're doing and not panic over a few low ratings.  If they do they'll just sabotage all the good they've managed to achieve over the past 6 months.  This is the first time in years their product has had any sort of buzz around it.  I never for a second believed they could rehab the company even to this level, so they shouldn't start second guessing themselves now.  I don't want to say ratings aren't important but they're making fuck all from this TV deal anyway so a few dips in the road are worth it to play the long game.

[uklaw]

34 minutes ago, CTXRussomark said:

They should just keep doing what they're doing and not panic over a few low ratings.  If they do they'll just sabotage all the good they've managed to achieve over the past 6 months.  This is the first time in years their product has had any sort of buzz around it.  I never for a second believed they could rehab the company even to this level, so they shouldn't start second guessing themselves now.  I don't want to say ratings aren't important but they're making fuck all from this TV deal anyway so a few dips in the road are worth it to play the long game.

Absolutely agree 😊 Was playing advocate and posing those questions.

[HeavyT]

what's the score with POP? any chance they will drop them with those kind of numbers?

[IANdrewDiceClay]

Their ceiling seems to be 300,000. Whether they get a high or low rating seems to depend on what the regular people watching are doing that particular night. With the reach that network has, you could put Cheex on there stretching a pigs tail and it'd do about 150,000. They need to get off this network and onto something with more upward mobility.

[Powerful_Fox]

The only thing that is putting me off now (I’ve been watching weekly since 2-3 weeks before slammiversary) is the crowd being absolutely silent at moments. It’s so off putting.

The show itself is bang on though, I’m getting well into it.

[simonworden]

Are they taping this week again in the same place as the last lot a few weeks ago and slammiversary was held? I'm not surprised ticket sales are down to be honest as even with a better product they've probably exhausted the ticket buyers. Also the venue was novel for a one off show but it stillooked quite small and amateurish to me. Probably best to shift on again.

[Vegeta]

I'm another one who started watching right before slammiversary thanksto this thread to be honest.

I am enjoying it more than raw and smackdown, but do seem a bit concerned about what is noted above regarding ticket sales etc

I would like to see them kick and do Well, as it's great to see them actually be entertaining for once 

[Jon-Carr_92]

The other day was the first full Impact I've watched since it left Challenge. It's certainly looking a lot better than the Impact Zone the place they're filming it now. Think it is bit of a slow burner for someone who's been a bit lapsed, but will have to try catch it more often.