wrestling / Columns

Truths & Lies: The Final Deletion

July 12, 2016 | Posted by Justin Watry
Matt Hardy Image Credit: Impact Wrestling

Hi, I’m Justin Watry. You may remember me from such classic columns as March 2012’s “WWE WrestleMania 28: Sheamus Should Defeat Daniel Bryan in Less Than a Minute” and October 2015’s “WWE NXT: Bobby Roode, You’re Next.”

Reader Feedback

Ken Wood: “Call it a wash.”

Nope. I’d have given you: AJ Styles, Sami Zayn, the Miz or Maryse(as returning-break out stars), but your picks all failed. Not a wash.

You are lucky I called it a wash. Originally I had written “huge success!”

Burkey: Sometimes I look at my life and think “Jesus. Things are going pretty bad for you”. Then I read a Watry article and everything feels good again.

Glad I could help.

Scott: Ugh, moving the day for Watry articles so people click by mistake now?

I thought you always clicked by mistake? 🙂

respectmyname: Why would you want the company to play it safe and not take gambles?They aren’t going to lose money by splitting the roster bd shaking things up Also when did the new day get stale or lose popularity?

The New Day got stale late last year. The ‘Save The Tables’ stuff was lame, as was the feud with League of Nations. Time Machine? Booty O’s? Yeah, sure. I am enjoying the serious mood from Xavier Woods as of late though. Much needed for them after pretty much being a comedy/joke tag team (even if I am expecting a swerve about face from him in the end).

Also, I wrote about this in a different column on a different website, but they openly mocked and made fun of The Wyatt Family’s entire gimmick. Like, completely. Yet, no whining about how they “BURRRIED!!! them. I guarantee you if John Cena or Triple H came out last Money night and did that exact same skit the online folks would have never stopping mentioning it and cried burial for years.

When The New Day do it (internet favorites), it is funny and amazing for the story line. Cena does it in 2014 – WAAHHHH! BURIEDDDDDDD!!!!!!

Sorry for the tangent, but as usual, it is the truth.

As for the WWE Draft, I am fine with calculated risk and shaking things up. I am looking forward to the next month or two as the WWE gets a refresher. Taking a risk just for the sake of taking a risk though, especially when business is just fine? Questionable move. Long story short, it was not necessary in the least and is no doubt going to create a whole mess of problems that were totally avoidable. We’ll see long-term how this goes. For now, mark it down as another lovely patented Watry Prediction – this was not needed. At all.

William Moulton: I still love that Shane returned on my birthday

Happy belated birthday!

AG Awesome: Why did you go to a strip joint but don’t feel comfortable using curse words?

Not comfortable? Huh? What? Not a very awesome comment this week. You are better than that.

Luisho: Come on, J. I will agree on most of these, but Roman as male wrestler of the year ahead of AJ? Unless you are taking kayfabe as the only determining factor no way Roman can be ahead AJ. As much as he has improved he should be on second place. What did you think of the Final Deletion match?

Yeah, kayfabe obviously played a factor. Roman Reigns and Charlotte were head and shoulders above the rest. Keep reading for The Final Deletion review…

Backstory

It all started last Tuesday night.

I do not have cable, certainly not POP TV, nor would I care to watch TNA Impact Wrestling anyways. The answer was no – I didn’t see it.

Fair enough…but I really didn’t care THAT much, despite all the hoopla surrounding a main event TNA story line involving The Hardy Boyz in 2016.

I saw their Slammiversary contract signing segment. That was more than enough for me…

Still, I received a few more tweets asking about my opinion, so I put it up to the Twitter world to decide my next column:

It ended up at 12 retweets within a day. Thus, the people had spoken! I would watch The Final Deletion match and give my thoughts.

Well folks, the wait is OVAH!!!!!!!!

Truths & Lies: The Final Deletion

TRUTH: This segment and this segment alone got me to watch TNA again. – To be fair, I didn’t see a single second of Tuesday’s episode outside of The Final Deletion. Thus, while everybody is talking about the Hardyz stuff, the rest of the show may as well not have even happened. Nobody cared. They wanted to see this 20 minute trainwreck, and that was it. Same for yours truly. Considering my 2016 ‘fandom’ of TNA has meant reading the recaps and watching a rare Youtube clip every few weeks, it is saying a lot that I would track down a full main event match and write about it. In that sense, TNA achieved their goal already for people to check out the show again…kinda.

LIE: It was enough for me to tune in again next week. – Nope, not happening. Just like with every other attempt for a wrestling company to “pop” a television rating, it is usually rendered meaningless the following week when viewership goes right back down to normal levels. We see it every time TNA throws out a big title change or WWE/WCW offer up a loaded episode. Viewers go wild for a one week bump, and then it disappears in no time flat. Needless to say, all of the viewers for The Final Deletion will not still be there in a few weeks. They won’t be. You know it, and I know it. Really does make you question the fad of popping a rating – is it really worth it?

TRUTH: The reaction videos were brilliant marketing in the lead up. – Even though I assume the guys watching the early screeners were either paid off by TNA and/or just acting, it was a great move. I loved the cheap but effective strategy. Since TNA operates on a show-string budget and NEVER advertises anything, it was refreshing to see them actually think outside of the box and give this an effort. Like I said, I doubt most of the reactions were real…but it worked. People were watching something amazing or horrific or awesome or terrible or SOMETHING! Their own talents were openly laughing at it, so that was a tad strange. In the end, it didn’t matter. The point was you HAD to see this!

