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| How much of Wink is too much? Photo Credit: Scott Finkelstein |
There are going to be a lot of major stories unfolding in 2013 in Chikara. As has been their proclivity, the odd-numbered year will probably bring a fair amount of resolution to stories that spent a lot of time in the even-numbered year being set up. They're obviously going to have a large focus on Archibald Peck vs. Mark Angelosetti. They're scheduled to have a match at the season opener in Reading, All the Agents and Superhuman Crew. I doubt that's the finishing point of their issue though.
There will almost certainly be recourse from what seems to be the final straw in Tim Donst's maltreatment of Jakob Hammermeier, as well as his seemingly unfinished and infinite obsession with Eddie Kingston. Chikara Civil War will more than likely continue to rage as a focal point, and of course, there's always the matter of Dasher Hatfield and Sugar Dunkerton continuing to be only able to communicate via tin cans attached by string.
There seems to be one major thread binding all these stories together, and it's the involvement of the Director of Fun, Wink Vavasseur. The last four blogs posted on the site have been either about his decisions or penned by him in defense of those decisions himself. While the DoF position has always been a fixture in the Chikara universe, in the last six months, it's taken on an unusually large spot in the narrative. Vavasseur didn't have nearly have as large a billing on the marquee in his first 18 months on the job. Dieter von Stiegerwalt, as much of a deus ex machina as he was for the BDK to maintain power, was kept mainly behind the scenes. For all intents and purposes, Leonard F. Chikarason may as well have been Jack Tunney.
For a company that has relied so much on stories between actual wrestlers, to see them have a non-player character as a nexus for storytelling feels confusing at best and a step backwards at worst. The problems with having authority figures feud with wrestlers are well-documented, the most major of them being that very rarely do you get the kind of resolution necessary, one that happens in the ring.
People look at the Vince McMahon/Steve Austin story and see how bonkers-crazy good it was, but McMahon was never afraid to take a bump or wrestle a match. Is Vavasseur going to wrestle to resolve the issues he has with the Gekido, FIST, the Colony, and Dasher Hatfield? No. The endgame will be Vavasseur being replaced by a mysterious board of directors or what have you (maybe by the mysterious Worldwide Media Development Corporation?) in a story that's way un-Chikaralike and more out of the corporate wrestling playbook. I make this criticism knowing that I trust Chikara to pull it off with way more panache and amusement than WWE ever could. But that doesn't mean that the buildup to it hasn't been dismaying.
It's disappointing to see Chikara following here, because I see them as leaders in the pro wrestling world from a creative standpoint. They shouldn't be aping corporate wrestling, but providing the templates that other companies end up trying to follow themselves. There's always the chance that they're trying to reinvent the wheel in this case, and elevation or subversion of old tropes is always appreciated. But honestly, if there's one thing from 2012 that I wasn't a fan of in Chikara, it was the involvement of Vavasseur and his Chikarametrics. If the execution isn't tickling me right now, why should I get up for the resolution?
Obviously, Chikara is a company that is steeped in great storytelling practices, so they're going to see this through to a resolution. My wish is that they end Vavasseur's involvement in it quick, name his replacement as a non-interventionist authority figure, and let the rest of the major stories play out as feuds between wrestlers. Letting Vavasseur be more than a figurehead was an experiment, that's for sure, to me, it's one that has fallen uncharacteristically flat in terms of the things Chikara normally presents.
There will almost certainly be recourse from what seems to be the final straw in Tim Donst's maltreatment of Jakob Hammermeier, as well as his seemingly unfinished and infinite obsession with Eddie Kingston. Chikara Civil War will more than likely continue to rage as a focal point, and of course, there's always the matter of Dasher Hatfield and Sugar Dunkerton continuing to be only able to communicate via tin cans attached by string.
There seems to be one major thread binding all these stories together, and it's the involvement of the Director of Fun, Wink Vavasseur. The last four blogs posted on the site have been either about his decisions or penned by him in defense of those decisions himself. While the DoF position has always been a fixture in the Chikara universe, in the last six months, it's taken on an unusually large spot in the narrative. Vavasseur didn't have nearly have as large a billing on the marquee in his first 18 months on the job. Dieter von Stiegerwalt, as much of a deus ex machina as he was for the BDK to maintain power, was kept mainly behind the scenes. For all intents and purposes, Leonard F. Chikarason may as well have been Jack Tunney.
For a company that has relied so much on stories between actual wrestlers, to see them have a non-player character as a nexus for storytelling feels confusing at best and a step backwards at worst. The problems with having authority figures feud with wrestlers are well-documented, the most major of them being that very rarely do you get the kind of resolution necessary, one that happens in the ring.
People look at the Vince McMahon/Steve Austin story and see how bonkers-crazy good it was, but McMahon was never afraid to take a bump or wrestle a match. Is Vavasseur going to wrestle to resolve the issues he has with the Gekido, FIST, the Colony, and Dasher Hatfield? No. The endgame will be Vavasseur being replaced by a mysterious board of directors or what have you (maybe by the mysterious Worldwide Media Development Corporation?) in a story that's way un-Chikaralike and more out of the corporate wrestling playbook. I make this criticism knowing that I trust Chikara to pull it off with way more panache and amusement than WWE ever could. But that doesn't mean that the buildup to it hasn't been dismaying.
It's disappointing to see Chikara following here, because I see them as leaders in the pro wrestling world from a creative standpoint. They shouldn't be aping corporate wrestling, but providing the templates that other companies end up trying to follow themselves. There's always the chance that they're trying to reinvent the wheel in this case, and elevation or subversion of old tropes is always appreciated. But honestly, if there's one thing from 2012 that I wasn't a fan of in Chikara, it was the involvement of Vavasseur and his Chikarametrics. If the execution isn't tickling me right now, why should I get up for the resolution?
Obviously, Chikara is a company that is steeped in great storytelling practices, so they're going to see this through to a resolution. My wish is that they end Vavasseur's involvement in it quick, name his replacement as a non-interventionist authority figure, and let the rest of the major stories play out as feuds between wrestlers. Letting Vavasseur be more than a figurehead was an experiment, that's for sure, to me, it's one that has fallen uncharacteristically flat in terms of the things Chikara normally presents.
