I Have Questions About Pro Wrestling
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- Опубликовано: 11 июл 2024
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hello I'll help you the questions I've been watching Wrestling since 2009 and starting with WWE when I was 5/6 years old and then TNA shortly after, in 2016 I started watching NJPW and nowadays I watch AEW, NJPW, and Stardom primarily I will check out WWE here and there but I fell out of the product due to how BAD 2019 was. but I do hope you take the time to read the answers i have for you and i'll try my best to answer them honestly 1) First things first, idk your schedule nor will I know your cable provider. i'm not a creep lol. but my suggestion is to get Sling blue/orange since that comes with channels that has wrestling on it, USA with RAW/NXT rn. FOX for Smackdown, TBS/TNT for AEW, and AXS for TNA and NJPW. now as far as streaming services goes, NJPW has NJPWorld, ROH has HonorClub, TNA has ImpactPlus, Stardom has Stardom WorldAEW has Triller but unless you use a VPN it may be hard to be available. also,various indy promotions have Fite.TV. and Various Japanese promotions has Wrestle Universe which has indies like Michinoku pro and DDT to major promotions like Pro Wrestling Noah, TJPW and Marigold. question 2) thats a good question. let's use WWE as an example, news broke today that a wrestler can leave with the names that got trademarked by WWE and keep it if they please. but before that wrestlers who'd come from other promotions like Tyler Black, Bryan Danielson, Kevin Steen, and El Generico were given new names like Seth Rollins, Daniel Bryan, Kevin Owens, and El Genericio. sometimes WWE has trademarked real names like John Cena. WWE get a percentage of his cut with movies he's credited in but Cena has enough leeway to use his name because of his standing in the company and that's his real name. Adam Copeland is Edge's real name but the reason he keeps the Rated R-Superstar nickname was because WWE let the trademark expire. Cody Rhodes was just "Cody" for a majority of his outside wwe run from 2016-2021 because WWE own the trademark for Cody Rhodes. now finshers, i believe WWE would trademark some names if they'd want to put it on a shirt. Bryan's YES!/NO! Lock in WWE although it was called the Lebell lock in tribute to legendary grappler Gene Lebell at the start of his WWE tenure it was dropped by 2012 but WWE never trademarked it but some wrestlers do just change finishers just to separate themselves from their previous employer. basically if a company doesn't trademark a name, nickname, theme what have you then its free for any company to use. now with licensed songs, Cody's Kingdom like Punk's Cult of Personality, Bryan's final countdown, Ruby Soho's theme in AEW, Orange Cassidy's themes, Triple H's themes, Orton's Voices, those have to get approved by the companies, the execs and most importantly the band themselves. although I think WWE owns Triple H's themes and Jeff Hardy's No More Words since those were made from the bands for WWE's Albums. royalty free songs like MJF's theme and the Hardy boyz themes are self explanatory they are royalty free.some songs get dubbed over in the games due to licensing issues. if you look on Peacock through ECW and even a few wwe/wcw shows loads of songs got dubbed over due to in ECW's case everyone used licensed songs (illegally) . and in WWE's case they only had the licensing music for that certain time period. Hogan in 2002 used Voodoo Child but that got dubbed over. Victoria had All the things she said, Edge had Never Gonna Stop but only some shows, mainly in 2004, has it dubbed over, some old PPV themes got dubbed over as well.. oof that was a long explanation lol. 3) keeping this one brief in my opinion a face needs to present himself as good guy but not really like superman aka a bland hero. they have to have some edge to em like Stone Cold, Omega, Punk and Rock, and they also need to show how much a setback means to them Bryan is great at this. a heel is someone who hate the crowd, full of themselves, does whatever it takes to win tweener is a mix of those. if a heel gets a pop then its not like they failed but the crowd gravitates towards the heel because for a long time in wwe, they written their babyfaces as chessy and one-dimensional and heels were more nuanced. 4) another good question so I've always thought that when it came to titles, it determined that you were successful based on days and times you held that belt...... until i watched New Japan Pro Wrestling. given the yearly tournaments every japanese promotions tend to have a champion is not expected to defend every month or every other week. what they determine as successful was how many times they successfully defended the belt. so adding that up, what makes a great reign comes down to: how many days did one held it, how many (televised) defenses, what were the outcome to those defenses (Pin, submit, DQ, Countout, no contest), and most importantly, who did they beat for the championship, who they defended it against successfully, and how did they lose the belt and to whom. some midcard wrestlers like Shinsuke with the WWE intercontinental belt, rarely defended but held it for a combined 383 days. 5) i think Bryan was selling a nerve injury not a brain one. Bryan has suffered worst injuries like his retina got detached in 2005 or something. A clear indicator is when a ref puts up a X sign: crossing their arms above their head they usually face the ramp way to signal to the back that's something's wrong. most notably, Wrestling Observer, WrestleVotes, Fightful, LuchaBlog, and the J-cast are the most reliable sources for real injuries and real behind the scenes of Wrestling. stuff like PWI and Tokyo Sports are more kayfabe stuff. whooof. my apologies man if this is a lot to take in, im autistic and wrestling is my special interest so I was more than willing to answer your questions.
"if any of these questions sound stupid it's because they are" is unintentionally really funny 😂
I spit my water out 😂😂
@@GreeNLeaF32 glad the opener landed 😆
@@Dporticus It stuck the landing
i think the best way to tell if an injury is real or not is whether or not the camera lingers on it. if it's real, they'd usually want to cut away, but if it's part of the story, they'd want to show it.
That is a good way. And normally the referee goes to a wrestler after a crazy spot and let him squeeze his hand to know if he/she is okay. If then, the camera cuts away it is probably serious. But overall it comes to you with a little bit of experience as a fan. Like, in the match against Okada, Danielson breaks his left forearm but the match continues for another 15 minutes. But I still immediately knew something was wrong, the way he was moving and holding his arm. But sometimes you will just not know. It is part of loving wrestling being sometimes concerned about the wrestlers.
There is no 1 stop place to see every promotion past and currently updated, not legally anyway. TNA has TNA+, ROH had Honor Club, AEW might get set up on Max. The rest are scattered around in various places.
In Europe, we got the full AEW library on Fite TV/Triller TV through AEW Plus
We Europeans get the full AEW library on Fite TV/TrillerTV through AEW Plus
Njpw has njpw world
watchwrestling.(whatever the suffix is this year)
Wwe network has by far the most stuff though they have all the old territories and wcw
Regarding music and entrance themes:
Cody linked up with Downstait to create his theme music. The rights specifically belong to him so he’s able to take it with him anywhere he wants.
Simile situation with Edge. He owns the rights to Altar Bridge’s song therefore he was able to bring it with him to AEW. But he couldn’t use the intro “you think you know me” because that part came from his old WWE theme by Jim Johnston. So he had his wife, Beth, create the new intro that leads to the rest of the song.
Punk is cool with Living Colour in real life. Cult of Personality was a song I believe his little league team used as a child and he’s loved it ever since. While he doesn’t own the rights, he has a deal with them and was able to talk Vince and Tony Khan to put money for the right to use it on their programs. If a promoter did not want to pay for it then he wouldn’t have it.
Outside of those and few other exceptions, the theme songs created for wrestlers in-hour with their music composer belong to the company.
I would not actually define face/heel as being about the moral character of the wrestler. I would say a babyface is someone who is intended to get cheered and a heel is someone who is intended to get booed. Usually there is a moral quality to these alignments as well, but not necessarily.
I agree, it's definitely crowd reaction. Think of Stone Cold Steve Austin being arguably the biggest babyface ever, yet he went about things in a more "heel" like way. Or even CM Punk's current feud with Drew. I'd argue and say CM Punk is carrying himself more as a heel, yet against Drew he's the babyface.
There always is. Sometimes people will cheer heels, and create an anti-hero. Baby faces absolutely adhere to universal moral standards in kayfabe. Baby faces will never cheat or take victory by count out on purpose. I think there are a few obvious exceptions, like when cheating is your entire gimmick, like Eddie Guerrero adopted in his later career.
If that's the case then it sounds like there are exceptions to this
@@Dporticus Rarely but yes. I would say Rhea is an exception because she’s a “cool heel”. I think in most feuds they would prefer her to be booed but if she gets cheered it’s not a big deal. Same with Breakker at the moment
It's wild to me that Punk is considered the face there.
As far as names, songs, finishing moves, and what not.. it’s different for everybody, and it’s different at different stages of your career. Most of it comes down to specific contract negotiations.
For a recent example it was reported that WWE wants the rights to the name ''Ethan Page''
Yh because I'm pretty sure people like Hulk Hogan, The Rock, and Stone Cold have the rights to their names and merch with their name on it
@@imthatjay Stone Cold actually DOES.. that's his real LEGAL name ((he changed it))
@@imthatjayhogan name and persona existed before he came to wwe so wwe couldn’t own it and the rock only recently got the rights to his name after joining the board, before he didn’t which is why he went by his actual name for years.
@@ElMundoDeHadesOKthat’s not true WWE still owns the rights to the stone cold Steve Austin moniker, they allow Steve Austin to use it and they get a cut off of anything he uses it with, same thing with John Cena even though that’s his birth name
Danielson selling a head/neck injury is intentional. He had to retire for a few years because of it. So they purposefully do that to get a reaction. I dont know that they would do that for anyone else.
