POLL: Are you satisfied with AEW/WWE's booking right now?

[Infinity Land]

6 minutes ago, RedRooster said:

You kind of explain the problem with the AEW approach in your own post - the questions 'have been answered elsewhere'. Not on AEW television. If you feature something on your programming, explain what it is there.

Except Prince Nana and Shane Taylor have been explained on AEW television.

[RedRooster]

2 minutes ago, Infinity Land said:

Except Prince Nana and Shane Taylor have been explained on AEW television.

When? As far as Prince Nana goes, he showed up suddenly as a manager - no promos or anything like that, and then Swerve announced that his group was merging with The Embassy, with no explanation as to who or what The Embassy is. Given that they (presumably) originated in a promotion that is viewed by around 10,000 people, you kind of have to do that. 

As for Shane Taylor, as far as I'm aware, he cut a promo referencing his link to Keith Lee, referencing 'Shane Taylor Promotions' with no real context as to what that is, and that was that. It was all very inadequate. Sometimes a character speaks for itself, but that just isn't the case here. 

[Chris B]

4 minutes ago, Infinity Land said:

Except Prince Nana and Shane Taylor have been explained on AEW television.

When I put together a (long, overly-indulgent) twitter thread explaining the Hangman Page storyline leading up to the Omega feud, I went in assuming that too much of the story had been on BTE - all the subtleties, etc. I was genuinely surprised by how much of the story had been told on Dynamite. Almost all of it was.

That said, I think there is an assumption people watch via other means, not least because the AEW audience skews (or skewed) younger than most of the WWE audience. Which, to my mind, means they're less likely to be watching live TV or see that as the main medium to learn from. Add in that the received wisdom is that the matches are the all-important thing for live TV, and I can see why their recap/hype packages are generally put on YouTube. It goes back to that idea that 'casual viewers' aren't as much of a thing any more.

[air_raid]

Being unsatisfied with the booking and not watching are not mutually exclusive.

[Hannibal Scorch]

Lots of fair counter points @RedRooster. However I think it's fair to believe a lot of AEW fans are either lapsed or not watching WWE anymore. The type of wrestling and stories are quite different. And it's fair to suggest ticket sales and attendance is a sign they have hit a ceiling. Now, can they raise above that, absolutely, but right now they have seen a plateau.

WWE is smashing it with ticket sales, and thats largely due to being the family friendly alternative to the AEW option. One thing I think they lean to far into is blood and extreme matches whilst WWE do it as a rarity. I thinking reducing that would do wonders in selling the product to a new audience. That said, it's the wrestlers and matches AEW offer (like on Wrestledream) that the casual WWE Fan or children won't care for, but a fan of wrestling would. And to be clear, I absolutely buy into WWE is not a wrestling company, though it is what they are recognized for. It is what sets them apart from any other wrestling company. Does that make sense?

Though as to your Prince Nana/Embassy comment. Both have featured on AEW TV for over a year. Yes, for a while they were mainly featured on ROH, but they have also been on Dynamite and Rampage before. Also, there were video packages regarding Shane Taylor Productions and Keith Lee, but this was on zero hour/you tube.

Edited October 9, 2023 by Hannibal Scorch

[RedRooster]

4 minutes ago, Hannibal Scorch said:

Lots of fair counter points @RedRooster. However I think it's fair to believe a lot of AEW fans are either lapsed or not watching WWE anymore. The type of wrestling and stories are quite different. And it's fair to suggest ticket sales and attendance is a sign they have hit a ceiling. Now, can they raise above that, absolutely, but right now they have seen a plateau.

I don't even think it's a plateau - they've seen live attendances plummet. It's such a shame too, because this used to be one of the company's strengths. But really though, it's a big ask for someone to go to an AEW taping; knowing that you're not only going to be sitting through Dynamite, or Collision - but also a load of ROH matches. It goes from being a fun experience, to being a bit of an ordeal. Before that, it was Dark and Dark Elevation - and I do wonder how many people who might have come back were put off by that. AEW live crowds used to feel like a party you wanted to attend, and now they don't. I'm not sure how you fix that exactly, but I really hope they do. 

[DavidB6937]

AEW feels more aimed at what Tony Khan likes and what he's been into over the years.

It's not a casual mass market alternative to WWE. More than ever, it's just a bigger bucks version of ROH or what the indyrific version of NXT used to be like. And that's not an insult or a criticism really but it does have a limited appeal. You've only got a finite number of people who give a shit about dream crossovers with NJPW or paying tribute to Inoki and all that stuff.

And the more they do that stuff, the less 'competition' there really is between them and WWE because it's two very different aims. And they can both be very successful doing what they're doing.

