Turn and Face the Strange: Championship, Time Slot, and Philosophy Changes

 

 *Blog post was started on March 18, 2021.

Turn and Face the Strange: Championship, Time Slot, and Philosophy Changes

The thought of an obligatory wrestling blog is bugging me. If only NinetyForChill.com did not turn into its own thing, but the repetitive content was making it larger than my primary website, MainEventOfTheDead.com. Too bad "Main Event of the Dead" only works as a name for a wrestling card or screenplay. My web publications would be so much easier if it could serve as a podcast name.

As for the screenplay option, I have written a Z-movie called "Main Event of the Dead". It is a comedy about desperate indie wrestlers who end up taking a booking against reanimated competitors. If you have suggestions about how to get the project out of developmental hell or if you would like to read a revised treatment, send an email to russthebus07@gmail.com. Thank you.

There really is not a lot to offer opinions about when it come to televised wrestling. I am doing my best to stay spoiler free in terms of the New Japan Cup, but there is a bit of catching up to do. Getting around to watching those events in a timely manner is nearly impossible, at least this week. In turns out I needed a rewatch of "Phantasm III: Lord of the Dead", so I think "Phantasm IV" and "Phantasm V" will need my attention for next week's Don Coscarelli's episode of "NinetyForChill dot Com - The Podcast".

And then I am cursed by referring back to previous episodes of the podcast. @QuidPro_Joe suggested that I give "Twilight" a chance. That will at least give me a chance to use my "Previously, on Ninety For Chill dot Com The Podcast" sound bite to give the illusion that the pod will be sophisticated. I think I need to dedicate the day I record to strictly British programming to further that angle. Unfortunately, we are in the midst of my 13-day work week.

Perhaps it is just a bad time to require a pro-wrestling blog. Every Disgruntled's Real Championship Wrestling page needs to feature at least one blog about what the blog's title promises.

 

 Roman Reigns [Wrestler] - Gossip Rocks

Current Disgruntled's Real Championship Wrestling's Champions:

• Real Men's Champion: AEW's Kenny Omega (defeated John Moxley)
  
• Real Women's Champion: AEW's Hikaru Shida (won from Smackdon's Bayler)
• Real Tag Team Champions: AEW's Young Bucks (defeated FTR)
• Poser Men's Champion: Universal Champion Roman Reigns (defeated "The Fiend Bray Wyatt) 
• The OCHO (WWE US, IWGP US, IC, TV, NA, XD, Nat, TNT) Champion: Intercontinental Champion Big E (won from AEW's Cody Rhodes)
  

"WWE Raw" is too long. Both of AEW's "Dark" shows are still too heavy on developmental talent to warrant their near two-hour lengths. "Impact Wrestling on AXS TV" lacks the presentation to keep me enthralled after the 8:00 pm (CST/CDT) paid advertisement from AEW. I will not watch "WWE Smackdown" because every Fox News ad they offer features fear-mongering narratives.

With the exception of AEW Dynamite, wrestling is a tough thing to watch now. It should not be this way when you have the biggest show of the year under a month away. There just has not been any drama after the week where Miz was once again WWE Champion.

The only recent title change was The New Day winning back the Raw Tag Team Championships from The Hurt Business to set up AJ Style's match at WrestleMania. Would anyone outside Omos's family pay $4.99 for that match?

AEW has always been solid, but for a blog dedicated to the championships of the industry, the championships being static does not help me. If Hikaru Shida would have lost the Women's Championship to Ryo Mizunami after she went through the title eliminator, a lot of excitement could have came from it. We could have had three months of joshi wrestling bouts before Mizunami's work visa would have ran out.

I suppose this is where @GrandestWWEAEW went off on me about Tony Khan not spending money for the top talent in women's wrestling. In all likelihood, Maki Itoh has a Tokyo Joshi Pro booking this Saturday. Or there still maybe a forbidden door to be opened that NJPW prefers remained locked. NJPW cannot let too many Japanese promotions (like DDT/Noah) through.

After the excellent unsanctioned bout between Britt Baker and Thunder Rosa, it is kind of a pity that the title could not have been tied to it. Baker or Rosa winning the tournament to beat Shida at "Revolution" to then main event "Dynamite" would have totally changed the narrative in how the championship is compared to NXT's.

Granted, unsanctioned would have meant the title could not be contested for, but that would require clever writing if Rosa was not the champion going into the bout. The drama would definitely been increased.

Honestly, my issue with the Women's division is that I fear Jade Cargill is being groomed to win the title before 2021 ends. If you watch all the talent with years of experience under their belt who are lucky to get time on "Dark", it feels wrong to let a product designed solely for TV be the face of a wrestling division. And if this leads to Brandi winning the title to close out the Shaq story, I will definitely being focusing on the NWA Championship come Wednesday.

At least with AEW I can envision an interesting and not so interesting future for women's wrestling. I cannot say that for the WWE main roster. This maybe how Tony Khan is showing that he is a better booker than Vince McMahon. Regardless of who should have beaten Shida for the AEW Women's Championship, I would have declared Sasha Banks the DRCW Women's Champion. But the moment Sasha lost the title, AEW would be where I think the next Real Champion would be found because they have the better narrative going at all times.

With NXT possibly moving to Tuesday, I think there is a chance that AEW can become the cable wrestling show. What can Vince McMahon do to increase his ratings? It does not look like they are looking to have Brock Lesnar take the place of Drew McIntyre to face Black Lesnar.

Even if Brock returns to Monday night wrestling, the ratings would only spike when he shows up for the show. Raw's ratings will continue to slide and AEW will keep shining. Eventually, it will come to the demographic, and we know AEW already has that won.

The only question now, is two million viewer enough for Vince McMahon to fight for?