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Submitted by Xan on Sunday, January 8, 2006 at 12:38 AM EST
 "If you want to blow my mind, then blow my mind. Blow my mind." So here I sit on Friday, January 6, 2005, less than two months before my thirty-first birthday writing a column on the one avenue of entertainment that has always stuck with me since the first day my brother encouraged me to watch it: professional wrestling. I'm dating myself intentionally here, because I want those of you who have only been watching professional wrestling for a few years to see where I'm coming from; especially if this is your first time booking passage on the Star. If you're interested, I wrote a bit of an autobiography of my time as a wrestling fan, and it's available by clicking here, though I would suggest you go grab a cup of hot chocolate or a cold glass of beer before you start, as it's rather long. That's just to know more about me, but what I really want you to know at this particular time is that I have been a wrestling fan for more than half the time I've been alive. I started watching somewhere around the middle of March in 1988, so I'm getting very close to hitting my 18th anniversary as a fan. The first WWF event I was privy to was when the Hart Foundation defeated the British Bulldogs for the WWF World Tag Titles on Superstars in December of 1986. The reason for the discrepancy in dates is that at that time I lived in South Korea and the Armed Forces television was always months behind actual U.S. Programming. From the moment I started watching the World Wrestling Federation(as I still call it today) I was entranced. It was the performers, it was the athleticism, it was the physicality, and, yes, by God, it was the spectacle. I didn't get into watching professional wrestling because I admired the way these men could work a match or because I was enchanted by Rick Martel being able to carry any opponent to at least a 3-star match, and while Bret Hart is, was, and likely always will be my all-time favorite wrestler--and was from the first moment I saw him--it wasn't because he could wrestle circles around his opponents or because of his incredible work-rate, it was because he was just SO. DAMNED. COOL. Pink and black, the shades, eventually the leather jackets. The dude just exuded an incredible arrogance and style that drew you in. ALL of the wrestlers did. No kid gets into watching professional wrestling because it's a serious sport, although I'd argue that nearly every one of them that begins watching it believes it's real at first; and probably for quite a long time after. No, children watch professional wrestling because it's fun, it's entertaining, it's over the top, and the wrestlers understood that all the way from the top on down--from Hulk Hogan to KoKo B. Ware--they understood it and lived it. The WWF is, at times, the greatest example outside the circus that we human beings have of a living cartoon show, and that's AWESOME. It was awesome to me as a child, it's awesome to my boy, Cody, along with millions of other children, and that's an awesome thing to me as an adult and parent. I've said before and will re-iterate now that if I'd started with the National Wrestling Alliance or World Class Championship Wrestling, I probably would never have become a wrestling fan. It's because of the spectacle that the WWF brought to the table that I did. "Heart's a motor bigger than a super nova train. Shame it's got to deal with all the demons in your brain." It seems to me that there was a time when Vince McMahon knew this; a time when he realized that the way to get professional wrestling to succeed on a grand scale was to make it something else entirely, to create a new breed of entertainment. In so doing, he transformed the Sport of Kings into what's now known as "sports entertainment". I have no idea if Mr. McMahon coined that phrasing or not, but it seems to me that this term has always been a good way to define pro wrestling. After all, while it's certainly physical in nature, it's a staged competition that is put on for the benefit of an audience. If the audience didn't exist, there would be no reason for the characters the wrestlers represent to be fighting. All sports have become big business, but wrestling has been changed so much now that it is only a business. The way that it got to this stage is that Vince McMahon turned it into some combination of carnival, cartoon, sport, and soap opera. He made professional wrestling popular by making it kid friendly; hell, he rebuilt the engine of the World Wrestling Federation so that it was fueled by kids. He did that by making the characters larger than the wrestlers that portrayed them. This happened with the aforementioned Hogan and Ware, but there are countless other examples including Andre the Giant, King Kong Bundy, Jake "The Snake" Roberts, "Million Dollar Man" Ted Dibiase, and "Macho Man" Randy Savage. Many