#AsForDynamite: Building Competitor Brands is *NOT* Easy

Watching the combined United Football League (UFL) struggle this week to build and maintain an audience reminded me of some of AEW’s recent struggles with ratings and attendance. 

The UFL is, of course, the fifth recent attempt at launching a spring league of American Football in the United States, following on from the AAF, XFL 2.0, XFL 3.0, and the USFL. This newest league is an amalgamation of the most successful half of the XFL 3.0 -- the one owned by The Rock -- and the most successful half of the USFL. It’s notable because it’s launched to markedly less overall fanfare amongst the general populace of football viewers than several of these other leagues. This has happened despite the UFL producing by far the best on field product of any spring football league in American history. 

It reminded me of AEW in the sense that AEW has also struggled to maintain buzz and overall audience despite producing the best, most consistent in-ring product of any major American pro-wrestling brand.

#AsForDynamite: Alright. Even *I* Didn't Like That One.

I wrote earlier this week about how AEW is a young man's or woman's company, and then they throw *that* out there.

#AsForDynamite: AEW Is a Young Man’s Game

Before we get started this week, I’d like to acknowledge that the last two articles in this series got way too negative in their approach to the fanbase. I am therefore trying to keep it more upbeat this week. There definitely are times when, “Fuck all these assholes. Normalize tribalism!” feels like an appropriate response to the discourse around pro-wrestling. However, our charge as West Pointers is “to live above the common level of life” and “to choose the harder right instead of the easier wrong”. It therefore matters little what other people are doing. I myself have long since been called to a higher standard.

#AsForDynamite: What Are We Doing Here?

Well friends, how are we doing?

I said on Twitter yesterday that I didn’t think that these #AsForDynamite posts were necessarily getting over, and since then -- happily -- we’ve seen a small but substantial uptick in readership. I mean, I’m still not sure that the world needs yet more bullshit in the pro-wrestling space, nor I am about to quit my day job to create yet another pro-wrestling YouTube channel. However, enough folks tuned into the last two articles to make me feel comfortable at least writing a mission statement for what we're now calling #AsForDynamite.

#AsForDynamite: The View from the Cheap Seats

My daughter Emma and I went to last night’s AEW Dynamite in Worcester, MA. The show was awesome. And now, since I’ve wanted to pitch a series of articles called “The View from the Cheap Seats” to AEW President Tony Khan for quite some time now, I’m gonna go ahead and shoot my shot.

To say the very least, I was *quite* surprised when AEW announced a show in Worcester. My daughter Emma is a freshman at Clark, located just two miles away from the DCU Center, and while she likes the university, we both agree that the town itself is kind of a dump.

With Emma during the Bucks' entrance

Twitter Threads: My Theory of Pro-Wrestling Fandom

Friends, this should be the last of the Twitter Threads Project -- at least for right now.

Friends, I’m developing this theory of pro-wrestling fans, & since we’re heading into a specifically *on point* edition of #AEWCollision, I’d like to get some feedback on my theory.

#AEW #WWE #AEWDynamite #AEWRampage

Let's Reboot Miami Vice!

It took some doing, but I finally convinced my wife to watch the original Miami Vice with me via Amazon’s FreeVee service. We’d just finished The Sopranos, and for as much as we enjoyed The Sopranos, I gotta say we're both enjoying Vice a good bit more. Part of that is undoubtedly down to nostalgia. My wife and I were both 80s kids. Most of it, though, comes from the vibes, which were immaculate at the time and remain unchanged even to modern eyes. I have therefore started wondering what a modern reboot of Miami Vice might look like. 

Here’s my idea.

As For Dynamite: What Do You Do with Goldberg?

Twitter got into a thing about Bill Goldberg the other day, and it got me thinking.

This was awesome at the time, but in retrospect, Diamond Dallas Page is the only guy who got a legitimately good match out of Goldberg.

— Danno E. Cabeza (@DannoECabeza) June 1, 2023

So okay. After Double or Nothing, AEW head honcho Tony Khan was asked about potentially bringing Goldberd into the company for a brief run. Goldberg is a free agent, but rumor has it that his price is too high. Still, Khan noted that he’s spoken to Goldberg a few times, and that he “likes” the big man.

If you’re AEW, what do YOU do with Bill Goldberg?

As For Dynamite: Let’s Talk About Collision

If you’re reading this, you probably already know that All Elite Wrestling (AEW) announced a new two-hour Saturday show at the Warner Brothers-Discover (WBD) upfronts yesterday called AEW Collision. 

On its face, this seems like good news.

