Part Three: The Wednesday Night Wars
In
February 2010, WWE debuted a reality competition show called NXT. The
premise of this new show was that a stable of male and female wrestlers
from the independent circuit with dreams of WWE Superstardom would
compete for an official WWE contract. After much drama and soap opera
todo, the competition was won by Wade Barrett.
Shortly after the
competition ended Wade Barret brought a new faction to the WWE. He
called it "Nexus." Nexus was composed of pretty much everyone who didn't
win the NXT competiton, notably Ryback (who went by a different name
at the time). So, to recap: after three months of competition for a WWE
contract, most of the competitors who lost got one anyway. WWE could
have saved us all three months of that melodramatic crap and just
skipped right to Nexus. But that's a different rant.
After its
first season, NXT moved to the WWE Network, where I lost track of it.
When next I heard of it, it had become the launch platform for the
C-List newbies who were trying to make their bones. Successful newbies
got promoted to the WWE flagship show Monday Night Raw, or to Smackdown!. Those Superstars who began to falter were downgraded to
the then off-air NXT for more training.
Fast forward a couple
more years to 2019. WWE debuts NXT on television, only this time not
as a reality show but as a companion to its other two wrestling shows.
NXT
began as a one-hour televised event that appeared to be the final hour
of their program. From the outset, it was clear that the talent on NXT
were nowhere near the caliber of their flagship show counterparts. Not
only were they unpolished, they didn't have their choreography as down
pat as they would in the future. But that was to be expected. This was
the amateur division, after all.
NXT wasn't that exciting, and
it did not have great ratings, but this is WWE -- if nothing else we
knew they'd soldier on. Vince had the money to sink into it until it
caught on.
In October 2019, TNT debuted a new wrestling show: All
Elite Wrestling. Spearheaded by millionaire Tony Khan (owner of the NFL
Jacksonville Jaguars) and former WWE alumni Cody Rhodes (son of the
legendary Dusty Rhodes), this new company was promoted as "A wrestling
show for wrestling fans, by wrestling fans" and it promised to be
all the things that wrestling fans have been wanting since WWE became
"Sports Entertainment".
Cough-Cough! Linda's political agenda! Cough-Cough!
It
didn't hurt that big names like Chris Jericho, Dustin Rhodes, Jake
Haeger, Jon Moxley, Kenny Omega, and even the greatest wrestling
commentator in the world, Jim Ross threw their support behind this new
company. Also prominent were several Ring of Honor standouts such as
The Young Bucks, Hangman Adam Page, and SoCal Uncensored. The ROH guys
dodged a serious bullet, in my opinion: the last time I flipped over to
_Ring of Honor_ in hopes of catching the Exotic Goddess Mandy Leone, I
was subjected to their new "Pure Rules" format. If you're not familiar
with it, you're lucky -- it's little more than theatrical high school
wrestling mixed with third rate drama and second rate talent. Minion 33
1/3 happens to like it, but I think it's crap.
(Minion's Note: Hey, Dem Boys! *AEW* is waiting for you!)
AEW
delivered on their promise. In just a few weeks, their show, Wednesday
Night Dynamite literally exploded. Their roster was packed with talent
that had been starving for a chance to show the world what they could
do, and show us they did. I've been utterly blown away by the level of
talent that these wrestlers have displayed. Rey Phenax of the Lucha
Brothers and The Bastard Pac (formerly Neville, The Man Gravity Forgot
in WWE, another snubbed talent) are two of the highest flying athletes
you will ever see. The women's division is absolutely top-notch! Kris
Statlander, Penelope Ford, The Bunny, and Hikaru Shida, every single one
of these women are phenomenal! If you haven't seen the match between
Dr. Brit Baker, D.M.D. and Thunder Rosa, you need to look it up. You
won't see this kind of action in any other company.
Since AEW is
funded by millionaire Tony Khan, who will never bow down to Vince
McMahon, Vince could not handle this upstart company in the way he has
responded to other rivals in the past such as WCW and ECW; namely,
buying them out and assimilating the company's talent into his own
stable before dissolving the company. Faced with its first real
competition in years, WWE was forced to mount a response.
