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I'm sorry to have to break it to you, but wrestlemania always was and always will be rigged. Like all the professional wrestling the winners are known before either contestant ever enters the ring. It's the reason you can't place bets on it in Vegas like you can on real sporting events. I'm sure at sometime in the future they will have a midget wrestler beat some big muscle bound freak just to create buzz.
shareI wouldn't use the word "rigged" or "fake" to describe it, sound too dismissive and derogatory. Scripted is the most appropriate descriptor. It is not 'fake' per se, they are really impressive athletes that are actually performing crazy stunts week in and week out. There is techniques they have to know because the 'fighting' is not choreographed like a film; they have to know the techniques and the moves and be able to improvise on the spot.
But yes the outcomes of the matches are predetermined.
No, it's fake. If you understood some of the holds they use against each other you would know that in many cases there is no way for the other person to escape the hold and that the person could easily snap an arm or worse if they used the real hold on a person. It is the one big problem with the crap, every year or so you hear about some little kid getting seriously hurt or killed because two little kids that had no clue it was fake thought they could do the same moves to each other and walk away unscathed.
It would be nice if they were fucking honest and admitted before every show that it was bullshit, but they don't and you can even find some grown ups that don't understand it is bullshit. When a wrestler gets some cut to his head and starts bleeding what is looks more like V8 than blood it is way past scripted and clearly in the fake land. I mean in a world where HIV is still a concern you would never have a real sporting event where a competitor was actually bleeding all over the fucking place.
Your statement is contradictory; you say it is "fake" but then say "in many cases there is no way for the other person to escape the hold and that the person could easily snap an arm or worse if they used the real hold on a person" These are mutually exclusive statements. A fighting hold or technique is not fake if you can actually use the technique to defeat an opponent. The holds are scripted though; they are supposed to hold on a certain way with a certain amount of give so the person can escape the hold. They are trained to do this. It is basically live stunt performance with scripts and scripted outcomes.
I can understand wanting a disclaimer; but do you see disclaimers at the start of every movie or show saying "this is a work of fiction, everything you see for the next 2 hours is not real and does not represent real life"? Actually now that I have said that, I think it might be a good idea to do just that. People have a hard time separating fiction from reality for more than just WWF.
I think, back in the day the blood was real. They would have little razors they would use to cut themselves open. I am not sure if that is the case or if that was just rumor; but yeah I seriously doubt they would allow that today. I have not watched WWF in like 25 years. Since the days of Stone Cold, The Rock, in the mid 90's. sure it is scripted and therefor is fiction; but it was entertaining.
Actually some shows on WWE Network do start with a disclaimer. They do go out of their way to show that it's not real. But they try too hard now to behave like they are all actors on a soap opera or something. I think they've had several shows with the lady wrestlers who were fighting each other on Monday Night Raw but then going shoe shopping together the next day.
shareYeah; I noticed as I got older that the scripts are really soapy and by the time I was a teen I was totally over it. Too melodramatic; also it seemed like the stunts got softer and softer as time went on; too many of the older guys getting hurt so they toned it down.
shareYeah, my biggest problem with wrestling is the backstage segments and comedy attempts. I liked it a lot better when it was portrayed as a fictional sport with rankings and such. WWE makes a point to tell you that the E is for entertainment... but I do miss the old days of the "Federation."
shareOh yeah, I forgot they changed the name many years ago. I saw the transition start to happen in the 90's. and around the time that The Rock started getting into acting and Stone Cold started to have fewer and fewer appearances; getting replaced softer more melodramatic performers that were more like failed soap opera appearances then a fighting performance show.
shareIf the application of the hold is done and then you pretend that some bionic claw or other nonsense thing allowed the other wrestler to escape it then it is fake. Simply because they use a real hold doesn't change the fact that it is fake. If they used a real hold broke the other guys arm or dislocated their shoulder and thereby won then it wouldn't be fake... but that doesn't happen. I'm not nearly as big or muscle bound as any of those wrestlers but if I had one in some of those holds they couldn't get out of it unless I allowed them to, I could easily snap their arm... It is therefore fake as fuck.
shareYou're thinking too hard about it. You're supposed to enjoy the show.
shareIf it is a real hold it is not fake. You can say that the performer was scripted to let go; they are acting/pretending to fight. Calling it fake is just a derogatory descriptor that completely and utterly dismisses the athleticism and physical endurance required to perform like they do.
Do you also watch Star Wars and complain about how fake the lightsabers are? There is no disclaimer in the beginning saying: "This is a work of fiction and does not actually take place in a galaxy far, far away" How about all those kids that got hurt playing with make shift light sabers and poking each other eyes out?
Have you ever been in a real fight? I was in many and have trained in multiple martial arts; and am black belt and an instructor in one. Even getting someone in an armbar in a real fight is fairly difficult unless you get it fully locked in fast. I bet you couldn't get me in an armbar; I have fought (technically sparred) people literally 3 times my size and weight and they could not do it. I couldn't beat them either because I couldn't get anything locked in either.