Quick Thoughts: The Mandalorian Season 3 Finale (Spoilers)

Spoiler alert: this post is totally going to have spoilers for the Mandalorian Season 3 finale.

The Last of Us is Nightmare Fuel

My daughter Emma and I started watching The Last of Us late last week -- about the time the Giants were getting blown out by the Eagles in the NFC Divisional Round -- and I gotta say that although I am very much enjoying the show, man, it is pure nightmare fuel.

Like, I had a literal nightmare after that first episode.

As For Dynamite: So Many Bad Takes...

I guess I just like this show more than a bunch of the people who actually write about it for a living.  I mean, I don’t know what else to make of it, nor why anyone would dedicate that much time to talking about something they’re lukewarm about.  I read one review this morning where the guy literally said of every match on the card: “I liked it, but…”

What are you doing, guy?  Is this shit really making you that much money?

Okay, so I made a header for the column. I guess we're serious now.

Find another hobby.  This one is making you miserable.

As For Dynamite: Predictions of AEW Revolution

I've seen a million of these prediction posts out there.  Here's mine.

Quick Thoughts: All-Elite Wrestling’s All-Out PPV

I’m gonna keep this quick because there are already a half-million takes on All-Out out there, and I can already tell you that the very last thing anyone needs is another Internet smark’s interpretation of anything.  I watched the show sitting next to my 15-year-old daughter Emma, and if there’s one thing that experience taught me, it’s that some of y’all read too much Internet before you turn on a pay-per-view.  Because Emma’s reactions and some of y’all’s reactions were so diametrically opposed that y’all are clearly wrong.

They say “the economy is not the stock market, and the stock market is not the economy.”  The same is true of Twitter.  It’s not really reflective of popular opinion; it’s reflective of a certain echo-chamber slice of popular opinion.  Hence people getting off Twitter for two weeks and -- consistently -- talking about what a life-changing experience it was.

Some of this stuff was only good or bad because one has a very particular view when one’s head is stuffed that firmly up one’s own ass.

5 Things on a Friday: Purple Rain

Hey folks, happy Friday!  Let’s do it.

Six Things on a Saturday: Divining Artistic Pretensions

It feels like the world has gone off the rails.  It wasn’t this week in particular or anything, but…  wow.

Let’s get to it.

Some Thoughts on Titans and the New DC Universe Streaming Service

I bought our daughter Emma a subscription to the new DC Universe streaming service for her birthday.  She is a monster comic book fan and a superfan of the DCU’s Young Justice animated show, and it’s been great because we’ve been watching a ton of TV together since getting the subscription.

Source: "Why Wolfman and Perez's THE NEW TEEN TITANS Is a Must-Read"

Totally worth it from that standpoint.

Gameday Headlines: at Buffalo

It's game day, folks!

Thanks to 5-time NFL First Team All-Pro @SteveTasker89 for talking to the team tonite. #GoArmy pic.twitter.com/1y2GfY6jVN

— Army WP Football (@ArmyWP_Football) September 29, 2018

If you missed Tuesday's Army Football Preview, it's here.  Let's get it on!

TV Review: Marvel's Cloak & Dagger

My daughter Emma and I finished Marvel’s Cloak & Dagger on Freeform last week, and we both really enjoyed it.  Truthfully, I think I enjoyed it more than she did.  Before watching the show, I’d have guessed that it was aimed squarely at the teen-girl fan-set based on its choice of cable networks.  The reality, though, is that the former ABC Family Channel has more in common with Spike TV than it does with, say, The Disney Channel or even Lifetime.  Where we were expecting something along the lines of the CW’s Arrowverse but starring younger Marvel protagonists, what we got was a decidedly gritty psychological drama that was much more in line with the tone of the original 1980s-era comics than I’d have believed possible.

5 Things on Friday: Football Begins!

Truth is, I didn't love the Giants' first preseason game even though it started with a bang.

Welcome to the NFL @saquon! First game, first play!!! #CLEvsNYG pic.twitter.com/OpukgNsiJX

— New York Giants (@Giants) August 9, 2018

After that, things slowed considerably.  The Giants' revamped O-Line looked maybe a little better than they were last year, but their second stringers were terrible, and backup QB Davis Webb, would-be star of the preseason, was not good at all.  Starting QB Eli Manning wound up 4/7 for 26 yards.  He took a sack, made a terrible pass via miscommunication to TE Rhett Ellison that should have been intercepted, and was victimized by two really egregious drops.  One went to a backup wide receiver on a quick out; the other came on a well-timed screen play to RB Jonathan Stewart.  Both should have been first downs.