“It’s too predictable, bro/pal!”

[air_raid]

So I was thinking yesterday about Cody’s impending title victory (yes). It seems predictable that he’ll win, but then, it seemed predictable he would win last year (unless you bought into “AEW stink” like some did). My blood runs cold at the idea that the right story is again not the one they tell, for the sake of it not being “too predictable.” I was already thinking about past instances when St Valentines Day Massacre came up in another thread so what the hell, let’s have a discussion.

If you don’t remember, in Spring 99 Billy Gunn was trying to win the Intercontinental title for the first time, and Road Dogg was trying to regain the Hardcore title he’d been stripped of at a weeks notice (umm, 30 day rule?) prior to the Massacre because of kayfabe injury/real life rehab. On Raw, each Outlaw got a shot at the title the other was chasing and won, causing them to shuffle the announced matches of Val Venis vs Ken Shamrock vs Mr Ass vs Goldust for the ICT and Hardcore Holly vs Al Snow vs Dogg for the HCT, with all the build and established issues therein, to what they put on, with the Outlaws going in cold to defend the crossed over belts against total five challengers, three of which the respective champ had no recent history with. It transpired this was all the brainchild of Vince Russo, a swerve for swerve’s sake, just to try and keep things “unpredictable” for viewers rather than actually end up putting on the matches that have been announced and that have some build. What a mess, bro. This from the same guy who caused the 97 Rumble to get changed by accidentally revealing the winner on live TV, of course.

Fast forward a year. Going into SummerSlam 2000 in Raleigh NC, there’s a rematch from WrestleMania - the second 3way ladder match (annoyingly branded the first “TLC” match despite identical rules) with Edge & Christian defending against The Dudley Boys and North Carolina natives The Hardy Boys. According to Matt, the Hardys were originally pencilled in to win the titles and get the big pop in their home state, then one day Vince calls the boys into his office and says words to the effect of “Everyone in the building is going to know you’re winning. It’s too predictable. You can win them next month instead.” Probably a less remembered example, but notable nonetheless.

Finally, notoriously, and much more known about even at the time, is the example from early 2009 involving several of the same players. Christian was due to make his return to the company during the Jeff vs Edge WWE title match and help his “brother” get the belt back, leading eventually to either a tag between E&C and the Hardys or a four way, possibly involving a ladder, at Mania XXV. As soon as he realized that the net was buzzing about Christian’s imminent return Vince immediately decided it was “too predictable” - turning Matt on Jeff for a disappointing feud nobody wanted, moving both titles around and forcing Edge into a re-run with Cena blended with an unnecessary Big Show, and eventually re-debuting Christian on ECW as a babyface where he’d tread water for fucking ages. Because “unpredictable” is better than “good” I suppose.

So…. do any of you recall any other situations where plans changed for the explicit reason that it was too predictable? Also, let’s Mrs Merton it… where do you stand on things being “too predictable” - just yesterday there was a PPV where three matches for titles or contention had obvious winners because the company gave us hardly-subtle clues as to what those two title matches would be at Mania. Are you happy they pushed on, or would you have preferred Orton or Bianca (examples) to have won? Or even LA Knight?

WRRRRRESTLING!

 

Edited February 25 by air_raid
Forgot about Glacier.

[HarmonicGenerator]

If the story is told well, predictable doesn’t matter because the predictable outcome is the one we want. By all means sow doubt, add some twists and turns on the way, but if everything has been leading to the heroic babyface finally winning the big title … everybody is going to be fine when that happens.

[BomberPat]

99 times out of 100, stories are predictable because the ending is the right one. The ending of almost every movie you've ever seen is "predictable" - good guy saves the day, gets the girl, that kind of thing. The plot twists, shocks and turns should come in the middle of the story, not at the end. 

Admittedly, wrestling being a continuous narrative that goes on forever rather than a closed one like a movie means sometimes it's not clear when the "ending" is or should be. 

[DavidB6937]

The twists and turns that are obviously just for the sake of swerving the audience just because they can are the worst ones. I'm all for good surprises and logical swerves but it's not something that needs to happen all the time. Sometimes stories can be straight forward and still be incredibly enjoyable. Good writers should be able to tell the difference.

[air_raid]

Quite often the bad guy has to win a particular chapter because a different good guy is beating him latter. For me, Reigns vs Zayn was a predictable outcome but it didn’t matter because the telling was good (for the most part).

The worst example I can think of for contrarian booking is when they did Lesnar vs Reigns at Mania 34. 3 years after fucking Roman out of beating him first time and near two years after Reigns lost the title last, and nearly a whole year of Strowman distraction later, it felt totally obvious Roman was finally going to knock Lesnar off the perch. So I sat there bored off my arse for 15 minutes waiting for Reigns to get it over with and win, then in the end he didn’t. So, I was surprised, but in a deflating, depressing way. Like I’d wasted 15 minutes of my life on a dull match that achieved nothing.

[DavidB6937]

1 hour ago, air_raid said:

Quite often the bad guy has to win a particular chapter because a different good guy is beating him latter. For me, Reigns vs Zayn was a predictable outcome but it didn’t matter because the telling was good (for the most part).

That's an interesting one because that plays into things being "predictable" on a personal level. You had the people there who knew logically Zayn wasn't the one to be ending the long Roman run and so thought it was predictable. But there was definitely enough people that had bought into it on an emotional level that the impossible seemed possible, even in a teeny tiny way. And I think giving people that slight hope that it might go another way is what the really well written feuds/matches have, whatever the ending is.

