Will I ever be able to Watch Wrestling the Same way again?– By Wrestle G

Will I ever be able to Watch Wrestling the Same way again?– By Wrestle G

 

Hello to all my friends here at NoDQ.com it is me Wrestle G back once again for some wrestling musings. Apologies for the lack of columns in recent weeks, real life has really done its best to challenge me. Thankfully/hopefully things seem to be turning more positive so I will be able to share my opinions with you all here and thank you all for your patience.

While I was away it was not all doom and gloom I did manage to go to the Dynamite and Collision tapings and AEW All In at Wembley. I will be putting down some thoughts on how it made me feel as a wrestling fan in more detail shortly for a future column. But overall, I just cannot let it slide without comment that I had the best time as a wrestling fan at both events. From the first Bell in Cardiff to Daniel Bryan standing tall at the end of All In the whole week just gave me my faith back in Wrestling fans. I can’t wait to go into more detail about it soon.

 

But I just want to get straight into this weeks topic. Netflix has just unleashed their 6-part series on Vince McMahon. I’ll let everyone else spill their review on it but I had a really strange relationship while watching it that I’d like to explore……

 

What is my wrestling relationship with WWE now?

 

Now Let’s get this straight right from the start based on the knowledge we have of Vince from Janel Grant and the accusations thus far and the amount of previous allegations such as Rita Chatterton. As a Human, I cannot condone Vince McMahon, and I utterly condemn his actions. What Janel and others went through is horrible and I am glad that Vince is no where near the WWE. These next few paragraphs are me trying to reconcile with my fandom and nostalgia and in no way is any of the following column intended to excuse any of the acts Vince has been accused of.

In the lead up to Summer Slam I created a thread of my favourite moments from Summer Slam history for my Twitter account. Upon creating and deciding on the moments I would unsurprisingly come across lots of Vince Moments. Moments on commentary, moments in the ring and angles. It was the first time I was ever really faced full on with my conundrum.

Is it ok to enjoy Vince historical work now?

This feeling of questioning was only exacerbated as I sat and watched the documentary with my wife who HATES wrestling. She does however love a Netflix documentary, so it was an interesting experiment to see how she reacted to the show. During the show she was appalled at some of the previous storylines and I found myself at times trying to give context, it was almost like an excusing on my part. The more the doc went on and the more I was trying to explain the Trish barking like a dog segment my heart sank, I thought this was just wrestling, I thought that this was all just something I was entertained by.

But it isn’t just wrestling now its connotations have changed. Watching Vince Leer over Sable mere years after her sexual harassment lawsuit and the same with Torrie Wilson, Stacey Keibler the list just seemed to go on. Hearing Vince lay out his rationale for storylines, hearing different storylines that vince pitched which didn’t go anywhere, the ‘Real’ Vince it felt more than ever had been bleeding through the TV for years in more of a subtle way than I was able to comprehend while it was happening.

 

These thoughts continued to roam around my head, and I didn’t know where it would land. Wrestling had been my life, it has been my crutch when I’m happy, it’s been my crutch when its sad. It’s the thing I know so much about I can tell people about it with confidence and answer their questions. It’s always felt somewhere welcoming and an escape from reality.  Could it still be that for me now? That’s when another angle to this came to me, am I able to jettison all of the other characters involved in this who have done no wrong, the careers of Mick Foley, Steve Austin, the Undertaker, Shawn Michaels are all intrinsically linked to McMahon can I just let that go? Is their history now unwatchable?

So, I put it to the test. Bad Blood is this weekend, and it is one of my all-time favourite events and the inaugural Hell in a Cell match remains one of my most cherished wrestling memories. The difficulty of legitimising a new match type was navigated with sheer class by Shawn Michaels and the Undertaker on that night. Topped off with the impressive Debut of Kane which was a huge part of almost a year build in the feud between Taker and Paul Bearer. I fired up my WWE Network and dived right in, it was all there. Shawn’s bumping, Takers aggressiveness, the attack on the camera man the escape from the cage, Shawns big bump and blade job all the way to Kane releasing the cage door from its hinges. I sat and I watched, and all those old memories came back to me, I still loved it. McMahon’s commentary was there, and it lingered but I Could tune it out.

As the match ended, I sat and I just still didn’t know how I felt. And I still don’t really know what my relationship is like with the WWE going forward from a nostalgia point. I love the current product and I’m so so glad Vince is gone. But I also love the feeling wrestling events gone by gives me.

So, I open it to the floor. What are your opinions and relationships with the on-screen Vince McMahon? Can you still watch? Can you separate character from person? I’d love to hear people’s opinions on this.

A shorter column in the books today and going forward these will be a lot more regular. And next week will be much more positive as I will deep dive my thoughts into how AEW All in week made me fall in love with Wrestling and Wrestling Fans again. In the meantime feel free to reach out on Twitter via @Wrestle_G and enjoy Bad Blood this weekend.

until next time,

 

Cheers,

 

G