1. Kill Kayfabe In WWE
On Monday night, kayfabe *really* died. Since starting the love triangle storyline between Rusev, Lana and Summer Rae, everyone in WWE's creative department should've known that TMZ's been doing a really great job of covering the fact that, in real life, Lana and Rusev have already fallen in love with each other and bought a house together. Given that WWE fans have access to the internet and largely don't believe anything they see on pro wrestling TV any more as *real*, the stretch of watching this storyline unfold has been painful. Summer Rae's attempted burial of Rusev's behavior felt so much more like the burial of the intelligence of pro wrestling fans worldwide. As well, the notion that Dolph Ziggler's just shuttled away from this storyline without any mention from him whatsoever, after wearing Lana's face on his crotch, is pretty ridiculous, too. Wrestling fans know that the matches are pre-determined, and they know that the people in the ring lead lives outside of the ring that oftentimes affect what happens in the ring, too. Thus, in WWE presenting pro wrestling more as scripted drama wherein the best athletes and compelling personas are pitted against each other -- rather than a wholly scripted universe where people's behaviors are scripted, too -- pro wrestling could save itself.
Marcus K. Dowling
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Besides having been an independent professional wrestling manager for a decade, Marcus Dowling is a Washington, DC-based writer who has contributed to a plethora of online and print magazines and newspapers writing about music and popular culture over the past 15 years.
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