Also depends what angle you're consuming from. You've got people that watch without all the insider stuff and so their perception is completely different sometimes.

[Carbomb]

Good telling can make you forget yourself. I always think back to that Triple H/TAKA Michinoku title match on SmackDown, when the outcome was the most obvious thing to anyone, smark or casual, yet for a few brief moments both guys made it completely plausible that an upset was on the cards.

[Fog Dude]

11 minutes ago, Carbomb said:

Good telling can make you forget yourself. I always think back to that Triple H/TAKA Michinoku title match on SmackDown, when the outcome was the most obvious thing to anyone, smark or casual, yet for a few brief moments both guys made it completely plausible that an upset was on the cards.

It can play such a trick on you that you forget which show it happened on!

Are you thinking of the Kai En Tai & Brooklyn Brawler vs Triple H handicap match from three months later? Because that one actually was on SmackDown. 

[Carbomb]

14 minutes ago, Fog Dude said:

It can play such a trick on you that you forget which show it happened on!

Are you thinking of the Kai En Tai & Brooklyn Brawler vs Triple H handicap match from three months later? Because that one actually was on SmackDown. 

No, the singles match. Was that not on SmackDown? Could've sworn I remembered a blue ring apron.

[ReturnOfTheMack]

It was Raw is War. 

[Carbomb]

Yeh, just checked and rewatched. Still a fun match.

[ReturnOfTheMack]

I sure as Hell agree with that! 

[Fog Dude]

1 hour ago, Carbomb said:

No, the singles match. Was that not on SmackDown? Could've sworn I remembered a blue ring apron.

I wasn't going by a visual memory. I recalled watching the singles match on a Friday night and the handicap match on a Saturday... back when I had Sky, before the time of on-demand TV and before weekends all blurred into one amorphous splodge. 

[no user name]

I think if a match is good you can believe a result might happen even of it obviously won't. To be honest when your there you can actually forget it's scripted if the crowd is really good 

[air_raid]

Just wanted to throw this out because I was edited my prior post about One Night Only to add a poster image and.... well, Shawn vs Bulldog was predictable on paper, but not when it got to the ring.

On 9/5/2022 at 6:58 AM, air_raid said:

Words can't express how much, in spite of the show being positioned between two In Your House events and the focus being very much on Taker/Shawn in the Cell, how much the edits to the UK broadcasts spelled out that this was a giant deal, easily the biggest show on these shores since SummerSlam 1992, very much positioned as a sequel of sorts with heavy emphasis on reminding us OF that night at Wembley, and that this was a glorious homecoming for Smith. The European title, somewhat of an afterthought at times prior to SummerSlam, was pushed as prestigious and something that the Heartbreak Kid, recently WWF Champion, truly wanted to win. They pushed the animosity and history between the two with footage from SNME from 92 of HBK relieving Davey of the Intercontinental title, and spliced in from the Fab 4 special of comments Shawn had actually made about Bret to make them seem about Smith in terms of the nature of their rivalry. Smith of course talked at length about how much we were the best fans in the world, and everything was geared towards this being the start of a glorious new future of UK PPV specials, and 100% seemed designed to push Shawn as a very real threat, but one that the heroic Bulldog would overcome. The idea Davey could lose this match was UNTHINKABLE. Of course, as is widely known, Davey Boy told several tabloids that he was dedicating victory in the match to his cancer-stricken sister Tracey.  We know now that Vince had told him that he was winning, and that Europe was "his" territory. One hour before showtime, they changed it to Shawn winning. The logic was that they'd be doing another PPV in April at the Nynex (best known as the Manchester Evening News Arena, now the AO) and they'd make even more money from the rematch with Davey winning the belt back in his announced hometown. Nevertheless it floored everyone. Cornette couldnt believe it, and Bret was especially incredulous at the finish (a DX/Vince/Brisco creation) that he knew hearing it, would make the Harts look like idiots, much as we all felt when it happened. Speaking even as a guy for whom Bret was the top hero and Davey just his lieutenant, the match swallowed me up, and the feeling of tension and panic in the building as Bulldog had his knee worked over was unreal. This was "my" SummerSlam 92 in a way, and the suspension of disbelief in my block at least was in tatters even if we "knew" Davey would win in the end, and the frustration was tangible that Bret and Owen weren't coming out to help him. Smart to it all being a work, me, my mate and everyone around us couldn't understand what was happening. The rage that filled the NEC at the end of the match, I can't really describe. There wasn't violence, but things were thrown, as you know if you've seen it. Coming out of the building, everyone was absolutely shell-shocked. Nobody could believe they'd beaten the Bulldog in England. It didn't make sense, and Bret describes a similar effect on Davey, like the fire in him died that day.

Of course, this wasn't changed because of being too predictable, but because of the almighty dollar. But even without the benefit of hindsight, I'll still never get over how they crushed us with that one. I understand that if the weight of the machine is behind making Shawn the biggest bastard imaginable before he's going to get knocked off by Steve Austin, it's a shrewd move (even if Smithers was booked as a heel in the US). But fucking hell, it was a gut punch. WITH the benefit of hindsight... Vince probably still would have gone in that direction even if he was told "Shawn will fuck his back and Davey Boy will leave, you don't get a rematch in Mancunia, this only happens once." Because he was already choosing Shawn over Bret in the big picture and Davey was collateral damage, the biggest value left in him was to make Shawn look like a prick.