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CALDWELL'S TAKE
CALDWELL: Christmas edition of Impact showed TNA's contempt for itself as a pro wrestling promotion Dec 26, 2008 - 12:59:12 PM
TNA despises what it is. Pro wrestling isn't part of the company's name, like "wrestling" is in the WWE acronym, but TNA used to call itself simply pro wrestling.
Instead, the company switched from the "We are wrestling" slogan to "Cross the Line," which seemed like simply a marketing change like McDonald's used to change once-every-Monopoly-giveaway. But, it's obvious the company no longer wants to be thought of as being about pro wrestling.
WWE came to grips with this a long time ago and decided to create its own spin on pro wrestling. The WWE main event heavyweight style of storytelling centers on interacting with a mass audience with bright colors, over-the-top facial reactions, dramatic nearfalls, and fanciful storylines.
TNA doesn't know what it is. TNA has decided the company is not going to be about pro wrestling, as evidenced by four matches on Impact last night where nothing that happened from bell-to-bell was of any consequence, depending on the pre-and-post-match activity to carry the story.
The ring is a mere inconvenience, but it's used because TNA has a hardcore audience that won't depart from the show as long as they're thrown a bone of a few matches here and there.
"Cool, Sabin's in the ring t-night!" might be a text from a friend to another friend. "Dude, Angle is wrestling!" might be another text.
TNA has reached a point where they're keeping that hardcore-of-all-hardcore TNA viewing audience simply by tossing stars into the ring. Rules don't count. Outcomes don't matter. Results will be quickly forgotten by the time CSI starts.
TNA's contemptuous approach to pro wrestling was inevitable. Spike TV has been whispering in TNA's ear that maybe people don't want to see pro wrestling, as evidenced by the information that X Division wrestling traditionally loses an audience in its designated quarter-hour.
Perhaps it's because viewers see through the facade TNA tries to put up. It's a chicken or the egg deal. Do fans not watch the wrestling content because they don't like wrestling or because TNA presents it with such irreverence and a lack of respect for what happens inside the ring?
Ever since the Trio of X - Styles, Joe, and Daniels - was split up to pursue heavyweight division action and the X Division was left without its top stars, the wrestling content has slowly faded away. That eliminated the threat to the heavyweight stars, which was the X Division demanding main event matches because they were that dang good.
Now, the threat has been pushed aside into a nice little stable called the Frontline, which was effectively deemed sterile on last night's show when Mick Foley - the flannel-wearing executive shareholder - was the first person to actually clean house on the Mafia after the Frontline failed and failed and failed for weeks.
Hulk Hogan said it best - that's a tough intro to this sentence to write - when he said watching TNA reminds him of the dying days of the NWO when everyone wanted to talk and no one wanted to wrestle.
Except, in this case, it's because of a clear contempt for the very nature of the TNA program. TNA is buying into the fallacy that people don't want to watch credible pro wrestling presented on a TV broadcast.
No, people don't want to watch irreverent and poorly presented pro wrestling action, which TNA is making a name for itself by doing. WWE figured out a way to mask its contempt with its main event style of storytelling by mixing the wrestling with the character-studies that a mass audience can buy into.
TNA's contempt for itself - it's very nature as a pro wrestling promotion - is hurting its ability to grow. They can't figure out how to handle self-contempt and still present an entertaining show.
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