Ryan Nemeth's Short Movie About Sexual Abuse in Wrestling

[Dub H]

(this was actually made before Speaking Out but released online just now)



Its heavily implied to be based around Joey Ryan

[Deleted]

I posted this when it dropped, if the mods want to merge mine into this thread since this one is embedded.

[Dub H]

May 12, 2022 17:29:12 GMT -5 @mattyphatty said:

I posted this when it dropped, if the mods want to merge mine into this thread since this one is embedded.

Sorry I took a look over and didnt find it.My bad

[The Legendary Ring Troll {BLM}]

Just watched it. Powerful stuff, definitely Joey Ryan-based.

[Deleted]

May 12, 2022 18:38:52 GMT -5 Dub H said:

May 12, 2022 17:29:12 GMT -5 @mattyphatty said:

I posted this when it dropped, if the mods want to merge mine into this thread since this one is embedded.

Sorry I took a look over and didnt find it.My bad

No you’re good, just didn’t want to clog the board.

[1 Free Moon-Down with Burger]

Bixenspan has been on one over this movie for reasons I can’t really understand

[Oh Cry Me a Screwball]

Yeah, Ryan Nemeth was essentially blackballed from a good portion of the indies up until June 2020 for obvious reasons. He was even cryptically tweeting about Joey before the expose, so I am sure this was cathartic to get out there. It's really what he wished he had done ages ago.

[Ecks Ecks Ringout Ecks Ecks]

I'm still trying to sort out my feelings about this. I've seen some people absolutely ripping into Nemeth over it, or dismissing it as a vanity piece in which he's fishing for sympathy points for beating up a Joey-Ryan-alike, but that feels terribly unfair. The sex pest character is clearly based on Joey Ryan, but Nemeth clearly isn't writing his own character as a saintly hero. Thanks to his own demons, he tries to impulsively address a deeply ingrained problem, but trying to be the noble badass only infuriates everyone and jeopardizes multiple careers.

It seems like an earnest effort to talk about the pervasiveness of sexual abuse in wrestling and how young performers might feel powerless to confront the problem, but it also seems like it wants to be a longer film than time and budget constraints likely allowed. The story it wants to tell seems really hard to fit into ten minutes, but for what it is, it's shot really well.

[Dub H]

May 12, 2022 23:54:17 GMT -5 Ecks Ecks Ringout Ecks Ecks said:

I'm still trying to sort out my feelings about this. I've seen some people absolutely ripping into Nemeth over it, or dismissing it as a vanity piece in which he's fishing for sympathy points for beating up a Joey-Ryan-alike, but that feels terribly unfair. The sex pest character is clearly based on Joey Ryan, but Nemeth clearly isn't writing his own character as a saintly hero. Thanks to his own demons, he tries to impulsively address a deeply ingrained problem, but trying to be the noble badass only infuriates everyone and jeopardizes multiple careers.

It seems like an earnest effort to talk about the pervasiveness of sexual abuse in wrestling and how young performers might feel powerless to confront the problem, but it also seems like it wants to be a longer film than time and budget constraints likely allowed. The story it wants to tell seems really hard to fit into ten minutes, but for what it is, it's shot really well.

Anyone saying so is an idiot, this movie was made before Speaking Out.

Nemeth had called out Ryan before ,out of movie format.

Nemeth got basically blacklisted from WWE and Indie by making enemies by sticking up for whats right.


This movie simply sheds light on the situation of how abuse was(and perhaps still is) seen and experienced, the fear the women has of losing all his booking and unable to do something.

No doubt it has some of what Nemeth wishes he had done by the end

[Larryhausen]

And of course, Bar Wrestling(the company owned by Joey) released their "match of the day" for the first time in weeks just as this was released.

Joey Ryan vs Ryan Nemeth.

[Mecca]

May 12, 2022 21:53:14 GMT -5 1 Free Moon-Down with Burger said:

Bixenspan has been on one over this movie for reasons I can’t really understand

You have to be careful with Bix. He'll throw anyone under the bus if he remotely doesn't like them or the company they work for and he'll complain about really petty stuff.

Yet at the same time if a promotion treats him well he'll be different. Right now GCW has been very cool to him to despite him loading his page with speaking out accusations..he refused to mention Chris Dickinson. When someone called him on it, he claimed there wasn't evidence beyond hearsay so he wasn't speaking on it..

There is literally the same evidence as most everyone else he threw under the bus as a piece of shit.

In short Bix is good sometimes but he has bias, GCW has rolled out the red carpet for him so he won't be real about them. But if he hates you he goes far the other way..like when he threw a fit about Southpaw Regional wrestling shitting on the territories.

[The Legendary Ring Troll {BLM}]

Really wish this movie had more people talking about it.

[HMARK Center]

There's definitely a longer story to be told here, since the kind of struggle depicted is one I can well imagine running all too rampant at different times and places: knowing something's @#$%ed up, wanting to do something about it, but knowing that keeping your mouth shut will likely be better for everyone's financial well-being while endangering more people long-term, while actually doing something about it might be the right thing to do but lead to negative consequences in the short-term, including to the very people you're trying to help. It's the kind of "trapped" feeling that we can all imagine, but most never quite find ourselves in.

I'm sure there's an element of wish fulfillment in the end regarding how he wishes he had dealt with someone like Joey Ryan, but there's a lot to explore there, for sure.

[Blade]

May 12, 2022 23:54:17 GMT -5 Ecks Ecks Ringout Ecks Ecks said:

I'm still trying to sort out my feelings about this. I've seen some people absolutely ripping into Nemeth over it, or dismissing it as a vanity piece in which he's fishing for sympathy points for beating up a Joey-Ryan-alike, but that feels terribly unfair. The sex pest character is clearly based on Joey Ryan, but Nemeth clearly isn't writing his own character as a saintly hero. Thanks to his own demons, he tries to impulsively address a deeply ingrained problem, but trying to be the noble badass only infuriates everyone and jeopardizes multiple careers.

It seems like an earnest effort to talk about the pervasiveness of sexual abuse in wrestling and how young performers might feel powerless to confront the problem, but it also seems like it wants to be a longer film than time and budget constraints likely allowed. The story it wants to tell seems really hard to fit into ten minutes, but for what it is, it's shot really well.

I agree with every part of this wholeheartedly.

And it's really great not only that he addressed this, but addressed why it is never just as simple as the vast majority of fictional treatments would have it. 

And while I'm sure it was helped by how close it was to his life experience, Nemeth's acting was actually really good, too.