Not a huge fan of that but it's not a huge deal.
@@DporticusDanielson is really weird with his selling. If you see him acting like he’s dying 95% chance he’s perfectly fine. It’s when something really really nasty happens and he shrugs it off and finishes the match. Danielson is as pro wrestling as they come and with that you always finish the match. For better or for worse
the dude does it every match tho while were trying to forget it happened, its not what we want to see to someone with so much head trauma
@@YoDaddyBwhy are trying to forget it tho? The fact he came back from a career threatening injury is an important part of his aura. It's part of his character.
@@Dporticusfor real injury stuff for after show stuff Shawn Ross Sap is a great source of information, for real time I’d generally say that if the match felt rushed it probably wasn’t scripted, if the injury comes at the end or the match continues with selling its most likely and a true injury or it a mild one
RUclips is your best friend when I comes to catching up on AEW and TNA specifically. TNA regularly uploads full PPVs from the past.
It just seems like so often I can only find match highlights.
@@Dporticusyou can pay for a membership (99 cents a month) on RUclips for just weekly shows or pay for TNA+. I'd recommend TNA+
True shit. If it wasn’t for RUclips I would have grown out of wrestling after like 2008
@@Dporticusmatch highlights are more than enough. And aew uploads hours of storylines on their channel.
Vince had a strategy of copyrighting names. When wrestlers joined WWE, he changed their names to ones the company owned. This way, if they became popular and left, they wouldn't be recognized elsewhere. Essentially, he wanted to control their fame so they couldn't take it to another company.
They also copyrighted certain moves and chants to control the wrestlers' fame, ensuring they couldn't be as popular in another company as they were in WWE.
Man had PTSD from Hogan and company jumping ship back in the day. Resolved to never let it happen again.
@@marcelocapeljunior3579 remember fake diesel ? that was cringe
Cult of Personality is an actual song by an actual band so CM Punk asked them for permission to use the song when he came to aew but for instance a company like wwe that makes themes own the rights to their songs. I will say though MJF's song is a royalty free song meaning if he ever went to WWE, he could take the song with him. Every case is different. For example, Cody Rhodes didn't start using kingdom until he went to the indies.
They just paid for it. That's it.
AEW is negotiating a streaming contract right now. I expect that we will get an announcement by the end of this calendar year. It will also likely include the ROH library since Tony Khan bought that company up recently.
As for names, gimmicks, music, merch, and move names, anything WWE creative makes for a wrestler, they get to keep when that wrestler leaves. Whereas anything that wrestler had from before entering the WWE is theirs forever. Finally, in the case of "Cult of Personality," sometimes, in rare cases, promotions may license pre-existing music for a wrestler's entrance. Doing so is prohibitively expensive, and so it's generally only reserved for top talent and special occasions. CM Punk is actually friends with the band who wrote "Cult of Personality" in real life (he has lots of friends in the Chicago rock scene), and they insist that he uses their music for his entrance.
Face v heel has changed over the years. Originally, faces played by the rules and heels cheated, but that changed in the Attitude Era. Wrestling stories entered more of a morally gray area. The difference between face and heel now is whether they run from a fair fight. Faces overcome the odds, whereas heels ensure that they are stacked in their favor. It gets even more complicated in AEW, where the majority of fans are "smart marks." We all know that kayfabe is bs and just cheer for whoever is delivering the best performance regardless of story.
Finally, we get to injuries. This is probably the most complicated question to answer. Really, being able to spot a genuine injury comes down to knowing how a wrestler is supposed to land from a given move. Typically, the safest way to land is flat on your back or stomach in the middle of the ring. Anytime a wrestler lands on their head or limb first, there is potential for a serious injury. This danger is only amplified when taking bumps outside of the ring. Then you generally want something to break your fall before hitting the concrete, whether it's a table or another wrestler. Outlets like Wrestling Observer, Fightful Select, and Cultaholic Wrestling are pretty good at confirming or denying your suspicions after the fact.
With keeping up, I just reccomend following wrestling companies Twitter accounts and YT accounts. If you can't watch the show, just skim through the clips and any videos of the show that interests you to keep up with specific guys or girls.
Yeah honestly now a days you can pretty watch the whole show minus full length matches but most segments are online somewhere almost immediately.
For the face and heel differences it just depends. I wouldn't say that intentions make you heel or face. Someone's intentions can be heelish but if what they're doing is heroic, then they're the babyface. I think of Roman as an example. His intentions will always be heelish but when he returns he'll be a babyface who's trying to stop Solo's reign of terror. That's my kinda take on it.
Njpw makes a bigger deal of title defenses than anything else, breaking that record is an achievement and usually the record holder will try to defend that record as the champion tries to break it. Aew does it sometimes and wwe has as well like when usos faced the new day
I'll be the mark to answer in detail because im sick and cant do anything else for the moment =)
1. WWE was just as difficult to follow past events until they released the "WWE network" and then licensed it to peacock. AEW does not have it similar because of how their TV rights are structured but it may change this year because AEW is negotiating a renewal of TV rights with WBD which could see their library added to Max, or they go to a different place with a streaming service. You can kind of do it with Ring of Honor but it will never be as affordable as WWE is right now.
2. It is a little bit of both, sometimes it is IP ownership and sometimes wrestlers want a new start. If you go to WWE they will craft a character personality around you and they will own it. Your name, catchphrase, entrance music, merch, etc.
There are a few wrestlers that have had value to their name before making it to WWE, such as AJ Styles, that got to keep their intellectual property but it is rare. To WWE if you are indy, you don't exist, and for the most part they may be right when it comes to the audience knowing the indy talent.
AEW and other promotions are different, because they see the value of wrestlers who carved their niche in wrestling and they welcome it. There is no point in renaming people like Danhausen or Orange Cassidy who already put a lot of effort, time and money in developing a character when you are a new company who needs talent right now, but for some talent they did need to build their personas from scratch and AEW would own that.
In the case of Edge that you mention, WWE owns his name, but the term "Rated R Superstar" was found too generic to be trademarked and the registry was denied, and his song is owned by a band named alter bridge who are friends with edge, so WWE could only own his WWE name. In the case of Cody Rhodes, he commissioned his song to Downstait and used it in the indies after leaving WWE, he used it in the UK and in Japan, he owns it. WWE used to own the name "Cody Rhodes" in the US so for a while in the US he was called just "Cody" but there was a negotiation between companies and he was given his name back.
3. When the term babyface and heel were coined wrestling was a lot less nuance, you could mainly follow wrestling in magazines, in local TV stations, or going to the arenas. The line between heel and babyface had to be clearer because fans were different and had a different type of access, so heels were cheaters and bullies and babyfaces were righteous to a fault.
In today's product that changes, nobody is trying to fool anyone, heels are still bad guys and faces are good guys, there is a lot more nuance than that because fans will cheer for the heel they like because they like them, its a lot harder to make people not to. Rhea Ripley is a heel people love but is not a heel right now because she is being put in a position in which her pursue of retribution is warranted, but so is Liv Morgan's, so it is a lot more nuanced. In AEW you could say the same with Hangman Page and Swerve. It's more of the ability to have morally grey characters in today's product, you get to decide who you root for.
4. This is a tough one, measuring success in wrestling is difficult but the amount of championships held is certainly a way to do it. Money made and popularity are another way to do it. Technical prowess is another way. It is up to you.
5. I am in complete disagreement. Wrestling needs to make you feel and if you're concerned over Danielson then he did his job. It tied to a storyline in which Ospreay does a move called the Storm Driver '91 (a slightly edgier tiger driver) that seems really dangerous to do and fans criticized it when he did it to Kenny Omega (who sold it like death). He did the move to Danielson and he sold it like, as you said, brain damage. He expressed regret over using that move because of Danielson's history on concussions and will not use that move again. That means he is protecting the move and when/if he does that move again, it will look dangerous and it will be special. It's all part of the story, because at some point either Ospreay will turn heel and do the move again OR someone will piss off Will so much that he will do the move just to hurt them, either way, it will be special.
However I'll say this. Wrestling is a performance art in a way. They know things can go wrong and if something does go wrong they are prepared, more often than not, they will not let you see it when it goes wrong. Refs are constantly making sure if the talent are okay during a match, there are trainers surrounding the ring and medical professionals too. Things can still happen because shit happens, but trust them knowing their limits (except Darby Allin, dont trust him knowing his limits at all).
As for reliable journalists, Sean Ross Sapp. (Shut it marks, he is reliable)
1:12 1) Not really. If you miss a weekly show you can typically find everything you need on Twitter or Instagram, unless you have cable and you can record an episode of TNA/AEW. AEW PPV’s are all on FITE. NJPW & ROH have their own streaming services but that’s about it
3:23 2) It really depends. If WWE created a name, song, etc they copyright that. If a wrestler leaves they can’t own any of that stuff. movesets, finisher names, most catchphrases, etc are not trademarked. Also, about a move having a different name it’s normally just trying to seperate themselves. I believe Cody owns the rights to his song, as he had to request permission by WWE to use it upon his return at WrestleMania 38
7:54 3) Face= Good guy (Cody), Heel= Bad guy (Roman) Tweener= Both (Uncommon but Stone Cold). A heel depends on who the character and wrestler is, you can cheer drew mcintyre and want him to beat Punk but he’s still a bad guy.
