Lance Storm on WWE's face/heel heat problem

[Bang Bang Bart]

I thought that this was interesting in light of Raw's recent ratings woes and the apparent problem WWE has with booking their faces.

[EoE: Well There's Your Problem]

The thing for me has always been about trying to keep a steady balance. Not necessarily 50/50 BOOKING~!, but... we want everyone to look good and be credible, right?

Sure, you don’t want heels crushing faces all the time, but on the other hand, if the faces were always getting over on the heels and making them look dumb, the issue just shifts sides.

[Bang Bang Bart]

Dec 16, 2018 9:51:10 GMT -5 EoE: Well There's Your Problem said:

The thing for me has always been about trying to keep a steady balance. Not necessarily 50/50 BOOKING~!, but... we want everyone to look good and be credible, right?

Sure, you don’t want heels crushing faces all the time, but on the other hand, if the faces were always getting over on the heels and making them look dumb, the issue just shifts sides.

For some reason, WWE has never really found a way to make this perfectly balanced (as all things should be). It's either invincible heroes crushing the bad guys without little challenge or heels getting one up over the faces all the time.

[Secret Clown]

Dec 16, 2018 9:51:10 GMT -5 EoE: Well There's Your Problem said:

The thing for me has always been about trying to keep a steady balance. Not necessarily 50/50 BOOKING~!, but... we want everyone to look good and be credible, right?

Sure, you don’t want heels crushing faces all the time, but on the other hand, if the faces were always getting over on the heels and making them look dumb, the issue just shifts sides.

But as mentioned in the video. The heel can always get their heat back. The face wins the match convincingly to end the feud? All the heel has to do is beat some other face down the next night and brag about it and boom and he's hated and the loss can be forgotten.
In the end it should always be about good triumphing over bad. Yes the heel can occasionally win but in the end the face should be standing tall.

[Tiger Millionaire]

Dec 16, 2018 10:08:35 GMT -5 Secret Clown said:

Dec 16, 2018 9:51:10 GMT -5 EoE: Well There's Your Problem said:

The thing for me has always been about trying to keep a steady balance. Not necessarily 50/50 BOOKING~!, but... we want everyone to look good and be credible, right?

Sure, you don’t want heels crushing faces all the time, but on the other hand, if the faces were always getting over on the heels and making them look dumb, the issue just shifts sides.

But as mentioned in the video. The heel can always get their heat back. The face wins the match convincingly to end the feud? All the heel has to do is beat some other face down the next night and brag about it and boom and he's hated and the loss can be forgotten.
In the end it should always be about good triumphing over bad. Yes the heel can occasionally win but in the end the face should be standing tall.

In theory, I agree with that, however, recently we've seen a guy like Bray Wyatt, who was white hot, just get beat to the point where he had change the channel heat.

[schizo]

All this talk about the booking needing to be balanced.

WWE should hire Thanos to be head booker!

[riseofsetian1981]

They seemed like they had the perfect balance during the Attitude era and even during Ruthless Aggression period. Somewhere along the line they went away completely from their creative aspect and figured lets revert back to the eighties and nineties.

As people in this thread have stated over and over again, once there's a healthy balance established the problem isn't as noticeable. But you know what? The creativity could be there, ideas could be flowing, and the inspiration behind said ideas could majorly be there in terms of presenting the product in an exciting and healthy fashion. When you have Vince writing, producing, and rewriting said segments and watering down elements to make it interesting it doesn't matter how the booking is done honestly.

Someone as indecisive and unpredictable as Vince is will make anything stale and inconsistent.

[romanstylesiii]

Dec 16, 2018 9:51:10 GMT -5 EoE: Well There's Your Problem said:

The thing for me has always been about trying to keep a steady balance. Not necessarily 50/50 BOOKING~!, but... we want everyone to look good and be credible, right?

Sure, you don’t want heels crushing faces all the time, but on the other hand, if the faces were always getting over on the heels and making them look dumb, the issue just shifts sides.

This concept has ruined WWE more than anything. Why exactly does everyone need to get their win back? Instead of having a few wrestlers who are really over who barely lose, you have an entire roster who are a bit over, but lose half the time

[horseface]

get rid of the term "babyface". drop the baby part. i can't listen to people say that word or read it anymore

[Sam Punk]

Can anyone give a recap?

[mrbananagrabber]

Not all faces have to be shades of grey. Johnny Gargano, pre-turn, was as traditional a face as you can get and was the perfect foil for Ciampa’s dispicable heel. And it worked.

Just write well, give your guys something of worth to do and traditional heel/face wrestling still can have a hell of a lot of value.

