Why The Invasion Angle Would'nt Have Worked....

[chunkylover53]

Its been said that one of Professional Wrestling's biggest busts was The Invasion. When WWF purchased WCW(and later ECW), many fans predicted dream matches between the company's biggest stars. Their hopes were later shattered. Though to be honest, it was bound to fail. And here's some of those points I'd like to dispute.

Lack of Big Names - The biggest names in WCW were Sting, Goldberg, Booker T, DDP, Scott Steiner, Kevin Nash, Ric Flair, Scott Hall, and Hollywood Hulk Hogan. Now for WWE to acquire that abundance of talent, they would need alot of money to hand out, and some of those names wanted to sit out the remainder of their AOL Time Warner Contract. All the company could've done was get the midcard talent because they were affordable. On the WWF side of things, Triple H was out with an injury missing the whole angle.

WCW Being The Heels - I can actually understand that. I mean, for most of the Monday Night Wars(especially the later 3 years) WCW was looked at by fans as the inferior product. If fans thought they were a second rate company, why would they want to cheer them, especially when they are invading their home turf?

The McMahon's Being Overexposed - Well duh, its their company, of course they are going to be on television all the time.

WWF/WCW Talent Facing Off - Its not like the personalities who worked for either company during the Monday Night Wars never fought each other in the ring while they worked for the same employer. You had talent defecting left to right, this would've just been another one of their encounters.

The Burial of WCW/ECW - People are saying those now defunct companies were being buried, I'm sorry, but they were already dead. And if Smackdown became a WCW show as rumored, fans would just crap all over it because it was nothing like the glory days of WCW(just like they are doing with ECW). Plus, my friends and I enjoyed the burial of them at the time.

So you see, it wouldn't make a difference how they handled the storyline. It was doomed from the start and I honestly don't think it would get the crap that it did.

Your thoughts?

[Robbymac]

It could have been done better, but without the major players it was destined for failure however you did it.

Bischoff should have been brought in as the leader of WCW.

[C2THAJ is a pretty princess]

you are very right about all this.


people give the invasion storyline a bad rap...and it was infact a very bad story....but we did get a lot of very good matches out of it...and thats what alot of people seem to forget.

[Red Impact]

I think the main problem was that, to do it right, they needed to wait. HHH could have come off his injury and they could have gotten the stars.

But then the perfect timing would have passed. They had to strike while the iron was hot, but didn't have the best tools to do it the best they could have.

[hollywood]

It COULD have worked. They could've let it simmer a while longer in order to bring in some of the bigger players, but they didn't. They could've established the WCW wrestlers as solid threats by giving them victories here and there, but they didn't.

The whole thing was basically killed by one thing -- Vince's ego.

[eJm]

Dec 12, 2008 11:40:39 GMT -5 hollywood said:

It COULD have worked. They could've let it simmer a while longer in order to bring in some of the bigger players, but they didn't. They could've established the WCW wrestlers as solid threats by giving them victories here and there, but they didn't.

The whole thing was basically killed by one thing -- Vince's ego.

[salsashark]

To counter a few of those points before I go to work:

1. They had both the ECW and WCW rosters available at the time, and just by using the sheer novelty of the new influx of talent, they could have made it work. DDP, Bagwell, Booker, RVD, Dreamer and other names I'm not forgetting (Was Mike Awesome part of the Invasion?) would have been an excellent holdover force. Draw out a WCW/ECW vs WWE feud for a year (thing about all the dream matches in there), and then when Flair, the nWo and whoever else that's important come into WWE, start a WCW vs ECW mini-feud and more faction warfare.

2. There's nothing wrong with WCW/ECW being the heels. Never got that complaint.

3. The McMahons could certainly have gone a year or so without being the focus of everything. Before 1998, I never knew Shane or Stephanie existed. They could have hidden them away for a little while, like how the McMahons are background figures right now.

f***, I'm late.

[nealo]

what should of happened is the big names as formentioned and the rights to WCW bought up then WWF could of had those dream matches we always wanted.as for the mcmahons they shopul of ended the shane/vince rivalry at WMX7.

[Push R Truth]

Multiple times, I've tried to re-write what-if's when it comes to the Invasion.


And every time, I look at my final product and see that it still looks stupid.


