Possible alternative/parallel explanation: The AEW audience has a lot of people in it who also watch WWE. When WWE booking improved, some of them decided WWE was giving them enough of what they wanted, and popularity went down.
It's hard not to get behind this evaluation. It seems like the last time the viewership numbers went up was the C2 last year, and they took the wrong message from that. They said "Clearly people favor sports-based presentation" when what it actually did was put down a list of people that would be on the episodes weekly and propel several stories along on a weekly basis with a greater narrative focusing around Eddie Kingston, Danielson, and Mox. People popped big for Swerve and Hangman in their ongoing feud. It's hard not to be excited when Hangman is on screen because he's always moving somewhere and always telling a story. So much of the show is matches for the sake of being great matches rather than being for some kind of story. And yeah, people will tune in for established names and hype matches even if nothing is really going on. But that doesn't have you excited to tune in next week. You saw the thing you wanted to see. 2018 WWE had the opposite problem, iirc, where the matches were not only not hype but they were repeated so often it wouldn't matter if they were hype at the start. They'd be boring next month. There are some directions present that they can build some momentum for, but back in Year 1 they had the faith of the audience. Like WWE, they've cashed in that good faith and now the competition might well be the better product in terms of weekly TV. It is passed time to start focusing on stories and the last PPV had two(?) promo segments so I think they've started to realize that.
Well, there are differences in that HHH seems to be less inclined to drop stories/characters midway. I mean, he hasn't given up on Karrion Kross yet (even if everyone else has)! Other than that, he hasn't been breaking the mold or anything. It's simple "guy A has a grudge against guy B and wants to beat guy B" stuff which pro wrestling always ultimately relied upon. The real bigger changes are in how HHH seems interested in reviving the old NXT Black and Gold model within the main roster, bringing back old favorites (Kross' continued push, the possible return of Candice Larae, DIY push) and introducing indie talent he loves but missed out on getting (MCMG). He's even allowed performers more leeway in terms of moveset whereas McMahon was more restrictive and conservative. It's the old "should luchadores flying all over the place open a show or do we put lumbering guys instead so as to not overshadow the rest?" mentality. Also, by now, McMahon would have cleaned house a few times. The early AEW "gotta lock up all the talent to long term deals before they jump ship" thing lasted a relatively short time before McMahon realized AEW wasn't going to sink WWE and released a bunch of those people - including Zelina Vega who got her job back after saying she'd start a union. HHH much like Tony Khan hates releasing people and loves hiring indie talent that people online are buzzing about. HHH also likes his bangers and dream matchups. HHH feels like someone trying hard to look good for an audience that once loved him as the head of NXT but may have shit on him for his time hogging the spotlight as a performer (and maybe didn't like the "Me and my friend Mark" promo) but gets prissy if people criticize him. McMahon was more nonchalant and clearly had years of dominance to feed his ego. If the Feds couldn't take him down, and Ted Turner's money didn't do more than cause a few years of rough sailing, then who cares of some online smarks don't like it? They were still making bank and that's all that mattered.
Here is the problem with wrestling podcasters and fans who obsess over "creative". RJ City is now supposedly writing the BCC story and Mariah May stuff. Will Washington writing the Swerve/Hurt Business stuff and wrote the Swerve/Hangman fued. Jen Pepperman writing the Mone and some of the women's division stuff. Tony Khan is not writing anything. But you need someone to say yes or no or there will be complete chaos like in TNA. There is very little difference in Vince and Triple H's booking. But people think there is. And that is the trick. Jim Cornette said bookers only have three years before people turn on them. AEW creative is already different. But people don't know that. If TK says RJ City is now head of creative everyone will change up their opinion of AEW. The IWC needs to be treated like dumb children. TK treats them like adults and that is his flaw.
It’s becomes a ‘would you rather’ question. ‘Being 1 wrestler in 100 on a show run by Vince….. or being one of 30-50 Vince-energy wrestlers on a show run by Tony Khan ?’
