What happened to the storylines?

[NegativeFeedback]

There used to be a time when everybody had a storyline. The top players to the low carders had stories all going around. Some of them were great, some of them were just okay, but there were so many going on that WWE was about to strike gold at some point.

Sure, guys like Booker and Edge faced off for Japanese Shampoo commercials and others were threatening to cut off someone's pipi, but you also had Christian and Jericho having a deep and personal feud involving Trish's betrayal, and plenty of other great feuds.

You don't have to go that far back either. Around 2006-07 at the height of the brand extension, you had Gregory Helms and Matt Hardy feuding on the undercard, Kane and MVP, Taker and Kennedy feuding in the midcard, and Batista/Booker and Chavo/Rey feuding at the top, all at the same time. And that was only on one show!! The other show had Jeff/Nitro, Cena/Edge, DX/Rated RKO, Flair/Spirit Squad, Santino/Umaga and more!

Pretty much everybody had a storyline. Even the guys who didn't get PPV treatment like Viscera and Charlie Haas were feuding in the undercard about injuring Lillian Garcia.

Now, the only guys who get to have stories are the top 2-3 matches on a PPV. Daniel Bryan gets to have a long fight against The Authority. Even Shield gets to have a mini-story rebelling against Kane. John Cena gets to fight for his legacy or w/e. But Dolph, Miz, Sandow, Big E, Fandango, Kofi??? Years ago, all these guys would have stories that would flesh them out as characters. Now, all we get are random series of matches that the announcers push as a feud but in reality, it's just two random guys doing their jobs.

Think about how Goldust and Cody had an actual story that led to them getting really over as a tag team. After that, they were booked in random tag defenses with absolutely no stories. Real Americans beat them in a match, then they lost the title match, then the Rhodes Bros moved on. Eventually, the monotony cost them their heat and now they lost the titles, and are battle royal fodder.

What happened to the storylines?? Why is it that Miz and Kofi can be paired in a series of matches and the Creative team calls it a day?

Why is it that most people now FEUD BECAUSE THEY HAVE TO FIGHT, instead of FIGHTING BECAUSE OF THEIR HEATED FEUD?

Even top guys like Big Show, Sheamus and hell, even Brock aren't exempt from this. Brock's feud with Taker was about a random challenge. All their promos were about "hey, I guess we're fighting at Mania, so let's talk about that". The same thing happened with Brock's first match with Cena.

I know creative team bashing was commonplace even 10 years ago, but at least 10 years ago the creative team were actually TRYING. You may have hated Matt Hardy and MVP's series of challenges, but hey, they were midcarders feuding for the US title and making it feel important. Dean Ambrose has held that same title for a whole year and I can't recall an actual feud. Big E has faced off Ziggler, Fandango, and others, without ever cutting a promo in the ring about his beef with anybody.

Where have the storylines gone and how can we get them back??

 

[SeriousProfessional]

Great topic and the OP makes a lot of valid points....

My main beef with the lack of creativity and non-feuds is that it's so easy to start to feud and there's plenty of TV time to keep it going. Why is it so difficult to have someone shoulder check a guy and let things escalate from there? Or have one guy walk through another guy's shot during a backstage promo. Why can't somebody just spill a drink on someone? "John, my diet soda..." People fight about dumb shit like this every day, the crowd would identify with it.

 

[OYDK]

I agree. Just ANYTHING. I remember a feud between Jericho and Kane started when Jericho spilled hot coffee on Kane! All you need is one tiny little starting point like that to get a feud rolling, but it seems WWE Creative is thinking way too far ahead. It seems like before they even create a feud, they know exactly how it's going to start, progress, and end without giving the wrestlers any creative freedom, and this seems like to much work for every person on the roster.

I mean even if it's over something stupid, give us a reason to watch Fandago vs Santino for christ's sake.

 

[TheICChampion]

I agree with the OP, but let's face it, even the best storylines are, more often than not, recycled. Let's look at a good example: John Cena vs. Randy Orton in 2007. Was it a good match? Yeah, sorta. What was the storyline? Orton attacked Cena's father. How dastardly! How cowardly! Why would Orton do such a thing? Who could have ever predicted this would happen? Oh, that's right. It happened exactly one year before, when Edge attacked Cena's father. AND they did it again just last year. Now, fine, you wanna have storylines, great. Makes matches more interesting. But the challenge is, try coming up with something that at least SEEMS original or maybe that hasn't been done to death. Example: Jeff Hardy/CM Punk in 2009. Now, I'll admit, I'm a Punk fan. But I was kinda on the fence about him until this feud. Why? It was PERFECT. "I'm straightedge and that means I'm better than you." Only a guy like CM Punk at the time could have pulled that off so well, especially against a guy like Jeff Hardy who has had problems with drug addiction in the past (and a few years later as well). All I'm saying is, maybe, just maybe, the Creative team can't come up with anything that hasn't been done a hundred (or maybe more) times. Or perhaps because the superstar they were going to give the push to or the storyline to messed up and got heat backstage and there's no one else to carry the storyline?