[Lorne Malvo]

I'm more than happy with AEW's booking right now. It's not perfect and I don't think it ever will be, some stories are dragged out and others rushed, but theres always good stuff happening across the 3 shows. And as 'workrate pervert' as it sounds, the in-ring stuff is enough to satisfy me even when the angles and feuds arn't red hot.

I religiously watched WWE from the 90s through to 2019 without a break and I think part of why I like AEW's storytelling so much is how different it is to the model that WWE has followed for years. The matches are part of the story - somebody can pick up an injury in a match that factors into the finish 3 matches down the line, or there are callbacks to previous matches that make me feel rewarded for paying attention. I never felt this with WWE, it often seemed like the matches were there in spite of the story. And the amount of 15 minute matches that would end in a DQ solely to set up a rematch didn't feel rewarding as a viewer at all. (I feel like I've worded this horribly but @BomberPat has touched on similar points before much more eloquently).

I can't deny WWE right now is hot. I catch a few clips every few weeks and their fanbase are loving it, so fair play to them. I just find the whole presentation and overly scripted story beats really off-putting, and the in-ring stuff doesn't hold a candle to AEW. It's just not for me anymore. And LA Knight and Cena being all over the shows at the moment is a big turn-off (I'm well aware I'm the only person left who doesn't like Cena as a wrestler but it is what it is). Cody is still fucking class though, and I'll be keeping an eye on how Jade Cargill gets on.

I guess at the end of the day, whether you prefer AEW's in-ring focused product or WWE's glitzy Hollywood version of wrestling, it's a pretty good time to be a fan. It was only 5 years ago WWE were sending Baron Corbin out to apologise for the shows being a load of wank and the landscape has changed so much since then.

[Keith Houchen]

1 hour ago, DavidB6937 said:

what Tony Khan likes and what he's been into over the years.

 

Voted don’t watch either. Would like to but can’t get past the cunts at the top and/or abusers on the rosters. If one of them signed Danny Boy Johnson I’d forgive them though. 

[Loki]

We're probably living through the best period of wrestling content since the Monday Night Wars, so it seems a little churlish to pick TOO many holes.  There's WWE, NXT, AEW and Impact! all putting out quite different product on a weekly basis, the excitement of jumps from one company to another, international PPVs in the UK...

I get out of WWE what I want at the moment, as a casual occasional viewer - big big money matchups at big PPVs and the excitement of watching a few new stars break through the glass ceiling.  So in those terms their booking seems to be firing on all cylinders at the moment.  

AEW doesn't have nearly as deep a pool of historic roster, megastars like Cena/Lesnar to pull out of the bag a few times a year, so for me they are much more dependent on getting the whole company moving in an exciting direction.  And in that regards, they've gone off the boil for me.  I'm old fashioned, I expect a World Champ to be in the top storyline of a company, wrestling in the main event, and having generally "serious" storylines revolving around how important that belt is, and that's not MJF at the moment.  The belt is an afterthought and that's NOT good imo.

And yes, the ROH stink is still too prevalent - I don't care about ROH, or its myriad belts, it reeks of early noughties workrate perv indy wankery, followed by low-budget bingo halls on a God bothering network, and so has little value to me as a brand.


 

[Supremo]

11 hours ago, Loki said:

We're probably living through the best period of wrestling content since the Monday Night Wars, so it seems a little churlish to pick TOO many holes.  There's WWE, NXT, AEW and Impact! all putting out quite different product on a weekly basis, the excitement of jumps from one company to another, international PPVs in the UK...

This is the perspective I try to keep.

The industry has never been as hyper-analysed, with every facet of every TV show nitpicked and discussed to death. And whilst neither product is at its peak - AEW has fallen massively since the Summer/Autumn of 2021 and WWE is currently living off the fumes of Winter 2022/Spring of 2023, this is still the best we’ve had it in decades. We’re spoilt rotten.

I’m probably as guilty of it as everyone else, but every time you get in a sulk about either product not clicking as well as it once did, or seeing something you wish they’d improve, or thinking they’ve made a stupid decision, cast your mind back five to ten years and remember how bad it once was.

It was the fucking dark ages for so, so long. A toxic monopoly. One game in town, where the primary goal was to troll the viewing audience. The Fuck All Era. Nothing to enjoy. Just relentless shit. Awful babyfaces being booed out of the buildings. Heels that only worked as heels because you wanted them to fuck off. Booking specifically designed to quell any organic emotion. Babyfaces forever being humiliated and booked to lose in their hometown. Pay per views ending with disastrous crowd reactions and universal complaints online. Wrestlemania main events where they had to turn down the volume of the crowd to hide their real reaction. The depth of thought put into character and storylines stopping at the level of, “make him wear blue contact lenses, that’ll make people cheer him.” It can’t be overstated how lucky we have it to even have companies earnestly trying to give us a good time and push people we want to cheer and boo accordingly, trying new things and figuring out what can get us excited and invested. It sounds like the basics, but for the longest time we didn’t even have that. We’d celebrate shit like Adam Rose having a funny entrance or Tye Dillinger coming out as number ten in the Rumble. Small, speckles of joy in an otherwise river of shit.

