Dammit! I was enjoying being able to actually watch TNA these days, but moving back to those blasted Wednesday nights might as well be cancelled for me. Maybe as long as they keep the replay at 10 I can at least keep watching after I get home.
- remember that live show TNA did? Destination America thought that would be do great for TNA. It did not, and it (after other problems) was the final straw. According to Meltzer, TNA was told their show is canceled and they'd be coming off the schedule whenever the Fall 2015 season starts. This was meant to be kept quiet until that schedule was unveiled. People in TNA and on the network side were told. This is pretty much exactly what happened with Spike.
- HOWEVER, no one was told about this switch from Friday->Wednesday shift when the cancellation came thru so there exists at least a slight chance that something's changed and they've been saved from certain doom once again.
- it is pretty much doom if they've canceled. Being canceled by 2 networks in 2 years is makes it hard to get a new deal.
Originally posted by thecubsfan- HOWEVER, no one was told about this switch from Friday->Wednesday shift when the cancellation came thru so there exists at least a slight chance that something's changed and they've been saved from certain doom once again.
Rumor is Meltzer's TV industry contacts gave him the news on this and he passed it on to TNA as a courtesy, and somehow that's become a pissing match with Bob Ryder for some reason.
R.i.p TNA 2002-2015, nobody thought you'd make it this long.I feel bad for the talent and the staff, but not Dixie or her family.
I suspect most of the talent is hired by Global Force and some by ROH and maybe two or three guys get a chance(or another one) with the WWE.
Imagine if TNA had hired Heyman in 2010? They had 1.5 million viewers and a network behind them, ahh what might of been
Imagine if the Carter's sell to Tobey Keith and Jeff Jarrett a year and a half ago? The deal fell apart because the Carter's wanted Dixie to stay on as a TV character. Jeff might have saved the Spike deal.
Dixie should just sell TNA to Jarrett so he could merg it with Global Force or do the talent a solid and let the talent find new homes before September.
Top 10 Actual Destination America TV shows that could have also been names for TNA Impact Wrestling: 10. Fast Forward 9. Hidden In America 8. Gutted 7. Blood Sweat and T-Shirts 6. Stuff Happens 5. What Sank Titanic? 4. Famous, Rich and Homeless 3. Last Call Food Brawl 2. What Went Wrong
And the #1 Actual Destination America TV show that could have also been the name of TNA Impact Wrestling:
1. Wa$ted
Folks, we've got a great show, Derrick Bateman is here, Gail Kim is here and our musical guest tonight is Billy Corgan of Smashing Pumpkins. We'll be right back!
OK, all that above aside, I don't want to dance on TNA's grave. I think it's wild that it made it that long, had some great talent and the sad part is that it had some moments where it was almost genuinely really good, like that period right before Hogan first signed on and as recently as the early Aces & 8s days. But it fell victim, and fell hard to bad leadership and getting worked by the same old tactics by the usual suspects on a repeated basis. In the early days, Jarrett made himself into a mini-HHH and like him in that same era, cut down everyone the fans got behind until it didn't matter for them anymore. Joe got over big time, and they botched it when they got something new and shiny in Angle. They brought in people who brought in all of their buddies and feasted on TNA's dime. They came up with an actual, entertaining company-wide angle and then got cold feet and refused to end it until it didn't matter anymore. The people in power became marks for themselves and wouldn't get off TV.
But there's been some great, funny, sometimes goofy stuff I will always be happy to have seen: R-Truth feuding with cigarettes! Christian getting a main event run! ECIII and Bateman, like those two, getting to prove how hard WWE dropped the ball on him. A shockingly good women's division breaking out on the talent of the performers. Nash mentoring the X-Division (probably a waste, but genuinely funny). Steiner cutting the Scott Steiner Math promo, which I genuinely, truly rate as one of the five best promos ever. Jeff Hardy getting psychic powers and projecting his thoughts into our mind, like "James Storm is great, but he draaaaanks too much!". Jarrett's crazy-ass shirts in the early days, and MMA Jarrett towards the end of his run. Seeing Abyss - arguably the saddest, most tired character they ever had - be magically reborn as Joseph Parks, the best character the company ever had and living proof that you need to let the wrestlers loose sometimes. Daniels and Kazarian (!) doing the same - late period, goofy heel Daniels was a revelation. Also, an evil midget wrestler jerkin' it in a trash can.
Before it was announced last Friday that Impact Wrestling would be moving to Wednesday nights beginning on June 3, 2015, Destination America officials made the decision to cancel the show and all other programming from the Nashville, Tennessee-based company. This is according to Dave Meltzer in this week's issue of the Wrestling Observer Newsletter, which was published Wednesday night.
It was noted to Meltzer that all TNA programming will cease to air on Destination America at the end of the third quarter of the year. This is roughly the last week of September, when the current television season ends. Key people at parent company Discovery Communications were informed of the decision.
Two major reasons were given for the cancellation of TNA shows. While Destination America officials considered the ratings for Impact Wrestling to be good, the numbers were not good enough to justify the cost of the programming. The other problem was that a number of the cable network's advertisers specifically did not want to advertise during Impact Wrestling.
The decision from Destination America was meant to be kept secret, quite like how Spike executives kept secret publicly last year their decision to drop Impact Wrestling for months after the decision was made and reported. A public acknowledgment is expected to be made when the station reveals its 2015-16 television season prime-time lineup.
