The so-called Wednesday Night Wars are a good example of wrestling
being more exciting. ROH is now the lead-in show for TNA's Impact Wrestling on
Destination America, in direct competition with WWE's white hot NXT show and
the weekly one hour cinematic masterpiece that is Lucha Underground. All of
those shows but Impact are great. They have their own distinct tropes and
identities and they feel fresh, new and exciting. Impact, despite its numerous
flaws and the fact that it's just flat out not good, has a dedicated fan base
who will tune in (and, perhaps more importantly, defend it) every week. It's a
concentration of shows that illustrates the variety of styles and approaches
that can be taken within the pro wrestling format.
Calling it a rise in popularity rather than a definitive boom
period also neatly covers the issue of WWE's dominance. The phrase boom period conjures
up an image of another wrestling promotion becoming successful enough to
challenge WWE's status as top (big) dog. That won't happen. WWE has so much cash
flowing in and so many draws and talents at their disposal that they're going to
be on top until some sort of major, unpredictable catastrophe befalls them. The
company best placed to challenge them, New Japan, are years away from even
trying in North America, although they're comfortably smashing WWE to pieces in
Japan.
No, a rise in popularity makes it clear we're discussing
the status of the wrestling biz as a whole, particularly the non-WWE segment.
And this finally brings me around to my point: I think the company that will do
best as wrestling gets a little more popular in mainstream culture is the
company that makes the best use of female talent.
Give this woman a women's division to head up. Watch the money roll in. |
Looking back it's clear that the last few years have seen
the status of women's wrestling progress considerably. The prominence of
Ivelisse Velez and Sexy Star in Lucha Underground and the entire women's
division of NXT has simply helped to highlight the point, because they're TV
shows. SHIMMER has been going for ten years now and has, along with
Florida-based Shine, helped to create an environment in which all-women
companies are a viable option for promoters.
These promotions being in a position to continue running
shows illustrates that there's an audience for women's wrestling. So does the
reaction that the performances of the wrestlers above get on TV. Just look at
the response to the Banks versus Lynch match from Takeover: Unstoppable. WWE
and TNA have been letting us down for years with shoddy women's divisions
booked as afterthoughts, despite each group having had a solid division at one
time or another over the last fifteen years1. Ring of Honor doesn't
even have a women's division at all.
There's a gap in the market for a wrestling TV show that
emphasises women's wrestling. NXT has made a lot of headway but so have LU, and
it wouldn't be impossible for ROH to look at hiring some more women to go along
with Maria, Veda Scott (who never seems to wrestle in ROH despite doing so
elsewhere) and ODB. Global Force could theoretically launch with a fantastic
women's league if Jarrett wanted to, there's enough available talent to be
signed up. You can turn on any wrestling show and see guys killing it great
matches. Making women min event attractions would be new and something wrestling
fans are ready for. More importantly it would be a way to hook non-fans with
something different. That's why I think good quality women's wrestling is going
to be of increased importance in wrestling's future, whether there's another
boom period coming or not.
***
1 For TNA it was the Knockouts. In the mid-00s
they, along with the X Division, were a reason to watch TNA in the mid-00s.
Then the writers decided to revert to the WWE approach of focusing on the world
title scene, keeping women and cruiserweights as a side attraction.
A few years earlier WWE had Trish Stratus, Molly Holy,
Ivory, Lita, Victoria, Gail Kim and others in a competitive women's division
that produced good matches. It's not clear why they decided to scale the
division back and reduce it to the filler role it occupied for about a decade.
At least the company as a whole remained profitable and had other, enjoyable
things going on instead. Which can't be said for TNA.
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