I'd make fun of the Invasion a lot more, except I've tried and failed multiple times to think up something better.


Yes, I hated the Invasion, but I'm not sure there was a way to even do it right with what they had to work with. You had to strike the angle when the iron was hot, and unfortunately, most of the contracts required to make it interesting were not available until later on... or never did become available.




All in All, I wonder if the Invasion is not just one of those things that we wanted so bad, and wished so hard for, that it was more or less impossible to do it and make people happy.

Kinda like the BCS in college football. People complained for YEARS that they wanted a system to give us a 1# vs 2# game at the end of the year. But everybody has millions of different opinions of how to get that 1# and 2# rating. So in the end we have a scenario where we have a bunch of people pissed off, but at least we got "something".

[hollywood]

One thing that's not mentioned very often... ECW.

WWE literally had all of ECW's key players at the time--Tommy Dreamer, Raven, Lance Storm, Justin Credible, Rhino, and even RVD. IF they needed to hold off on doing anything with WCW, they could've just done something to start things up with ECW "invading" first.

Of course, the problem is, Vince would've had to make the ECW guys look competent. And no way was that happening.

Again, it could've worked. There's absolutely no excuse for why it didn't. None.

[randomranter]

They could have held off the invasion angle while still keeping things at least semi-fresh. My idea would have been an offshoot of the NWO angle:

WWE buys WCW. Vince has to wait to be able to sign the really big names. He also has HHH out on injury. But he's also got a few dozen new wrestlers and doesn't want to see them rotting away doing nothing productive. So what do you do?

We start to see a slow infusion of WCW wrestlers onto the WWE card. But you don't put them in storylines and you don't give them a whole hell of a lot of TV time. You play them up just enough to remind the fans that they still exist and still are good wrestlers. Some decent 5-10 minute TV matches with the announcers playing up their strengths and wondering why they don't get more TV time and don't move up the ladder. This plants the seeds for the "invasion".

After some time of getting the bare minimum of TV exposure (by this point, some of the contracts of the big players would be expiring), the storyline begins. The WCW wrestlers are sick and tired of just being the "filler" matches. They want more exposure. They want more TV time. Heck, they want their own show.

Vince says no. Vince comes up with every stall tactic in the world, and WCW is getting fed up. So they start banding together, and interfering with Raw and Smackdown, similar to the NWO in the early days. WWE (aided by a returning HHH) starts banding together and fights back. WCW starts bringing in reinforcements -- First, they bring in ECW, then the big names that were formerly under the AOL contracts.

You'd have WWE managed by Vince, and led by Austin/Rock/Angle/HHH. Eric Bischoff leads the WCW crew, led by people like Goldberg, Hall and Nash. Heyman and the ECW originals lead the ECW faction.

Hogan could be a wild card. Where do his loyalties lie? With the company that revived his career in the 90's, paid him handsomely and gave him all the creative control he wanted? Or with Vince, who helped make him a household name in the first place? There's a main event storyline right there.

And there you have it -- The invasion has begun.

[Paul Is Deadpool R.I.P]

Dec 12, 2008 12:12:59 GMT -5 randomranter said:

They could have held off the invasion angle while still keeping things at least semi-fresh. My idea would have been an offshoot of the NWO angle:

WWE buys WCW. Vince has to wait to be able to sign the really big names. He also has HHH out on injury. But he's also got a few dozen new wrestlers and doesn't want to see them rotting away doing nothing productive. So what do you do?

We start to see a slow infusion of WCW wrestlers onto the WWE card. But you don't put them in storylines and you don't give them a whole hell of a lot of TV time. You play them up just enough to remind the fans that they still exist and still are good wrestlers. Some decent 5-10 minute TV matches with the announcers playing up their strengths and wondering why they don't get more TV time and don't move up the ladder. This plants the seeds for the "invasion".

After some time of getting the bare minimum of TV exposure (by this point, some of the contracts of the big players would be expiring), the storyline begins. The WCW wrestlers are sick and tired of just being the "filler" matches. They want more exposure. They want more TV time. Heck, they want their own show.

Vince says no. Vince comes up with every stall tactic in the world, and WCW is getting fed up. So they start banding together, and interfering with Raw and Smackdown, similar to the NWO in the early days. WWE (aided by a returning HHH) starts banding together and fights back. WCW starts bringing in reinforcements -- First, they bring in ECW, then the big names that were formerly under the AOL contracts.

