Post by Stone Cold Eleanor Shellstrop on Dec 18, 2013 3:43:50 GMT -5
Perhaps this thought comes from a moment of cynicism given that Monday night I watched one hour of a three hour show, the first half hour and the last half hour, as a result of being annoyed by the selfie incident but also wanting to see the Bryan/Orton main event. And parts of this thought are a result of thinking about comments in the selfie thread about what kind of show do people expect from WWE as to why people react the way they do about the product.
How do you think WWE would work as a television program if instead of being a wrestling show (i.e. a program that depends on wrestling matches and wrestling promos and wrestlers as its main content) that instead Raw and Smackdown were television shows that happened to have wrestling on them?
What I mean is, what if Raw and Smackdown were shot like Arrested Development or The Office in terms of a documentary/mockumentary style, in which wrestling is really just the environment or backdrop in/against which personal drama just so happens to unfold. In this sense, WWE could just hire a bunch of extras to be fans in the audience, and they could simply film snippets of matches and edit them together in a montage instead of dedicating 5-10 minutes to actually having a match occur. That way, WWE could focus on whatever talent they so choose without relying on the live audience interaction to determine who is a face or heel or who should be pushed and who shouldn't. They could even have the commentators simply narrate omnisciently as the show starts or ends, or before and after commercial breaks. In addition, WWE's tendency to write their shows as variety shows means that the pretense of the show would be that Raw and Smackdown are shows about making a television show that is a wrestling program, in which certain segments are much more 'real' than others (the kayfabed kayfabe of the in-ring action, the worked shoots of backstage issues which is still kayfabed). Or they could simply follow the Saturday Night Live model and just air a bunch of sketches that really have no need for any narrative cohesion whatsoever. All of this is to ask: is WWE programming about wrestling first or television first, of which wrestling is absolutely central in terms of being able to tell a story or merely incidental as the catalyst to make narrative happen?
In this fashion, Vince McMahon would finally have his show about entertainment that isn't really wrestling at all anymore. He gets to feature who he wants with limited repercussions instead of having live audiences crap all over segments or chant random names when they're bored. Working less in the ring means that the risk of injury for televised talent is reduced. Since matches really no longer matter and don't need to be booked as such (i.e. by a booker or agent), perhaps the television writers hired in recent years can put their chops to real work. And if they stick to the schedule that they're already working with (3 hours of Raw, 2 hours of Smackdown, 3 hours of pay-per-view every 4 weeks, etc.) then they could produce endless amounts of content in a short amount of time when compared to other TV shows (Lost's 100+ episodes, Breaking Bad's 62 episodes, Bonanza's 430 episodes, etc.).
How do you think WWE would work as a television program if instead of being a wrestling show (i.e. a program that depends on wrestling matches and wrestling promos and wrestlers as its main content) that instead Raw and Smackdown were television shows that happened to have wrestling on them?
What I mean is, what if Raw and Smackdown were shot like Arrested Development or The Office in terms of a documentary/mockumentary style, in which wrestling is really just the environment or backdrop in/against which personal drama just so happens to unfold. In this sense, WWE could just hire a bunch of extras to be fans in the audience, and they could simply film snippets of matches and edit them together in a montage instead of dedicating 5-10 minutes to actually having a match occur. That way, WWE could focus on whatever talent they so choose without relying on the live audience interaction to determine who is a face or heel or who should be pushed and who shouldn't. They could even have the commentators simply narrate omnisciently as the show starts or ends, or before and after commercial breaks. In addition, WWE's tendency to write their shows as variety shows means that the pretense of the show would be that Raw and Smackdown are shows about making a television show that is a wrestling program, in which certain segments are much more 'real' than others (the kayfabed kayfabe of the in-ring action, the worked shoots of backstage issues which is still kayfabed). Or they could simply follow the Saturday Night Live model and just air a bunch of sketches that really have no need for any narrative cohesion whatsoever. All of this is to ask: is WWE programming about wrestling first or television first, of which wrestling is absolutely central in terms of being able to tell a story or merely incidental as the catalyst to make narrative happen?
In this fashion, Vince McMahon would finally have his show about entertainment that isn't really wrestling at all anymore. He gets to feature who he wants with limited repercussions instead of having live audiences crap all over segments or chant random names when they're bored. Working less in the ring means that the risk of injury for televised talent is reduced. Since matches really no longer matter and don't need to be booked as such (i.e. by a booker or agent), perhaps the television writers hired in recent years can put their chops to real work. And if they stick to the schedule that they're already working with (3 hours of Raw, 2 hours of Smackdown, 3 hours of pay-per-view every 4 weeks, etc.) then they could produce endless amounts of content in a short amount of time when compared to other TV shows (Lost's 100+ episodes, Breaking Bad's 62 episodes, Bonanza's 430 episodes, etc.).
