Do you think WWE will go back to TV 14

[I Like Your Poetry]

For the love of everything that's holy.

Shooting up the suggested rating will not shoot up television ratings. There is no direct correlation.

Except for an abundance of thonged Big Dick Johnson. Unless you're into that kinda thing.

[Tyfo]

Dec 31, 2009 1:19:08 GMT -5 I Like Your Poetry said:

For the love of everything that's holy.

Shooting up the suggested rating will not shoot up television ratings. There is no direct correlation.

Except for an abundance of thonged Big Dick Johnson. Unless you're into that kinda thing.

I don't think anyone expects it to shot up the TV ratings, because they were TV-14 all the way through late 2007 or early 2008 and the ratings were similar to now.

I think it's more a case of fans wanting to be able to watch a product that they can feel is "for them".

Like me personally, I detest the current Hornswoggle angle and basically anything he's been involved with for the last 9 months or so. That is something that it obviously aimed at a younger audience and not for someone in my age group.

The biggest problem I have with that is all the people saying how if I was younger I would love it. Well, I was 7 years old or so when Doink the Clown brought in his little buddy Dink, which is more or less Hornswoggle with clown makeup, and I HATED Doink and Dink.

I've always been of the impression that kids want to watch something that they feel is NOT aimed towards them, but instead they want something that seems to "mature" for them. I know that's how I was, and most kids my age that I knew. When I was 11 or 12 and the Austin/Hart Foundation and DX type stuff was starting, I LOVED it because it made me feel older and like it was something that I wasn't supposed to be watching. That's how you hook them in my personal opinion. But I guess we'll see how things work out.

[Bub (BLM)]

Dec 31, 2009 1:33:44 GMT -5 Tyfo said:

Dec 31, 2009 1:19:08 GMT -5 I Like Your Poetry said:

For the love of everything that's holy.

Shooting up the suggested rating will not shoot up television ratings. There is no direct correlation.

Except for an abundance of thonged Big Dick Johnson. Unless you're into that kinda thing.

I don't think anyone expects it to shot up the TV ratings, because they were TV-14 all the way through late 2007 or early 2008 and the ratings were similar to now.

I think it's more a case of fans wanting to be able to watch a product that they can feel is "for them".

Like me personally, I detest the current Hornswoggle angle and basically anything he's been involved with for the last 9 months or so. That is something that it obviously aimed at a younger audience and not for someone in my age group.

The biggest problem I have with that is all the people saying how if I was younger I would love it. Well, I was 7 years old or so when Doink the Clown brought in his little buddy Dink, which is more or less Hornswoggle with clown makeup, and I HATED Doink and Dink.

I've always been of the impression that kids want to watch something that they feel is NOT aimed towards them, but instead they want something that seems to "mature" for them. I know that's how I was, and most kids my age that I knew. When I was 11 or 12 and the Austin/Hart Foundation and DX type stuff was starting, I LOVED it because it made me feel older and like it was something that I wasn't supposed to be watching. That's how you hook them in my personal opinion. But I guess we'll see how things work out.

Exactly. When kids are 10 or 11, they don't want to go see whatever new PG Disney movie has come out. They want to see the new PG-13/R-rated action-adventure movie. Wrestling is the same way. They aren't trying to hook kids with the PG product. They're trying to hook their uptight parents.

[AriadosMan]

Never.
Because the current product (and wrestling style) is now the only thing WWE employees know how to do.

[I Like Your Poetry]

Look, I agree with the arguments brought on here about the product feeling inferior to our mature tastes..but this IS a wrestling program. And wrestling is marked primarily towards children, with us as an afterthought.

And while we're talking about children as the primary audience...look at it this way. All of us are significantly grown up, and either have or going to have children in the near future. (On average.)

Assuming our children follow our footsteps and watch wrestling, do you want them to watch the filth and lewd stuff that was splattered across the screen during the Attitude Era? I'm not conservative or preaching RTC-like morals here, but I'd feel much better taking young children to the current product than something out of the Attitude Era.

In fact, I attended the last Raw at MSG and you know what? I sat next to a child who was maybe 6 or 7. He was wearing merchandise, laughed at all of the DX stuff, and had a wonderful time. He enjoyed himself completely, loved the product (along with his mom next to him) and had probably an extremely memorable time at the wrestling event. Which to me was a breath of fresh air from the bellyaching of most 20-something year olds on the internet who are constantly complaining that a pretend wrestling event isn't in line with their older acquired tastes over the last ten years.

I'm sick and tired of these PG-related arguments.

[hypnoticgenes]

I think eventually it might.

