Negativity Thread.

[JLM]

I like to imagine he did the “oooh-aaaah” really quietly at the other end of the room. Real stealthy like. 

[tiger_rick]

I'm torn on that one. It makes no sense but it was a bloody fantastic spear that looked brilliant from that angle.   

[LaGoosh]

6 minutes ago, tiger_rick said:

I'm torn on that one. It makes no sense but it was a bloody fantastic spear that looked brilliant from that angle.   

Well there's no reason you can't do that exact same spot. You just have to take 5 minutes to work out a reason Sheamus and Orton don't see it coming so it's logical. Like maybe Ambrose/Rollins attack first or trick them into walking into an attack. It's really not hard. But instead they went for the laziest option of 'The Shield appear from nothingness'. 

[SwayWays]

For me, and I know a few of these have been mentioned before.. 

 

Entrance music, watched the rumble and had to watch the entrance screen to guess who some of them were coming out. Imagine if someone had a "trust me" ala jake theme now, it would stick out like a sore thumb. They use to be so unique to the character. Now a lot of them are interchangeable. 

 

The quality control on some people's attires. Some people would look better in a singlet top, or wearing wrist tape. 

 

Over use of the super kick, I mean hbk had one as a finisher. Not everytime you see one, does it have to be a world ender, but it'd be nice to see an actual kick to the face not be as done almost as often as a kip up in the women's rumble.

Finisher quick outs, they're over done and too often. 

 

I watched AEW last month can't even remember the match but it was a potential match ending move kick out... Same again... Kick out.. Etc. 

Not every match needs 12 potential match ending move to be epic. You can build it up and make going for a finisher the story, how you get there, not how often you get there 

[SuperBacon]

The fact that Cathy Kelley isn't in every single shot of every single WWE show. Awful. 

Dives through the ropes. Oooooooh you've dived through the ropes and PUSHED someone into the barricade. Grow up.

[FUM]

7 hours ago, tiger_rick said:

I'm torn on that one. It makes no sense but it was a bloody fantastic spear that looked brilliant from that angle.   

Too many positive words used for this thread. Take it elsewhere.

Edited February 4, 2025 by FUM

[BomberPat]

18 hours ago, Carbomb said:

Also, something that touched upon what Pat was saying: nobody has a signature colour any more, though it's something that's been the case for some time. Hogan had red and yellow, then black and white, Bret Hart and any subsequent Harts/Hart associates donned the neon pink & black, Kane had the red (and black, but the red was more emphasised), Taz had the orange & black, DX had the black & green, Nexus had the yellow & black, and I have trouble thinking of any more. I'm sure there are, but none come to mind.

It was something a bit more prominent in Japan, to be fair: sometimes the wrestler in question would even have a signature move named for their colour: Misawa (Emerald Flowsion), Kobashi (Orange Crush), Akiyama (Blue Thunder Driver), Taue (Ruby Flowsion), Chono (Shining Black). Dunno if Kawada ever had a move named for his yellow & black, but wouldn't be surprised if there was one.

There's a principle in animation that a sign of good character design is that you should be able to recognise the character in silhouette. I think there's two principles at work in wrestling - one is that, if you're a kid watching for the first time, you should be able to describe the wrestler with only one adjective or qualifier; "the tall one", "the one in pink", "the one that's a pirate", whatever it may be.

The other is similar to the "in silhouette" thing - if you're playing the video game, and assigning moves in Create-A-Wrestler, so there's just generic red and green wrestlers performing moves, I should still be able to recognise your moves. I should know that "Foot Stomp 4" is The Rock's, while "Foot Stomp 6" is Stone Cold's. Okay, so everyone does a superkick or a spear; how is your's different? What makes it yours?

There was bit on the old Proving Ground series on the Network that's just a bit of background dialogue, but it really stuck with me. Tyler Breeze is in the ring talking to two rookies/trainees, and he asks them, "if a kid were playing at being you at school, what would they do?". How do they carry themselves, what gestures do they make, to make it instantly recognisable that it's you they're "being"?

To bring it back to colours and gear - if a kid is dressing as you for Halloween, what do they wear? There's a reason you used to see a lot of kids dressed as Orange Cassidy or Darby Allin at AEW shows; they're easy, identifiable costumes. How would they dress as Finn Balor, or half the people in the men's Rumble just gone? It's all just black trousers.


