Why WWE Is In For A Rude Awakening

Vince McMahon's current vision for WWE RAW might yet yield his most embarrassing moment.

WWE Thunderdome
WWE

The coronavirus pandemic is not over. No wrestling promoter, Tony Khan, Vince McMahon or otherwise, gets to tell you that it's over.

It's simply too inconvenient to sell for a year and a half later, and thus, on Friday, July 6, 2021, WWE returns to put real smiles on real people's faces in real life.

No longer can some producer or other instruct the uncanny digital video wall to cheer who they want the fans to cheer. If those ThunderDome fans aren't beaming with quite enough performative gusto, that producer can simply bounce them off the broadcast and replace them with somebody with a particularly great Undertaker WrestleMania 25 face. If a performer is not over, that is no problem; the production staff can simply press cheer.wav and boo.wav to guarantee the preferred reaction. Better yet, because those fans aren't physically present in the arena, there is no foul stench to stomach. This makes it rather difficult to script heel promos, but no matter: the WWE Superstars can instead just insult one another with cringe-worthy spiels in a race to the bottom. And if there's soulless and sterile quality to the production set-up, who cares?

It looks very pretty.

On July 6, 2021, WWE, on recent evidence, is returning to a place they hate more than Jacksonville. Looking at the abject state of Monday Night RAW, WWE is returning to a place various commentators, instructed to no-sell reality, once called "Bizarro World".

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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 surefire Undisputed WWE Universal 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!