You'd have WWE managed by Vince, and led by Austin/Rock/Angle/HHH. Eric Bischoff leads the WCW crew, led by people like Goldberg, Hall and Nash. Heyman and the ECW originals lead the ECW faction.

Hogan could be a wild card. Where do his loyalties lie? With the company that revived his career in the 90's, paid him handsomely and gave him all the creative control he wanted? Or with Vince, who helped make him a household name in the first place? There's a main event storyline right there.

And there you have it -- The invasion has begun.

I always wanted to see Hogan involved with the InVasion as a WCW member who ultimately joins up with the WWF and leads them to victory..... but it never happened...

[nealo]

Dec 12, 2008 12:25:56 GMT -5 Paul Is Deadpool R.I.P said:

I always wanted to see Hogan involved with the InVasion as a WCW member who ultimately joins up with the WWF and leads them to victory..... but it never happened...

My thoughts exactly. Made more sesne than Stone cold turning on WWF

[Bub (BLM)]

People say that it didn't work because of the lack of WCW stars, but it's not just that. The Aliance seriously consisted of Steve Austin, Rob Van Dam, and then a bunch of good wrestlers they turned into jobbers. Of course the fans saw it as being dull and lopsided.

Not only that, but no one wanted to see Steve Austin in that role. The fans wanted to see him leading the WWF and kicking ass, not playing a douchebag heel and saying "What?".

[cabbageboy]

The 2001 Invasion could have never worked. At the end of the day both WCW and ECW had gone under and WWF fans just would not accept these guys beating their stars.

Let's say the WWF brought in all these WCW guys in 2001 instead of later in 2002-03. So what? They would have a bunch of guys that stopped drawing by 1999, weren't having good matches, and were old.

[Hugh Mungus]

To be fair, Austin wanted to turn heel after WM17 to refresh his character. Also, there were the real-life issues within the company that worked against them (HHH and Benoit's injuries, Rock gone making movies, WWF were bleeding money after the XFL debacle and the WCW buyout).

[chunkylover53]

Dec 12, 2008 12:47:24 GMT -5 Hugh Mungus said:

To be fair, Austin wanted to turn heel after WM17 to refresh his character. Also, there were the real-life issues within the company that worked against them (HHH and Benoit's injuries, Rock gone making movies, WWF were bleeding money after the XFL debacle and the WCW buyout).

The Rock didn't completely miss the Invasion, in fact, him returning in the summer was perfect timing, especially with capturing the WCW championship. I mean, he's out of the picture and WWF's biggest star has turned against them, who else can they turn to? BOOM here comes The Great One to help lead the WWF into victory. Its a shame though Triple H completely missed out on The Invasion.

[Mr. Nice]

I didn't like how Austin leaded it and Jericho was on team WWF. It should have been WWE (with Vince as owner) vs WCW (with Bischoff as owner) vs ECW (with Heyman as owner). Team WWF should have been Taker, Kane, Rock, Angle and Triple H vs Team WCW - Booker T, DDP, Austin, Jericho and Benoit vs Team ECW - Van Dam, Rhino, D-Von, Bubba Ray and Taz.

Maybe Saturn and Malenko vs the Hardys and Eddie vs Edge

[Tea & Crumpets]

Dec 12, 2008 12:05:23 GMT -5 hollywood said:

One thing that's not mentioned very often... ECW.

WWE literally had all of ECW's key players at the time--Tommy Dreamer, Raven, Lance Storm, Justin Credible, Rhino, and even RVD. IF they needed to hold off on doing anything with WCW, they could've just done something to start things up with ECW "invading" first.

Don't forget Jerry Lynn. Mind you I can understand forgetting him- they had him jobbing on Jakked or beating Crash on the InVasion preshow by cheating after getting his ass handed to him.

Also the Dudleys had been key players. Tajiri was a reasonable ECW name. And Taz too.

[chairshotshurthead]

Well, obviously it COULD have worked. The two biggest promotions, pretty much in wrestling as a whole fighting it out for supremacy over who survives, and actually doing it with real matches between wrestlers from both promotions and not just in a ratings war? Easiest f***ing money ever.

It's just a shame Vince's ego got in the way of business as a major part of why it failed.