I *love* AEW. Genuienly, one of the best promotions Ive watched in 33 years of watching wrestling, and when they are on, they are fucking *on* BUT...holy crap is this spot on. "AEW doesnt promote rational booking" explains the last several months of Mariah May, the ""face"" turns of Stat and Cole, Stat's last few months, and everything around Darby lately
@@staticcharm3808 Mariah went from something new (for wrestling), ie, a conflicted, queer/poly, woman who was clearly planning something, to a generic, been done hundreds of times, "i was manipulating you all along" heel whos been directionlessly floating between barely fleshed out "feuds" while aew waits for Mina & Toni to finish up in Japan. Imo, it doesnt matter how good it was several months ago considering where its been at for weeks Cole came back and cut a whiny "hes the bad guy, not me" heel promo that got a more and more mixed reaction as it went on and in storyline theres no reason for the "face" turn. Hes literally the same character as when he turned heel cuttign the same kind of promo. It is absolutely, imo, a Vince era "hes a face bc we told you hes a face" turn Darby is a face despite burning a man and threating to do so again while said man was chained to a cage wall and unable to be put out if burned. That is literally the kind of overly aggro repsonse and level of violence that was used to turn Adam Page heel, but, much like with Cole, Darby is still a face bc the writers say hes not a heel Stat has been in a vortex of character development for months now and is also a face just bc the writers say so
@@transagentcooper8041 To be fair, wrestling fans generally don't care whether a wrestler's actions are ethical so long as the target is someone they dislike. Back in the early days of Stone Cold/Pillman and even Stone Cold/McMahon, some voices online questioned Austin's behavior as status as a face. Can heroes act like this? In North America of the 90's? Yes. And they had for some time already. The line between bad guys and good guys was really "how cool are you" and "what else do you do that I might find appealing in some way". You don't even need good, logical story progression so long as you have characters that can propel things forward. Austin/McMahon made no sense in that McMahon could fire Austin (an employee) or get an arrest warrant given the stunts Austin pulled. Whenever anything like that happened, some loophole magically appeared to allow Austin back. People loved Austin and what he represented. They loved his promos and attitude. Conversely, they hated McMahon for everything he represented. The story and its twists were just an excuse to get those two to ham it up for the camera and fulfill a very basic fantasy scenario.
@@horgh_japan id argue that something being exciting, like Austin/McMahon, can hook you in, but for the most part, having lived thru, the attitude era was just car crash tv. It was new and exciting and controversial so it got away with hours and hours of garbage tv. Considering how much people these days hate screwy finishes, nonsense motivations, and how they've rejected many modern dickhead "faces", I don't know if id compare the two time periods Just bc it used to work, doesn't mean it will now
@@djchino774 I went to the house show in Syracuse NY every year between 2018-2023. Attendance was lowest in 2019, but 2018 wasn’t great either. It didn’t pick up until 2021 due to no shows in 2020 (covid). In 2023 attendance was just about sold out. So from 1000 people in 2018 to 4000+ in 2023 I’d say things were pretty bleak back the .
WWE fixed their problem by getting rid of Vince McMahon. AEW will NEVER get better as long as Tony Klown runs the show! Having more platforms for your show, doesn't change the fact that it's STILL GARBAGE!
Possible alternative/parallel explanation: The AEW audience has a lot of people in it who also watch WWE. When WWE booking improved, some of them decided WWE was giving them enough of what they wanted, and popularity went down.
It's hard not to get behind this evaluation. It seems like the last time the viewership numbers went up was the C2 last year, and they took the wrong message from that. They said "Clearly people favor sports-based presentation" when what it actually did was put down a list of people that would be on the episodes weekly and propel several stories along on a weekly basis with a greater narrative focusing around Eddie Kingston, Danielson, and Mox. People popped big for Swerve and Hangman in their ongoing feud. It's hard not to be excited when Hangman is on screen because he's always moving somewhere and always telling a story.
So much of the show is matches for the sake of being great matches rather than being for some kind of story. And yeah, people will tune in for established names and hype matches even if nothing is really going on. But that doesn't have you excited to tune in next week. You saw the thing you wanted to see. 2018 WWE had the opposite problem, iirc, where the matches were not only not hype but they were repeated so often it wouldn't matter if they were hype at the start. They'd be boring next month.
There are some directions present that they can build some momentum for, but back in Year 1 they had the faith of the audience. Like WWE, they've cashed in that good faith and now the competition might well be the better product in terms of weekly TV. It is passed time to start focusing on stories and the last PPV had two(?) promo segments so I think they've started to realize that.
Well, there are differences in that HHH seems to be less inclined to drop stories/characters midway. I mean, he hasn't given up on Karrion Kross yet (even if everyone else has)! Other than that, he hasn't been breaking the mold or anything. It's simple "guy A has a grudge against guy B and wants to beat guy B" stuff which pro wrestling always ultimately relied upon.
The real bigger changes are in how HHH seems interested in reviving the old NXT Black and Gold model within the main roster, bringing back old favorites (Kross' continued push, the possible return of Candice Larae, DIY push) and introducing indie talent he loves but missed out on getting (MCMG). He's even allowed performers more leeway in terms of moveset whereas McMahon was more restrictive and conservative. It's the old "should luchadores flying all over the place open a show or do we put lumbering guys instead so as to not overshadow the rest?" mentality.
Also, by now, McMahon would have cleaned house a few times. The early AEW "gotta lock up all the talent to long term deals before they jump ship" thing lasted a relatively short time before McMahon realized AEW wasn't going to sink WWE and released a bunch of those people - including Zelina Vega who got her job back after saying she'd start a union.
HHH much like Tony Khan hates releasing people and loves hiring indie talent that people online are buzzing about.
HHH also likes his bangers and dream matchups.