10:27 4) Depends. I think gunther is the greatest intercontinental champion even tho he only had one long reign. But Cena is also the greatest WWE Champion and he lost it every month.
12:27 5) In this case Bryan was dropped on the back of his head (even tho he really landed on his shoulder) so i think selling that your neck/head is super hurt is understandable. And yes, typically you can figure it out easily by how the production team handles the injury. if it’s super bad and real they try to hide the injury. Also WWE normally reports injury on social media and so do news sources like FightFul & PWInsider. But going back to danielson It was used to further the story in that Will can no longer use his finisher the Tiger Driver because it’s too dangerous. Danielson was his favorite wrestler and the thought of him injuring him severely “haunted” him in a way in the weeks going forward. His manager Don Callis would tell him to use it but he couldn’t get himself too with the fear of injuring another person. So if it’s used limitedly and in an actual big event/match then i think faking a severe injury is okay
Ok my personal way on how I value a champion, I take a lot of things into account....how the title was won, how long they held it, how they performed in championship matches, do the increase or lessen the prestige of the championship, level of opponents while champion
The best way for keeping up with everything is watching other RUclips channels that summaries the weekly show. I don't actively watch entire episodes of raw, smackdown, nxt, aew anymore simply because I don't have time.
You can watch highlights on WWE and aew's own RUclips channels, they upload them relatively quickly once the show goes off air.
Solomonster's sounds off is a podcast where Jason Solomon does a weekly recap on WWE, aew and nxt, sometimes NJPW.
I personally watch ring the belle RUclips channel where the host DS shin recaps weekly shows of WWE, nxt, aew and tna, but he exclusively talks about women wrestling.
The “X” is the most reliable way to tell if it’s serious in the wwe even though they perverted it in the past it’s still the most reliable
The 'X' sign has been discontinued in WWE as far as I am aware, as it had become too well known. But looking at the ref and the ref's interaction with the wrestler is indeed the best way to tell.
They know we know the x so they work that now too. Refs usually aren’t the best actors so watch their eyes
Seems like they don't use it much now
@@Dporticus they might not anymore. My memory is skewed from me binging old ppvs
@@Dporticus Once you have been watching pro-wrestling long enough (especially mainstream North American wrestling) it generally becomes much easier to tell the real injuries from a work.
A recent example would be Riho's return match on AEW Collision. After a dive to the outside it was obvious from her reactions going forward that Riho had sadly injured her arm or wrist.
Mind you some wrestlers are such good sellers, it can muddy the waters.
The best way to watch other promotions is through their youtube channels. They may not post every feud but they post the important ones
Aside from the X for the wrestlers, the easiest way to tell if an injury is legit is where the camera is focusing. If there is a genuine injury, the camera will refuse to show them at all and focus on literally anything else. As someone who has been watching for a year now, youll be able to tell the difference, whether intentionally or not, between the usual camera cuts and moves, and the way they act when a legit injury happens
This dude just went through a list of why pro wrestling is so fascinating. Many of the topics he bought up are questions that have been, still are, and probably will always be debated as long as this sport lives. That’s why dirt sheets and backstage news is mostly what the internet wrestling community covers since no other form of live entertainment blurs these lines between reality and fiction. Always good to see a fresh face get into this weird roller coaster of muscle theater
Sorry, I missed your question about title reigns. The unfortunate reality is that title reigns don't matter. They are just another imaginary brass ring that has forever been tarnished by Vince's bad booking. What makes a wrestler GOAT'd is the number of instant classic matches, promos, entrances, and moments they produce and how often.
Life long wrestling fan here, I love this content! I'll watch this again and give my opinion on each topic but I'm half way through now know I'll keep watching.
Easiest way to tell if a wrestler is TRULY injured, is if they stop showing the camera on them entirely or very little; the longer they film them, the more you should realize it's a part of the show.
The Reilable way to keep up with all the shows is just by watching clips on each companies RUclips channels. They usually post highlight videos after each event. AEW does this video series called AEW Timelines which showcases past rivalries and character development.
I mean on the title defenses point, AEW and NJPW both like to have stats on hand for things like that. Go watch Okada’s record IWGP Heavyweight Title reign in NJPW and they sold how important and impressive it was for him to break the title defense record and how big a deal it was for the previous record holder Tanahashi to try and stop him. It’s just not a WWE thing especially after the Brock Lesner era where he defended every quarter
AEW posts timelines on their RUclips channel that sums up a wrestlers feud/whole story in AEW, every show they also post highlights on RUclips like WWE so it’s very easy to catch up with those clips. Also WWE used to make wrestlers use a stage name and not their real name so they could copyright it so if a wreslter went to a different company they couldn’t use what they used in WWE, same things goes with finishers and theme songs.
Im an AEW guy atm and what i do is watch the AEW shows usually when they air and watch the wwe and tna highlights of their weekly shows on youtube. If I see a match or angle i want to see more of in the highlights, i will seek out that specific show / match. The best way to learn all the moves by names is to play a couple of wrestling video games where you build your own wrestler and moves . going thru those lists of moves will make u know them even when they call them something else. Cody Rhodes owns his own them song so he is a special case.
I'm not sure which other promotions have something like WWE's relationship with Peacock, but NJPW does run their own streaming service called NJPW World that costs about $10/mo that you can get (it even has English commentary, I think?)
In terms of who owns a wrestler's gimmick/name/finisher/entrance music/etc. the answer is "It Depends". In general WWE tends to own the characters and associated names/music/trademarks/etc. when a wrestler comes up through their system (OVW/NXT) so they own the rights to characters like Stone Cold, The Rock, etc. But some wrestlers who forged their brand elsewhere may themselves own the rights to their stuff, like Cody does. Further complicating things is when a wrestler performs under their real name, in which case they may or may not own the rights to the character/gimmick, meaning they may or may not need to wrestle under a different name if they move to a different promotion.
In terms of face/hell, I think you're spot on that it's based on the character actions and roles rather than the crowd reception. It's also somewhat of a relative spectrum, and there are some other cases where e.g. you can have a babyface anti-hero who ignores the rules but still takes an honorable or heroic role (see Stone Cold Steve Austin). Turning someone heel is actually a great technique to get a young wrestler over with the crowd, since audiences tend to be more willing to accept someone new in that context, and once they've built that rapport with fans they can pull a face turn in a more natural fashion than trying to put them over just as a superhero babyface (e.g. The Rock's early work as a heel, or Roman's failure to be a believable babyface in the mid-2010s).
I don't think there's any reliable way to tell when an injury is legitimate in the moment--the X thing used to be an internal production signal, but once knowledge of it got spread around they integrated it into the storytelling (and presumably developed some other way to let people know internally if someone was actually hurt). Fortunately or unfortunately, this is an element of pro wrestling where kayfabe is alive and well, and basically any signal that the audience could use to tell if it's a work will eventually be co-opted into the work.
Finally, regarding title reigns, I remember a promo once where someone was saying how they were a 12-time champion or whatever, and the other person pointed out the exact same thing: "You lost the title 12 times?"
On that very last line, why did I picture the Miz 😆
@Dporticus JBL said this in a promo on his first title reign. He had a lengthy run with it and it made all the sense in the world to point that out
@@DporticusI'm pretty sure you can get CMLL in NJPW world as well
As far as the characters and copy right and all their branding, it depends from wrestler to wrestler.
Edge as a name is copyrighted by wwe but adam copland is his actual name and he can take it wherever he goes. His theme song is by a third party band so they decide if they want adam to use it anywhere or just be with wwe.
As far as moves go and to the best of my knowledge moves can be used anywhere and names are not copyrighted but wrestlers like to change the names to fit their characters. Like there was a wrestler named rhino who used a spear as a finisher but used it under the name of gore. Wrestlers might even change up a famous move a tiny bit and use it for themselves under a new name.
TNA has TNA Plus, NJPW has NJPW World, ROH has Honor Club. These are all subscription services costing around 10 dollars a month with the majority of past shows on them as well as access to their weekly shows. AEW has AEW Plus for its international audience but it is not available in the US.
It is if you have a VPN and set it to the UK location.
Impact, New Japan, and Ring of Honor all have some sort of streaming website. AEW is trying to get a deal with Max to stream.
For the names of finishers and wrestlers names and stuff like that, it’s pretty easy to understand. If a specific company files for trademark of the names they give to finishers and wrestlers then when they change promotions then those names can’t be carried over. Like WWE trademarked the name EDGE, so he can’t be Edge in AEW. But in cases where WWE doesn’t trademark a name then that name can be taken to a different promotion. It’s as simple as that. I hope I helped
You did! Thanks!
WWE also have a history of changing names of talent that come from other promotions, probably because they plan to make them a star under the WWE umbrella, as well as making sure they can't use the name in other promotions. Like how most people know Finn balor as his WWE name instead of his name in NJPW "Prince Devitt"
My personal opinion is the intention of the character, if they have good intentions they are face, and bad intentions are heel....I agree with you
To your first question, there isn’t exactly a singular place for literally everything. But there’s a few streaming things out there, each with their own flavor or way of doing things.
New Japan World, Stardom World, and ROH’s Honor Club - Streaming services that only have just the library of the featured company, nothing else. (Personally, New Japan and Stardom should unite their services into one service, since they’re both under the same parent company, but I digress.)
Triller TV Plus (formerly called FITE Plus) - Has many independent companies in one service. If indie companies like GCW interest you, you might like exploring what Triller has.