The Attitude Era came around because the kids that watched wrestling in the 80's and early 90's had grown up and the WWE started catering to them.

When the young fans of today get older, the WWE might just do the same thing again.

[Thrillho]

Dec 31, 2009 0:55:22 GMT -5 Lionheart said:

Maybe if we just post enough threads about the TV-PG rating.

Don't forget to bring it up in every thread that isn't about the PG rating

"If WWE was TV-14 everything would be all better" is the new "If WWE was still called WWF everything would be all better"

- Maybe if WWE wasn't written by failed sitcom writers.
- If every wrestler coming in wasn't a carbon copy of Randy Escobar or Cody Conway.
- If they weren't wearing theirselves out by wrestling every night.
- If the creative team weren't having to rush to write 6-9 hours of original programming every week.

Then it might just get all better.

Don't get me wrong. I still enjoy the shows, but I know they can be a lot better. I don't claim to know anything about writing TV shows, but I really don't think changing the name of Cena's finisher back to the "FU" and letting DX make penis jokes are going to turn Monday Night Raw into the single greatest anything in the history of everything.

Edit: Writing that, I had an idea for a storyline. Randy Orton & Cody Rhodes both sleep with one of the divas, who then reveals she's pregnant. Since they don't know who the father is, they name it "Randy Rhodes". Hilarity then ensues.

[AriadosMan]

Dec 31, 2009 1:58:50 GMT -5 Thrillho said:

Don't forget to bring it up in every thread that isn't about the PG rating

"If WWE was TV-14 everything would be all better" is the new "If WWE was still called WWF everything would be all better"

- Maybe if WWE wasn't written by failed sitcom writers.
- If every wrestler coming in wasn't a carbon copy of Randy Escobar or Cody Conway.
- If they weren't wearing theirselves out by wrestling every night.
- If the creative team weren't having to rush to write 6-9 hours of original programming every week.

Then it might just get all better.

Don't get me wrong. I still enjoy the shows, but I know they can be a lot better. I don't claim to know anything about writing TV shows, but I really don't think changing the name of Cena's finisher back to the "FU" and letting DX make penis jokes are going to turn Monday Night Raw into the single greatest anything in the history of everything.

I don't think they ever will go back to TV-14.
Because they can't.
MMA has devoured the older wrestling fan market. WC represents a minority of a minority of wrestling fans now. I honestly think the last gasp of any mainstream power that Attitude-era fans had was "If Cena Wins, we riot". Ever wonder why the fans are so well-behaved and quiet now? Because all the adults left for MMA stuff.
In a weird way, this is probably more typical of what wrestling is in the US than not. There was a tendency of US fans to "graduate" from watching wrestling to other, more violent and realistic contact sports. The only thing that kept this fan generation (of which WC represents the last sliver of) watching was the emergence of ECW and ultraviolent, edgy content. That was coopted by WWF and led to their most succesful period in history.
Problem is, the booking sucked BEFORE WWE reverted to TV-PG. WWE was trying to use raunch vs. UFC and was losing anyway because the UFC offered a more "real", unpredictable product. Remember, Brian Gewirtz and crappy predictable booking were around long before TV-PG. Remember when every ME face's storyline was Vs. McMahon and the face was an anti-authority rebel? That ended up as cliched as the crap with leprechauns and costumed Santino is now.
As long as there's something for its fans to "graduate" to, WWE can't do raunch and expect to win. The company's existence is now dependent on getting a new stream of little kids with each "wave" of fans. This is the future.

[Real Folk Bruce]

Dec 31, 2009 2:21:31 GMT -5 AriadosMan said:

Dec 31, 2009 1:58:50 GMT -5 Thrillho said:

Don't forget to bring it up in every thread that isn't about the PG rating

"If WWE was TV-14 everything would be all better" is the new "If WWE was still called WWF everything would be all better"

- Maybe if WWE wasn't written by failed sitcom writers.
- If every wrestler coming in wasn't a carbon copy of Randy Escobar or Cody Conway.
- If they weren't wearing theirselves out by wrestling every night.
- If the creative team weren't having to rush to write 6-9 hours of original programming every week.

Then it might just get all better.

Don't get me wrong. I still enjoy the shows, but I know they can be a lot better. I don't claim to know anything about writing TV shows, but I really don't think changing the name of Cena's finisher back to the "FU" and letting DX make penis jokes are going to turn Monday Night Raw into the single greatest anything in the history of everything.

