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Dave Meltzer: "The reality is that AEW Rampage is becoming more and more skippable. Numbers will continue to fall without pushing major main events."

8.4K views 81 replies 64 participants last post by  MEMS  
#1 ·
Do you watch Rampage? What would you like to see improve on the show?

 
#2 ·
I agree with Dave, Rampage has to be even less exciting than SmackDown right now.

My biggest problem with Rampage is that I simply don't care about predictable matches where the outcomes are obvious. For example, Samoa Joe vs. Trent Beretta, or Keith Lee vs. Colten Gunn. As much as these matches get praised, I just have no desire to watch them, they do nothing for me and I don't see the appeal. Rampage cards look like a bunch of matches being thrown at a wall. Zero excitement whatsoever. Really skippable stuff.
 
#4 ·
I watch it, but it is definitely skippable on the surface and become more so. Many weeks you look at the card and think "is that all?", but then the show itself is enjoyable. I'd say the easiest to digest hour of wrestling around and often better than Dynamite. However, it feels like Saturday afternoon wrestling to casually watch while you're doing other stuff, rather than the true B show it was shaping up to be. It's like WCWSN after Nitro took off, where it'll only appeal to fans wanting to watch some good/novel matches but only 1/3 ~ 1/2 of those who watched Nitro would watch Saturday Night.

On one hand, I don't blame them in that timeslot as you could put on Mox vs. Danielson and would struggle to attract many more viewers. Late on Friday night is one of the worst possible timeslots to have so how much effort do you want to give it?

On the other, it shouldn't stop them trying out ideas. Royal Rampage was an example of how they could use Rampage more creatively. There are no shortage of ideas to be used, such as a one-hour gauntlet match spanning the entirety of Rampage with the winner getting an AEW World Title shot. Experimental concepts to see if you can reach underperforming demos (women's Forbidden Door, Masked Mania night ft. luchadores). AEW isn't a very creative promotion though, so there generally isn't much out-of-the-box thinking.
 
#7 ·
I still think if they’re not going to try putting on top matches (and generally they shouldn’t due to the time slot), just make Rampage more segment heavy/as promotion for Dynamite matches/further current storylines.

Make it more of a Talking Smack type show. Maybe once in a while you do a Rampage with matches that actually mean something (whenever Rampage would be live). Otherwise if it’s just taped with Dynamite, don’t do that and instead make it more of a talk-show for in character interviews. Get a couple of hosts that have great chemistry, and your gold. You could tape it in front of a live audience, or make it look like a professional backstage interview show and this way the segments won’t be spoiled ahead of time.

I mean it probably won’t work anyway for ratings given the time slot, but at least it would feel different from all of AEW’s other programs. Advertise one big guest a week, end the show with that, and fill it in with entertaining interviews before that. Right now Rampage is just a weak third hour of Dynamite, with Dark and Elevation as additional low card Dynamite time.

And again, when in a big town you want to get an extra hour of wrestling in, you could still do that for Rampage. Make it a mini-PPV type show with a big main event when the situation calls for it.
 
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#44 ·
All of the matches are usually storyline driven. Last night every match was part of an ongoing feud or storyline. What most seem to want is progression. Three different programs are taped on Wednesday nights. They likely don’t want to burn through rivalries too quickly.

AEW not being “very creative” is a good thing. Too many times someone like Russo is associated with creativity. The rate of bad ideas to good he has had must be at least ten to one odds in favour of the bad. He isn’t creative in the least. Russo was mainly just random. He was also very guilty of repeating himself…repeatedly.

Creativity in pro wrestling on the scale of national television is often the opposite of what most would consider actually creative. A blowhard comes along “being creative” when all that wrestling needs is coherency and quality control more than it needs anything else.
 
#9 ·
Rampage is usually a fun show to watch but personally, I do not like the format. Taped show, with all the entrances cut and just speeding from segment to segment. I actually disagree with Dave, as often the match line-up for Rampage is better than Dynamite. Although, this week's Rampage's line-up was not. If anything, I would put LESS matches on Rampage. Like 2 or 3 at most. Or maybe even you do special episodes of Rampage focused around one big match.

A common complaint I've seen from people who do not like Dynamite is that it does not give things "time to breathe". These people would suffocate watching an episode of Rampage.

Since TK loves NXT so much, I actually think he should go back and watch the 1-hour episodes of NXT. That was a great 1-hour wrestling show IMO and they were always taped shows too.
 
#14 ·
DZ Crew said:
If you want people to care about this show put it on live on a different night
The dilemma here is AEW has to practically double its number of live events if Rampage goes live because currently they only do a live Rampage once every blue moon. It means more financial risks (if that's even an issue), plus less time at home for the workers and one of the pulls of AEW is that the roster can spend five days a week with their families.

But if they want to grow their brand and earn more TV revenue, then Rampage in primetime and live would be the way to go. You can't wing it and you can tell when AEW does do live Rampages, the caliber is usually higher. Kenny vs. Christian (IMPACT World Title), Punk's return, Hangman vs. Cole (AEW World Title), Junior Dos Santos debut, Bucks vs. Lucha Brothers tag MOTYC all happened on live Rampages.

I think Rampage has had some great matches (Mox vs. Yuta being the most recent example, the match that made Yuta something in AEW) and moments interspersed through its one year history, but too often it's formulaic and only appealing for those wanting an easy hour of wrestling to relax to.

One of AEW's best ever singles matches IMO, Bryan Danielson vs. Minoru Suzuki, was tucked away on a Rampage buy-in show.
 
#15 ·
I watch it, I like it, but it's true. At this point, they are hardly even putting the top names on there, and certainly not putting them in meaningful matches. That's fine if they're okay with it being the B show, but I'm pretty sure that is not what it was originally envisioned as.

Granted, a lot of this may have to do with the fact that there are at least 3 key guys who are currently out with injury, that when Bryan, Omega, and Punk are all back there will inevitably be more of their bigger names doing stuff on Rampage.
 
#19 ·
For once I agree with Uncle Dave. I don't watch it anymore. Bad timeslots plus so so matches equals a skipable show.
 
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#20 ·
It’s just an awful time slot. So if that is what the network is going to give, then I’d fill it with the lowest quality stuff they got which really should make it a mostly womens show.

There should never be a week where Rampage has a better match than Dynamite on it.

It’s never gonna catch on till it’s live and on in primetime. Right now it’s Sunday night heat.
 
#24 ·
I think one thing I would do with Rampage is make it really experimental. Like maybe you give some people a chance on Rampage that you wouldn't normally on Dynamite. Or go with some really weird ideas for segments and match types. No one's watching it anyway, so you have an opportunity to present whatever and maybe you find something on Rampage that works for Dynamite.