Following the March 13, 2015 episode of Impact Wrestling, which saw viewership sink to a new low, Destination America officials made the decision to cancel Saturday morning programming under the belief that eliminating the replay would help the Friday numbers—the only numbers they care about. Although there was a slight increase, all first-run programming with the exception of Impact Wrestling airing multiple times on Friday nights was axed due to the cable network's difficulty in selling advertisement time. For the May 8, 2015 "live" episode of Impact Wrestling, Destination America purchased an advertisement in the USA Today newspaper to promote the show, believing that additional advertising and it being almost live would lead to an increased rating. Instead, Impact Wrestling did its second lowest number on Destination America, and the replay, which is primarily watched by viewers in the West Coast, drew a record low. Days later, Destination America executives made the decision to cancel all TNA Wrestling programming.
Dixie Carter, President of TNA Wrestling, was made aware of Destination America's decision early last week although it doesn't appear that most of the talent knew anything since word of this had not gotten around. Her knowledge of the cancellation may have played a part in Impact Wrestling moving to Wednesday nights, but that is uncertain. Carter didn't respond to any questions on the subject from Meltzer.
Meltzer noted in his report that Destination America's decision has not been finalized. Employees at the station, however, not been told anything new since a memo was issued to them informing them of the cancellation. Meltzer noted that "this story is very much ongoing."
Seems like it would be a good time for a reverse boycott, bombarding Destination America's sponsors threatening to boycott them if they don't advertise with TNA.
That could've worked before, but it seems like it's too late.
TNA has usually surviving due to the funding off it's parent company (or just actual parents), they can keep on existing without a TV deal if they were set on it. As a very occasional viewer, it seems like they've cut back greatly during the last few years on Spike and this year on Destination America so maybe they're not eager to do that sort of funding anymore.
But...TNA has appeared to just about die or been in grave trouble for just about every year it's existed, and it just keeps existing. They're the most rickety major league promotion to go a decade and a half. It's easy to believe they'll somehow keep shuffling on forever until someone finally admits they're done.
What is with all the angry backlash that's been cropping up since this first came out. Why weren't all these angry people watching TNA in the first place?
By the way Billy Corgan claims Meltzer is being worked by a "sloppy angle", I have no idea what that means.
Nous ne nous pouvons pas sortir. Even though Dr. Unlikely is my second favorite W (Justin Ride Til I Die) I do want to dance on TNA's grave. But as cubs said, they always seem nearly dead.
Just you wait, some streaming company trying to get under Hulu's skin or just prop up some easy programming will pick them up and give us another year.
Pleasepleaseplease Epix, Netflix, Crackle, Yahoo Screen, whatever the Verizon-AOL thing is, prove me wrong.
Free these people to NXT, Lucha Underground, even GFW which will hopefully be a less crappy version of early TNA.
Corrigan and other TNA officials are denying the news thus far, and if ever I've hoped Meltzer is wrong, it's now. Celebrations from haters may be premature. On the other hand, rather than a new show this week TNA replayed Slammiversary 2014, for what's that's worth (if anything). I suspect they'll address the big question next week when they go back to the regular show.
Meltzer reports that Dixie will address the talent about the rumors of cancellation next month. I expect her to deny, deny, deny like she did when it came to the spike tv stuff last summer.
On the other hand, rather than a new show this week TNA replayed Slammiversary 2014, for what's that's worth (if anything).
This was planned at least before the last set of tapings (last weekend) - Destination America figured the ratings would be down on a Friday before a Memorial Day weekend, so they asked for a repeat of a PPV instead of a new episode. It didn't make any sense to any one else, and it's unclear if it's related to anything else.
(TNA did tape an episode for this week, but one designed to have nothing important happen. It'll still air internationally.)
Well, Dixie announced a LIVE show on Destination America for June,
This was also planned before whatever happened, just hadn't been announced. That last set of tapings covered everything prior to the last show before the Slammversary PPV. The idea is they were bringing everyone in for the Sunday show, so bring them in a couple days early, do a live Impact to push the PPV, run the PPV, and tape the next batch of shows the next few days.
Only, after TNA finished taping, Destination America told them they were moving to Wednesday nights. That means TNA would have to fly people in Wednesday for a live Impact, have them sit around Thursday, Friday and Saturday, run the PPV, then tape the TV. TNA either doesn't want to do that or can't afford to do that, so the new plan is Impact on Wednesday, tapings for shows after the PPV on Thursday-Saturday, and then PPV itself on Sunday.
There's the obvious continuity problems with taping the TV out of order (deciding if it's more important to make TV interesting or the PPV results a mystery), but the bigger issue is TNA clearly wasn't told their show was moving until just about the moment was happening. They would've just taped one more week and avoided all this hassle if they were told, and this is going to end up costing TNA money no matter how they handle it. Even if you don't believe any other story, it's inarguable there's has to be complete breakdown in communication between Destination America and TNA for something like this to happen.
This situation is not decisively meaningful on it's own, but combine it with the shift in days and all the other TNA programming being canceled or moved to graveyard hours and it all adds up very badly. You don't really need to Dave Meltzer to figure out TNA is in some trouble right now.
This is absolute pie in the sky thinking but I wonder if someone somewhere in the TNA organisation has considered possibly approaching WWE about a slot on the Network.
Hear me out.
On UFC'S FightPass, they show events from Invicta and Shooto Brazil. With the emergence of the UFC women's divisions, there's an argument to be made that Invicta is in direct competition with UFC so there is a precedent of sorts here.
I imagine TNA would have to fork over some serious coin for WWE to even consider thinking about it, but I think it could work.
I don't think UT will ever lose at Wrestlemania. He will be the WWE's great dynasty. Basketball had the Celtics, hockey had the Habs, Vince has got the 'Taker.