These days, more than ever before, stories must be based on reality. Given that most characters in the company worth a lick are quite human, their problems have to be humanized. The thing that wrestling provides the fan is a settlement to disputes inside a squared circle. These men and women seemingly have the same issues we do, but can fight it out in the end and hopefully entertain us along the way. It's great to bring up old storylines in this thread like Undertaker/Kane, and McMahon vs. Austin, but that was a different time. Today, in 2009, everything done is a lot more on the real side. When referring to the Undertaker/Edge rivalry, what made it click was the Vickie Guerrero aspect. Fans enjoyed Undertaker's new submission move and she took it away, she even stripped him of the title for using it. The fact that the man has an overdone, non-human gimmick was forgotten for the time being because it was man against boss in essence and the story of being controlled and fighting back against that. To be honest, what ruined it was the end where Edge was "sent to hell". A simple fix, just have the Taker chokeslam or Tombstone him for a high altitude while Vickie watches in horror, thus he can sell his injuries off screen but it's less dumb than "sent to hell".
Let's examine a few of the current feuds to further my point. To start, what made the Jericho/Michaels feud work so well was that Jericho's heel turn didn't come until about 2 months in. He sold it perfectly, and just when you thought it wasn't going to happen, there went HBK's head through the Jeritron. Now take the current Hardy storyline. Things are happening to Jeff and Matt is always first out to help him. Then at the rumble, he turns on him and hits him with a chair and says they aren't brothers anymore on the following smackdown. GET REAL! I don't want to get into the semantics of this being a backup plan, but you can't go to extremes so fast. Matt has nowhere to go with his promos. This feud is failing from the get-go where it could have had potential perhaps if built properly. The problem is, these are two REAL brothers that us fans recognize. Two brothers that for years the WWE marketed as close brothers, ones that actually like each other. For that reason, you can't have one turn on the other out of nowhere and disown him. There has to be buildup. Perhaps when the fireworks accident happens, you see Matt come out but just stare at his brother blankly. Not mad, not upset, but not happy either. This way you are unsure of his emotions regarding his brother's accident. Then on the cutting edge, Matt addresses it all but is very vague in answers and tries to pass blame on to Edge (which is what happens) but in a subtle way, a good ear could tell he is covering something. If all of that happened and THEN he turned on his brother, it would make more sense. Then Matt would have to cut a promo much better than the one he did saying that he has tried to be a good brother, tried to be supportive, but it's hard to be the "good" one all the time, it's hard to be the responsible one while you get all the glory. It's not fair to anyone that you are reigning surpreme when you can't keep your life together without me (Matt). Then Matt could say "you're on your own Jeff, no more life help from me", and thus the Hardy Boyz split. Then, as time goes by, you further it by making it real, Jeff being the younger, but more talented brother and Matt as the responsible, do the right thing brother who is jealous because he should have more success for doing things the "right" way. I know this would work because my family is like that. I am the older brother who worked his butt off athletically while my younger sister was blessed with a golden right arm but coasted through her athletic career. At times I was jealous of her g-d given ability, but unlike my life, the WWE can settle differences in the ring and away we go.
Take the big story on Raw now (other than Legacy). HBK is down on his luck and takes a deal with the devil so to speak. For those who cry "how can this happen? he's one of the best?", I suggest you read some WWE autobiographies and find out what kind of money these guys make. Even the biggest stars make a couple of million dollars per year, but the WWE does NOT pay for travel expenses and the like. It is an expensive business to be in, and many guys are too frivolous, INCLUDING HBK, who WAS the character he is playing in the late 90s. He was the commissioner of the WWE because he needed money. He couldn't wrestle and should have been taking time to kick his addiction to pills, but he needed money and kept coming back, despite efforts by friends Kevin Nash and Triple H (it's in his book, I'm not making it up). Yes, now these days he is a born-again and SHOULD BE more responsible financially, but we all know it is a recession and people are struggling with money, so it's not crazy to think someone in the WWE could be. And yes, it had to be HBK because it had to be a face who would work for a heel and it had to be a guy who is an established yet fading superstar. It is perfectly believable and performed well by two veterans. Also, note that Shawn has been working for JBL for a couple of months with people expecting him to "turn on JBL" and give up the money, but the WWE actually did this right and didn't make Shawn into a moron with too much pride. He did what he had to do despite not liking it because you have to get paid. How many of us go to our jobs every day when we dont' want to because we have peopel to support? Believability my friends, that's what gets the story over. We may be unhappy because we expect one thing, but in the long run, the best stories take a lot of time to develop, are real, and worth the time.
