WWE: Why Blurring Lines Between Scripted & Reality Is Key to Success

We appeared to be watching just another edition of Monday Night Raw, which was about as painfully dull as usual an hour and fifty-seven minutes into the broadcast.

As we internet fans were just waiting to log on and bash the WWE (or had already in my case), something unexpected happened—something we rarely see in the walk-on-egg-shells environment that many ex-employees have described the WWE as fostering. 

CM Punk, after costing John Cena his tables match, sat on the top of the ramp, Indian style, with a microphone.

Six minutes later, we had witnessed possibly the greatest shoot promo in the history of professional wrestling. 

Now, before I begin taking you where my mind is leading me, in no way am I saying that every promo should be a shoot promo.

This is because, as a former creative writer described them on the I Want Wrestling podcast (and I am paraphrasing), shoot promos are like silver bullets: You can only use them so often... And once you have used all of them, you're [expletive] out of luck.

So, Vince Russo, I hope you were listening. Please don't turn every promo into a shoot on the next edition of Impact Wrestling.

Nonetheless, many are labeling this promo as the end of an era and the beginning of another. It's as if we were expecting the second coming of the Attitude Era (which would be doomed to fail from the very re-launch).

I may get scrutinized for the following statement, nevertheless it is how I feel: I hope we don't see another Attitude Era.

Yes, internet smarks, another Attitude Era would do more harm than good!

What I am hoping for is something very different, hasn't been done before, and the surface for which just has the marks of a fingernail scratching of a tightly-groomed person.

What I am hoping for is realism. Yes, the era in which we would experience the WWE blur the lines between scripted and reality.

I am talking about where we have things of significance happen outside of the two-hour window of television programs.

Similar to the reactions to the aforementioned shoot promo and Samoa Joe and Crimson's bar fight, I want people scratching their heads, asking what was real and what came off a freshly printed piece of paper.

We would have wrestlers appear on talk shows, only to get attacked by their archrivals during the interviews. How refreshing would it be to watch CM Punk attack John Cena when he's on Jimmy Fallon because Punk believes he should be the face of the company?

How about a Twitter feud sparking a wrestling feud? 

Or maybe a tittle changing hands every once in awhile at a house show? 

I mean, isn't it funny how champions have the magical power to retain at house shows? 

This is the only way that I believe MMA fans would be brought into the realm of pro wrestling. Like it or not, wrestling will always be the "fake three-ring circus" unless we blur the lines.

That would also bring wrestling back to the mainstream, which is just what a promotion with slumping ratings and a poor pay-per-view buys rate needs.

In my opinion, this is the best possible way to make wrestling the big hit it once was. The WWE must reinvent itself, rather than marketing the past more than the future as they are presently doing.

Disagree?

Why don't you explain why the WWE already has an ex-wrestler, current movie star in the main event at WrestleMania, and jumped at the opportunity like a cat on a bunny rabbit?

C'mon people, the WWE is relying on it's past more than it's future. Honestly, they have failed to create a mega-star since the John Cena-Randy Orton-Batista trio. That's not only sad, but what will we do when Cena and Orton hang up their boots?

That's a scary thought, now isn't it?

CM Punk's promo could be the beginning of a fresh new era. We can make people wonder what exactly is fake and what is real. The WWE has a chance to put pro wrestling in the mainstream once again.

Let's just hope they don't squander it all this time around.