Colour Commentary: Branding

There's been a lot of rebranding within the big two of North American wrestling so far year, for WWE it comes on the heels of a major change in their PPV schedule, for TNA it comes into a logical progression of taking their next step, but how much does it help and how much does it hinder?

We'll start with the easiest of the two – TNA. The little company that shouldn't but have done just keeps on going from strength to strength, and as apprehensive as people were about the arrival of Hogan, you can't deny the initial numbers. To say Hogan and Bischoff have overhauled TNA would be an understatement, they've done away with the iconic six sides, they've brought in many new names and they've managed to give us a much more coherent power structure on TV. For TNA this is a logical step, and whilst I personally would've kept the six sides, I think the four sides has a more epic look to it, the six sides just doesn't seem like it would feel right if it were trying to produce a card the level of a WWE event. For TNA rebranding is an absolutely essential step, and as much as certain “hardcore” fans might dislike it, it's a necessary evil for a company they claim to love and want to succeed. The only major issue I have is the fact that they're talking about being "wrestling" rather than "sports entertainment", which is all nice in concept, but isn't being practised, if you're going to make a claim you back it up, people wouldn't notice if you didn't mention it!

WWE is different, they don't need to rebrand in the interest of getting bigger, they need to do it in the interest of keeping things fresh. As much as some people might say “ECW died years ago”, ECW will never die, as sad as that makes me feel to say, and whilst ECW can be felt in every crowd chant, it can also be felt in every modern wrestler who's suffered from taking too many chair shots and worked themselves so hard that they need to take pills just to go to the toilet, but that's a rant for another day. The death of ECW is a blessing to me, it will allow WWE to try some fresh programming, people don't tune in for those three letters anymore, the name had got as much of a run as it was ever going to get, I'd much rather see a fresh show than a show that's got the name of a company from ten years ago and is not even a watered down version of a style that's died a death.

As for the Survivor Series issue, again, it's a good move, with Bragging Rights having taken its place, Survivor Series hasn't really been relevant in the last decade. As has been pointed out in numerous placed, 5-on-5 matches often top RAW (and yet rarely ever Smackdown, which is very odd), it's just the elimination concept (which is totally underused in all multiman matches in my opinion) that was protected. I welcome the change if it means one of the following:

● The revival of King of the Ring as a PPV, which I don't see happening since WWE didn't even care enough to have it free on TV last year, which is a total shame, because despite the fact it only works about 50% of the time, it can be a real elevator and makes any show truly feel different.

● The long awaited return of War Games, and anyone who's ever seen this match will tell you, it could be an absolutely amazing thing to behold, especially in modern WWE where such innovative concepts don't come up too often these days.

● The return of Lethal Lottery/Battlebowl/RAW Roullette/anything featuring randomly thrown together wrestlers, I'm a sucker for these kinds of things because they can really help spark a feud, and considering that Survivor Series was the unofficial start of the build to WrestleMania it just makes sense.

● An all tag team PPV, since we might want to keep the team concept and the WWE seems to want to start pushing the tag titles as important this last year, what better than to have a show highlighting team accomplishment, and this could even be worked into the above Lottery concepts, or still retain 5-on-5 matches like Survivor Series if required.

So all in all, I guess you could say that whilst rebranding/change is scary, there's always positives in it, if it weren't for change we'd still be seeing Hulk Hogan, Mick Foley, Shawn Michaels and Bret Hart at the top of the card, right guys? Guys?