Wrestle Universe - Has many Japanese companies in one service. DDT, NOAH, TJPW, and more. Recently, they have added more Japanese companies and even 1 American indie company (DPW) into its archive.
Personally, I prefer services like Triller or Wrestle Universe, because having multiple companies in 1 service is more bang for your buck.
You're right about faces and heels; it's based on their character motivation and behaviour rather than the fan response, although the fan response can be used to guide the company in how they want to portray the character in the future. For example, if a heel is getting cheered like a babyface, they might consider turning them face and vice versa. You're right about heel and face often being context based rather than about the overall character's disposition. You're not making it too complicated!
1) Depends on the company. WWE has a deal with Peacock. AEW currently doesn’t have one, but they’re currently negotiating with Warner Bros so hopefully that changes. New Japan and Ring of Honor have their own streaming services you have to pay monthly for. TNA I believe has a service also, but I’m not 100% sure.
2) The reason a lot of wrestlers who left WWE have changed their names and move names is because WWE owns the trademarks. When Vince ran things anyone new that came to the company had to get a name change so that the company could own it. This wasn’t just for wrestlers either, they did this with commentators and on-air personalities also. Over time exceptions started to get made (like with CM Punk) and now today it depends on the deal WWE makes with incoming wrestlers and on-air personalities. Some wrestlers who are established names outside of WWE can negotiate to just keep their names and trademarks if they want, or if the company sees value in not re-packaging them.
Before going to WWE, Bryan Danielson (which is his real name) was a big star on the indies and had a very infamous title reign in Ring of Honor. But when he went to WWE they made him change his name. As a joke William Regal suggested “Daniel Bryan” but Vince ended up liking that name. His current name and the names of his moves he uses now were the original names of the moves pre-WWE.
When Cody first left WWE he wasn’t allowed to use the full name “Cody Rhodes.” He had to go by “Cody” for a while until eventually WWE didn’t renew the trademark.
For music the wrestling company has to pay for the rights to use it on air unless you have permission from the song owner to use it. I’m pretty sure Cody’s song was made for him and part of his negotiating with WWE was to keep that song when he came in.
3. There’s ebbs and flows to the face/heel dynamic. The thing about wrestling that sets it apart from other forms of entertainment is definitely the crowd reactions. Sometimes you can have someone be the worst heel imaginable, but if they’re good at being a heel the crowd will cheer for them. For example, in AEW Swerve Strickland on paper should be a heel. The things he did to become the World Champion were messed up (including threatening a newborn child). But he came off as very cool that the crowd got really behind him, turning him into a tweener character. The intent of the character is important, but the crowd’s reaction can def affect things.
4. If you go on Wikipedia you can find articles on most major wrestling companies’ titles that tell you all kinds of stats, including title defenses. Personally I think getting a title is an accomplishment, but there are levels. Three pieces of criteria I have on assessing the best title reign accomplishments are “How long did they have the title for,” “How many defenses did they have,” and most importantly (for me) “How were the quality of the title defense matches?” It can be suggestive, but I do think winning a title or like a Royal Rumble is an achievement in itself.
5. Here’s a quick way to know if there was an actual injury or not. If they’re not showing you the wrestler getting checked by the doctors directly on camera, and they’re not cutting to them at all, then something unplanned might have happened. The “X” symbol is still important and they still do that, but the real telling thing is if they’re making a point in cutting to that person being checked on while on air.
Obviously everyone’s taste is different, but Bryan Danielson has done this type of selling several times and he has the reputation of being one of the most realistic sellers of all time. Watching the Dynasty match, to me it was pretty clear what they were doing but the main way I knew that is because they made it a point to showcase him getting checked on by the doctors on camera.
As far as online news sources I have found that Fightful and PWInsider have been the most reliable on posting actual news updates. They also make it clear in their posts/articles if something has been confirmed or not or if the injuries are kayfabe (part of a storyline).
On injuries, my biggest cue is when the announcers aren’t quickly talking about the perceived injury. If it seems like everyone pauses for a second, it’s probably a legit injury
Glad you're enjoying your wrestling journey! There's no stupid questions, we all had them at some point and we're always finding more.
Regarding defining a Face/Heel (probably a long post, sorry)
Intention is definitely the key factor in what their role is. At its most basic, it's "Do they break/bend the rules to win?" though it can get significantly more complicated than all of that. A face can/will break rules too, but it's usually in response to having a heel playing dirty etc.
Crowd reaction does play a few parts, too. You talked about getting heat/reactions, which at the end of the day is what the role is intended to do.
If the Heel is unable to elicit enough boos and is instead getting cheered (or vice versa) then the intention is no longer landing and it can dictate the creative direction for that performer from there.
A good example of this is Stone Cold Steve Austin. Through the conception and introduction of the character, the intention was very much to be a heel until the crowd suddenly started cheering and sporting a sea of "3:16" signs. He was too popular to be a heel, so they orchestrated a face turn. A well executed turn doesn't completely change the character's behavior, which Austin was also a great example of in this time. Some would say he was a "tweener" because his actions were still very heelish at times, but ultimately he was doing the same things but pandering to what would make the audience happy/relatable/cheer.
Anyway, I know this was long winded and I'm sorry for that 😅
I appreciate you asking this stuff, though. I've been a fan since 1989 and there's a lot of things you don't think too much about over time. It's cool to see that through a new lens.
Have a great day, dude.
I appreciate the in depth explanation! Lol thank you
@@Dporticus Thanks, dude. Good luck with the channel
New Japan's G1 Climax is about to start. It's literally the best way to get into New Japan since it's a HUGE Round Robin Tournament to see who's going to challenge for their top title - The IWGP World Championship. If you don't know how a Round Robin Tournament works, it's pretty simple. There are 2 Blocks with 10 people in each Block. Everyone in a Block wrestles 1 match against everyone else in their Block. If you get a Win you get 2 points, if there is a tie (30min time limit, double DQ/countout) each person gets 1 point, and you don't get any points if you lose. Tie breakers go to the person who won the 1v1 match. There is like 2-4 shows a week during the G1 tournament. First night is on July 20th and the whole thing ends in the middle of August
You can watch all the shows on New Japan World, which is like $8 right now
Usually within WWE they have the rights to music, wrestling name. You can still use the gimmick you cannot refer to the proper name. Also wrestlers who leave the WWE expand on their moveset since WWE has banned moves.
Bryan Danielson had to tweak his style when he entered WWE and went back to his previous style once he
left.
Wrestling moves has official names. The “yes lock” is actually called a lobell lock. “Punk’s” Go to Sleep wasn’t a move he named but was created by a japanese wrestler named KENTA.
If you have Hulu with Live TV it has a back catalogue of the three AEW weekly shows - Dynamite, Collision, and Rampage available. This week's Dynamite in particular did a lot to set up All In. Blood and Guts on the 24th is another show to keep an eye on from AEW, I am pretty sure that'll be a part of their weekly program on Dynamite.
11:30 to expand on this, NJPW seem to emphasise the importance of title defences more when compared to other western promotions. For example, back in 2018 Hiroshi Tanahashi challenged Kazuchika Okada for the IWGP World Heavyweight Championship. The story for this match was built around Okada approaching Tanahashi’s record for most successful title defences and Tanahashi challenging Okada in an attempt to keep his record alive. You should look into their feud as a whole btw! I’d say it’s one of the most important feuds in wrestling history imo 🙂
There will never be a "mathematical formula" for determining the GOAT. These stats (wins, losses, number of championships, number of defenses) are all just made up numbers determined by the scriptwriters so it really doesn't matter. What they'll present to you is what's most convenient for each champion to make them look strong (Roman - no of days, Cena-no. of belts, etc.).
But if you really want to "measure" the greatness of a champion, I think the most reliable way is to look at how much they sell (tickets, views, merch, etc). That's why Stone Cold, The Rock, John Cena, and Roman Reigns are GOATs because of these "statistics"
Sometimes the names of moves are set in a generic way "jumping cutter", but then some wrestler comes along and makes that move his finisher and crowds start knowing it as the new name "Diamond Cutter", and then if a wrestler in a different company also wants to use it, they can't use the name of the wrestler over at the competition's show, so there's now ANOTHER name for the move depending on who is doing it ("RKO" "Cody Cutter"). So that's why you might see announcers change out what they call a move depending on what era you are watching and who is working where at the time using the move.
From my time watching New Japan Pro Wrestling a few years ago, it seemed like they measured the main title in # of defenses. I remember them mentioning how Kazuchika Okada had set the record for the most title defenses in a single reign. I’ve also heard AEW mention # of defenses as well from time to time. Don’t recall WWE doing it much. It is a good way of looking at it whenever it gets brought up!
these vids are my favorite cause i like reading all the comments
Thats what She said
As far as the specials, go, Peacock for now retains the WWE specials and PLE’s until next January
Your questions are something I've considered a lot myself.
But I think for a lot of them, we all have our own opinions. You seem chill. I'd personally love to talk wrestling with you sometime. You seem wise for a relative newcomer.
Every answer is basically a "it depends on many things" lol
Tbh that's awesome. I love discussing different viewpoints of this stuff.
So with so much wrestling out there, I primarily watch WWE but I try to keep up with AEW. So I ready the Bleacher Report and read the live draft grades. From there I’ll go on RUclips and watch highlights on segments that intrigued me through the summary. As for whole feuds, there are tons of RUclips videos from either the promotion or a 3rd party’s that either have put all of the content from a single feud into a video or just the key points. Hope this helps!
