Wrestling’s fake

[cobra_gordo]

6 minutes ago, gmoney said:

He's half right in the case of that match, the barbed wire shots to HHH are fake barbs. 

Sort of, they're pieces of solder attached to wire to make it look like barbed wire and if you read Foley's book hurt more than the actual barbed wire.

[Chris B]

"An eagle-eyed viewer might be able to see the wires. A pedant might be able to see the wires. But I think if you're looking at the wires you're ignoring the story. If you go to a puppet show you can see the wires. But it's about the puppets, it's not about the string. If you go to a Punch And Judy show and you're only watching the wires, you're a freak."

[Hoptimus]

I'm kind of not sure about stepping away from being a fan these days. 

A lot of my love and passion around wrestling was the not knowing how everything works. 

The internet kind of ruined that for me. Now with more and more being exposed it kind of nearly kills it for me to enjoy and suspend my disbelief. 

 

I have a list of pet hates just now:

#1 The internet making people conscious of the fact that a wrestling match for WWE is produced by a producer. 

#2 Talent putting their actual real life name on their Twitter in acknowledgement the wrestler is in a sense a TV character in a TV show. 

#3 Storylines now becoming that the "real life" people who work and perform together may not get along so we see if what is going on in the ring is part of the performance of two professionals performing or will there be a bit of stiffness as talent A has had some real life backstage heated disagreement with talent B.

#4 Having to admit constantly it's a performance or that someone was doing something in character then having to apologise on social media as the person who plays the role of said talent. It destroys heel heat and changes the demographic of how a heel works. It seems the business is fearful of talent getting heat by directly attacking fans rather than the heat being generated by the talent gaining heat from the actions acted our on screen from one and other the heel towards the baby-face. Perhaps this is a good thing and an evolutionary thing of the business. Sponsors and TV executives don't want a talent to shout aggressively directly directly at a fan at an event then find out that person is in a marginalised group and it gives off a bad look for the promotion. So any heat a heel has with an interaction with a fan now needs to be a plant who is in on the performance and they know isn't a marginalised group and won't complain on Twitter or other social media platforms. 

 

 

[Your Fight Site]

3 minutes ago, Hoptimus said:

So any heat a heel has with an interaction with a fan now needs to be a plant who is in on the performance and they know isn't a marginalised group and won't complain on Twitter or other social media platforms. 

Could be a good job for “fans” who go to shows just to let off steam.

[DavidB6937]

I've never had issues with 'real life' names or anything like that. If you can't suspend disbelief about that stuff then I don't get how you watch TV shows or movies in general.

[tiger_rick]

7 minutes ago, DavidB6937 said:

I've never had issues with 'real life' names or anything like that. If you can't suspend disbelief about that stuff then I don't get how you watch TV shows or movies in general.

Do film and TV stars post in character on their social media feeds? Do their companies use their in character tweets to build up matches and feuds? That's as poor as most comparisons between wrestling and regular TV shows.

It's not surprising, particularly with WWE over the years. They want to promote these real people with their backstories occasionally, but sometimes make them a different person altogether, while having them working alongside ridiculous "characters" who couldn't possibly be real. It's a nice crossover with @BomberPat's great post earlier about the environment in which these whacky characters take place. It's all so muddled.

I don't find it a deal breaker. I've certainly put up with some nonsense over the years. It is just another element that makes them terrible storytellers though.

[Chris B]

57 minutes ago, DavidB6937 said:

I've never had issues with 'real life' names or anything like that. If you can't suspend disbelief about that stuff then I don't get how you watch TV shows or movies in general.

 

 

[HarmonicGenerator]

On 4/22/2021 at 12:54 PM, SkinnersHat said:

Can you remember when or what it was that made you realise the moment/s that these big, muscle bound supermen weren’t really trying to kill each other in there?

When I read this

6 hours ago, gmoney said:

He's half right in the case of that match, the barbed wire shots to HHH are fake barbs. 

 

[DavidB6937]

2 hours ago, tiger_rick said:

Do film and TV stars post in character on their social media feeds? Do their companies use their in character tweets to build up matches and feuds? That's as poor as most comparisons between wrestling and regular TV shows.

It's not surprising, particularly with WWE over the years. They want to promote these real people with their backstories occasionally, but sometimes make them a different person altogether, while having them working alongside ridiculous "characters" who couldn't possibly be real. It's a nice crossover with @BomberPat's great post earlier about the environment in which these whacky characters take place. It's all so muddled.

I don't find it a deal breaker. I've certainly put up with some nonsense over the years. It is just another element that makes them terrible storytellers though.

Oh of course wrestling is its own thing for sure but I guess for me even if they are using real names etc then there's still an element of it being a fictional version of themselves if it's storyline related. They're still playing a character during promos even if it's tapping into certain parts of their own beliefs. So I guess that's why I'm not too bothered about it myself.

The debate about it being messy and them doing a shit job of it..  well that's a whole other thing. I can accept things but doesn't necessarily mean I enjoy them.

[Supremo]

4 hours ago, tiger_rick said:

Do film and TV stars post in character on their social media feeds? Do their companies use their in character tweets to build up matches and feuds? That's as poor as most comparisons between wrestling and regular TV shows.

Didn’t Vin Diesel and The Rock try and work something leading into the release of one of the Fast and Furious films? Not exactly the same thing, but still.

As an off-shoot of this, I do think reality TV and sports stars have proven you can take that pro-wrestling approach of creating and living a gimmick on social media and in the press to huge levels of success. Conor McGregor, Donald Trump, even more recently Jake Paul. At its core, they’re all doing pro-wrestling. Playing these exaggerated caricatures to both appeal to a certain demographic whilst pissing off another, succeeding either way. Done shrewdly, there’s clearly something to it and it can absolutely connect to a larger audience. I’m not sure anyone in the actual industry has come anywhere close to achieving its full potential though. Becky Lynch when she would constantly rip the piss out of everyone was probably the closest.

On topic, I came to wrestling pretty late, around twelve or thirteen, so the idea of it ever being real never entered my head. As has been said already, the magic was in trying to figure out how the hell it worked and how they put it together. I’m in my thirties now that’s still a huge draw for me. I can’t stop thinking about that multi-man Tag Title match at the most recent Takeover event. The choreography, the speed of the guys, everyone hitting their spots and being in the right place at the right time. It blows my mind how they do it.

Edited April 27, 2021 by Supremo

[Jackpot]

I think I always knew because I was always told by me arl fella that it was "fake" when I first started watching it in the early to mid 90s. But I think the fact that the shows was portrayed as serious and "real", it allowed me to believe in the wrestlers and not my family. Whereas now I feel the characters show a lot less authenticity due to the over-scripted and micro-managing and it comes across on screen.

[Hoptimus]

Reading the past comments is that for wrestling it's in a unique situation where on one hand it is the job for the talent to be in character and in instances we are expected to believe that who you see on screen is them and there is no stage name and the personality you see on screen is how they live their life day by day in private at home. On the other hand if they are a heel but in real life said talent is then in politics or does something for a childrens charity newspapers and press may report the talents actual real name who plays current WWE star "insert name here"