I think as a fellow AEW fan, we should expect that. WWE is a massive company. There are things that cause that type of success. I like AEW programming and I disagree with many of the suggestions to “improve things.” But I also understand why those suggestions happen. Good matches have never sold tickets and views. Pyro, big entrances, larger than life personalities and iconic promos and rivalries do that.
That’s why you never hear me talking about how many fans AEW had at a show or how many watched on tv that week. It shouldn’t be factored into my fandom — I’m not asking for a type of product that will be conducive to those things. AEW is a niche product, one I’m extremely invested in.
If you want AEW to do something WWE does, present it like “this is what WWE does, this is how AEW can change it to make it unique and
to their product”
Like War Games in WWE and Blood & Guts in AEW. It’s the same match type - no DQ, two rings, inside a roofed steel cage, two teams, staggered entrances, etc. Anyone who wants to argue it’s not the same match type is not a serious person.
But no one in their right mind will say that a Blood & Guts match is anyway the same in execution that a War Games match is - one is a PG affair (War Games), the other is a bloody hardcore spectacle (Blood & Guts)
They copied the same concept and changed it to be unique and fitting to the AEW product.
And the only people I ever hear complain about it are because they think it’s too bloody and violent. I never hear anyone saying B&G is War Games lite even though it’s the exact same match type but executed differently.