10 Reasons Why WWE's Problems Aren't Going Away

3. Consumers, Simply, Are Losing Interest

Saudi Trouble
2K Games/THQ

...because it feels too often that this company cannot do anything right.

Babyfaces are cowards or dorks, and they don't have friends to save them. Storylines and pushes end abruptly. Buddy Murphy is a ghost after beating Daniel Bryan in the summer. The video game is astonishingly, inexplicably awful. Tag team entrance themes are just a bar of one, and then a bar of the other. The t-shirts are ugly. The commentary is forced. The promos are artificial. The matches are laid out and paced in a way that is prohibitive to the talent wrestling them, like capturing an HD gaming stream on a polaroid. The recent cucking phenomenon is wildly dated soap opera stuff. The titles are meaningless. There are too many of them. Match results hold no significance; in just one recent example of the countless, the 'Best Tag Team in the World', the OC, were defeated by the debuting Street Profits three days before earning that title.

WWE's video production remains exceptional. That is the one thing at which WWE still excels.

Ratings, house show attendances, merchandise sales, Network subscribers: every consumer-driven metric points towards a sobering decline in popularity, and WWE, at this point, is institutionally incapable of arresting the slide...

Contributor
Contributor

Michael Sidgwick is an editor, writer and podcaster for WhatCulture Wrestling. With over seven years of experience in wrestling analysis, Michael was published in the influential institution that was Power Slam magazine, and specialises in providing insights into All Elite Wrestling - so much so that he wrote a book about the subject. You can order Becoming All Elite: The Rise Of AEW on Amazon. Possessing a deep knowledge also of WWE, WCW, ECW and New Japan Pro Wrestling, Michael’s work has been publicly praised by former AEW World Champions Kenny Omega and MJF, and current Undisputed WWE Champion Cody Rhodes. When he isn’t putting your finger on why things are the way they are in the endlessly fascinating world of professional wrestling, Michael wraps his own around a hand grinder to explore the world of specialty coffee. Follow Michael on X (formerly known as Twitter) @MSidgwick for more!