Ken Anderson led off the show riffing on how Jeff Hardy was given another shot that he didn't deserve. He dredged up Hardy's seedy past and how TNA bent over backwards to not only nurse him back to health, but to give him things like title shots that he didn't deserve. Obviously, this is a false narrative. Hardy won the Bound for Glory Series to get the title, and he had to earn his rightful rematch (I guess his contract doesn't have a rematch clause?) wrestling three other dudes, two of which were also former World Champions. If the point was to want to throw things at Anderson, well, I was with you a long time ago. But if it was to hate Aces and Eights as slimy, villainous liars, then yeah, it got the point across.
The problem is that the principals on the opposition side of the coin are kinda jerky too. First, there's Hulk Hogan giving Hardy a pep talk, saying how he's proud of Hardy and thinks he'll win so he could clean up Hogan's mistakes. It was passive-aggressive pressure at its finest. Hogan was basically giving Hardy praise as a way of telling him "If you fuck up, I'll be angry at you." His asininity was paid back in kind when Sting came out right after and basically told him that he gave Hogan bad advice, but it's Hogan's fault for listening to him and that he should take responsibility.
Hogan, above anything else, has at least put his belly to the bar and took heat for going against his gut and trusting Bully Ray. In fact, for how adamant Sting was to trust Bully, don't you think that it would take more than begging and pleading to get forgiveness? Sting really came off as an awful person, and I'm supposed to root for him?
Maybe AJ Styles has it right. Don't associate with anyone. Because if given the choice between the bikers who just wanna beat people with hammers, but who STILL scatter with a two-to-one advantage or the loud jerkoffs who don't have any sense of their own bloat or delusion, I'd sit on the sidelines, especially since James Storm is playing his loud, askew moral conscience. I mean, sure, it's all well and good that you took your ball and went home, Mr. JOHNNNY CAAAAAASSSSH LIST'NINNNNNNNNNNNNNNNN guy, but you didn't just have your mortal enemy and former friend do everything in their power over the last year to dick you over, and you also weren't restricted from the World Championship.
AJ Styles shouldn't be 1997 Sting in this scenario. He should be elseworlds Dr. Manhattan who has replaced his apathy for humanity for vengeful-godlike rage, raining blows on anyone who comes within punching range. And of course, if he needs backup, there's always the guy sitting on the sidelines who pulled a goddamn tree up from its roots and bashed his mother's door in just to save her from a burning house.
If Styles is the least jerky guy in TNA right now to you, then I don't know what that says about their landscape, or at least your and my perspective of it. I know noir storytelling can be done well, and hey, that scenario I laid out for Styles above is just one of many different ways that angle can go to make it a tentpole story for both him and the company. I'm willing to put up with the current landscape if it means we'll get some kind of character growth from parties who need to grow. I don't need a happy ending; I just need someone to learn a lesson before the next hero withers and becomes the big bad for the next major arc of the company.
There's nothing more grating than being around jerks all the time, but there's also nothing more cathartic than when an utter chode makes a transformation and becomes someone worth rooting for. I'm waiting to see which one of TNA's butthead crew is going to step up and show me positive character development. It doesn't even have to be the guys I think are likely to or should grow.
Just as long as it's not Ken Anderson, because that guy suuuuuuuuuuuuuucks.
The problem is that the principals on the opposition side of the coin are kinda jerky too. First, there's Hulk Hogan giving Hardy a pep talk, saying how he's proud of Hardy and thinks he'll win so he could clean up Hogan's mistakes. It was passive-aggressive pressure at its finest. Hogan was basically giving Hardy praise as a way of telling him "If you fuck up, I'll be angry at you." His asininity was paid back in kind when Sting came out right after and basically told him that he gave Hogan bad advice, but it's Hogan's fault for listening to him and that he should take responsibility.
Hogan, above anything else, has at least put his belly to the bar and took heat for going against his gut and trusting Bully Ray. In fact, for how adamant Sting was to trust Bully, don't you think that it would take more than begging and pleading to get forgiveness? Sting really came off as an awful person, and I'm supposed to root for him?
Maybe AJ Styles has it right. Don't associate with anyone. Because if given the choice between the bikers who just wanna beat people with hammers, but who STILL scatter with a two-to-one advantage or the loud jerkoffs who don't have any sense of their own bloat or delusion, I'd sit on the sidelines, especially since James Storm is playing his loud, askew moral conscience. I mean, sure, it's all well and good that you took your ball and went home, Mr. JOHNNNY CAAAAAASSSSH LIST'NINNNNNNNNNNNNNNNN guy, but you didn't just have your mortal enemy and former friend do everything in their power over the last year to dick you over, and you also weren't restricted from the World Championship.
AJ Styles shouldn't be 1997 Sting in this scenario. He should be elseworlds Dr. Manhattan who has replaced his apathy for humanity for vengeful-godlike rage, raining blows on anyone who comes within punching range. And of course, if he needs backup, there's always the guy sitting on the sidelines who pulled a goddamn tree up from its roots and bashed his mother's door in just to save her from a burning house.
If Styles is the least jerky guy in TNA right now to you, then I don't know what that says about their landscape, or at least your and my perspective of it. I know noir storytelling can be done well, and hey, that scenario I laid out for Styles above is just one of many different ways that angle can go to make it a tentpole story for both him and the company. I'm willing to put up with the current landscape if it means we'll get some kind of character growth from parties who need to grow. I don't need a happy ending; I just need someone to learn a lesson before the next hero withers and becomes the big bad for the next major arc of the company.
There's nothing more grating than being around jerks all the time, but there's also nothing more cathartic than when an utter chode makes a transformation and becomes someone worth rooting for. I'm waiting to see which one of TNA's butthead crew is going to step up and show me positive character development. It doesn't even have to be the guys I think are likely to or should grow.
Just as long as it's not Ken Anderson, because that guy suuuuuuuuuuuuuucks.