HHH feels like someone trying hard to look good for an audience that once loved him as the head of NXT but may have shit on him for his time hogging the spotlight as a performer (and maybe didn't like the "Me and my friend Mark" promo) but gets prissy if people criticize him. McMahon was more nonchalant and clearly had years of dominance to feed his ego. If the Feds couldn't take him down, and Ted Turner's money didn't do more than cause a few years of rough sailing, then who cares of some online smarks don't like it? They were still making bank and that's all that mattered.
Here is the problem with wrestling podcasters and fans who obsess over "creative". RJ City is now supposedly writing the BCC story and Mariah May stuff. Will Washington writing the Swerve/Hurt Business stuff and wrote the Swerve/Hangman fued. Jen Pepperman writing the Mone and some of the women's division stuff. Tony Khan is not writing anything. But you need someone to say yes or no or there will be complete chaos like in TNA. There is very little difference in Vince and Triple H's booking. But people think there is. And that is the trick. Jim Cornette said bookers only have three years before people turn on them. AEW creative is already different. But people don't know that. If TK says RJ City is now head of creative everyone will change up their opinion of AEW. The IWC needs to be treated like dumb children. TK treats them like adults and that is his flaw.
It’s becomes a ‘would you rather’ question.
‘Being 1 wrestler in 100 on a show run by Vince….. or being one of 30-50 Vince-energy wrestlers on a show run by Tony Khan ?’
I *love* AEW. Genuienly, one of the best promotions Ive watched in 33 years of watching wrestling, and when they are on, they are fucking *on*
BUT...holy crap is this spot on. "AEW doesnt promote rational booking" explains the last several months of Mariah May, the ""face"" turns of Stat and Cole, Stat's last few months, and everything around Darby lately
@@staticcharm3808 Mariah went from something new (for wrestling), ie, a conflicted, queer/poly, woman who was clearly planning something, to a generic, been done hundreds of times, "i was manipulating you all along" heel whos been directionlessly floating between barely fleshed out "feuds" while aew waits for Mina & Toni to finish up in Japan. Imo, it doesnt matter how good it was several months ago considering where its been at for weeks
Cole came back and cut a whiny "hes the bad guy, not me" heel promo that got a more and more mixed reaction as it went on and in storyline theres no reason for the "face" turn. Hes literally the same character as when he turned heel cuttign the same kind of promo. It is absolutely, imo, a Vince era "hes a face bc we told you hes a face" turn
Darby is a face despite burning a man and threating to do so again while said man was chained to a cage wall and unable to be put out if burned. That is literally the kind of overly aggro repsonse and level of violence that was used to turn Adam Page heel, but, much like with Cole, Darby is still a face bc the writers say hes not a heel
Stat has been in a vortex of character development for months now and is also a face just bc the writers say so
@@transagentcooper8041 To be fair, wrestling fans generally don't care whether a wrestler's actions are ethical so long as the target is someone they dislike. Back in the early days of Stone Cold/Pillman and even Stone Cold/McMahon, some voices online questioned Austin's behavior as status as a face. Can heroes act like this?
In North America of the 90's? Yes. And they had for some time already.
The line between bad guys and good guys was really "how cool are you" and "what else do you do that I might find appealing in some way".
You don't even need good, logical story progression so long as you have characters that can propel things forward. Austin/McMahon made no sense in that McMahon could fire Austin (an employee) or get an arrest warrant given the stunts Austin pulled. Whenever anything like that happened, some loophole magically appeared to allow Austin back. People loved Austin and what he represented. They loved his promos and attitude. Conversely, they hated McMahon for everything he represented. The story and its twists were just an excuse to get those two to ham it up for the camera and fulfill a very basic fantasy scenario.
@@horgh_japan id argue that something being exciting, like Austin/McMahon, can hook you in, but for the most part, having lived thru, the attitude era was just car crash tv. It was new and exciting and controversial so it got away with hours and hours of garbage tv. Considering how much people these days hate screwy finishes, nonsense motivations, and how they've rejected many modern dickhead "faces", I don't know if id compare the two time periods
Just bc it used to work, doesn't mean it will now
Definitely 2018 wwe. Booking doesn’t make sense. Talent just goes away without explanation. Tony needs real booking help with a real booker.
In 2018, WWE was still selling tickets and making money.
@@djchino774 I went to the house show in Syracuse NY every year between 2018-2023. Attendance was lowest in 2019, but 2018 wasn’t great either. It didn’t pick up until 2021 due to no shows in 2020 (covid). In 2023 attendance was just about sold out. So from 1000 people in 2018 to 4000+ in 2023 I’d say things were pretty bleak back the .
WWE fixed their problem by getting rid of Vince McMahon. AEW will NEVER get better as long as Tony Klown runs the show! Having more platforms for your show, doesn't change the fact that it's STILL GARBAGE!