I used to work with a guy who did a superhero gimmick, and he'd changed up his gear every few months - it was always the same basic get-up of a bodysuit, trunks over tights, a cape, and furry boots, but the colours changed. One year he was getting booked a bit more seriously, less of just a comic relief jobber character, and he decided to go for darker colours, with a black bodysuit with blue accessories, aiming for a kind of Batman Animated Series vibe. It looked great. But he regretted it and changed back very quickly, because I told him about a time a friend of mine had brought her daughter to a show, and he had been her favourite because he was wearing pink. He realised that he'd lost a point of connection with the audience by, even though it was still the same basic idea, changing his gear to be the same colours as everyone else's. He was no longer "the one in pink".
 

17 hours ago, LaGoosh said:

There's a million production/presentation things I hate. The vast majority of them being things introduced/cemented by WWE over the past 15 years which are now see as "the way" wrestling is presented, is copied by every other US promotion and are absolutely fucking SHITE but to spare you all I'll just pick one in particular for this post.

I can't remember if it was the pilot or the proper series, but I was practically pulling my hair out when the WOS reboot on ITV had people saying "Sports Entertainment". And then they did a "don't try this at home" that was almost word for word, "yes, this is entertainment, but the hazards are real". Using the actual or visual language of WWE - especially when so much of it is weird and broken anyway - just makes you look second-rate. But everyone follows WWE's lead, in almost every sense, and wrestling as a whole has suffered from how long they had a virtual monopoly for.

[Dr. Alan Grant]

11 minutes ago, BomberPat said:

There was bit on the old Proving Ground series on the Network that's just a bit of background dialogue, but it really stuck with me. Tyler Breeze is in the ring talking to two rookies/trainees, and he asks them, "if a kid were playing at being you at school, what would they do?". How do they carry themselves, what gestures do they make, to make it instantly recognisable that it's you they're "being"?

I pity the poor child playing as Seth Rollins. “Okay, I’ve raided my mum’s wardrobe, I’ve nailed the cackle, let’s go!” Then immediately gets twatted by the kid dressed as KO.

[Supremo]

15 minutes ago, BomberPat said:

I can't remember if it was the pilot or the proper series, but I was practically pulling my hair out when the WOS reboot on ITV had people saying "Sports Entertainment". And then they did a "don't try this at home" that was almost word for word, "yes, this is entertainment, but the hazards are real". Using the actual or visual language of WWE - especially when so much of it is weird and broken anyway - just makes you look second-rate. But everyone follows WWE's lead, in almost every sense, and wrestling as a whole has suffered from how long they had a virtual monopoly for.

I felt similar watching that recent TNA pay per view. My first time watching TNA in forever. It was good. I enjoyed it. But fuck me, it’s just more WWE.

Everything from how it’s framed, produced, scripted, performed, formatted. It’s just WWE in a smaller building, with a different cast.

Worst is that I don’t blame them at all. I’m just as guilty. I know I’d love to see pro-wrestling done in a wildly different way, but even I can’t really explain or pinpoint how you do it. The monopoly has indoctrinated us all. I’d end up just doing more WWE, too.

[Carbomb]

15 minutes ago, BomberPat said:

There's a principle in animation that a sign of good character design is that you should be able to recognise the character in silhouette. I think there's two principles at work in wrestling - one is that, if you're a kid watching for the first time, you should be able to describe the wrestler with only one adjective or qualifier; "the tall one", "the one in pink", "the one that's a pirate", whatever it may be.

The other is similar to the "in silhouette" thing - if you're playing the video game, and assigning moves in Create-A-Wrestler, so there's just generic red and green wrestlers performing moves, I should still be able to recognise your moves. I should know that "Foot Stomp 4" is The Rock's, while "Foot Stomp 6" is Stone Cold's. Okay, so everyone does a superkick or a spear; how is your's different? What makes it yours?

This was actually something that "Charming" Don Charles, who ran SAS Wrestling, used to talk about in the psychology/character sessions at the SAS school. He talked about how, in the SD games, you could even recognise a wrestler by the stance that they gave him. It was something he covered in detail; essentially acting classes for wrestlers, pointing out that you should use every small moment to tell people who you are, like circling each other for a bit before you lock up, to show how you might walk or shift position if you were a "beast" guy like Rhyno or an aristocratic/posh guy like early William Regal, etc.

I remember him pointing out to a now well-established guy who's a bit of a monster heel that, when wiping sweat away from his forehead, he should ostensibly grit his teeth and pull the back of his hand slowly across his brow, to make it look more like he was taking his time to inflict pain.