I don't think they ever will go back to TV-14.
Because they can't.
MMA has devoured the older wrestling fan market. WC represents a minority of a minority of wrestling fans now. I honestly think the last gasp of any mainstream power that Attitude-era fans had was "If Cena Wins, we riot". Ever wonder why the fans are so well-behaved and quiet now? Because all the adults left for MMA stuff.
In a weird way, this is probably more typical of what wrestling is in the US than not. There was a tendency of US fans to "graduate" from watching wrestling to other, more violent and realistic contact sports. The only thing that kept this fan generation (of which WC represents the last sliver of) watching was the emergence of ECW and ultraviolent, edgy content. That was coopted by WWF and led to their most succesful period in history.
Problem is, the booking sucked BEFORE WWE reverted to TV-PG. WWE was trying to use raunch vs. UFC and was losing anyway because the UFC offered a more "real", unpredictable product. Remember, Brian Gewirtz and crappy predictable booking were around long before TV-PG. Remember when every ME face's storyline was Vs. McMahon and the face was an anti-authority rebel? That ended up as cliched as the crap with leprechauns and costumed Santino is now.
As long as there's something for its fans to "graduate" to, WWE can't do raunch and expect to win. The company's existence is now dependent on getting a new stream of little kids with each "wave" of fans. This is the future.

You are exactly correct about older fans turning to MMA. Every wrestling fan I know has given up on the current product and became MMA fans. My grandfather who was a huge wrestling fan as a kid and a loyal viewer for more then 50 years has said many times that "wrestling sucks nowadays" and it's "all garbage".

He is without question the most forgiving wrestling fan I know, he has sat through all sorts of wrestlecrap over the years in hopes that the show will one day improve. As of now, whenever I ask him about it I usually get a "who cares it sucks". You know if he's given up on the product, something must be up. I'm glad Vince knows that he will never get those old fans watching again, and instead chooses to build a new generation of fans. For that I'll give him credit.

The show could be rated pg, tv-14, whatever, the problem is that the current product is miserable, unentertaining, lifeless, and a damn chore to sit through. I can't blame my grandpa, or any of the other fans I know who stopped watching.

[Shogun316]

for me, i think that they will keep TV 14 as their secret hidden weapon

that is, they will break it up when they feel their regular younger audience has grown up and want a more mature product

but at this time (currently), PG is doing wonders for them

[MolotovMocktail]

I was saying the PG rating shouldn't make a difference, but now I'm reconsidering. Yes, they had success with a PG product before (the national expansion up until the early 90's), and not everything in TV-14 was good. The problem is, when you market your show to kids, you really have to dumb it down. The result is more outlandish characters that scream "fake" to everyone else and keep up the perception that wrestling is a carnival sideshow.

I've been watching old Attitude-Era Raw's, and I think I know why that period is so revered. It wasn't the sex, the profanity, or even the violence. It was the perception that everyone and everything served a purpose. We had a dumb skit here and there, but for the most part, there was very little wasted space. Everyone from Steve Austin to Tiger Ali Singh had a place on the card, and was used according to the best of their abilities. They tried to get everyone used as much as possible, if not on Raw, then on Shotgun and Heat. Today, without shows like that, and with the intense focus on a handful of feuds and wrestlers, certain guys just hang out on the roster and do nothing all year. Each match was made to mean something, as well. They had gotten past the previous formula of jobber squashes which had become boring, repetitive, and served no purpose other than to let us know a wrestler is still around. They gave us good matches between two unique personas, and it furthered a storyline, without blowing a ppv-caliber match by giving it away for free on TV. Today, matches between name wrestlers are still the norm, but the winner is easily predicted, it either does nothing to further a storyline, finishes one prematurely, or tries to continue a feud by dragging it on with false starts and cheap finishes (Kofi/Orton should be a great feud, but has been booked poorly by having them face off each week in this manner). The other benefit is one I will explain below.

Shooting up the suggested rating will not shoot up television ratings. There is no direct correlation.

That by itself will not. But a more mature product gave us more mature, and most importantly, more "real" characters. The face/heel dichotomy is back to the days of Hogan vs. Bundy, the clean, do-no-wrong face vs. the evil, monstrous, soulless heel. The problem is, nobody is like that in real life. We had more belief and support in rebellious anti-hero faces like Austin facing arrogant yet fun and charismatic heels like Rock. Why? Those characters were more than just walking personality traits. They were amped-up versions of who they were in real life, making them more real and more like us. Appealing to kids means Cena is a baby-kissing phony, while if he was allowed to really be himself, he could be a lot more exciting and relatable, and there wouldn't be the level of hate he gets. People complain about the main event the last few years being HHH/Cena/Orton, but in the Attitude Era, it was Austin/Rock/Foley, and later Austin/Rock/HHH, but we didn't mind because those characters were unique, easy to get behind, exciting to follow, and because they had elements of both darkness and light, we could relate to them more easily.

