BLATANT TNA EXHIBITION
Posted by: Sean Carless on 04/21/2004

The following is not a burial of NWA TNA, just simply one man's opinion.

With that said, I'm trying. I'm really trying. I really want to love TNA, but the part of my brain that actually possesses common sense and logic will not allow me to. When I order a TNA Pay-per-view, I don't get the same feel that others get in that the promotion is on the door-step of being a credible "number 2" promotion behind the WWE. To me, TNA is falling into the same trap that WCW in latter years fell into, that being a holding pattern, with the focus on stars who in most cases have no business being in that position. Now don't get me wrong, I WANT TNA to succeed, after all a healthy TNA is always a good fall back for those individuals who for whatever reason get the axe from WWE.

With that said, let me say that TNA is home to some INCREDIBLY talented wrestlers, but unfortunately the bulk of these athletes are under-cut by the companies focal-point Jeff Jarrett, who time and again remains on top regardless of the situation. There are some similarities between Jeff and WWE's HHH, but the main difference is that unlike Triple H (at least at this point) Jeff OWNS his promotion, and thus, keeping a stranglehold on his "spot" is not needed.

There are MANY stars on the show that are ready to break through, most notably Raven, who in my opinion has been the single most well developed character in the company in the last year. Unfortunately though, you know that if the Jarretts were able to procure the services of Hulk Hogan, or to a lesser degree Nash or Hall, that Raven, AJ Styles and AMW would all be put on the back burner. While at the Orange Goblin's behest, real "stars" like Brian Knobbs and Ed "It's safe, it's only Cocaine!" Leslie would be getting the top spots. For all intensive purposes it's already began to happen, as over the last while, we've pretty much had every cling-on on the Hulkster's ass in the last ten years seem to be getting gainful employment. I once saw a sign in the crowd that said "Smells like WCW" and I can't think of a better way to sum it up than that.

What's the point of bringing in guys like Lex Luger and Duggan for one night? It really doesn't benefit anyone including them, other than to maybe get their faces on TV. Honky Tonk Man in one of his recent shoots hit the nail right on the head when he basically said that coming in for one week has no worth whatsoever. Especially if it's just to job, because frankly, a lot of these guys still have to make a living in the Indies and getting squashed in a non-program lessens their stock somewhat. That's why you won't see HTM eating a Jeff Jarrett confetti guitar-shot of DEATH anytime soon.

Rather than building the promotion from the ground up and developing actual CHARACTERS, (TNA's weakest trait in my opinion) Jarrett and company instead try to get publicity by any means necessary by bringing in C-level celebrities, football players and bushleague Country & Western stars, rather than just focusing on a set roster of wrestlers and what they can do in the ring.

The best example of this recent trend is Jonni Fairplay from Survivor fame, who was brought in to assume an "Andy Kaufman" role. The thought process was that they'd get crossover appeal from Survivor viewers who would watch TNA to see what had become of the man they so despised. What they didn't take into consideration is that "Survivor" itself was the "franchise", and once a hammy sun-fucked dirt-ball left that Island, people ceased to care whether they lived or died. TNA of course didn't think this through and still gave Jonni his own "Piper's Pit" type segment, calling it "Playing Fair With Jonni", but based on the response or lack there of, perhaps it should have been called "Who the fuck is Jonni Fairplay?". Needless to say, the character flopped, and you get the impression that Andy Kaufman would be rolling over in his grave... if he wasn't already completely disintegrated...

Since that time, TNA has continued to extend the olive branch to every WWE/WCW cast-off, including Joanie "Chynna Doll" Laurer, Sting, X-Pac and many others, wanting them to come in for one night, work an un-resolved program with Jarrett, then leave the promotion that night faster than a guy wearing an "All you need is Cock" T-shirt at a feminist rally.

TNA can be salvaged though. It will just take some rebuilding and some much needed changes at the top of the card, as well as some minor ones at the bottom level. And these changes will be needed soon now that they've seemingly got a TV deal in place with Fox sports. With that said, I'll list several key changes that I'd employ:

Too Southern: There's nothing wrong with having a southern flavor , (Hell knows mid-south thrived for years on that style) but as Honky Tonk Man once said, TNA is like "Hillbilly Wrestling". And, while that part of the country may thrive on Nascar and monster trucks, the rest of the country really can't relate to that, and this kind of hurts it's overall appeal.

