First, this is a good example of how losing a match, and even a feud, does not have to be a burial. If that loss serves a storyline purpose and branches off to something else that fans can get excited over, that is a good thing.
However, I hope the WWE didn't book things the way they did solely to tease the "Broken" gimmick. I have pointed out before that there are no good, fresh face teams to feud with heel Tag Team Champions on Raw right now. The Hardys feuding against The Revival for the tag titles would just have been good booking to give a young, new tag team a good rub. I feel like the WWE just buried the tag division last year by pushing New Day too much with the tag titles. They would have done fine without the tag titles. This time, it would be a case of a gimmick being pushed as a priority over the tag titles. For the sake of putting the attention on The Hardys and the potential gimmick change, the WWE books the tag division in a way that just isn't best. More excitement is still on The Hardys than over whatever is going on with the tag titles. Can't we share the spotlight better? Is it fair that these guys that were relevant over a decade ago are priorities like this in the tag division?
Another issue is the reaction from the live audience that the promo got on Raw. I pointed out on a message board that a lot of the audience just didn't care. Some fans thought I was crazy. Didn't I see the fans doing the "Delete" gesture? Didn't I hear the chants? Yeah, I saw it and I heard it. As I said, a lot of the audience didn't care.
It reminds me of when Samoa Joe debuted a couple months ago on the main roster. One guy on the message board I mentioned made a topic laughing at Samoa Joe not getting a reaction. Other people came in to talk like he got a great reaction. What was the truth? Did Samoa Joe get a reaction? Yes. Was it a great reaction? No.
It is like a lot of fans today only know two responses when it comes to crowd reactions today. You are either getting no reaction or you are getting a great reaction. That is just a dumb way to look at things. Some people will get a great reaction. Some will get a mellow reaction. Some will get no reaction. It might be different every week for the same wrestler. You cannot judge overness based on one reaction to one moment or even one night. You got to understand how much of the audience is reacting.
What was the truth about The Hardy segment? Did they get a reaction? Yes? Was it a great reaction? No. The fan reactions were mellow and did not last that long. The entire audience was definitely not reacting.
Someone I was talking to on that message board actually posted a Youtube clip to show them getting a reaction. Yeah, and it only confirmed for me that the reaction was not great. But the reason I mention this is that I read some of the comments and one that stood out to me was that someone said something along the lines of that 500 TNA fans could give a better reaction than an arena full of fans. And that is exactly my point. The reaction was there, but it was not great.
And why would you expect a great reaction? This was a gimmick from TNA, a company that was nowhere close to the WWE's numbers last year. Yes, The Hardys helped TNA's numbers with this gimmick, but Impact Wrestling wasn't averaging even half a million viewers. A lot of the WWE's audience does not care. If they cared, they would have watched TNA.
Do I believe The Hardys can eventually get epic-level reactions? Yes, if they continue to tease the gimmick, the fad will catch on and grow. And this is without being in smark-heavy arenas. Fans just love fads and things to play along with. This can definitely grow. But let's not overrate how popular this thing is now. It has potential, but the entire WWE audience is not hot for it, and it definitely will not draw much more viewers.
No comments:
Post a Comment