There isn’t any aspect of today’s climate that if you plucked it out of history and dropped it into the Fuck All Era it wouldn’t be lauded as the greatest thing anyone had ever seen. Characters as layered and interesting as Eddie Kingston, Hangman Adam Page or MJF. Babyfaces as hot and universally loved as Cody Rhodes and LA Knight. Heels as delightfully entertaining as Bullet Club Gold and Christian Cage. New, exciting acts like Timeless Toni Storm. Comedy as funny as Jeff Jarrett on the Briscoe Farm. Storylines as fun and positive as MJF and Adam Cole’s Summer of Love. Matches like that Strap Match between Ricky Starks and Bryan Danielson or Hangman vs. Swerve Strickland. Title reigns as exciting and enthralling as Orange Cassidy as International Champion. Angles as great as Sami Zayn turning on Roman at Royal Rumble or The Elite doing Avengers Assemble. Moments as good as Edge’s debut or Jade Cargill stepping out of a car as an instant, ready-made superstar. Babyfaces getting the huge reactions and big wins in their home town like Bad Bunny at Backlash. WWE’s annual run of mostly amazing pay per views. AEW’s current run of three of the best pay per views of all time, back to back, in the space of weeks. Crowd reactions like the end of this week’s Smackdown when the babyfaces came together at the end. The goosebumps of Sami and Kevin hugging. A fucking pay per view at Wembley Stadium.

Could it be better? Sure. But overall? In 2023? This is probably the best it’s ever been.

I mean, fucking hell, Fastlane was under three hours long! We used to pray for times like this!

Edited October 10, 2023 by Supremo

[RedRooster]

3 hours ago, Supremo said:

The industry has never been as hyper-analysed, with every facet of every TV show nitpicked and discussed to death. And whilst neither product is at its peak - AEW has fallen massively since the Summer/Autumn of 2021 and WWE is still living off the fumes of Winter/Spring of 2023, this is still the best we’ve had it in decades. We’re spoilt rotten.

I’m probably as guilty of it as everyone else, but every time you get in a sulk about either product not clicking as well as it once did, or seeing something you wish they’d improve, or thinking they’ve made a stupid decision, cast your mind back five to ten years and remember how bad it once was.

As far as AEW goes, I think the reason I am so frustrated by it is because I fear another TNA - a company gradually becoming smaller due to a series of obviously bad decisions and the owner’s own stubbornness when it comes to accepting or recognising what is going wrong. AEW doesn’t have to be as cold as it is, and Tony Khan isn’t doing them any favours at all when it comes to some of the choices he makes.

[RedRooster]

Sorry for the double post - but it's really interesting where this poll has landed. AEW's booking is clearly divisive, with it almost being equal as to who is satisfied and dissatisfied. 

I'm also slightly surprised at just how many people don't watch WWE on these forums - I guess AEW finally gave people a reason to stop watching, and some never came back. Maybe the fact so many people are enjoying what they're doing right now will lure some people back, I don't know. I'm curious as to what people consider "not watching" - is it a complete WWE blackout; or are you still tuning in for major PPVs like Royal Rumble or 'Mania?

I'm curious about the people who don't watch AEW too - are they people who don't watch wrestling at all anymore, or do they still watch WWE? 

I wish I'd asked some supplementary questions! 

[Jesse]

I stopped watching WWE, then I stopped watching wrestling altogether, until AEW brought me back during the lockdown era. I've slowly lost interest in regularly watching that again to the point I basically don't watch any wrestling beyond gifs on Twitter and reading opinions on here.

[westlondonmist]

I rarely watch wrestling, I'm always aware what is going on hoping something might pull me in. I watched AEW on Youtube pre and post All In but it wasn't enough to keep me interested. It was fun but nothing to make me want to find the time to watch it weekly. I watched some WWE youtube and apparently it's the best they've been in years, thank fuck I didn't watch previous years then. However I'm always going through spells of watching and not watching and a spell can last years so I wouldn't be surprised if I start again. Something needs to grab me though, I started watching again in about 2014 when the UK scene really started to grow again and ICW and RPW helped me get back interested and in turn got interested in New Japan. New Japan got a bit tedious as they've struggled to replace main event spots filled by Tana, White or Omega.