 

[CyberPunk]

It certainly has been a problem. It seems writers have been told to concentrate only on the main event scene. Every now and then you'll have a mini-feud break out somewhere, but it goes nowhere. Remember when Brodus Clay turned on Sweet-T? What happened to that? Yeah it was undercard stuff but nothing came out of it. Ambrose being with Shield has done nothing with the US title.

With the amount of TV time WWE has, you'd think they'll come up with something. I hope post Wrestlemania time lets them focus on something else besides main event scene.

 

[AegonTargaryen]

Amazing thread and very brilliant inferences and assertions by Feedback! I couldn't agree with you more. But sadly, this is what it is and what will remain. If you went about enlisting the list of "superstars" who should actually be involved in meaningful feuds/storylines, I suppose that'd give you at least 20 Wrestlers. From Rhodes brothers to Christian, Sheamus, Wade Barrett, Dolph Ziggler, Damien Sandow, among others.

There was a time when wrestlemania had at least 4-5 good stories/matches. This year it was totally crappy where the whole thing revolved around Daniel Bryan vs Authority/Orton/Batista, and John Cena-Bray Wyatt being the only other feud/story. As the OP correctly said, the buildup to Brock Lesnar and Undertaker was underwhelming, uncreative and uninspiring and I'm just glad Uncle Fester and his damn streak with the yearly repetition won't happen next year. The Shield match was a random throwaway with undeserving opponents like NAO and was underwhelming as well. Battle Royal= Uncreative solution to the Creativity problem. What the hell could they do with a dozen guys ?

Even as far back as 2009, there were multiple feuds going on simultaneously. On SD, Big Show and Chris Jericho faced DX, John Cena and Sheamus had a tables match, Undertaker feuded CM Punk, Batista had a long feud with Rey Mysterio, and then John Cena. But it seems to me, ever since the brand extension has ended, the WWE has gotten much worse when it comes to writing stories and developing meaningful feuds with guys like Ziggler, Sandow, etc. How many times have we seen two guys randomly have a match on Raw, then on SD, and even on main-event and ppvs? Miz-Kofi, Del Rio-Sheamus are two of the most recurring matches.

With Raw being 3 hours, and new/interesting mid-card feuds rarely coming up, it's a miracle how WWE has been able to sustain itself. I guess either people don't really
want meaningful undercard feuds and are content with random matches on Raw/SD, or they primarily watch Raw for major developments in the only feuds/stories that the WWE can depict, which these days usually revolve around Daniel Bryan, Shield, Authority, Orton, Wyatts, and Cena, and the occasional part-timers such as Lesnar. I wonder how bleak the careers of Dolph Ziggler and Damien Sandow seem to be.

 

[chicagokmc]

To be fair to WWE, I think too many storylines would make it hard to follow. Especially given how WWE television focuses so much on the top 2 or 3 storylines (this would require a major change in how shows are structured and I don't think WWE would do that). But I agree there could be a much better job of involving the roster in meaningful, defined programs, especially given how tv shows spend over half the time re-capping what is supposed to be important.

A simple and effective way to get feuds going used to be centered around the belts and not just the world belt. Jockeying for position to "move up the ranks" was a reusable and effective way to get people in storylines without those having to be directly involving a title.

It seems like the 80/20 rule is followed...80% of the storyline effort is centered only around the top 20% of the talent.

 

[StraightEdgeSaint15]

Lack of competition is a major thing. From an economic standpoint, monopolies are always bad for the consumer. The WWE isn't a true monopoly because it technically has competitors in TNA, ROH, and other indie circuits, but TNA is the only one with a major television presence and the quality of their product just doesn't match up. If people want to watch televised wrestling, the main place to go is WWE. So long as they make money, the company doesn't have to put out a whole lots creatively. Want to see better storylines? You'd have to get everybody to boycott, forcing them to change the product or lose money. Until that happens, WWE will stay where they are at.