Thus began the Wednesday Night Wars.
First,
WWE extended NXT to two hours to match the two-hour time slot filled
by Wednesday Night Dynamite. Then, they proceeded to disrespect the
ever-loving frak out of their main roster by downgrading some of their
top talent to what has always been considered the amateur platform.
Wrestlers like Charlotte Flair and Finn Balor, who were big name
main-eventers, got sent to NXT. The then tag team champions, Sasha
Banks and Bailey, made frequent appearances on NXT to compete, even
though it was abundantly clear that there was no way in the Nine Hells
WWE was going to let any of the NXT female tag teams win the belts.
But
perhaps worst of all, WWE orchestrated the invasion of Monday Night
Raw and Smackdown! by NXT talent in preparation for the 2019
Survivor Series pay-per-view. This culminated in the Black & Gold
Brand's first participation in and subsequent victory at a Survivor
Series event. While this was intended to show the world that the NXT talent were equal to their RAW and Smackdown! counterparts, what it
really did was make the flagship show talents out to be a bunch of
bitches who'd been posing this whole time. I mean, the so-called amateur
talent just ran up into your house and beat everyone down on _both_
shows! And _then_ they dominated you at their first ever Survivor
Series!
This didn't make NXT look good, it just made both RAW and Smackdown! look bad.
Since
then, it's only gotten worse. WWE has pumped as much promotion into NXT as it possibly can in their effort to compete with Wednesday
Night Dynamite, up to and including upstaging their flagship talent
with talent from NXT. After this past Wresltemania, all three of the
title holders in the women's division -- Bianca Belaire, Rhea Ripley,
and Raquel Gonzales -- celebrated their championship gold in the NXT ring. With the exception of Gonzales (who is the current NXT Women's
Champion) all three women are recent NXT graduates. And while Raw and Smackdown! storylines continue to plunge in quality, it's clear
that a LOT more effort is going into the Black & Gold Brand's
story writing.
Meanwhile, AEW has only risen in quality and
presentation. Not only have they had better storylines, but they've
elevated talents that have been ignored by the WWE. What's even better,
much of the talent that WWE has snubbed in their own roster have jumped
ship to AEW. Rusev (DAAAAAY!) has emerged as Miro and already earned
championship gold. Andrade El Idolo has just premiered in great shape.
Matt Hardy, Christian, Tay Conti, all have come from WWE to the AEW
roster. It's only a matter of time before we see Bray Wyatt and Rowan
make their debut.
But possibly the most damaging acquisition that
AEW has made is Aleister Black, who WWE has absolutely mishandled ever
since he came from NXT to RAW. He recently arrived on Wednesday
Night Dynamite as Malachi Black, and I am frothing at the mouth to see
the damage he's going to do to his competition in this company now that
he's going to have a chance to compete like he's meant to.
If
anyone contests the absolute _ass whipping_ that AEW has been putting on
WWE since its debut, you need only look to this date: April 13th, 2021.
That is the date that WWE announced that they were moving NXT to
Tuesday Nights.
Ring the bell, ref -- this one's over. Your
winner of the Wednesday Night Wars, by an absolutely dominating
knockout, is All Elite Wrestling.
To make matters worse, AEW has
just announced that they are soon to debut a new show, Friday Night
Rampage. I'm very interested to see how Smackdown! fares once AEW is
chomping on their ratings.
One final note: WWE, I have Loved you
for years, and though I hate some of the directions you are taking, I
Love you still. But when you promote the Black & Gold Brand, you
really lose credibility when the only reviews you display during the
commercials are from your own roster. #Didn't think we'd notice?
The
preceding has been a message from the IFW; who would like to remind you
that being an Empire is no excuse for being lazy, disrespecting your
talent, or suing your former talent for the rights to his name just
because he's kicking your ass in the ratings. This message is sponsored
by the memory of Brody Lee and brought to you by the number -1. Rest in
peace, Brody -- there'll never be another like you.