Names are usually trademarked by either the promotion or the wrestler. So some indie wrestlers could keep a kayfabe name as long as they own the TM, however doesn't mean a promotion won't change it. If you use your real name on the indies, you wont have to really go about trademarking that
Face/heel - all about intentions... You are correct.
People measure success differently. IMO it's how (often) you're featured. Kevin Owens hasn't had a singles title in 7 years, but he's main evented Wrestlemania twice and is constantly close to the top of the card. A stable level of success.
Coming out the pandemic Bobby Lashley had 2 WWE titles, one of those times beating Brock Lesnar. He lost the title w.o getting pinned in Feb 2022 and has been floating ever since. I feel like even w zero titles, KO is more successful than Lashley.
Being featured > Holding a belt
As a long time wrestling fan (and I'm sure other fans will agree with me)
All of these are fantastic questions lol
I just love the discussion on it lol
Face and heel matters more in wwe. In wwe it sets a character archetype and behaviors theyre allowed to do vs not, and it stays consistent. In some promotions *cough cough* face and heel is relative and is more about the role that competitor plays in a specific match and is centered on how the crowd reacts during that match.
No question in my mind, when there’s a lot of wrestling to keep up with and it’s hard to digest all at once, Simon Miller’s Ups & Downs is like scripture to me. He’s super level headed and just loves wrestling regardless of where it comes from. He does a good job of breaking down the segments of the more flagship shows so if I ever miss and Raw, Dynamite, Collision, or Smackdown, he’s my guy.
As far as segmented content like you mentioned at the top: AEW, like wwe, uploads “playlist” videos that are 3-4 hours long and cover feuds and promos on their RUclips channel leading into big shows or matches. That could be a fun place to get into some good matches and content if someone or something catches your eye
I'm in the UK, so I'm not entirely sure how Peacock works over in the States, but we still have the WWE Network. The Network has pretty much every past episode of Raw, SD, NXT, WCW Nitro and all their PPVs. I'm not sure if Peacock is set up the same. WWE and AEWs RUclips channels are the best source if you dont have hours in your week to dedicate to wrestling. It has condensed clips of everything that happens on all their products.
Cultaholic Wrestling and WhatCulture Wrestling are also major news channels on RUclips that post 2/3 videos a day to keep you up to date on everything in the wrestling world.
Between all that, you'll be golden, my man.
1:17: check in with social media pages. that’s one of if not the best way to keep with other wrestling promotions
3:51: 9 times out of 10 it’s usually just there name and entrance music that they can’t take with them to other promotions. Edge (Adam Copeland) and Cody Rhodes are the only expect to that.
13:43: If the ref makes an “x” with there arms then it’s a legitimate injury.
Good questions btw
1) Any realiable way to keep up with AEW/TNA?
A: I would say the RUclips videos they upload are very good. Especially AEW. I am an AEW fan but don't necessarily watch every episode so watching the RUclips videos are extremely helpful. I would often go to the AEW channel on thursday and Sunday (After Dynamite/Collision) to watch the segments. They typically upload full segments and most of the matches are like 70% full length.
2)Wrestling Branding:
A: Certain names are owned by the company, a prime example is John Cena. John Cena is his real name but WWE ows the rights to the name John Cena and John Cena talked about this on Howard Stern back in the Day. If a wrestler makes it big in another promotion and the WWE bring them over without a repackage then often times the wrestler owns the rights to their performance name. Same with theme songs. Edge's theme song was personally gifted to him by the lead singer of the band which is why he can use it anywhere he goes. WWE never came up with Edge's theme song. Most of the times finishers do not have to be changed or renamed since those are moves they have in their moveset prior to joining WWE. John cena has the STFU submission, but the generic name for the move is the Stepover Toehold Facelock, so if John Cena were to go to another company the move would probably be commentated on as the Stepover Toehold Facelock or a variation of that. That is because WWE changs the generic move to a name that would more suit the character gimmick. So when the wrestlers who have a named move in one company that the company came up with (or that the wrestler has associated with his time in that company), then if they go to another company the move name would change or be reverted to the generic name.
The reason why Kingdom is used for Cody is because he reinvented himself in the Indie scene and his branding was tied to the theme song and the Tattoo on his neck. Vince specifically wanted Cody back with his entire package. Cody said he wanted the Cody-vator. the theme and the presentation and that Vince said that is exactly what they are buying.
3) Face or Heel:
A: It is within storyline. Roman is a Heel because of the actions he does. Every match he wins he cheats, he demeans his cousins and manipulates them but the crows reacts positively because Roman is a great character worker. The reason Roman is coming back as a face is because after seperating the bloodline from Roman, Solo has made the bloodline a more demented version that enacts physical violence instead of mental manipulation like Roman. It would be like a King who was bad but now taken over by a horrendous dictator and when the King fights the dictator, he is still a bad king but he is fighting against the greater evil hence making him a face. Rhea is now a face because the storyline she is involved in is with a manipulative woman stealing her man and Rhea feels disrespected and dissapointed hence making her have more relatability to the audience making her a face because of the position she was in. Everyone reacted to when Rhea came back because Dom was doing something clearly wrong screwing Rhea over.
4) Character Success:
A: I think a reasonable way to put it is How many titles won + Cumulitive Days Held + Intrigue of storylines + value given back to the sport + a dash of in-ring ablility + in-ring storytelling + memorable moments. An example would be why cena is the GOAT is because He has had many world titles, cumulitively held them for hundreds of days. The weight can be different though. Roman held the titles not so many times but his recent one was a legendary reign so the days held for 1 title is weighted heavier than his other titles. Then there is also brand appeal. Someone like Cena and The Rock has insane worldwide appeal and can bring in just about anyone to professional wrestling. Daniel Bryan can be considered the GOAT because his in-ring ability and his storytelling in the ring is probably 2nd to none. His pure skill is weighted so heavily that even though he is a multiple time champion people will always remember Daniel Bryan for putting on some of the best matches ever. DB vs MJF, vs Ospreay, vs Kenny Omega. Granted most of these are in his AEW run but that is because AEW is so so SOOOOO heavily reliant on the in-ring product and it so happens that they have one of the best wrestlers on the face of the planet. If someone like Kenny Omega went to the WWE, he may not have been able to put on such great matches since WWE matches are more standardized so when they have a truly exelsior match it stands out. Seth rollins is one of the most insane wrestlers on the planet. The reason him and someone like Kurt Angle does not have a ton of 5 star matches is because WWE, the entertainment company is out to make an entertaining product not necessarily the most technical mind blowing sequences. I rarely ever see WWE have multi-reversal sequences because they is not the company they are, they are focused on the Week-To-Week stories to get you to be hype for a match even though the match could be middle of the road but the build to get there bumps it up. AEW on the other hand does not focus on the Week-To-Week storylines and focus on the quality of the in-ring work. WWE is like an action movie but AEW is like martial arts. WWE is like Fast and Furious keeping you entertained the whole way where as AEW is more like Ip Man where the entertainment is rooted in the in-ring performances and the quality of the matches rather than the overarching story before the matches happen.
5) Bryan's Injury Selling
A: A few points on the selling that made it make sense. Years ago Bryan retired due to multiple concussions which lef to siezures and concussions. Will Ospreay's move that ended the match is a notoriously dangerous move that if you don't execute it properly can legit lead to injuries. The easiest way to know if an injury is real is if it feels like something is wrong. If you find yourself wondering "omg are they ok? is he hurt?" then 99% of the time they are selling the life out of it. However if they are really injured they often look confused or disoriented because the injury oftens ruins following sequences so they are trying to find a way to continue with the injury present. Bianca Belair sold an injury like she was really injured and everyone was talking like she was actually hurt but then came back 5 mins later to hit a 450 splash from the top rope, When Jon Moxley got injured at Grand Slam. he was completely out of it and you could tell something was off. These are professional stuntmen actors. If they seem like they are really really hurt then its most of the time a sell. If they seem injured but are not selling at all or just barely then. Another good tell is the ref. If the referree is talkative and there are people engaging with the wrestler whose selling the injury and they are making it a point to focus the camera on the, injured wrestler then they are often times completely fine. If they seem to be shying away and trying to hide it then it could be a real injury very much since they don't want to show actual injuries on camera.
The "X" used to be a big deal back in the day when kayfabe (suspending disbelief) was still very much alive. Nowadays with so much of the industry being exposed and out ther ein the public, the "X" is now used a tool to be like "hey this guy cant compete, call it off" so then they could the injured talent come back and have a heroic victory after being injured.
The easiest tell though is the camera, if they are obviously avoiding something then its usually because something went wrong. Miz Vs Shane at wrestlemania where shane got injured and the camera kept on showing miz not showing Shane at all since he was injured.
I feel the same as you with selling neck/head injuries. There's some times where I'm fine with it but, after seeing so many wrestlers have to retire due to neck and head injuries, those type of spots are always hard for me to watch. I have the same reaction watching everytime Rollins has done his sunset flip powerbomb spot in the corner after he blew out his knee doing it. IDK why that kinda stuff affects me as much but it does.