 

[NegativeFeedback]

Want to see better storylines? You'd have to get everybody to boycott, forcing them to change the product or lose money. Until that happens, WWE will stay where they are at.

It's not about having better storylines, it's about having MORE storylines. We have 7 hours of main roster programming every week, 10 in weeks when there are PPVs, and even more if you count the numerous panel shows.

And yet, all we get is 2-3 storylines which is a farcry from the years before when we had 6-to-7 storylines per show. Nowadays, we get an opening segment and a main event that involve one storyline, another storyline at the top of the 2nd hour, and the rest of the show is filler with absolutely no direction whatsoever.

They can have Kofi and Miz feud over whose shirt is better. It would be a crappy storyline but it would be something. They used to have somethings for everybody, but now all we get is random match-ups and the illusion that these characters have beef despite the fact they haven't shown any personality, conflict or struggle aside from "I was booked to face you today, so I guess I don't like you".

I want the good old days when if you hated John Cena's stupid storyline about never giving up, proving he's the best and defending his legacy, all you had to do was wait until the opening segment was over, and you'll have Jeff and Johnny Nitro come out and have a decent midcard feud, followed by a Rated RKO segment where they targeted DX, etc etc. Now we just get a random Del Rio squash, someone facing Fandango for the 10th time, and then some Bad News.

WWE got this far because the alternative programming to Raw was Raw! You didn't like what we offered with this story, that's okay, because we have another story in 10 minutes. It's the same reason I watch Walking Dead and Game of Thrones despite the fact I hate some of the characters. There are always some stories I enjoy. Now, there's just a very limited selection.

 

[George Steele's Barber]

There are plenty of storylines going on right and the top ones have been pretty darn good. I'm not huge on there needing to be a certain number of minutes of ring action each week but I feel like Raw over the past year has been as solid as ever. They have found such a nice balance. As a fan I understand that these guys are paid to fight and sometimes they have no other reason. I'd rather watch some enjoyable wrestling than poorly written and acted soaps.

Plus we just got through what is thought of as the end of the year. This week's Raw was ended some things, new stuff will start.

On top of that, I don't remember so many (7 or 8) storylines all at once ever. And a lot of what I do remember was not entertaining and nonsensical.

 

[StraightEdgeSaint15]

I really think the big thing that is suffering right now is just mid card feuds. The uppertier has been good for me personally as of late. One thing that doesnt happen as often nowadays are backstage segments that aren't on location. (Ex: Triple H went to find Shawn Michaels and found him working Iin a restaurant. Or the time he went to Randy Orton house and tore it to shreads). Some of these segments can get cheesy, but other times they help give more foundation to the feud.

 

[lil steroid meat]

I agree. Dudes just fight to fight.

It's a shame guys don't get to cut promos anymore.

It's weird too, because they have more television time than EVER to fill. 3 Hours of RAW, 2 Hours of Smackdown, 1 hour of Main Event, 1 hour of Superstars and all they do is put on random matches.

Creative Team has definitely gotten lazier.

 

[NegativeFeedback]

On top of that, I don't remember so many (7 or 8) storylines all at once ever. And a lot of what I do remember was not entertaining and nonsensical.

There were always 7-8 storylines, per BRAND. And there was a time there were 3 Brands, making that over 20 feuds happening at the same time. Every PPV match had a personal story leading up to it. It was never random "Let's fight!" feuds like Henry/Ryback, Taker/Brock, etc.

And sure, I know it's their job to fight, but that's why they will always be booked in matches. It's up to creative to turn those matches into a storyline. While CM Punk feuded with Jeff Hardy, they both got to face John Morrison 1-on-1 on Smackdown, but one of them would be sitting on commentary, or another would interfere in a match, and that would add more depth to their feud. Nowadays the random throwaway matches occur and it adds nothing to any story.

 

[JoeFromTomsRiver]

I'm not sure you really want what you're asking for. In theory, more storylines sounds good and at one point I would have been the kind of person who would bring this topic up.

But then I thought about the fact that the WWE is PG. If every "feud" hide a well-defined "storyline", it would probably make me want to stop watching. A few years ago, a Sheamus v. Del Rio storyline was based on the fact that Del Rio convinced Booker T, the GM at the time, to ban the brough kick. That was it, weeks and weeks spent on whether or not Sheamus should be allowed to use his finishing move. That was a "storyline" that could fit in the PG parameters, and it was dumb.

Be careful what you ask for, you could get storylines and they would be something right out of their animated series "Slam City".