Hello, once again. If you haven’t heard, I’m Aaron, the RoH DVD reviewer here at the Pulse. Hopefully, you’ll give those a read and articles like this as well. In this article type, I’ll be replying to my colleagues at the Pulse’s articles from time to time, when I feel I have something to add. Last time I’ll use this intro, I promise.
Today is the day I’d usually post my ROH DVD review, but my laptop seems to be on the fritz. My friend was going to retrieve the review using the laptop as an external hard drive, but even that hasn’t worked. I’ll be re-doing the review shortly (ugh), but as there isn’t a time, I figured a special co-hosted Modest Response would will the void nicely.
Today, with the help of the Tuesday ECW Reviewer, Rob Blatt, I’ll be looking at certain points where ECW has made mistakes. Here’s the direct quote from Rob’s column, which inspired this column:
“I mean, they’ve set this whole thing up to fail. They’ve taken the ECW out of the PPV and the Hardy’s are going to face a reuniting MNM on an ECW PPV. You know what that says to me? It reeks of poor planning, shitty booking and no long term plan. Vince soured on this product months ago, and it’s showing. Rather than evolve the product into something he likes, he’s just let it die. This is sad.”
The Misuse of Talent — Poor Planning, Shitty Booking, and No Long Term Plan
Blatt’s portions are in italics for your convinience.
There is a Hispanic saying that is quite apt here- “The fish stinks from the head.” That is clearly the case here, and we begin with ECW’s former owner, head booker, and creative lead Paul Heyman.
The Problem: Paul, at the onset of ECW, was the single most over non-wrestling personality in the company. He was a face with power and face power figures rarely work. They just, generally, aren’t as relatable. Most people in real life hate their boss and having the boss be a major face is difficult to pull off. So, Vince, the other writers, Paul himself, or whoever else could have been in charge of this decision, decided to make Heyman a heel. Heyman as a heel authority figure takes away from any unique position ECW might have been in and destroys his point of interest as a character.
First, the destruction of the unique position of ECW is inevitable. Heyman becomes just another heel authority figure in the mold of Mr. McMahon and Eric Bischoff. ECW, the innovators (supposedly) are ripping off the most basic concept of the 1990s WWF and WCW. What makes this worse is that this is a character we’ve already seen Heyman play as the heel GM of Smackdown! We’ve established that this will be ho-hum programming right off the bat.
Second, Heyman’s interest as a character in ECW comes as the rebel promotion leader. This isn’t Paul E. Dangerously the character in ECW, this is Paul Heyman, the violent rebel leader. To take away that major point for the character and attempt to pretend it makes sense is an alarming lack of continuity for any long time viewer lured in by the ECW name. Taking away the Heyman character in ECW and replacing him with the stale heel authority Paul E. character (even without the name change) sends the message immediately to old fans that the history of the promotion will not be respected. Destroying the nostalgic memories of your fan base is a bad message to send.
The Solution: The real fix to this was to never have done it. The purpose in it was a shady recreation of Austin-Vince. Rather than that, focus on Paul’s strength as a character and ECW’s as a promotion: their rebellious nature. Let ECW be restarted, or even now, stripped from Heyman. This would clearly lead the character to go stark raving mad. The rebirth of the rebellious and dangerous Paul Heyman would be nearly instantaneous. Paul, with the support of the ECW originals, could immediately reignite the Us vs. Them mentality that carried ECW for so long. This also ensures all characters have an immediate role- not to be underrated with only an hour show.
The Problem: Since jumping to ECW, Matt Striker’s impact has been insubstantial, his character has debilitated the momentum of the Sandman, and despite his natural charisma he’s been enervating the crowd whenever he’s on TV.
The Solution: Why did Matt Striker’s feud end so suddenly with the Sandman? Paul Heyman was boasting recently about how now he could really take his time letting feuds build between different wrestlers. The problem with that statement is that we haven’t seen one slow burning feud yet. Striker has proved effective on the stick enough to be given a spot on most shows, but nothing much else. We saw him on the fringes of a relationship with the Big Show, but that never came to fruition. Nothing would have benefitted the “monster” that is the Big Show than not having to speak and sound like an idiot. It also would have cleared up another issue that is addressed here, being that Paul Heyman is so closely associated with the Big Show. Also, there is a Pay Per View coming up in less than a week with a card that is wide open. We have yet to see a match between Sandman and Striker end in something that resolves a pin or a submission. As a matter of fact, we’ve rarely seen a Sandman victory like that either. Striker isn’t dead, but he’s on his way to dying without something to help the fans remember just who this guy is. Besides the jobber who had a few matches on RAW and was relegated to Heat once his shine wore off.
New ECW has missed the boat on many of its originals, but none more-so than Sabu.
The Problem: Sabu has been turned from an absolute madman into Jeff Hardy. From never speaking, rarely appearing, and always bringing the insane danger and violence by his very presence to a bad promo who can hit a few high spots and takes a beating. Sabu is just the kind of dangerous character that could be over hugely, but having him speak and stripping him of his gimmick has turned him into another vanilla, spotty performer.
The Solution: This one’s easy. Let someone, anyone mess with Sabu in a violent manner. Have someone (Tazz?) interview Sabu and let Sabu nearly kill him. Give him his credibility and edge back. Take away his intro. Turn the lights out and have Sabu suddenly appear in the ring. Create a mystique around him again. Let him destroy people using his body as a weapon, and above all, do not book him in matches where he cannot retain credibility. He should not be wrestling regular matches. The rest of the roster, fine, but for Sabu, all that’s accomplished is the stripping of what makes him special. The man has scars all over his body, an insane pain tolerance, and a penchant for ultra-violence. Don’t treat those as weaknesses, accentuate them.