First thing, I can recommend if you if you get contact your cable company they might be able to give you a login for most of the apps for the apps associated with the channels on any Cable company i.e TBS TNT USA Fox Sports
the face/heel thing - its kind of a mix of both character development and crowd reaction. sometimes, turns happen naturally, they arent planned but the story organically goes that way. crowd reaction is more important though - you cant be a big hero if you're booed every week.
The answer for nearly all these questions is "it depends".
As is the status quo with streaming at this point, there isn't an easy way to access all the shows. Some companies have their content on a streaming service, some have nothing as of now (AEW). RUclips is really the only simple option that somewhat works.
Ownership is a case by case basis. Cody, Punk, Edge, etc. use licensed music but are friends with the artist. Some of the music is royalty free/public domain like MJF, Ric Flair, Jeff Hardy, Daniel Bryan. WWE in most cases has ownership for anything created while a person works for them, and doesn't allow use elsewhere. TNA and AEW are the same but in some cases allow use elsewhere. The whole thing boils down to whatever groups of lawyers want to fight about, so when in doubt its best just to be safe, do something different.
face/heel, it depends, my understanding is the hardline is drawn that faces seek admiration or acceptance from the fans, while heels either mostly don't care or seek hatred from the fans. Roman and Rhea are heels because they don't care how the fans react. It use to be a lot simpler, faces were only cheered, heels were only hated, but its blended more over time. Now, it seems the common phrase "any reaction is a good reaction" is the goal. If the fans are loud you are doing a good, if they are quiet, try something new.
When it comes down to it, titles don't matter much into someones career, several hall of famers have held few to no titles. Which stats matter has been debated for decades, its kind of a "just go with it" situation. The only recent exception is Gunthur's record breaking intercontinental title reign, that was a combination of frequent title defenses, many short but great stories, great wrestling. His title reign alone, at least In my opinion, satisfies the requirements for future hall of fame induction, which is insane because its so early in his WWE run.
Its hard to tell if an injury is real, but that's kind of the point, ideally fans are suppose to believe all the injuries. There is no foolproof way, it can take years of viewing experience to have a sense of when its real or not. Really the best way now is to check social media, often the wrestler will directly address if they are injured or backstage news will leak about an injury. Also if a lot of attention is put on an injury, its probably not real; majority of the real injuries you won't even notice until next time you see them or you don't see them when you should. Also to clarify "The X" was a secret sign for the ref to use to signal an injury, the fans were never suppose to know; now majority of fans know, so it became a story element, so it became unreliable.
1) The easiest simplified way is each promotions youtube channel and in some cases their social media accounts. While AEW doesn’t have a streaming platform to watch old shows, yet, they do a good job with content they post on their RUclips channel.
2) First, yes Adam Copeland is Edge’s real name. And secondly, it’s more so a copyright and licensing thing. WWE usually copyrights wrestler names so they can maintain control over their stuff after the wrestler leaves. It’s a lot more complicated than that but that’s the short answer I can think of.
3) Pretty much yes. It’s moreso down to the narrative structure around the character we’re seeing. Sometimes a wrestler who is a heel is just either really good at being a heel or in the ring and fans can’t help but cheer for them. It’s as they say “sometimes people like a bad guy”.
4) Really it’s both. Look at Walter(Gunther) had just had the longest IC title reign ever, but then you have someone like Ric Flair who had 16 World title reigns.
5) The easiest way to tell is how the ref reacts, like you said. But also a not so simple, but decent way to know is the wrestler themselves, of which Bryan is the best example of this. He has been known to, especially in AEW, to milk “injury” angles. But with him it’s mainly something he’s worked into his character due to the fact that he very notably was forced to retire in the mid-2010s due to concussion related injuries. Bryan is probably the most frequent one to do this “he might be seriously hurt” things. The only other time to know if an injury is legit or not is how abruptly the match finishes. Like if the ref immediately stops the match or the match abruptly goes to a finish when it didn’t seem anywhere near it, those tend to be due to a legit injury. Outside of the show itself, sometimes the only way to know is from wrestling news sites and dirt sheets.
My best suggestion to you for any promotion you are interested is most if not all of these promotions have RUclips channels that you can watch either full form or short form videos and even post matches and promos and full on timeline videos.
Whichever company you feel like getting to know better before you want to full on watch it I suggest to get familiar with it watch the RUclips videos.
I also want to suggest this cable channel that show most wrestling companies you showed. It’s AXS tv, I only ever seen it when I had fios if possible see if you are able to get the channel.
The best place to keep track with AEW is honestly simply RUclips. They put out all the main highlights of their show so all you need to do is just watch the couple 10-15 minute videos they put out each week and you’re basically caught up with everything. For instance they put out 20 minutes of MJF vs Ospreay, so just watch 10 minutes of that and if you enjoy it then try and seek out the full show where you can watch them wrestle for a full hour. Also AEW are relatively good at long form videos, every so often they’ll put out a video that’s 3 hours long but it’ll detail every major moment of a major feud, one of my favourites was they put out a 2 hour video last year just before All In 2023 which had every moment of MJF’s and Adam Cole’s friendship, you get to see the whole storyline which is perfect to watch before going into something like All In 2023 (unfortunately they didn’t add the All In match as part of a subsequent compilation but the point remains that you can see a backlog of a storyline with AEW without having to piece everything together yourself)
for question 1, i read recaps on 411wrestling, have been for like 25 years lol.. but yeah i get recaps and star ratings for matches for shows i normally wouldn't watch and if it sounds like a must watch, i'll find a way to catch it.
The heels who get a face reaction are usually called tweeners - they’re between a heel and a face. For a long time, faces weren’t very cool and a lot of wrestlers wanted to be tweeners. Cena didn’t want tobe a heel after he became the face of WWE and was a hero to Make-a-Wish kids.
I've answered each question the best I could :)
Keeping track of all the promotions?
I haven’t seen anyone other than WWE have an easy way to watch the older stuff. Your best friend, is RUclips or DailyMotion that’s where either the company or other fans will put the matches, edits or highlights.
Names, moves, and theme music?
Most of the time, WWE owns all of it but certain wrestlers get to keep their own names like Samoa Joe, A J Styles, and C M Punk, these are people that made their names before making it to WWE. As per certain songs like Cult of personality (C M Punk), Kingdom (Cody Rhodes), and Metalingus (Edge). They are cool with the artists that sang the song.
Face/Heel?
It’s rooted in what the wrestlers intentions are and what in character they are willing to do in order to get their desired goal. For example Becky in 2018, was frustrated with getting overlooked, now she’s no longer going to be nice and fair, she’s going to cut corners and tell it how it is from her point of view. Since the fans agreed with her, following her journey for years up until that point, fans didn’t want to boo her. As for Rhea, most fans just love her for how great of a job she is doing and are over looking her heel ways.
In the current wrestling, face/heel reactions are based on whether the fans think the wrestler is doing a good job at their job itself. WWE wanted to make Roman a face, but fans saw it wasn’t a fit and it wasn’t believable so they booed. When Roman became the head of the table, it was very clear that Roman wasn’t fed lines and a character that didn’t fit himself.
Tittle: defences, days and number of reigns?
When talking about how great a wrestler is, we take a look at whether or not they won a world tittle, because only a very few get to hold them. We have seen greats never hold them, and that is one of the few real marks of greatness, can they carry the company on their backs?
Injuries?
A lot of times, companies will lean into real life injuries for a storyline to make it more believable. For example, Seth Rollin’s knee/back, yes he blew it out in 2015 and left for like 8 months but then to increase sympathy, they act like he rehurt the knee when in reality, he’s fine. They do this a lot and it does kinda take you out of the moment in future attempts because its like crying wolf. They did this for WM 33 against Triple H, a few years ago against Austin Theory, and this pass WM
Whether or not the injury is real?
At times it is a wait and see, who breaks it on X, or RUclips. Sometimes, you can tell right away like Finn Balor at SS 16 when he very clearly blew his shoulder, or you know that the person hasn’t resigned with WWE like Ricochet, Bron Breaker took him out because Ricochet isn’t coming back and it helps Breaker’s character
For me it’s how a wrestler defines a belt when they hold it. That gives them the status.
The World Heavyweight Championship was being tossed around to anyone in the mid to late 2000s 2010s before being merged together. Some people had very good reigns and other times it was flip-flop between two wrestlers every other ppv.
Tomohiro Ishii, Katsuyori Shibata, and Toki Makabe are wrestlers that have defined a championship (The NEVER openweight championship) and how it should be presented.
The GOAT formula question is quite interesting ... for me, I don't think it's necessarily purely based on the number of reigns or the length of the reign. I think you also have to add in factors like the quality of the reign, how the reign started and ended (for example did they make a new star at the end). Basically, I don't think that question is purely quantitative, it's also qualitative. After, you can hold a title multiple times, but if all those reigns suck, are they really at that prestigious?
I def recommend a utube channel called TH14. The guy posts whole 1 hour ish videos with clips and everything detailing each episode of a specific rivalry, from promos to some matches. He mainly does wwe but he does do aew ones too every now and then. If u have a specific feud from the past u wanna check out i highly recommend his vids.
Wall of Text response to all questions incoming:
for the back catalog question. There is a legal grey area for AEW in that you can get a VPN, set it to the UK and sign up for Triller's AEW+ it has a full back catalog broken down by year, but thats it. TNA has TNA+, but im not sure about the back catalog aspect. ROH's Honor Club has full PPV but only back to 2011-ish for TV in their catalog. NJPW (once fully migrated) will have damn near its full history again.