of you who have not been watching the sport of kings for very long even know who these people are. See how well McMahon's plan worked? He truly is a genius, even if he doesn't display this characteristic today. So, is his genius gone? I guess it could be argued that it is, but I don't know how that argument would truly fly. I don't think you can be a genius for a long time and then just stop. Brilliance is a constant, so unless McMahon really has gotten senile as some people say, or is starting to suffer from some sort of dementia, I'd have to believe the brilliance is still there, but has been overwhelmed by something else. I don't think that he could have forgotten the lesson that he taught wrestling promoters: entertain them, and they will love you; but I do think that at his age he feels he has nothing left to prove. I think maybe he believes that he's done a lot to entertain others and now that he's a multi-millionaire it's time for his monopoly to simply be his toy. "If you want to blow my mind, it's time for you to start the show. If you want to blow my mind, it's time for you to let it go." Can even Vince McMahon, though, really be arrogant enough to think that wrestling fans are going to wait forever for things to change; for him to put his toy away and get back to what he's always done best--entertaining wrestling fans? It would certainly seem that way, but I can't believe he'll keep pushing things in this manner indefinitely. Can Vince McMahon really be saying to the wrestling fans that made him his fortune: Fuck you? That certainly is and has been for years what his character is telling us, but why would he really want to destroy his company in this manner. I realize we're a long way away from the WWF folding, but on the other hand, time is relative. I've been watching this company's product for the better part of two decades, and I never imagined I'd see it so close to what appears to be a massive implosion. It's one thing for a company to do its best and fail; it's quite another to just say, "who gives a shit, this is what I want to do." Some have compared the relentless push of John Cena to the 1994-1995 run of Kevin Nash(then Diesel) as WWF Champion. In Kevin Nash, Vince McMahon clearly felt that he had found the next Hulk Hogan, and when it turned out he was mistaken and Nash's title reign ended up very nearly killing the company, Vince dropped the hammer on it and a couple of years later turned things back around after the Montreal Incident that eventually ended in the emergence of Stone Cold Steve Austin. And not only the emergence of Austin as a main eventer, but as a worldwide phenomenon. Some say that Cena is the WWF's new imagining of Stone Cold, but I don't; or at least not fully. People forget that Steven Williams was, at heart, a tremendous wrestler in addition to being an outstanding performer. So Cena is much closer to a Hogan/Austin hybrid than a street rapper take on Stone Cold. Though I don't think it's exactly the same thing, I do believe that Vince has promoted Cena as his new Stone Cold, even going so far as promoting identical angles with the two characters. Maybe the same thing will happen this time around, perhaps the WWF will discover its bright new direction while floundering at trying to create the old. The next three weeks, I will discuss three men that I feel will be the future of sports entertainment/professional wrestling; one each week. I am a big fan of what Total Nonstop Action is doing, but because I also believe they aren't doing everything perfectly, one of the columns will suggest a performer for them, the other two will be for the WWF and one for each show. The past era of wrestling was all about attitude. The NWO, Stone Cold Steve Austin, Shawn Michaels, Lying, Cheating, and Stealing, the title reigns of Jeff Jarrett, and those of both John Cena and Batista have been all about the attitude of the men involved; and there are too many other examples to list. I submit that the Attitude Era of professional wrestling never really ended, and that now is the time for it to die. Now is the time once again for wrestling to embrace what brought it to the national dance: entertainment. We've seen that with the immense popularity of Eddie Guerrero and Rey Mysterio, with the success of TNA's X-Division, the reactions the Boogeyman receives, and the rap stylings of John Cena. Keeping this in mind, there is one man for each organization, RAW, Smackdown, and TNA, that can be the next big thing. Next week, the Star will begin lighting the way towards the future. That will conclude today's voyage on The Northern Star. Please e-mail any feedback to XanManX@hotmail.com, with the words "Northern Star" or "feedback" in the subject line. The Northern Star will rise again in 7 days. Until then, Long days, pleasant nights HOT NEW PIX: The HOTTEST Kelly Kelly Pix Ever! Words Can't DESCRIBE!!!
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