[thecrusherwi]

If you find a face that is over, it's almost impossible to overpush them. How many times from late 1997 until he was hurt in late 1999 did Steve Austin not stand tall to end Raw? I bet it's less than 20% of time. People loved it because they liked Austin and they liked watching him succeed. And it's what made new fans into permanent fans. They heard this Stone Cold guy did a lot of crazy stuff and kicked a lot of ass. Well when they finally tuned in, they better see that happen or they aren't going to tune in again the next week.

I think the problem now is they can't get anyone to that level, because McMahons and the writers have no idea how to make someone liked. And I don't know if you can write someone to be liked in a wrestling environment. Most of the best babyfaces in history have gotten popular by just being their natural selves in front of the audience. It's far easier to write heat. That's why we see it so much. Any of us can write a segment that will piss off the audience. Writing one they will like is much more difficult.

[Allie Kitsune]

Dec 21, 2018 14:18:15 GMT -5 thecrusherwi said:

If you find a face that is over, it's almost impossible to overpush them. How many times from late 1997 until he was hurt in late 1999 did Steve Austin not stand tall to end Raw? I bet it's less than 20% of time. People loved it because they liked Austin and they liked watching him succeed. And it's what made new fans into permanent fans. They heard this Stone Cold guy did a lot of crazy stuff and kicked a lot of ass. Well when they finally tuned in, they better see that happen or they aren't going to tune in again the next week.

I think the problem now is they can't get anyone to that level, because McMahons and the writers have no idea how to make someone liked. And I don't know if you can write someone to be liked in a wrestling environment. Most of the best babyfaces in history have gotten popular by just being their natural selves in front of the audience. It's far easier to write heat. That's why we see it so much. Any of us can write a segment that will piss off the audience. Writing one they will like is much more difficult.

Shit, how many times did the entire damn roster have to run out and eat Austin's finish?

I always hated it, but most people loved it.

[King Devitt: Scrum Guzzler]

Dec 21, 2018 16:13:06 GMT -5 Allie Kitsune said:

Dec 21, 2018 14:18:15 GMT -5 thecrusherwi said:

If you find a face that is over, it's almost impossible to overpush them. How many times from late 1997 until he was hurt in late 1999 did Steve Austin not stand tall to end Raw? I bet it's less than 20% of time. People loved it because they liked Austin and they liked watching him succeed. And it's what made new fans into permanent fans. They heard this Stone Cold guy did a lot of crazy stuff and kicked a lot of ass. Well when they finally tuned in, they better see that happen or they aren't going to tune in again the next week.

I think the problem now is they can't get anyone to that level, because McMahons and the writers have no idea how to make someone liked. And I don't know if you can write someone to be liked in a wrestling environment. Most of the best babyfaces in history have gotten popular by just being their natural selves in front of the audience. It's far easier to write heat. That's why we see it so much. Any of us can write a segment that will piss off the audience. Writing one they will like is much more difficult.

Shit, how many times did the entire damn roster have to run out and eat Austin's finish?

I always hated it, but most people loved it.

Totally with you on that one.

It's one of the reasons I absolutely LOVED his heel turn.

[TGM]

Face and heel is a stupid term. Just go with fan favourites and have characters act consistently not change their actions through a perceived alignment.

[héad.casé]

Dec 21, 2018 13:56:22 GMT -5 Sam Punk said:

Can anyone give a recap?

He basically said that if you have an over face like Bruno was, Hogan was, Austin was, you have to protect that babyface as much as possible because a heel can always get their heat back. Then he talked about Braun & Seth being super over as faces and WWE sacrificing that all for Roman with the Shield reunion and Braun's heel turn, now Roman's gone and they have no one.

[Jedi-El of Tomorrow]

Dec 22, 2018 6:23:20 GMT -5 héad.casé said:

Dec 21, 2018 13:56:22 GMT -5 Sam Punk said:

Can anyone give a recap?

He basically said that if you have an over face like Bruno was, Hogan was, Austin was, you have to protect that babyface as much as possible because a heel can always get their heat back. Then he talked about Braun & Seth being super over as faces and WWE sacrificing that all for Roman with the Shield reunion and Braun's heel turn, now Roman's gone and they have no one.

He's right that a heel can always get their heat back. Look at Batista vs Triple H, Batista kicked his ass a lot, and never lost a one on one match, yet it was easy for Trips to get his heat back.

And WWE has always done better with a dominant face champion. Hogan, Austin, and Rock, were all on top of the company while they were making money left and right. A dominant face champion that the fans love, leads to bigger business than any other champion.

[PsychoGoatee]

While this is true, you also don't want a bland boring babyface. Part of what was so great about The Rock was he was eccentric, and Stone Cold was a bit crazy.

