Blue Meanie Expects Weekly TV to be the Real Test for AEW

– WrestlingInc.com recently interviewed former WWE and ECW Superstar Blue Meanie for its WINCLY podcast. Blue Meanie discussed his thoughts on AEW being an alternative and how weekly TV will be a real test for the promotion. Below are some highlights from WrestlingInc.com.

His thoughts on AEW: “I’m very happy there’s an alternative with AEW. Technically their first show was All In and then they come around with Double or Nothing in Vegas and I thought it was a good show. The whole weekend was show with Conrad [Thompson] and Starrcast. It’s like a Wrestling Woodstock almost. The only real test I see them facing is when they go to weekly television. They’ve had these couple of months where they have 5-6 months in-between to promote. People from all over the world get a chance to save up and take vacation time to see these two events. But now the challenge is getting those same fans to come out every week with the TV show. Will they still be able to do the 10,000 or 13,000-seat arenas? How will that translate to television?”

Blue Meanie on filming TV for ECW: “For ECW it wasn’t that hard because we would do a TV taping and film like three weeks at a time. You would go to the ECW Arena and we could film 3-4 weeks easily. The rest of the show was promos and at the end we had these Pulp Fiction segments for people who didn’t have a match but got to have an interview segment or skit to get their character over.”

Blue Meanie on ECW TV and PPVs were run: “We didn’t really have to worry about going live once a week, every week for a year. The only thing live were the PPVs. That’s when you really get the feel for having to edit on the fly because when we did shows at the Arena or elsewhere, Paulie could always fit that in post-production. Paulie was a maestro in post-production and you knew if you messed up, he would work it so that you wouldn’t see the flaw at all. The challenges of live TV are that you need to think on the fly, edit on the fly and you also have to be mindful of your time because it affects other matches. There were plenty of times in WWE where I was in the Gorilla position and in my outfit and they say your segment’s been cut because somebody’s gone long. Or times when you’re in the ring and you have to go longer because somebody else’s match went short. That’s the thing about live TV.”

Blue Meanie on AEW having weekly TV: “With AEW a similar thing almost happened. You’re gonna have weekly TV and a lot of the guys who are used to working shows where they can tape it and edit, they’re gonna have to worry about sticking to times. Also working to cameras – sell faces to the cameras to become stars. But Cody and The Bucks are smart guys and have been around the business. I’m sure Tony has helped work this out but I’m looking forward to seeing what they do.”

Blue Meanie on appearing in RetroMania Wrestling: “Coming out early next year is a video game called RetroMania Wrestling. It’s like an old-school arcade along the lines of WrestleFest – the old WWE arcade game. You can search on social media for Retrosoft Studios and there’s plenty of videos and stills for the wrestlers involved including myself, the bWo, Tommy Dreamer, Austin Idol, Colt Cabana and a few other names to be announced soon.”