Darkside of the Ring season 4 discussion.

[Chris B]

2 hours ago, tiger_rick said:

That got me wondering just how much shitstain TNA TV there has been over the years. My best estimate is 1.5 hours a week, taking into account ads once it became a TV show rather than a weekly PPV, when the show was 1 hour, dark periods and when they briefly had a B show, over 24 years. Add to that 296 PPVs/specials (according to Wiki) at about 2.5 hours each on average. That makes 2612 hours of their TV or 108 entire days. 

[Jazzy G]

20 hours ago, Merzbow said:

Pretty much on-topic, Russo (i know I know) has a new book and says in it that Eric was trying to sack Sting early on because he had to miss a show due to family problems.

Eric was such a lying cunt in this episode too, talking about that the six sides were never ever taken advantage of when the X-Division were doing that every single week. He didn't watch an hour of TNA before signing, did he?

If he did it was probably booked by Russo so won't have contained more than four minutes of actual wrestling anyway. 

[The Gaffer]

Third episode of the TNA trilogy was the weakest but there was still some gems. It never occurred to me that the talent meeting Dixie conducted which was broadcast on Impact was a shoot. Completely hideous and ridiculous. That was the end of the original TNA, leading the way for its provo and continuity incarnations. I'm glad the piece stuck the knife into the Hogoff era (though I'll freely admit to enjoying a lot of the overhaul and presentation for a short period) with only Bischoff's pithy "Well the first head to head drew one of the biggest Impact ratings ever, didn't it?" aired as a defence. 

I was okay with them relying on Jeff heavily for the narrative. There's too much middling "Which public access network are they on now" shit for years afterwards to try and spin out the story of a company that's sort of still the same brand in order to be able to wrap it up on a human note. 

Overall highlight was ordained Church of Satan priest/low-level GTA mission giver/motel hypnotist James 'Sinister Minister' Mitchell being reluctant to tell his mam that he works for a company called TNA. 

[herbie747]

As bad as Dixie was, there would have been no TNA without her family's money. It wouldn't have lasted more than 3 months, and would be a 2002 footnote like the XWF and WWA were in 2001.

So as much as they all slagged her off, Jeff's "vision" of TNA meant fuck all without her money to subsidise him. 

[TheScarlettChad]

I did like the unintentional "I didn't want a beer gut, so I switched to Vodka" comedy bit. 

[Snitsky's back acne]

14 hours ago, herbie747 said:

 

So as much as they all slagged her off, Jeff's "vision" of TNA meant fuck all without her money to subsidise him. 

Her parents money. 

[RIDDUM_N_STYLE]

One thing that always baffled me about the Hogoff era was Hulk’s theme being the NWO Japan one instead of American Made, but then they go and use the latter anyway for Abyss when he was doing the whole powered by Hogan’s HOF ring gimmick

[BarryOVega]

6 hours ago, RIDDUM_N_STYLE said:

One thing that always baffled me about the Hogoff era was Hulk’s theme being the NWO Japan one instead of American Made, but then they go and use the latter anyway for Abyss when he was doing the whole powered by Hogan’s HOF ring gimmick

Didn’t help that 

1. the nWo Japan theme sounds like a cheap knock off anyway which made them look small time

2. It’s shite

[herbie747]

12 hours ago, Snitsky's back acne said:

Her parents money. 

I said "her family's money". 

It was just odd seeing them make fun of the "money mark" lady (who paid their wages for years), when all of these jabroni's were able to do fuck all without her. If they were so clever, then why did they need her? That's what I found a bit hypocriticlal about them burying her. 

Edited July 18 by herbie747

[LaGoosh]

10 minutes ago, herbie747 said:

I said "her family's money". 

It was just odd seeing them make fun of the "money mark" lady (who paid their wages for years), when all of these jabroni's were able to do fuck all without her. If they were so clever, then why did they need her? That's what I found a bit hypocriticlal about them burying her. 

Wrestlers and wrestling fans love being snarky about nepo baby promoters and money marks despite every successful North American wrestling promotion being run or owned by one since Vince bought WWF from his Dad using his own Dads money in the 80s.

[The Gaffer]

29 minutes ago, herbie747 said:

It was just odd seeing them make fun of the "money mark" lady (who paid their wages for years), when all of these jabroni's were able to do fuck all without her. If they were so clever, then why did they need her? That's what I found a bit hypocriticlal about them burying her. 

I think this is an odd argument. You can foot the bill and still overstep the mark involving yourself in the company's creative and being a feature act in on screen storylines. The two can co-occur. And in terms of why they needed her, wrestling always needs investment and backing to get to the level TNA wanted to get to. Your creative could look like March 1998 Raw is War on a loop until the end of time but without backing - more often than not provided by people who don't understand how you did that creative - it's going absolutely nowhere. 

Money mark can be an awful term but if ever it was warranted. Especially given the cross section of people involved in the old TNA who all seem to corroborate the general feeling. Especially given she seems to have paid fucking peanuts unless you were one of the handful of people she recognised as being stars. 

Personal preferences aside, history seems to have reliably beared out that TNA's golden period was from Panda ponying up to about when Jeff was ousted in 2009. The years in between seem to have been Dixie's money and Jeff and his crew's booking. 

[Chico Torres]

46 minutes ago, herbie747 said:

I said "her family's money". 

It was just odd seeing them make fun of the "money mark" lady (who paid their wages for years), when all of these jabroni's were able to do fuck all without her. If they were so clever, then why did they need her? That's what I found a bit hypocriticlal about them burying her. 

The same reason we mock the likes of Herb Abrams, Paul Alperstein, the old British guy (Len?) etc. Because there is a rich tradition of dumb fucks getting fooled into losing money by investing in a no-win proposition and the wrestlers rightly taking them for a ride and rinsing them. Dixie Carter carried on that proud legacy.

[Browser Brady]

1 hour ago, Chico Torres said:

The same reason we mock the likes of Herb Abrams, Paul Alperstein, the old British guy (Len?) etc. Because there is a rich tradition of dumb fucks getting fooled into losing money by investing in a no-win proposition and the wrestlers rightly taking them for a ride and rinsing them. Dixie Carter carried on that proud legacy.

Why do use the word “rightly” there ?

 

it sounds like you are siding with the people who were being knowingly deceptive ?

[Chico Torres]

Yes I am siding with the independent contractors who have no employment rights, union membership, benefits, pension or healthcare and I fully support them taking advantage of promoters who give a very small proportion of their revenue to talent and I fully support them rinsing naive money marks with more money than sense because it’s the least that they deserve.

Are you siding with management against labour?

[Browser Brady]

26 minutes ago, Chico Torres said:

Yes I am siding with the independent contractors who have no employment rights, union membership, benefits, pension or healthcare and I fully support them taking advantage of promoters who give a very small proportion of their revenue to talent and I fully support them rinsing naive money marks with more money than sense because it’s the least that they deserve.

Are you siding with management against labour?

Valid points certainly but somewhat misguided.  Pension and Union benefits are a problem but i don’t believe that any wrestling promotion in the world has solved. It sounds like TNA was running in the red for the most part so committing to long term debt like you’ve mentioned would have been unwise from their point point of view. Morally is it correct , yes it is ? But TNA never had the cash reserves to actually make this happen. To think otherwise is quite naive to be honest.

If “rinsing” said money marks leads to the place where they work having to make cuts and downsize then has anybody actually benefited in the long term if they are no longer a viable alternative place to work ?

 

i might be wrong but i don’t think TNA actually made too much net profit , even in it’s glory years , to redistribute to lower rung talent?

 

i find the “rinse the money mark” argument grubby and extremely short sighted to be honest ..