Survivor Series

[Slashmaster]

I don't like Survivor Series.

Every single year we get the exact same storylines heading into the event. Both Raw and Smackdown have qualifying matches to assemble a team. The team is then formed, but oh no! It seems the members of the team don't get along with eachother! Are they going to be able to put their differences aside and beat the other show in the name of BRAND SUPREMACY? With there being both a men's and women's match that means that we get the same storyline 4 times each week for weeks on end.

Raw currently has two ready-made factions in the form of Retribution and the Hurt Business. Why not use one of these two units as a team? Raw's storyline could be that they are holding 'auditions' for a fifth member and it would change up the narrative on Smackdown, because they know they are going up against a cohesive unit.

Then there's the question what they are fighting for.

AJ Styles really wants to represent team Raw, even though he was still a Smackdown superstar about a month ago. He also wants to be the team captain, although that title is meaningless. What does AJ get out of all of this?

---

Here's how I would change things:

First of all, move the Draft to the week after Survivor Series. That way Survivor Series can function as a sort of season finale. All wrestlers have been on their respective brand for about a year at that point, so it makes more sense if they have developed a bit of loyalty to either Raw or Smackdown. They could add stakes to the 5 on 5 matches by making the Survivors exempt from the draft and give them the option to choose their own brand.

[Dark Mauler]

Survivor Series needs to use storyline based booking. An example is Team DX vs Rated RKO in whatever year that was.

[Papa Chopper]

Survivor series was great when it was all team matches. Within each match you had 2 or 3 ongoing feuds, complemented with recent and planned feuds and the odd jobber or two.

[Duke Mongoose]

Nov 14, 2020 7:17:25 GMT -5 Papa Chopper said:

Survivor series was great when it was all team matches. Within each match you had 2 or 3 ongoing feuds, complemented with recent and planned feuds and the odd jobber or two.

Agreed 100%. When Survivor Series was the all team matches gimmick PPV you got booking and teams based on current storylines. Ever since the brand split it seems we get the "BRAND SUPREMACY" angle which is dreadful. All those champion vs. champion matches? Make them title unification matches YOU COWARDS!

Also the "Team Captain" angle is so played out and nonsensical. It's not like the team captain wins something extra if the team wins.

I'd also like to point out the stupidity of Adam Pearce having to tell Braun Strowman "You know Braun, we'd love to have you on the team, but you need to qualify. Problem is we can't find anyone for you to fight". If they really wanted him on the team they'd just put him on the team.

WWE claims to be "Sports Entertainment" but they've almost completely eliminated the "sports" so now it's just ""entertainment"" and yes, those extra quotations are intentional.

[Magnifico jr.]

Honestly if they want to do this brand supremacy thing they should just bring back bragging rights and let survivor series be more than just red vs blue

[Shock Pillman]

Have it like the 80's 4 on 4 elimination with the winners going on to compete later on that night

[Duke Mongoose]

Of course they can't do it this way now because of too many titles, but the first two Survivor Series shows were a great way to get a ton of people on the card, push storylines, etc.

Opening Match: 5 vs 5 one team captained by the IC champion and the other by his current top challenger. Other lower and midcard wrestlers and feuds fill out the teams
Second Match: 10 vs 10 Tag Team match (5 teams vs 5 teams) again one side headed by the champions and the other by the top challengers, generally heels vs faces
Third Match: 5 vs 5 women's match, same deal as the men's matches
Main Event: 5 vs 5 World champion's team against top challenger's team, upper midcard and main event guys fill out the teams.

Theoretically they COULD do this and instead of having Champion vs Champion matches they could to Champion's team vs Champion's team, but let's face it, the brand split is a joke and arbitrary and all it does is make WWE look dumb.

[Thumper Moore III]

I agree completely. The only people who care about brand supremacy are the USA and Fox executives, and the only supremacy they care about is ratings, sponsorships and money.

Let’s keep it simple. McIntyre assembles a team (would probably include Sheamus and Keith Lee), as does Orton and they face each other. Same with Reigns and the Uso twins. Call it a family feud.

Have New Day and Street Profits team together against the top two contenders. Hell, have Big E join them and make it a traditional 5v5. How fun would it be to have Montez Ford come off the top instead of Xavier for the Midnight Hour? Do Hurt Business v Retribution and put Ali, Dijakovic, Maddin and the rest out of their misery.

And then wrap up the Seth/Mysterio/Murphy angle and call it a show (because they may have called it the “final chapter”, but this is the angle that JUST. WONT. DIE.) That would be 10x better than this contrived brand supremacy garbage they’re giving us. And it basically writes itself.

[Duke Mongoose]

Nov 17, 2020 11:00:42 GMT -5 Thumper Moore III said:

I agree completely. The only people who care about brand supremacy are the USA and Fox executives, and the only supremacy they care about is ratings, sponsorships and money.

Let’s keep it simple. McIntyre assembles a team (would probably include Sheamus and Keith Lee), as does Orton and they face each other. Same with Reigns and the Uso twins. Call it a family feud.

Have New Day and Street Profits team together against the top two contenders. Hell, have Big E join them and make it a traditional 5v5. How fun would it be to have Montez Ford come off the top instead of Xavier for the Midnight Hour? Do Hurt Business v Retribution and put Ali, Dijakovic, Maddin and the rest out of their misery.

And then wrap up the Seth/Mysterio/Murphy angle and call it a show (because they may have called it the “final chapter”, but this is the angle that JUST. WONT. DIE.) That would be 10x better than this contrived brand supremacy garbage they’re giving us. And it basically writes itself.

This all makes too much sense, therefore WWE will do the exact opposite. In fact, that seems to be their booking philosophy - do whatever makes the least sense.

[Dark Mauler]

Nov 17, 2020 12:15:23 GMT -5 Duke Mongoose said:

Nov 17, 2020 11:00:42 GMT -5 Thumper Moore III said:

I agree completely. The only people who care about brand supremacy are the USA and Fox executives, and the only supremacy they care about is ratings, sponsorships and money.

Let’s keep it simple. McIntyre assembles a team (would probably include Sheamus and Keith Lee), as does Orton and they face each other. Same with Reigns and the Uso twins. Call it a family feud.

Have New Day and Street Profits team together against the top two contenders. Hell, have Big E join them and make it a traditional 5v5. How fun would it be to have Montez Ford come off the top instead of Xavier for the Midnight Hour? Do Hurt Business v Retribution and put Ali, Dijakovic, Maddin and the rest out of their misery.

And then wrap up the Seth/Mysterio/Murphy angle and call it a show (because they may have called it the “final chapter”, but this is the angle that JUST. WONT. DIE.) That would be 10x better than this contrived brand supremacy garbage they’re giving us. And it basically writes itself.

This all makes too much sense, therefore WWE will do the exact opposite. In fact, that seems to be their booking philosophy - do whatever makes the least sense.

It does make sense to one person.

[Magnifico jr.]

Nov 15, 2020 5:04:19 GMT -5 Magnifico jr. said:

Honestly if they want to do this brand supremacy thing they should just bring back bragging rights and let survivor series be more than just red vs blue

speaking of bragging rights
Maybe instead of just brand supremacy it could also be the draft

[Dyno]

I said pretty much the same as everyone here on Twitter, teh "brand supremacy" means f-all when wrestlers are appearing on all the shows all the time. I know the draft used to be not long after Mania so you could be excused for people wanting to rep their brand as they'd have been on it for 6/7 months but even that's changed now.

The old way of doing things, with teams based on exisiting storylines was far superior. Then maybe have your World title matches on top of it so 3/4 team elimination matches.

Last years brand vs brand only worked because of NXT.