Modern wrestling annoyances (rational or not)

[westlondonmist]

4 hours ago, Ironic Indie Lad said:

Must have missed the bit where anyone suggested they thought long headlocks were absolutely electrifying. 

Well it depends. The crossface chicken wing on Bret at Survivor Series 94 is storytelling masterclass. 

[The King Of Swing]

Whenever someone on commentary in AEW says, That's a great call. 

Also verbal tap out. 

It's still submission to me, dammit. 

[BomberPat]

On 5/6/2026 at 10:15 AM, Slapnut said:

Name changes when someone joins WWE. I know why it's done from a business perspective, but from a kayfabe perspective why would Bryan Danielson, a world renowned wrestler, decide to change his name to Daniel Bryan? Why would Walter decide to go by Gunther instead? There's hardly ever an actual explanation to why this happens. 

I absolutely hate this, and it's an example of a lot of my pet hates - something that is just accepted that it's done because it's done, or that doesn't need an explanation beyond "because wrestling". It's just become an accepted part of somebody signing with WWE that they will take on a new name, and that's fine if it's a gimmick name, or it can be sold as "this is a new phase in my career, and I needed a new approach, and with that comes a new name" - it's goofy, but you can make it work - but why did Ben Carter wrestle for a few weeks on NXT UK and then decide that actually his name is the equally ordinary Nathan Frazer? What a mental thing to do. 

With Daniel Bryan, early on, he was doing shoot promos saying "I'm not Daniel Bryan, I'm Bryan Danielson". Okay, then why are we calling you Daniel Bryan? Why did you continue to wrestle as Daniel Bryan for the rest of your time with that company? It's even madder when they have second-generation wrestlers, where being second-generation is part of their gimmick, and they still change their name. There's a whole faction in NXT of nepo baby heels, but none of them are even using the surnames to make that gimmick make sense!

The worst example was in NXT UK, they had Sha Samuels debut as "Ed Harvey". In the middle of his first match, he throws a tantrum and says that he's not called Ed Harvey, he's called Sha Samuels. Okay? What does that mean? Why weren't you called that in the first place, then? I don't know who Ed Harvey is, or who Sha Samuels is, so why am I supposed to care about that? What's the difference? Worst part is that he lost the match anyway, so he effectively said, "no, my name is Sha Samuels", and then immediately taught us that Sha Samuels is a loser.

 

Most of my pet hates in wrestling today come down to one of three things - the increasing homogenisation of wrestling so that everybody wrestles like everybody else, doing something "because wrestling", or treating a wrestling TV show as a TV show about wrestling, rather than a live wrestling show that happens to be filmed.

That last point covers a lot of what's been brought up already; the hard cam taking precedence over everything else, rather than the camera finding the action, and backstage segments where anything that isn't happening in shot is invisible to the wrestlers, just generally the whole approach that if something isn't on camera it doesn't exist. If something is being filmed backstage, I want to know why there was a camera crew there in the first place - WWE would do this thing for years, in that they would cut backstage to Vince McMahon or Eric Bischoff on the phone right before a wrestler burst into their office to interrupt them; in kayfabe, on the show's schedule, what was that segment supposed to be? How were they able to magically cut to a backstage interaction right before it happened? To say nothing of angles supposedly taking place in local bars or hotel rooms or wrestlers out on dates or whatever - why is there a film crew there, and why is the show cutting to them at this time? 

Similar to that, a heel cuts a promo to open the show, is interrupted by a babyface, and then a match is set up between them for that night's main event. Hang on, you mean you went live on TV and you didn't even have a main event booked yet? How was the show going to end if that wrestler hadn't spontaneously decided to interrupt the first wrestler's promo? It's all shit that you can make work with just a minor adjustment or a single line in a promo or on commentary; acknowledge that another match was bumped to make space for this one - not only does that make sense of things in kayfabe, it also gives you another avenue of storytelling in that the wrestlers who got bumped off the show now have a grievance with management, or with the wrestlers who took precedent over them, and how do they react to that? Same goes for all the invisible camera/magic editing stuff I talked about before - in almost every instance, doing the work to make it actually make sense doesn't just protect the kayfabe of that segment, it creates a route to other interesting ideas you could explore.

Another bit of "it only counts if it's on camera" shit that I remember from a couple of years ago was CM Punk running in on a Drew McIntyre match and pretending to be the referee, and the commentators only reacting when the camera cut to show Punk's face. He's right in front of you, for fuck's sake. I know announcers are only meant to call what's on their monitor, but for that angle to work, I'm expected to believe that the commentators all have zero peripheral vision, and they were, to a man, so intellectually incurious as to not bother briefly glancing up from their screen to look at the entrance ramp or the ring to see who this mysterious bloke who just ran all the way down to the ring and looked right at them could possibly be. It's not like they need to ruin the shock by calling it as CM Punk, just a quick, "wait...is that...?!" right before the reveal at least prevents the commentators looking like idiots and the audience from being treated like idiots. 

