10 Reasons Why WWE Fans Are Sick Of Nostalgia

2. Nostalgia Damages The Present

Perception is everything in pro wrestling. Simply, if WWE again glorifies the past at WrestleMania 34, the present will be received as an afterthought. It is an exercise in basic conditioning proven on a year-to-year basis.

Vince McMahon silently b*llocked Kevin Owens following his match with Chris Jericho at WrestleMania 33 - conveniently misremembering that his demotion of Owens, in turn, lowered his stock among the fanbase. There is an argument to be made that this demotion should have lit a show-stealing fire within Owens and Jericho, one not without merit - but from card placement to pre-show promotion, this attraction - one likely regulated beyond reason - was cast as an appetiser. Worse, it was months in the making. That it was marginalised at the mercy of Goldberg's return to the 'Mania stage reinforced the idea that the current generation is occupied by guys who simply aren't as good, important or popular as their predecessors.

This affects fans and talent alike. Dolph Ziggler on a recent E&C Pod Of Awesomeness appearance revealed that the current generation refers to themselves as the 'Gratitude Era'. They should be happy just to be there. On the same event, hosts The New Day were happy to let the Hardy Boyz challenge for the RAW Tag Team Championship they made history with. Though the New Day remain very popular among the hardcore fanbase, and the pop obscured the plot hole, what message did this hero worship transmit to the one-off casual audience? They are fans, like us - but we don't want them to be fans. It takes the idea of identification and normalises it to an off-putting extent.

You would never see Steve Austin praising the Ultimate Warrior as a talking head on a VHS release. He was a superstar above the sort of fawning recollection The Miz is asked to enact on the Network.

The ghost of nostalgia haunts the entire fabric of the company in this digital age - and even something as insignificant as the Halloween episode cosplaying proves that there is no escape from it.