[I Like Your Poetry]

Dec 31, 2009 16:07:55 GMT -5 MolotovMocktail said:

I was saying the PG rating shouldn't make a difference, but now I'm reconsidering. Yes, they had success with a PG product before (the national expansion up until the early 90's), and not everything in TV-14 was good. The problem is, when you market your show to kids, you really have to dumb it down. The result is more outlandish characters that scream "fake" to everyone else and keep up the perception that wrestling is a carnival sideshow.

I've been watching old Attitude-Era Raw's, and I think I know why that period is so revered. It wasn't the sex, the profanity, or even the violence. It was the perception that everyone and everything served a purpose. We had a dumb skit here and there, but for the most part, there was very little wasted space. Everyone from Steve Austin to Tiger Ali Singh had a place on the card, and was used according to the best of their abilities. They tried to get everyone used as much as possible, if not on Raw, then on Shotgun and Heat. Today, without shows like that, and with the intense focus on a handful of feuds and wrestlers, certain guys just hang out on the roster and do nothing all year. Each match was made to mean something, as well. They had gotten past the previous formula of jobber squashes which had become boring, repetitive, and served no purpose other than to let us know a wrestler is still around. They gave us good matches between two unique personas, and it furthered a storyline, without blowing a ppv-caliber match by giving it away for free on TV. Today, matches between name wrestlers are still the norm, but the winner is easily predicted, it either does nothing to further a storyline, finishes one prematurely, or tries to continue a feud by dragging it on with false starts and cheap finishes (Kofi/Orton should be a great feud, but has been booked poorly by having them face off each week in this manner). The other benefit is one I will explain below.

Shooting up the suggested rating will not shoot up television ratings. There is no direct correlation.

That by itself will not. But a more mature product gave us more mature, and most importantly, more "real" characters. The face/heel dichotomy is back to the days of Hogan vs. Bundy, the clean, do-no-wrong face vs. the evil, monstrous, soulless heel. The problem is, nobody is like that in real life. We had more belief and support in rebellious anti-hero faces like Austin facing arrogant yet fun and charismatic heels like Rock. Why? Those characters were more than just walking personality traits. They were amped-up versions of who they were in real life, making them more real and more like us. Appealing to kids means Cena is a baby-kissing phony, while if he was allowed to really be himself, he could be a lot more exciting and relatable, and there wouldn't be the level of hate he gets. People complain about the main event the last few years being HHH/Cena/Orton, but in the Attitude Era, it was Austin/Rock/Foley, and later Austin/Rock/HHH, but we didn't mind because those characters were unique, easy to get behind, exciting to follow, and because they had elements of both darkness and light, we could relate to them more easily.

You honestly make great points...but I refuse to believe that the rating has to do with this.

You're gravitating towards the concept of better booking, and I agree with that most of all. You book the entire roster to seem important? Bam, you have a product that fans care about because they care about all aspects of it.

I say rating doesn't matter because my favorite era of WWF/E was the previous PG era during the late 80's, early 90's. Every character was pretty much revered (with few exceptions that quickly received the can), and for those who went through it, we remember all the characters with an air of nostalgia that's been difficult to produce.

I think people generally feel that way towards the Atittude Era if they grew up with that primarily...but the problem was that wrestling took a backseat to skits, and while the entire roster was pretty much used, there still were obvious jobbers and points that weren't great. Everybody loves Austin and Rock now but they did have an overwhelming presence on the program and I remember disliking Austin beating everybody, even though I was the target age of about 13-14.

I also disagree with the "PG means dumbed down" because late 80's WWF had some very intelligent programming, characters that were larger than life (even more so now), and matches between superstars all over the card were competitive. I could tell you everybody's finisher and allegiances to this day, and I don't believe it was necessarily dumbed down. Sure, guys like Hogan were boiled to an essence, but there were still people like Bad News Brown and Jake Roberts who didn't fit the mold and were actually pretty outside the box of what you expect.

Made simple: I agree wholeheartedly on better booking. But increasing the rating so we could get more pointless wet t-shirt bikini contests? I love breasts as much as the next guy, but that won't bring the masses back from UFC and the like.

[Azrael from Outerspace]

Raising the TV rating means nothing if the quality of the story telling doesn't get better. I won't say match quality because this year has shown that if you put two good wrestlers in the ring they will have a good match. The only problem is the story telling. If that got better nobody would complain about pg or 14. Not that i care, i enjoy Smackdown and ECW as a whole and Raw has it's moments.