For the Name Change: It is extremely common for WWE to trademark everything from talents stage name (for lack of better term) to the name of the move. For instance Brock Lesnar's finisher "The F5" is trademarked by WWE but the move itself isnt able to be trademarked, so it can be done elsewhere, but if they call it the F5 it can mean trouble. on VERY rare occasion, someone will let them trademark their real name, I know Johnny Gargano allowed WWE to do this with his but thats not very common. Many Wrestlers outside of the WWE (AEW, TNA, NJPW, Indies etc) do own the trademark to usually their name so that they can sell gear. Trademarking move names is very rare though. Punk, Edge, Cody and Ruby (theres likely more those just jump to my mind) are all actually friends with the bands that do their respective songs so their themes are done on a personal level and promotion agnostic. Indie Promotions tend to get away with using real songs but im not sure the legal side of that.
For the Heel/Face discussion regardless of crowd reaction (because sometimes its fun to cheer the bad guy) its very much the character intent and stuff done in ring. Heels tend to do underhanded tactics like interference or low blows and faces dont.
The GOAT discussion is purely subjective and there is no concrete metric. There are kind of universally agreed up people like Danielson but at the end of the day it is purely subjective
For the Danielson Injury stuff....thats just Danielson he legitimately does enjoy doing that and making the crowd wonder if he's legit hurt or not. Fightful is a really good source for if injury news, outside of that is common for wrestlers to sell an injury on their Left side, be it arm, leg whatever. but thats also not always the case. some times its just experiance to be able to tell if someone is actually hurt or not, like you can sometimes tell "that didnt go as planned" or "that ending seemed rushed" as kind of a hint. if someone is "hurt" but still gets into fights is usually a good sign too.
WWE has Peacock and Hulu
AEW is trying to get Max
TNA has TNA+
Companies don't copyright moves but, they do copyright some names of their moves unless it's a part of classic pro wrestling like the spear or the superkick. They also copyright the name that they give them. I don't know about theme songs but, some pro wrestlers have their own theme songs that are not produced by WWE.
Face/Heel is kinda undetermined. It's between opponents, crowd reactions, and on screen actions.
Measuring success is determined by the fans and they feel. It's determined by title wins, defenses, opponents, and length. There's no exact stat for everything. R Truth is the best 24/7 champion tho.
As far as I know, there's no exact way to confirm a superstar's injury.
When it comes to wrestler names, WWE for the most part, licenses a wrestler's name so they own the rights to that name. They were really known for coming up with names for wrestlers who came from indy promotions but started to get lax with some wrestlers, CM Punk, AJ Styles, and Samoa Joe are 3 names that come to mind where they were able to come into the WWE with their indy names and are able to be in other promotions, still using those names.
When it comes to finishing moves, usually they come up with gimmick names for moves that align with their character at the time and some of those names gets licensed along with the wrestler name. Bryan Danielson being an example, in WWE as Daniel Bryan, he had a gimmick of the "yes" chant. His submission name was called the LeBell Lock (named after Gene LeBell) but with his gimmick, he called it the Yes Lock. When he left WWE, he no longer owned the rights to the gimmick, hence lost the gimmick name and reverted back to the original name
As of right now, the easiest way to tell if it's a legit injury is this: if they are showing it on screen, then the answer is it's a work and part of the show all be it one in bad taste. If the camera pulls away from the performer and they do everything they can to distract from it, it's real and they don't want to get in trouble for showing a real injury to a real person. It's worked for me for as long as I've watched wresting.
depends on if you wanna go the “legal” route or not. there are websites that house all of the new TNA, NJPW, ROH etc. i have a website that at first seems sketchy but once you get the hang of it that’s how i’m keeping up on TNA
I'm sure every promotion has a library,but I'm not interested in paying a fee for every service used outside of WWE,I can tell you I watch a show every day but Sunday and some days are 2,I pay attention to any promotion of significance either by reading the results or watching clips from RUclips,and I'll occasionally peek at the indie scene, usually if someone is making a splash,it's a lot,but I've been a wrestling fan for 40 years, WWE will always be my number 1,even through the dark times,I can watch everything and enjoy it, otherwise why am I watching lol
So in sequential order:
When a wrestler jumps from one promotion to another, their ability to take/bring their name, "gimmick", music, everything, is left to the discretion of the promotion. In the case of CM Punk, CM Punk (real name Phil Brooks) made a deal with WWE when he first joined Ohio Valley Wrestling (at the time WWE's developmental system before NXT came along) that he was not going to be given a name, that he was to use the name CM Punk, even though WWE does not own the rights to that name. This is why he was able to use the name CM Punk in Ring of Honor, WWE, and AEW. The Cult of Personality theme also dates back to his pre-WWE days during what long-time Punk fans call the "first Summer of Punk" back in 2005. He's able to use the song thanks to a hefty rights contribution by the promoter, first ROH, then WWE, then AEW, and now WWE again. There was a short time that WWE was using a different song for Punk back in 2006-2011 but that was mostly because management at the time didn't want to pay for the rights to Cult of Personality. Likewise, with Edge/Adam Copeland, the Edge name is owned by WWE, and therefore he just simply couldn't take it with him. So he went with his real birth name, Adam Copeland. The music, however, is not owned by WWE, Metalingus by Alter Bridge. Copeland has spoken about this during interviews that he went to Alter Bridge and asked if he could use their song when he went to AEW and they said yes. That's why despite the intro being slightly different ("You think you know me" vs "You think you know him") the song and presentation is virtually the same. Cody Rhodes was able to strike a deal with WWE to allow him to use Kingdom and the American Nightmare name despite neither of these being owned by WWE.
The video game question, I cannot answer, because I've never played any 2K games past 22
Moves being different is a preference thing. You'll notice in WWE, wrestlers are a lot safer and more careful with how they are presented compared to AEW or New Japan. That is by design. Now, WWE has loosened up on this over the last year under Paul Levesque aka Triple H with wrestlers doing more insane moves and more blood showing up in the matches, but the moves being different is completely a wrestler preference.
hahahahaha face vs heel....yeah, that's a tricky one. The idea is that a babyface is to have good intentions and be cheered by the crowd whereas a heel is supposed to be booed by the crowd (key distinction: supposed to be; you can thank/blame the nWo and Kevin Nash for that) and has bad intentions or cheats to win. There are some babyfaces that will cheat to win (great example of this being Eddie Guerrero RIP) and some heels that will mostly play it by the book (Gunther being a key example). Fans gravitate who they will gravitate towards, regardless of if a wrestler is considered "good" or "bad". As a promoter once said famously, good, bad, mixed, as long as there's a reaction from the crowd, it's good. And yeah, when Roman comes back, he's going to be the biggest babyface in the company, because he's going to go after Solo Sikoa, who we are supposed to hate viscerally.
Like with any GOAT debate, the WWE/wrestling GOAT debate is subjective. It really depends on how you look at it. Some people will view John Cena as the GOAT, some look at Ric Flair or Hulk Hogan as the GOAT, some look at Bryan Danielson/Daniel Bryan as the GOAT, there are some wrestling fans that will view Bruno Sammartino and his eight year long reign as WWWF Champion and say he's the GOAT. It's all subjective.
A lot of people had issues with Danielson's selling of his injury, ESPECIALLY given his history of concussions. To answer your last question, I don't know if there's anything reliable outside of one or two sources, but if it's serious enough, the commentators will mention it. There've only been a couple instances where they've done this (unfortunately one of them was the night Owen Hart died) but when the commentators are going out of their way to say "this is not an angle, this is not part of the entertainment or part of a story" something to that effect, that's when you know it's serious. The other instance of this happening was the night Jerry "The King" Lawler suffered a heart attack live on Raw at the announce desk. It used to be that the commentators going completely radio silent during a segment was a way to signal to people that this wasn't planned, but to your point, they've even abused that over the years, so that's no longer reliable. A big problem people have with wrestling now is that it's too much based in real life. (Again, thank/blame the nWo for that) So the line between reality and fantasy has been blurred so many times that there sometimes appears that there is no line. Thankfully, there are reliable news sources out there that will help you with this key distinction, but they can sometimes get things wrong as well. The best advice is to follow your gut and to enjoy the show in the meantime.
Sorry for the length response but I get pretty passionate myself when talking about this stuff.
If you have a cable TV/satellite provider, you can watch up to 5(?) weeks of AEW's past content on the TNT and TBS apps/websites. All you have to do is link your provider to the site, and you're good to go.
This may be off topic but if you ever wanted to witness the Monday Night War of the 90s, I'd highly recommend the RUclips series Reliving the War by Wrestling Bios
- The majority of companies nowadays have their own streaming services of some sort or are on streaming service, AEW is very much in the minority in that regard at this point. There are even some services that have multiple promotions inside of it, notably Wrestle Universe which has multiple companies from Japan, and IWTV, which has a lot of independent companies. These services will have a backlog of content, though the amount will vary depending on which one.
- A lot of times, wrestler’s ring-names will be owned by WWE, so many will use a different name when wrestling elsewhere, though that isn’t always the case. For wrestlers coming into the WWE, there name may be changed so the company can “own” the name. A lot of times wrestlers’s finishers will be existing moves, but will have a name that is tailored to them, so a lot of times the “other” name for a move is its default name. As for music, I believe it’s mostly a copyright thing for in-house music.For licensed music, it just comes down to the price of the song a lot of times and if a company is willing to pay for it.
