Whatever happened to the lost art of wrestlers being a tweener? For those unaware of what a tweener is (no, it has nothing to do with porno), a tweener is a wrestler who is not necessarily a face and not exactly a heel; they are in between. I guess the literal term for fans would be 'badass.' Someone who kicks ass, takes names, and looks out for number one at all times. The golden age of tweeners undoubtably began during the Attitude Era of WWF. Likewise, wCw developed many memorable characters using the simular tweener formula during its heyday. Presently, however, I have found tweeners in wrestling to be rather miniscule compared to a decade ago. Drawn out heels using the theory of British monarchy as a way to draw heat (Booker) and wrestlers using circa-1930 microphones in their intro's (Kennedy) is what I see on TV today. Am I the only one who thinks that WWE is just a step away from making a tag team involving Nazi skinheads? Why do wrestlers need taglines these days? Do we really need gimmicks that involves midgets that come out from the ring or pro wrestlers that wear dresses on an everyday occurrence? Sure, a Moppy gimmick ain't bad for laughs and giggles here and there, but WWE is taking these storylines to an unnecessary extreme.
Stone Cold Steve Austin, The Rock, Sting, and Eddie Guerrero. What do these historic wrestlers have in common? They all are of different ethnic groups, have had varied storylines, and have followed separate (and tragic) paths through the wrestling business. What makes them different from run of the mill wrestlers is the fact that all have been tweeners throughout a large portion of their careers. Austin never used an overly tasteless redneck with attitude gimmick. He never dawned a Confederate flag on his tights or blasted Johnny Cash music with his intro. He didn't have to. People knew that when Austin came to the ring anything and everything could happen at any given moment. What distinguished himself from others was the fact that he didn't need flashy pyro effects or tassel laden pants. He came, preached his sermon, kicked ass, chugged a few beers, and left. Simple, effective, and entertaining.
The Rock moved into a tweener persona by shear accident. In the beginning, when The Rock was a simple cliched babyface known as Rocky Mavia, fans would blatantly jeer him for being too two-dimensional. The Rock was then allowed to casually move into the Rock that we all know and love today. The character of The Rock was meant to be that of a simple heel though. So why did fans show such a positive attitude towards The Rock, a character meant to be an egotistical jackass, when they discarded him during his early career as a babyface? One simple word: charisma. He didn't draw heat from fans using casual heel tactics. He used his mouth to draw heat and in turn fans began to respect him for his charisma and cheered for him when he should have been booed. Also, like Austin, he kept everything simple yet stylish.
So if two of the most successful wrestlers in the WWE were tweeners, why is there such a lack of them today? Carlito and John Cena are the only major tweeners that I've seen in the WWE in the past three years or so that have been legitimate stars. In many ways the brand expansion is responsible for this. Since the expansion was established I noticed an increasing urge to package wrestlers with a backdrop of some kind. This was likely due to the fact that there were far less star power to go around for a two-hour show. Writers were pushed to repackage wrestlers as quickly as possible in an attempt to make them seem more exciting instead of taking the time to carefully test the gimmick out first. An example of the idiotic repackaging that ensued after the brand expansion was Goldust. The character of Goldust already had a backdrop of being a sexually ambiguous movie star with a tendency to stalk others. Was there really a need to give him Tourette's Syndrome? Thats like turning Eugene gay or having John Cena play the guitar. Its something useless and unneeded for the evolution of a character. But the WWE writing staff still does not fully understand that less is sometimes more in many cases (Hogan has made a Hall Of Fame career using that theory.)
WWE even inadvertently alluded to its addiction towards overblown gimmicks with Lance Storm and his 'boring' angle. Storm was a fluid technical wrestler and shined in very many matches during his tenure with the WWE. Yet instead of tawdry lugs such as the Big Show, WWE made it a statement by searing chants of 'boring' over the live loudspeaker in an attempt to get fans to chant 'boring' themselves during Storms matches. That sums up WWE's vision of wrestling in a nutshell. I don't believe that its a bad vision in theory, but WWE really blows that vision into a surreal, childish game of inventing and refurbishing gimmicks that nobody really thinks is entertaining in the first place. Take the angle of Jimmy Wang Yang. The whole Japanese cowboy gimmick is meant to be a play on Japanese steriotypes in wrestling. Instead of wearing a dragon vest, he wears a cowboy hat. I get it, but how in the hell is that entertaining. Its fairly ironic, yet is has little effect on the entertainment richter scale. Why don't you just have him stick to wrestling and entertain in that fashion? Do you really have to give him such a cypher of a gimmick in the first place?
There's also at least dignity when a tweener is involved. You get a sense of realism and actual competitiveness when a tweener is in a match because you know that he'll do anything to win, but will do so in a spirited manner. Eddie Guerrero did that perfectly. He wasn't like a typical babyface because he would cheat to win a match. Guerrero also defied heel logic because he could also pull off a clean win if necessary. It's always a downer when a champion heel is involved in a title match because you know that at any time he can end a match by cheating and still hold the strap when all is said and done. I know that its a ploy to continue a fued with a face, but it degrades the value and importance of the match in the first place. A tweener, though, would use heel tactics for the sake of revenge, but always show that he could win cleanly. There needs to be more in that with wrestling these days. Why does a cage match have to be the only way that a face can get a clean match against a heel? This isn't the 1950's anymore. Wrestling promotions need to evolve and be more focused on being innovative and groundbreaking instead of using washy heel tactics to garner a response from spectators. ECW rarely used heel tactics when in the ring. Everything was legal at any time and the winner was the one who was truly better at the moment. That made feuds involving the likes of Raven, Tommy Dreamer, Sandman, Sabu, etc. seem somewhat legendary in hindsight.
Many feel that John Cena's 'rapper with a purpose' angle has worn its luster off over time. I can guarantee, though, that Cena would have irked many fans years ago if he didn't symbiotically portray tweener traits aswell. It still gives me pleasure to see Sting in the ring. He's kept the same repertoire (face paint with scorpion tights) for over a decade, yet never gets stale. Why? Because he's a badass. In his wCw years he would get the best of his foes with either a baseball bat or his fists. He would also dazzle the audience by cutting off the arena lights at any point in time and harnessing down the arena during entrances. He was the Fonzi of wrestling. And to this day he continues the same path of being a dark badass with a draw. Cena evoked a simular path with the badass rapper angle. He was meant to be a simple mid-card heel, but fans took attention to his flamboyancy (much like The Rock.) Cena soon took a tweener/anything goes method that stands even today. The fault in this process was that his rapper angle slowly shedded away, leading many fans to notice that his in ring ability was noticeably raw compared to years before his main event push. Even more, writers took a more of a babyface approach to his status, yet he still had his same flamboyant features. Fans took this as obnoxiousness, something The Rock could pull off, but a 20-something newcomer in the ranks couldn't. Cena's current lack of fan appreciation may lead to a lack of tweener characters for years to come. I highly doubt that the current writing staff can keep up with consistently making a tweener seem fresh anyways (though the are doing fine with D-X.)
Hopefully in time there will be more tweener angles given to up-and-coming young wrestlers. It certainly beats gimmicks involving the mentally challenged or homosexual. Cryme Tyme looks like a tweener tag team in the making, much like Los Guerrero's.
Thanks again and....And Thats What I Think!
Copyright © 2005; TheWrestlingVoice.com & Douglas Nunnally.
All Rights Reserved.
Disclaimer & Privacy Statement
| What Did You Think About WWE Backlash 2008? |
|
|