There’s no question that TV wrestling has had its share of popularity over the years. However, I can’t help but notice that there hasn’t been as much media promotion for it as there used to be. With how much the world has changed throughout the years, it’s not shocking that the media was also affected, but how much is this affecting WrestleMania?
Looking back at the early 2000s, WWE was extremely popular among kids. I recall that action figures and playsets were advertised multiple times between children’s television shows and how action-packed these commercials usually were. From showing the action figures flipping a chair to them competing for a briefcase, the true essence of WWE was successfully captured. Having not seen a commercial for WWE toys in quite a few years, it’s plausible that it is no longer a popular choice for the current generation of children.
It can also be argued that the differences between past and current characters within WWE are a major reason for WWE’s decrease in popularity. Around the time of the Iranian hostage crisis, one of the biggest WWE villains for fans to hate was the Iranian wrestler the Iron Sheik. Villainizing based on race, religion, real-world events, or anything of that nature nowadays, even if it’s around a fictional character, would be canceled by the media almost immediately in the 21st century. With this, villains are left with nothing but bad guy stereotypes: backstabbers, cheaters, conceited people. None of these are as interesting or fun to hate as someone who can be labeled a villain.
The result? Characters within WWE don’t draw the same attention that their predecessors did. It feels like, to stay relevant, TV wrestlers make guest appearances on, and compete in, other popular media shows.
I’m not canceling WWE. I’ve seen one of the current wrestlers, The Miz, be a guest star on many other shows, and he was hilarious. I will, however, say that if something was working, someone shouldn’t have tried to fix it. The old WWE format was unique and, while it made the fans as mad as the wrestlers at times, it worked. If we can’t accommodate a format to fit the present world, it might be time to retire a franchise.