LIE: This was something BRAND NEW! – Was it unique? Yes, definitely. Was it different in 2016? Yeah, clearly. Was it something extraordinary and so innovative that they re-invented the wheel? Eh, no. Not even close. As most know, Lucha Underground presents a very similar product every single week. WWE has had bouts outside of the squared circle before, as have others. Like the Brock Lesnar-Smackdown segment for his WWE Summerslam opponent, I was a big fan of no spoilers getting out (due to the location). However, everything else was just backyard wrestling with music. Hardly enough to call it a “match” but as we know, they weren’t going that. It was a big budget movie with a low budget presented as a wrestling match but wasn’t a wrestling match. Unique and eye catching certainly. A new blueprint of the business and all that hyperbole? Nah.

LIE: The Final Deletion will end the Hardyz feud. – This is another small point where The Final Deletion loses its long-term luster. Short-term, TNA got their 15 minutes of fame. Literally. In the grand scheme of things, the Hardyz feud should have ended at their big June pay-per-view. If not, because nothing is ever simple in TNA, it should have ended when the exact same result took place on Impact Wrestling shortly thereafter…but no, now we get The Final Deletion to end things! Fine, whatever. Except Matt Hardy, the heel, won, which means this is not OVAH! Jeff Hardy (as Willow?) will now get to come back and avenge his loss at TNA Bound For Glory. Yippee? TNA has always had this problem in closing story lines and moving. Ask Daniels and AJ Styles about that. While it may seem irrelevant now, down the road, yes – folks will think of this as the never ending feud that would not die.

LIE: I will watch The Final Deletion again. – No thanks. Once was enough. I may show some casual wrestling fans, but who knows? To their credit, I couldn’t look away once thing thing started. From the shamed referee showing up to the ridiculous moves being hit right off the bat to the twists and turns with Willow all the way to yet another body breaking bump from one of the brothers. It sure was something else to see. Once it ended though, I was satisfied. Didn’t need anymore – I got my ‘fix.’ You can’t do this type of thing every week, or even every few months. For twenty minutes though? It was cool, in a Sharknado kind of “this is the biggest joke ever” type of deal. Nothing more, nothing less. Now let’s hope the rumors are false and TNA doesn’t plan to re-air this in a few weeks and beat it into the ground. Take the ‘win’ and be happy.

TRUTH: The “online buzz” for The Final Deletion was/is over rated. – Yeah, they popped a number on TV. I guess 400,000 viewers is something to be celebrated? Congrats. That will be gone within two weeks. As for the social media presence, PWTorch notes that last Tuesday’s episode BARELY had more activity than a few weeks ago when the technical difficulties on POP TV aired two straight hours of commercials. In that sense, The Final Deletion just barely beat out two hours of commercial in terms of social media “online buzz.” Puts things into perspective there. Also, the official TNA Youtube channel has the full ‘The Final Deletion’ match at 211,00 viewers. A three minute “Shootin’ The Breeze” Youtube video for WWE from two weeks ago has over 236,000 views. A completely irrelevant and forgotten Smackdown battle royal from a few years – over 47 million views. Again, puts a damper on all this supposed “online buzz.” Now, you may be saying that comparing TNA interest to WWE interest is unfair, and I would agree. It is unfair. As for TNA Youtube views, try this one out: a quick TNA Knockouts evening gown match from last year – take a guess at the Youtube hits. Go ahead and take a guess. Keep in mind The Final Deletion and alllllll this “online buzz” currently has 211,000 viewers.

Got your guess?

Good.

The answer is over 15 million views.

Not surprising considering the thumbnail tease. Still, my point stands. Brooke vs. Robbie E from last year got over four million views. Matt Hardy winning the title earlier this year – over 400,000 views. From just two weeks, a Matt and Jeff Hardy promo on Impact Wrestling has over 300,000 views. Must be missing all this “online buzz” then, huh? This ranks right up there with the “buzz” for Claire Lynch, Katie Vick, and David Arquette winning the WCW World Title.

Yes, we all turned our heads to look, but we aren’t looking twice.

Overall: As you can tell, I liked a lot of the presentation and build for the unique “match.” However, once all that went away, it was poor acting, poor editing, poor logic (like they cared!), poor story telling, and it will not mean one extra cent to the bottom line of TNA. Like I said, the Sharknado of Wrestling. If you believe in the “so bad it is good” theory. Others just think bad is bad, and don’t try to spin it as ironically entertaining. Kudos to everybody who played their part and went with something different in wrestling, even if the hype fell short. I would love to see more of this kind of thing but done correctly. Not the Hardyz filming their backyard wrestling matches. On a grade scale, let’s go with a B+ for effort and getting me to actually watch TNA (well, a segment at least). Props on that aspect. Let’s go with a C- for the rest. Just felt like the Hardys have complete control over the writing team, backstage influence (Shane Helms hiring) and are doing anything to include Reby Sky, Maxwell, and the entire family. If that is your thing, you probably loved this all. If not, I have three words for you…

DELETE! DELETE! DELETE!

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Final Deletion, Jeff Hardy, Matt Hardy, TNA, Justin Watry

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