- I view faces & heels on a spectrum, some people fall on the ends of it, but a lot of people will be somewhere near the middle. Faces & heels function differently depending on the company, for example in CMLL in Mexico, you will literally be told who the faces and heels are before many of the matches.
- Titles at the end of the day are simply story-devices, so they will be used and viewed differently depending on the context. I don’t think there is one specific way to gauge how successful someone in regards to titles. For the WWE it seems to be a mix of how long you’ve held a belt and how many times you’ve held it, but again it will vary.
- A good way to tell if an injury is real or not is how much the attention is put onto it, if it is real, likely the cameras will not focus on it and commentary will not put to much emphasis on it. If a match gets called off or ends abruptly that should also likely be a give away.
I like the idea that they'd avoid showing a real injury.
NJPW has the title belt standard you want. They keep track of how long its held and how many times it is defended. They hold a special prestige on title defenses.
Answer to Question 2: Names, very specific gimmick or character traits, and music Are owned by WWE. Hence the changes through Trademarks so they can use it in the future for games toys etc. If the wrestler is more established then they can keep things like names some like AJ Dtyles and Sting are so well known that there whole Identity is unchanged. CM Punk has liscence rights to cult of personality and he is well known that changing hos music would hurt the brand. As for moves if the wrestler creates it or uses the move and "gets it over" the same applies to the move it's the performers.
That's why the Rock's version of the eurnagi called the rock bottom is not done by everyone, or Undertaker's tombstone is not done by all. If someone uses a move done by someone else it's because they asked. Or do it once as a tribute i.e. Kevin Owens asked Steve Austin for the Stunner
The best way to keep up with all the companies is from their RUclipss these days, some have their own individual libraries but that adds up like streaming services. WWE is the biggest promotion with the most money and connections and they have been for a long time and always will be. That’s why they’re so easy to find.
The name stuff- whoever gets to the copyright office first gets it
The companies pay for the real music with the exception of Edge who knows the band personally apparently
It is very difficult to try and keep a normal life and watch all of the wrestling. The best way to do this is to scroll on reddit or what I do which is follow a couple of instagram accounts, could be twitter or even maybe Facebook too. These accounts will tell you the results of all the shows. You have to follow a few because there's no one that I have found that does them all. I legit know the champion of AJPW and Ive never watched a single show. This for me, is the best way to keep up and then I sit down and watch the big PLE's or PPV's. Watching only the big shows or even the big weekly tv episodes also helps with not getting burnt out or over wrestling, as it can be very shitty and long sometimes.
If you want to binge these shows, you have to buy the subscriptions and there's a lot of them but mainly fite tv is the best because you can watch most of the wrestling shows, but you have you buy.
Or you can also go through the entire social media accounts
For the last question I've gotta say, I understand your concern because I've felt it a lot, here in Mexico when they sell an injury they take the wrestlers in a stretcher and when I went to my first live wrestling event ever I was concerned because on the preshow there was a wrestler who got out of the match in a stretcher during a match but then came back to do some more flips. I have to warn you, in my personal experience, looking online for reports and stuff made me enjoy wrestling less because the "dirt sheets" which are the wrestling reporting sources usually spoil returns and things like that. You're a new fan so I would hate it if your experience is less special because Dave Meltzer or Sean Ross Sapp spoiled that x wrestler you like comes back in the rumble or something and it's such an easy rabbit hole to fall into. I understand your concern about wrestlers and their health and if you want to get into dirt sheets to know if they are ok I admire you and bless your heart, just beware that those dirt sheets are willing to spoil everything just to get clicks.
Thanks for asking the questions, Josh! The whole face/heel distinction is super confusing to me, too!
Glad it's not just me lol
RUclips is a great source for AEW. You can go watch the entire cm punk mjf feud. Kenny omega belt collector run. AEW channel is loaded with long and short clips
About Storyline injuries. If it's legit then Wrestling news media like Fightful Select, Pro Wrestling Insider or Wrestling News Observer will report about it.
OR
If it's actually legit then promotions themselves acknowledge it by giving wrestlers absence, updating fans about their surgery/therapy or vacating the title if they're champion and not using their injury to play in their storyline or let them get invested in it because it's legit
TNA+ is the best way to watch TNA. You can get the entire content library back to the beginning in 2002, stream weekly shows anytime you want (live is 8pm Eastern on Thursdays) and if you spring for the world champion tier you get every PPV and it's 20 ish dollars less than the 10 dollar a month option and all four PPVs
well the story with Edge is his theme song he can use it when ever he wants because hes friends with the singer of alter bridge so he has the rights of Metalingus and his real name is Adam Copeland Edge was his name in wwe Adam actually talks about it in a interview on how he got his entrance theme
Bryan specifically has a history of concussions, he retired because of it, then came back - so that's probably why he specifically did it. But also its good to know that if they are showing everything its probably not real - very serious injuries they tend to move the camera away.
3ish year fan here!
On song rights, across the board in all media, it is way more expensive to get rights to use copyrighted music, if the artist is interested at all. The video game thing is a great example why. If I as a singer sign that you can use my music, have to specify can it be used just in ring?, on tv?, commercials?, radio?, youtube?, video game? With WWE being pretty big, what then happens if someone gets involved in domestic abuse. Now your hit single makes hundreds of thousands of people think of an abuser. Singers similarly could get into big scandals. It's way easier for companies to just pay for people to make songs for that purpose than have to deal with all that. That said, they can pay enough to get more mainstream music if they wanted to.
Heel and babyface are classuc wrestling terms. Historically, babyfaces held moral high grounds and would be the person you rout for. Heels would be open to mean moves or cheating and be booed. I think that got blurry in the 90s with Hogan turning heel but Steve Austin Undertaker and Randy Savage getting popular. Now, stories have more layers and they play with wrestlers history with one another more (think the punk promo "more dusty"). I actually think the best matches are those complicated ones where the crowd is split on who we want to win. Feels like team sports. Rhea is an interesting case. I think she is heel in that she'll cheat and hop into matches but she's baby in that she was the loyalty holding judgement day together in loyalty.
The fake X thing would definitely be a thing planned out. The ref knows beforehand when to expect it. It feels yick to sell that but can lead to good storytelling the Drew injuring Punk at the Rumble. It would be pretty easy to just use a different sign like double thumbs down if you're actually hurt during matches with a planned fake.
Apparently there is now a rule that if you used a name before coming to the WWE and use it there, you can use it when you leave as well. Examples were given as Ethan Page and Stephanie Vaquer. Think this may have been brought up by Ricochet leaving
Branding of wrestlers - WWE trademarks nearly every name, even if it’s their real name (like Jacob Fatu). Move names might be trademarked if WWE gives it a special name or if the name of the move is tied into their name. Real music, they have to pay a license fee to the artist and then how it’s used outside of TV would depend on the legalese revolving that
1. Some promotions have them (NJPW has NJPW World, ROH has their own service, TNA has TNA+), but not everybody has them. It looks like AEW is going on Max whenever they get their new TV deal with WBD, but for now the best way to keep up is social media if you aren't able to watch the show.
2. Most of the time outside of WWE, the wrestler owns it, sometimes they don't but they do most of the time. That's why Ricochet has had the name in NJPW before WWE, NXT, and WWE. But usually when they come to WWE, the WWE trademarks the name and keeps the ownership, which is why guys like Copeland and Danielson go by their real names now instead of Edge and Daniel Bryan.
3. Face/Heel is sometimes hard to define because they can be very broad with who's who. For example, Hangman Adam Page is technically a heel because of what he's doing in-ring to guys like Jeff Jarrett, but his actions are justified, so it's hard to define. The way I see it, the best definition is a face is who is supposed to be cheered and a heel is who's supposed to be booed, but those definitions change from character to character.
4. Depends who it is. A good example is comparing Gunther to Chris Jericho. Jericho has held the belt nine times, but he hasn't even held it collectively for one year, while Gunther has only had it once but has held it for 666 days. Both are viewed as great champions, but for different reasons. The main thing to consider is how long they've been wrestling. Obviously in only 2 years on the main roster, Gunther isn't going to win the belt nine times, but in the short time he's been called up, he's been dominant. But Jericho was on the main roster for a long time, so those 9 reigns are impressive.
5. It used to be the X, but now that's been used in storytelling and matches to where you can't trust that either. The main way to tell in WWE is if they're showing replays and keeping the camera on them. If they're showing it, it's kayfabe, if they're not showing it, it's likely real. In AEW there isn't a great way to tell because they almost always show a replay unless it causes a serious injury.
On the face heel thing you are missing out on the booking aspect. Who they are friends with and who they feud with has a lot to do with it.
You are right about Rhea having a mix of heel booking but face reaction... This was actually a big issue I hope they fix. She was in a heel faction hanging out with the biggest heel in the company feuding with faces, but people want to cheer her. This created a situation where the faces she was feuding with got boos. Becky and Liv essentially had to turn heel because the crowd backed Rhea. The feud that worked best for her was Nia Jax because she was in her home country fighting a monster heel getting massive cheers.
It seems she will finally be turning face fueding with Dom/Liv and presumably having issues with the rest of judgement day minus Damien who is also hinting at a face turn by refusing to cheat and turning against judgement day.
I agree the dom situation will help her with the face turn