By
Dave
Most finishing moves that WWE Superstars are using today
are far too dangerous. In the interest of protecting these hard-working
entertainers, I think WWE should ban Superkicks, Curb Stomps, the Khallas, the
Kinsasha, and all other impactful moves considered “match-enders”.
In all seriousness, finishing moves are screwing up my
enjoyment of wrestling and have been for a while. Not because of their impact, but
due to an almost complete lack thereof.
WARNING: This may well be a Grumpy Old Man piece. If you
are currently enjoying wrestling and think that WWE is doing everything right,
you should probably go and read something else.
The other night I was watching a match between two
Superstars I wasn’t overly familiar with. It had to have been NXT because I’ve
been bad about watching lately and I think I know everyone on the main rosters
fairly well. Anyway, I got really into
the match and once I realized why it was like putting the last piece in a
puzzle – it gave me the perspective to recognize a BIG problem I have with WWE’s
main roster matches.
I didn’t get into this match because of the wrestlers
themselves. They were perfectly good and did a fine job, but I didn’t really
know anything about them so I didn’t get invested that way. I was into the
match because I really didn’t know what their finishers were and had no idea
when or how the match might end. This is a very different experience from
watching typical WWE matches where basically every match ends with several
false finishes and both competitors kicking out of “finishers”, usually
multiple times.
I feel that WWE (and the wrestlers) feel like they have
to do this as a way to build drama because the audience “knows” how wrestling
works now and they see these false finishes and non-match-ending-finishers as
the only way to surprise us with the outcome. What they’re forgetting is that
matches are about so much more than just the outcome. If you look at each match
as part of a long-term plan to build up a Superstar in the audience’s eyes,
then every part of the match is important, not just the finish.
The result of every match having the finish that I
described above is the, on some level, the end of every WWE match is boring. Because
we know once the finishers start happening where things are going. Not only
that, what do any of these moves really mean when the wrestlers pop right back
up and wait their turn to hit their finisher?
Here’s an example of my issue – Roman Reigns and Dolph
Ziggler are having a tremendous athletic exhibition. Lots of back-and-forth.
Dolph hits a Superkick or a Zig-Zag, but you know it isn’t going to end the
match, just that it’s time to start wrapping things up. Roman kicks out, gets
up, and waits for Ziggler to be in position for a Spear. He hits it, Ziggler
kicks out, gets up, and waits for Roman to be in position for a Superkick. He
hits it, Roman kicks out, etc.
This is not compelling or exciting to me. The game of “Which
Finisher Will End It?” is not fun. I’d much rather wonder which move will end things. This same formula,
but with a variety of moves, would be so much more entertaining.
Which brings me to another issue – this homogenized
endgame is made all the worse by the lack of selling and the obviousness of
performers just waiting for their turn. The end of every match looks like a
practiced dance routine as a result. Sometimes the entire match preceding the
final act does, too, but that’s a whole other post. I’ll have to put on my Jim
Cornette pants to address that phenomenon.
Hopefully by this point you get what I’m saying – most
WWE matches end in very similar and predictable ways and I enjoyed the match of
a couple of lower card talents because I had no idea what was going to happen.
I’ve often said that one of my all-time favorite match
finishes happened years ago in a match between Samoa Joe and Low-Ki. They had a
brutal, awesome match where they had thrown everything at each other (many
different moves, not ten of the same move). It finally came down to the pair
exchanging kicks in the middle of the ring. Low-Ki won when Joe just couldn’t take
anymore. Neither man used a kick as a finish. Nobody could have called the match ending that way.
Obviously you can’t do that sort of thing all the time,
but it was something different that was memorable and added weight to both
performers’ reputations.
I’m not saying WWE should get rid of finishing moves. But
they should absolutely stop the trend of the same move signaling the same kind
of match ending. And if Nakamura manages to hit the Kinsasha – which he shouldn’t
always use or always be able to hit – then that is the end. If a move is going
to be considered a “Finisher”, then it should be protected and used as a finisher. If you have setup
moves that might be kicked out of, then the wrestler should use a different
move next instead of just doing the same thing again. That’s what gets boring
to me. I’d much rather see, “Which move am I going to have to use?” than “How
many times am I going to have to hit them with this same move?”.
On a side note, I got really excited watching SmackDown the other night when Daniel
Bryan won with a heel hook. It was a “finisher” we hadn’t seen from him in WWE
and it felt like such a fresh and exciting thing. As an audience member, I
really didn’t know if Jeff Hardy was going to tap or not because it was an
outside-the-box move. And when Jeff did tap it get a big reaction out of me because it was unexpected.
My hope was that Bryan might start utilizing a large
arsenal of moves to end matches, providing that excitement and uncertainty that
I mentioned before. Unfortunately a poster on the one of the forums I frequent
pointed out that it might be Bryan’s new finish going forward because it would
be easier for him to apply to larger guys like Cass and would also be easier to
set up with lower impact (for Bryan) moves like kicks.
I hope you see that I’m not saying matches can’t still
end with a Spear or a Phenomenal Elbow. My real problem is how similar every
WWE match feels and how little most (not all) Superstars deviate from very
established match formulas and movesets.
Oh, and before anyone recommends that I watch New Japan
instead of WWE, tell New Japan that they need to make their website interface
not awful. I subscribed for a while and loved the product, but their website is
the drizzling shits.
I hear you! Finishers are great but "knowing" that they have to happen to finish a match definitely makes the rest of the match feel less intense. If you believe that a match can end at any point with nearly any move, things get so much more exciting.
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