Some people would argue that ECW had a local flavor too, but that was in Philadelphia, and it honestly had a more intense urban underground feel to it, so much so, that you'd feel like your life was endangered by just being there.

TNA hardly has the same edge, as It's hard to appear mainstream when the majority of your roster sounds like inbred Ozark hillbillies who catch teenage hikers in bear-traps up in the mountains for sport. I just don't think it would connect with the bulk of people out there the way it is. ECW is similar to TNA in it's size, but other than that, this is where the comparisons end, as at this point, it's honestly like comparing Dice-Clay to Jeff Foxworthy, with one being edgy and controversial, while the other just knows a lot of people with two first names.

When John Q. Casual Fan turns on a TNA broadcast, he's not blown away like he is with the slick presentation of the WWE, but instead gets the feeling of it being somewhat bush-league. Remember, not all fans have the same scrutiny for wrestling that we do, and sometimes something as simple as terrible theme music or technical glitches can deter them from ever coming back.

TNA's best bet is to move the shows to larger venues, and really sit down and improve on their presentation. Because despite all the scuttlebutt, I can't see Hulk Hogan coming in full-time once he gets a load of his new stomping grounds.

Lose the "Sports Entertainment". WWE is the only company who can do the soap-opera schtick, and even they don't do it that well anymore. With Russo at the helm (or in any way involved) the direction of certain characters has been ridiculous. Sometimes you feel like your watching amateur hour as these poor guys who probably just want to wrestle, are forced to ham their way through these skits often delivering their lines with the same emotion of a 1960's sitcom robot. And while we all enjoy the occasional humorous promo, the bulk of this style of character writing died with the Attitude era and should have been obsolete after the majority of the casuals left in late 2001. Just let these guys wrestle, it's what they do best. And if properly exploited it can get over, if only for the reason that WWE puts so much physical limitations on it's stars. AND PLEASE GOD, no more "shoots". How many times have we had to SUFFER through the latest WWE alumni coming out in his debut and cutting the same generic promo on how WWE "had shit for them!" It's PLAYED, and besides something Russo has never gotten is that the bulk of the wrestling fans have no idea about this type of shit. Don't believe me? Go to the moronic WWE Chat room sometime, you'll see. These types of promos tend to go over about as good as a fart in church, and it often kills the heat of being surprised to see this "Superstar", while he rattles on dispensing insider jargon that just causes the crowd to shrug their shoulders before going back to drinking the two different types of beer from their gigantic foam novelty hats.

Character Development: As already mentioned, this is TNA's weakest suit, and definitely needs to be improved on. Wrestlers are by nature living cartoon characters, and it's hard to differentiate between the two people in the ring when you have a couple of Johnny Generic's wrestling for no apparent reason whatsoever, using the same moves in every match. There just isn't any character depth or "uniqueness" in TNA (other than Raven, but I chalk that up to his own meticulous implementing of psychology). I mean, why does Abyss wear a mask? Has it ever been explained? Why are the Red-shirt security evil but the black shirts "good?" and WHY, dear God, why, did Jerry Lynn, a known death-metal enthusiast use a fucking country song for almost a whole year as his theme?! They're creative team needs to sit down and map out some characters for it's roster, even if it's kept simple. It's really not that difficult. And I'm not suggesting Sonjay Dutt become the "Egyptian Magician" or D-Lo Brown become "Poindexter the Awesome Accountant" or something silly, just a little depth in persona added to the excellent action would be nice.

And oh ya, keep Vince Russo off camera, it's kind of hard to suspend disbelief when he's a whole foot taller than the guy he's managing...

So that's that. I will still show my support by continuing to order the pay-per-views, and not STEAL them as I originally wanted to. How could I when AJ styles came on and told me it would not be "Phenomenal" to do so, And I have to tell you, it changed my evil ways, because if AJ says that it's wrong, than it has to be, right? Right?

I'm Sean.

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