The Problem: Too many new faces, not enough characters. Rene Dupree was introduced time and time again, but the trigger was never pulled on any kind of uniqueness to his character. In his first match there were some hints of what would make him stand out and be different from the rest of the roster, but not enough air time, no feud and a seeming lack of desire to build the character has left him dead in the water.
The Solution: Dupree was introduced as being the most hardcore wrestler that ECW has ever seen, while at the same time looking about as un-hardcore as one man could get. This seemed like a great direction for the guy who used to be in La Ressitance. Unless something’s changed since then, this guy wasn’t hardcore and the fans knew it. So what to do with this guy who’s un-hardcore in the land of hardcore? Expose him. If you watched his first match, you’d have noticed that he hit a double axe handle from the first step of the stairs. The first step. Who does a move off of the first step? Someone who doesn’t understand that he’s not hardcore. Think Mick Foley’s anti-hardcore gimmick, but done by someone who is completely oblivious to the fact that he’s not hardcore. There is an easy feud to start him off with in Tommy Dreamer, someone who “knows hardcore.”
Wins and losses matter in wrestling, but this kind of gimmick needs time and a few losses to really flourish. Rene loses a match and decides that he just wasn’t hardcore enough. Maybe he needs to use a chair, he brings a chair into the ring and sits while he throws punches. Now THAT’S hardcore. It’s an entertaining angle, and he’ll get over as a monster heel at the same time, provided that he’s not there as comedy.
ECW lacks the time the other two brands of WWE product do and as such has trouble finding time to ensure that everyone has reasonable motivations. There is also a distinct feel of this being just another WWE show with nothing to separate it for even the casual fans. The solution to this is simply a tag division.
The Problem: There is no tag belt in ECW. There is no motivation or direction for about two-thirds of ECW’s characters. There is no differentiation between ECW and its brand counterparts.
The Solution: A tag title tournament needs to be held. Alliances could form and fall due to this. This gives feuds time to develop, wrestlers a second goal, and motivation for all the wrestlers. With only 2-3 teams on both Smackdown and Raw, either bring over London and Kendrick, or rebuild the FBI. Give ECW fans a division where the in ring product is king. Let the fact that the tag division is prominent cause a differentiation in the brands. Above all, find use for the many good, but limited workers on the roster who can get over. You never know, the WWE might even stumble upon the next big thing in this manner. Might I suggest the Kings of Wrestling?
The Problem: Who cares about Kevin Thorn? This is not his first time around the block in the WWE, his other gimmick was trashed almost as soon as it debuted.
The Solution: Yeah, if we could go back in time, we’d disassociate Thorn with the Zombie that debuted during the first episode of ECW. We’d separate him from the bull crap that was Macho Libre and the male stripper, but what’s done is done. Thorn needs to be established as someone who is to be feared when they get inside of the ring. They already took the right step in giving him a (hot) mouthpiece, but they haven’t given anyone a reason to fear him. Perhaps an easy way would be to make someone disappear for a while. Think somewhere between the Undertaker’s Ministry and Raven’s Flock.
While the scenery isn’t the same, it’s time for Thorn to get himself some disciples. I’ll suggest taking some wrestlers who have been struggling in the ring to disappear for two or three weeks only to re-emerge in a similar outfit to Thorn and Ariel’s and to also use Ariel as their mouthpiece. The character of Kevin Thorn is completely hinging on Ariel, and unfortunately, that aspect of his character hasn’t been utilized.
The WWE clearly considers John Cena one of their huge successes. The backlash at his push based on cliché filled matches has yet to affect either their booking or their opinion of him. CM Punk, one of the most talented men on the roster, is receiving the same push as Cena did and almost inevitably, will receive the same backlash.
The Problem: CM Punk is being pushed as a monster without proving he can really go in a WWE ring. He is being pushed to the moon with an undefeated streak despite the simple fact that he is not an intimidating presence. This is happening without establishing Punk as more than a two dimensional character. While Punk is among the more charismatic men around and will stay over regardless of these issues, this type of push leads to fan backlash. The WWE have a potential huge moneymaker on their hands and are in distinct danger of letting bad booking taint it. Many viewers, including myself, only tune in for Punk and the buzz he’s generated. Without moving him up the card and away from squashes, the buzz will die and Punk’s career will be stalled.
The Solution: Punk needs to get the title on Sunday for this to work at all. The quick push would actually be surprising. A genuine surprise is so rare that this would really elevate Punk in the fan’s eyes. Let Lashley and Show eliminate each other to keep them out of the title picture. Now, CM Punk, meet Rob Van Damn. Rob and CM, meet 25 minutes, on either ECW Tuesday or the Royal Rumble. Punk needs a longer match with an opponent of some quality to show that he is top notch in the ring. Punk tends to pace longer matches a bit slowly, but with RVD keeping the pace up, this match might be quite impressive to the fan that’s unfamiliar with Punk. RVD would need to win here to set up their Wrestlemania rematch, but with proper booking, even face-face, this can establish Punk as world class while making some use of RVD’s being so over and previous mega-push, even though he remains in the dog house.
Hope you enjoyed, I’ll be back as soon as possible with the ROH DVD Review of A Night of Tribute and Blatt will be around Tuesday like he always is. Hope you enjoyed our look at the problems and some solutions to the new ECW. Until next time, I remain a ROHbot (it’s cool, we took it back).
