RAW Is Failed UPN Sitcom

Despite what you may have been reading from me on some wrestling forums (which is mainly a reaction to being condescended to, not anything with the quality of the product being discussed), RAW wasn't exactly all that great last night. In fact, it was terrible. I would have liked for this to have been the first time I had this kind of reaction, but honestly, RAW has been sketchy this year at best and wildly inconsistent with a trend to the bad at worst. I can't put it on the same levels as the Impacts that I watched earlier this year, because those shows had barely any redeeming qualities if at all. Even on the worst RAWs, like what was on last night, there was still that fun six-man tag match, a great interview segment with Miz, Mickie James and Maryse Ouellet, a pretty cool promo with Chris Jericho and Priceless Legacy and what I thought was a breakout performance in the opening segment from John Cena (breakout in that he cut a really good face promo and was himself rather than a caricature of The Rock and/or Hulk Hogan).

However, it's worthless to try and defend what was driving the show, a lame attempt at comedy, where the guys driving the action, a clearly-not-over ZZ Top, didn't have the comedic chops to deliver the subpar material delivered to them. Todd Martin from F4W Online put it well, although I only agree with part of it. It was a bad sitcom last night, one of those shows that is uncomfortable to sit through. Bad drama/action may be boring, but it's almost never cringeworthy. That's why comedy never gets the respect it deserves. It's so much harder to do well, and when it fails, it fails spectacularly.

Speaking of which, they even found a way to make Santino Marella seem unfunny. SANTINO! The most naturally charismatic wrestler they have right now and the most naturally funny wrestler they've EVER had, spent the night in a fake beard throwing out forced quips. It was truly awful.

The WWE and Vince McMahon claim so much that they're into the old school and that they honor whom came before them, but it's all lip-service. If they truly honored the past:

- There'd be a midcard
- There'd be a tag division
- There'd be less forced comedy from outside sources and more comedy and entertainment value from the people they have
- There'd be fewer repeated main events on consecutive shows
- There'd be fewer gimmick matches on free TV and less frequency of said gimmick matches at PPVs
- There'd be fewer instances where a Champion was pinned cleanly in a non-title situation
- There'd be more build for the PPV, y'know, the events that people PAY MONEY to watch
- There'd be more emphasis on WRESTLING!

Of course, while it is true that a show dedicated to nothing but wrestling matches would wear thin on people, the pendulum swinging too far the other way makes it a sitcom or a drama. Let's face it, there are writers out there that do that kind of scripting way better. The thing is finding a happy medium, giving the fans of wrestling more of what they want, which is wrestling action and their favorite wrestlers, not musicians, actors or NPCs, but WRESTLERS, being entertaining on the microphone.

They're just lucky that UFC 100 happened on a week where there was an uptick in the quality of RAW, because if it happened this past Saturday, it might have meant a figurative death in ratings. The comparisons would have been that much starker.