Same criticism goes for every single "masked/hooded person interferes in a match, then immediately reveals their identity" angle. I know it's a running gag that it was all Triple H booked for months, but it would be shit even if he only did it once. They did it back in the days of Evolution - a bloke in a mask attacked someone, then immediately unmasked to reveal it was Randy Orton returning from injury. Okay, so why the mask? And if the mask served a purpose, why get rid of it? It's for nothing but the cheap pop of the reveal, which only makes sense as something to be done on camera, there's zero reason to do it otherwise. As if wrestlers in a match would be blindsided, that they must think, "oh, I have nothing to worry from this wrestler-sized bloke in a hoodie running to the ring, he can't be here to interfere in this match". Bollocks, get rid.

 

Last point on all that is tedious in-ring monologuing. There's always a place for trash talk and talking in the ring, fine, but if your story doesn't make sense unless every plot point is talked out from beginning to end, then maybe wrestling isn't the medium to tell it in. I bring this up all the time, but there was a Roman Reigns/Drew McIntyre match where Drew kicked out after a Spear, and Roman looked right down the camera and said, out loud, "this isn't the same Drew McIntyre I beat before!". Horrid. I don't know if it's not trusting the wrestlers to tell a story without it, or not trusting the audience to follow a story without it, but both options are as bad as each other. Bret Hart didn't need to stare at his hands halfway through the I Quit Match with Steve Austin then look straight into hard cam and say, "I can't beat him by playing fair, I am going to have to become the bad guy now", because both wrestlers were good enough to tell that story, commentary were good enough to sell that story, and the audience were smart enough to understand that story. 

[AshC]

It used to be that 10% of wrestling was silly and that was a bit of a pallette cleanser. Now it's maybe 90% and the serious stuff is respite.

[BarryOVega]

In regards to the renaming of second generation wrestlers, I’m pretty sure in the last month or so Vic Joseph has mentioned on commentary that one of Birthright has a different name (Think it was Connors) because he wants to make it on his own, whilst being in a stable based entirely on its members having famous wrestler dads

[Merzbow]

One thing I noticed far more in AEW is how there's often a group of faces outnumbering the heels or winning the numbers game in a War Games style match, I'm sure it happens elsewhere and before but it feels like a more common thing today and it's annoying, shouldn't it all be about the good guys overcoming the odds?

[IronSheik]

Christ, where do I begin? 🤣

[Carbomb]

On 5/16/2026 at 11:18 AM, Merzbow said:

One thing I noticed far more in AEW is how there's often a group of faces outnumbering the heels or winning the numbers game in a War Games style match, I'm sure it happens elsewhere and before but it feels like a more common thing today and it's annoying, shouldn't it all be about the good guys overcoming the odds?

The problem I've always had with that is that, when it happens so often, it gets to a point where it just makes the blue-eyes look stupid. Once or twice, fine, but when it's actually costing them titles or winnings on a regular basis, I kind of just want them to use their brains a bit, or at least just be practical.

There's plenty in wrestling that we say shouldn't reflect real life, but the basic, relatable notion of "I keep getting screwed by these cunts ganging up on me; I need my own gang" wouldn't be pushing kayfabe beyond reasonable limits.

[LaGoosh]

On 5/16/2026 at 11:18 AM, Merzbow said:

One thing I noticed far more in AEW is how there's often a group of faces outnumbering the heels or winning the numbers game in a War Games style match, I'm sure it happens elsewhere and before but it feels like a more common thing today and it's annoying, shouldn't it all be about the good guys overcoming the odds?

It's a thing that when done right works. Like in a previous Blood & Guts match (I think The Elite vs the BCC) the heel group fell apart and one of the heels just walked out when they could see the tide turning and it worked because the heel group were all scumbags who had no loyalty to each other while the face group were all mates and stuck together to defeat evil. And you give the audience that cathartic moment of cowardly heels who usually have the numbers advantage having it now turned against them.

But it's not a well you can go to very often.

[Dr. Alan Grant]

It may have been mentioned already, but someone in a heel stable/tag team becoming a face simply because their teammate has turned on them. Finn Balor and the Judgment Day come to mind. The ousted person hasn’t done anything to warrant the change from bad to good, but now we’re supposed to root for them. 

[Chris B]

"stepped foot". You don't "step foot", you "set foot".

[BarryOVega]

6 hours ago, Dr. Alan Grant said:

It may have been mentioned already, but someone in a heel stable/tag team becoming a face simply because their teammate has turned on them. Finn Balor and the Judgment Day come to mind. The ousted person hasn’t done anything to warrant the change from bad to good, but now we’re supposed to root for them. 

I’d agree with that in general but in fairness the Balor one was mainly down to him wanting to prove himself more after the Punk match and encouraging McDonagh and the others to do the same 

Bigelow turning face after the Million Dollar Corporation binned him off and Orton looking like a wanker after Evolution turned on him were terrible ones though 

[gmoney]

I think it can work if it's a wrestler the fans want to see turn anyway, and they get cool revenge/save another babyface afterwards. Like a lot of stuff, depends on the specifics and the execution. 

[Arch Stanton]

6 hours ago, Chris B said:

"stepped foot". You don't "step foot", you "set foot".

I don't know what this relates to, does someone say this regularly on TV? I've never heard anyone say it!

[Chris B]

14 hours ago, Arch Stanton said:

I don't know what this relates to, does someone say this regularly on TV? I've never heard anyone say it!

Turns up a bunch in promos. "Every time I step foot in that ring...", "Ever since I first stepped foot in this ring" etc. HHH was a bugger for it.