Quote

I can't remember if it was the pilot or the proper series, but I was practically pulling my hair out when the WOS reboot on ITV had people saying "Sports Entertainment". And then they did a "don't try this at home" that was almost word for word, "yes, this is entertainment, but the hazards are real". Using the actual or visual language of WWE - especially when so much of it is weird and broken anyway - just makes you look second-rate. But everyone follows WWE's lead, in almost every sense, and wrestling as a whole has suffered from how long they had a virtual monopoly for.

It's one of the thngs that used to really annoy me about people who'd defend WWE's/McMahon's approach during this era. Yes, they got to where they were by being good at what they did in the 80s and 90s, but the monopoly years gave McMahon to come up with some properly awful dross that he'd tweezed out of his P.T. Barnum-warped mind and would probably never have been able to get away with had there been a proper competitor. Their sheer, monolithic invincibility through their brand recognition meant they could ignore ratings going down, because they were still acceptable, and because Cena and Mysterio were selling merch for them. I do wonder just how much more they might have missed out on for the lack of someone to keep them sharp.

[Lion_of_the_Midlands]

11 minutes ago, BomberPat said:

There's a reason you used to see a lot of kids dressed as Orange Cassidy or Darby Allin at AEW

Yeah, it's called lazy parenting. Double denim, a white t-shirt and sunglasses for OC or jeans hotpants, black tights and your nans faux fur coat, with a touch of white face paint for Darby.

[BomberPat]

30 minutes ago, Carbomb said:

This was actually something that "Charming" Don Charles, who ran SAS Wrestling, used to talk about in the psychology/character sessions at the SAS school. He talked about how, in the SD games, you could even recognise a wrestler by the stance that they gave him. It was something he covered in detail; essentially acting classes for wrestlers, pointing out that you should use every small moment to tell people who you are, like circling each other for a bit before you lock up, to show how you might walk or shift position if you were a "beast" guy like Rhyno or an aristocratic/posh guy like early William Regal, etc.

Absolutely - never do anything without purpose. I was at a trainee show recently, and I was initially really happy to see how many wrestlers on the show had really fun and interesting gimmicks, but then so few of them did anything with them. It didn't inform the way they moved or wrestled at all.

A wrestler friend of mine was complaining of something similar recently, and I found myself saying something that I've since found useful shorthand criticism - "if your character doesn't inform your wrestling, you don't have a character, you have a costume". 

I count myself lucky in a lot of ways that I came up through CIWW in Jersey, which was a very character-heavy and comedy-heavy promotion, and I had a hand in developing or coming up with a lot of those gimmicks, so it's something I've had plenty of time to think about. People used to come to us with ideas for characters, and it was usually a pun name and some variation on "wrestler with a day job" - wrestling postman, that kind of thing - and pretty much every time it fell apart on, "okay, but how does it actually translate to wrestling?". What does the wrestling postman do that no other wrestler does? And it can't just be another pun name for a standard wrestling move, as no one in the audience will know that's what it's called. Whereas I always wanted someone to work a caveman gimmick, because you can immediately picture how they would move and act.

On the flipside, we had a guy working an evil Soviet Russian gimmick, and he once said to me that he needed some tips on character work, because he didn't know how to convince the audience he was Russian. I had to explain that he didn't really need to convince them he was Russian, because he was called Yuri, he wore a red mask with a hammer and sickle on it, and entered to Russian marching music, so I figured that part was kind of accounted for and he could focus on everything else.

[tiger_rick]

5 minutes ago, BomberPat said:

What does the wrestling postman do that no other wrestler does?

Never get in the ring because he won't climb stairs... 

[Chris B]

21 minutes ago, tiger_rick said:

Never get in the ring because he won't climb stairs... 

And he copies other people's signature moves.

[Carbomb]

19 minutes ago, BomberPat said:

On the flipside, we had a guy working an evil Soviet Russian gimmick, and he once said to me that he needed some tips on character work, because he didn't know how to convince the audience he was Russian. I had to explain that he didn't really need to convince them he was Russian, because he was called Yuri, he wore a red mask with a hammer and sickle on it, and entered to Russian marching music, so I figured that part was kind of accounted for and he could focus on everything else.

Ha - that was also a gimmick we had JC Thunder working as at SAS, "The Russian Nightmare" Radik Anenko. He was booked as a monster, and it worked, because he came out walking like Drago, sold stiffly, and was booked to go over. His finisher was a kneeling powerbomb called the "Nuclear Bomb".

This is about seventeen years after the USSR ended, of course.