Take Seth Rollins, my fav wrestler in WWE. Such a well done heel run, despite some weak booking, my fav since Edge. He's over at the moment as a babyface, but I think with a bit more character, a little more of that edge and kooky personality, excitable etc, I think that'd be more memorable and bigger than the down to Earth normal "cool guy" kind of character they're currently doing.

While top to bottom WWE needs to massively improve their booking and characterization, I think "characters" is more important than the "heroes" aspect. Though I think I can agree with them on part of this, in that they should give big epic pushes to the babyfaces such as Seth. And heroic moments are cool, but overall I think the heels and authority dominating the show is played out, but that's another story.

[A Platypus Rave]

I mean we did have the alternate problem recently too.

For instance Rusev vs. Roman where Roman beat teh shit out of Rusev the entire time so there was NO heat for their match because Roman already proved that he was above Rusev...

Rusev was never allowed to be put in a position by hook or by crook to be shown as superior than Roman...

if the antagonist don't have something over the Protagonist at some point there's no real interesting story to be told there.

Like if Superman vs. a random Mugger was a comic and it was superman just pummeling him for like 20 pages for 3 months straight ... that's not really a story that's going to be considered a classic and you're lucky if someone buys the second book of it...

on the other side... if the 3 month story arc was Superman getting his ass kicked by like parasite the entire time and at the end of the arc Parasite just gets bored and leaves.... that's also a really shitty story that people aren't going to care about...

["Cane Dewey" Johnson]

A little late to the party with this thread, but...

I think the idea of heels getting their heat back is only applicable if heels are also able to score decisive victories over babyfaces. This doesn't mean heels need to win feuds, but they should win, regardless if they cheat or win cleanly, when it counts.

Look at the "Samoa Joe is a bitch" thread as an example of a heel who doesn't win when he really needs it. Sure, per Lance Storm and Bryan Alvarez's comments, Joe could always get his heat back by attacking a new babyface were he spun into a new program. But who cares, since fans have been conditioned to expect Joe to choke when the character needs the W the most. As a result of choking when it counts, Joe's effectiveness as a heel wanes, regardless of how good a 'getting heat spot' in which he partakes.

What can be said about Joe has been said about someone like Bray Wyatt, as well as other mid-card level heels.

In a way, the example of Marvel movies that Storm and Alvarez discuss underscores my point. Yes, there are clearly defined good guys and bad guys, heroes and villains, in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. But one of the long-persisting criticisms about these movies is that the villains aren't very memorable and are killed off, which undercuts their value as recurring antagonists. In many respects, an MCU movie operates according to the idea of getting heat. Malekith kills Frigga to get heat. Alexander Pierce deploys the HYDRA operatives within SHIELD to go after Captain America to get heat. Taserface spaces a bunch of defenseless Marauders to get heat. But they're all blah villains because their heat doesn't lead to anything. They don't win win it counts, and they don't matter because they don't win win it counts.

But people went gaga for Thanos, not just because he's the Big Bad towards which the movies have been building since Avengers 1, but because he beat the heroes when it counted for this character and his narrative arc. And he unequivocally handed the Avengers their worst defeat by putting all of them on their asses. To a lesser extent, Baron Zemo stands out as a villain, compared to, say, Obediah Stane or Ronan the Accuser, because he was able to hurt the Avengers in a way that broke up the group. And he was motivated for reasons that were, essentially, the Avengers' fault because Tony Stark messed around with the Mind Stone and AI programs when he shouldn't have. Baron Zemo didn't just get heat by killing T'Chaka, for instance, but by beating the Avengers mentally and emotionally, even though Civil War ends with Zemo in prison.

What wresting is missing right now is, in part, those moments in which the bad guy wins. Not just to get heat, but to get one over on the babyface.

Think of Vince McMahon when he feuded with Steve Austin. McMahon screwed Austin out of the title at Breakdown. The next month, at Judgment Day, McMahon fired Austin. At Survivor Series, Shane double-crossed Austin. At the Royal Rumble, Vince dashed Austin's chance at a guaranteed Wrestlemania title shot by winning the Royal Rumble match himself. Yes, Austin usually would end most TV shows or PPVs by dropping Vince on his head, but McMahon won when it mattered to his character, but also to Stone Cold's character. Heels today are not booked like that. Either they constantly lose, which is boring to watch because who cares about an ineffectual bad guy, like Samoa Joe or Bray Wyatt, or they constantly win, which is boring to watch because who cares about an unbeatable bad guy, like Brock Lesnar or Stephanie McMahon. There is a middle between these two extremes towards which WWE can't or won't book.