Real fighting is not really entertaining and is usually over in a few minutes. Even MMA (UFC) I don't consider real fighting because there is too much formality to it; to many rules. It is obviously more real that wrestling but anyone that is a street fighter will tell you it is not 'real' fighting.
Athleticism? You have to be joking... have you ever actually paid any attention to the crap... no one is every really throwing anyone around the ring they are pretending to throw someone while the person supposedly being thrown jumps and all to often it is not done in any manner that would be convincing to anyone over the age of 10.
As for Star War, get fucking real.. That is a movie that has never put itself out there and pretended to be real. Wrestling has all to often make a very real effort to convince people that it is real... So a very big difference.
And yes I've gotten in a few fights, and you are right they don't last long. I never tried silly things like armbars, I was taught to go for the elbows if attacked, headlocks, and other ways of going for the neck, and only once did I manage to get a the right grip to do damage to the elbow, normally it resulted in choking the other guy out. And I agree MMA is not real fighting because it does have all sorts of rules, in a real fight if I see a chance to jam my fingers into the other guys eyes or bite a piece of them I would do it.. I'm pretty sure any fighter in a MMA match would get disqualified for either of those things.
It is athleticism; just because they choreograph the moves doesn't mean it doesn't take real effort and conditioning; notice how there are not too many fat wrestlers? and most have backgrounds as real wrestlers. It is 'pretend' and make belief; but it requires real training and conditioning. They are actually doing these stunts so they are not 'fake' anymore than a stunt performance in a film is fake. I think you are unfairly dismissive.
Trying to make the fiction convincing is what all good fiction does. I don't think there has ever been a time in which WWF tried to make legitimate claims of being real wrestling or real fighting. Most of the time the 'actors/performers' are only in character when they are at the show and the rest of the time are normal people. Or do you think people actually believe characters like "the undertaker" were really dead men that rose from the grave? it doesn't make 'real' attempts at selling itself as anything other than fiction.
Yes; at least you know something about real fighting. Chokes are much more manageable in a fight but also that depends on how much bigger the guy is than you and how well you can get the hold in. those Aikido type of joint manipulation only really works if the opponent is not super aggressive and you can surprise them before they are fully engaged. I don't know about going for the elbows though; the way that I was taught and teach people to fight is to use elbows for deadly strikes to the neck or back of head/spin area. people don't expect elbow strikes to eye. If it went to the ground I would be using my elbow as a point to push into the neck area. It serves 2 purposes, one it can be very effective; two with my arm bent in such an angle it is protecting me from strikes and makes armbars almost impossible.
If they could perform those moves without a normal person knowing that the other guy was helping them do it then it could be called a performance, and once upon a time that was what you saw on TV, but the quality has dropped so far now that it is like watching a movie with superman and seeing giant cables lifting him up when he flies. That kind of performance can only be called fake... to call it anything else is an insult to some of the better performers.
shareWell that might be true; I haven't watched it at all in over 20 years and the quality was already diminishing by the late 90's so much that I lost interest. So maybe 2020 WWE earned the title "fake". IMO though mid 90's and prior deserved to be called scripted stunt performance show and not simply labelled "fake" as that was too derogatory to the performers and the audience.
shareI suggest you watch it for a 10 or 15 minutes now. I remembered it in the 80's and it was reasonably well done... but it was flipping channels about a week ago that my daughter paused on a recent show long enough to see that it had become complete and total shit. I expect high school kids in their backyard could have staged a more convincing fight. The bit that just completely pushed it well into the fake category was the faked blood on the forehead. I remembered in the 80's the blood was real since they would just cur themselves on the head to get some real blood streaming down their face... but if anyone had had the blood this color consistency in them they would be dead god only knows what they were using to simulate blood but it was pitiful.
shareThat sounds terrible. I don't have TV and don't watch but if I do ever happen to catch a show of it; maybe I will reassess my argument. I think I believe you and will say, it is fake; but in prior to the turn of the century it was impressive stunt performances.
shareIt was impressive once upon a time. But I think the problem is too many wrestling shows got put on TV and the result of needing 10 times as many performers means you end up having to accept performers that would never have been on TV in the past.
When I was in middle school a friend's dad was a small time wrestling promoter and you could tell the difference in quality of the performers as his shows on a local TV station on Saturday mornings ranged in quality from bad to good, a few of the wrestlers he would work with did make it to the big time but most were never good enough... Those that were never good enough were just born too early because by the standards of today they would be on prime time shows.
Sign of the times; people are softer and too many rules about 'not getting hurt'; these are limitations that stop people from really pushing the limits of their abilities. When you push yourself to your absolute limits sometimes you might get hurt. Not only are people softer today then they were before; employees are also so afraid of liability and insurance they highly encourage safety above all else.
Somehow I don't think someone like Mick Foley would sue if he got hurt; but the way you describe performers today they sound like they would if they broke a finger nail.