Dwyane Johnson’s Seven Bucks Productions and Vice Studios are developing a docuseries on the demise of WCW.
Deadline had a story on Monday on Scott Landsman joining Seven Bucks as its new Head of Television and Melissa Fried joining as its VP of Film Development and production.
A section covering the projects in development at Seven Bucks Productions, included a mention of a docuseries with Vice Studios “investigating the mysterious demise of World Championship Wrestling (WCW), once the biggest wrestling company in America.”
There were no additional details or timetables for the project.
WCW went out of business in March 2001 after its programming was dropped by TNT and TBS and the company was sold to the then-World Wrestling Federation for a fraction of its previous value and saw the end of professional wrestling on the Turner-owned cable networks until AEW launched eighteen years later.
I totally get your perspective, and yes if you look at everything that is out there you can put something together. But, I don’t feel like there has ever been anything that tells the entire story accurately with all the major players participating so I’d love to watch a series on it. Look at thr last dance, I learned virtually nothing new outside of the fact that MJ played quarters with a security guard lol, but I loved it.
I was also a fan of WCW so I have a soft spot for it.
Except that the documentaries you are referencing had TONS of unseen footage because the subjects worked with the documentarians. The Last Dance had incredible backstage footage that nobody had ever seen along with home videos and tons of NBA footage to tell their story.
If WWE isn’t willing to work with them then this is just going to be a bunch of talking heads telling stories without being able to reference any of the on-screen or behind the scenes footage WWE might have that could make it compelling.
At least The Last Dance had a selling point of releasing those behind the scenes footage that Jordan himself had final say to when those can come out. And you see actual events that back up to what the talking heads were talking about. I agree, what is gonna be DIFFERENT about what Vice and Seven Bucks will work with here?
I’m sure there is unseen footage from WCW that they could show as well like in the Last Dance, my point is that the Last Dance didn’t really tell you anything (at least for myself) that I didnt already know for the most part, granted I am a sports nut so maybe I’m the exception.
I agree with your second paragraph, if WWE doesnt play ball it will not be good, and as I was saying earlier if Vince has control over the final cut, it will not be good. My hope is that its an in depth docuseries that is done in a similar fashion to the Last Dance, that interests me. The fact that its the Rocks production company does give me some hope as I dont see Vince and co. playing hardball with him.
Clearly nobody else here cares about this, that’s cool, but it interest me and I’ll watch.
I obviously can’t answer this question. My hope is that it will get everybody majorily involved with WCW rather then just a couple talking heads. It covers WCW in depth from the 80’s to 2001 (ie. not just the Monday Night Wars which I have a feeling a lot of you here are thinking its going to be), unseen backstage footage (I have to imagine it exists), and ideally stories that have never been told before in general, or on a large stage.
Like I said, this interests me. If you guys don’t care, that’s fine but its not going to change my excitement. Sorry, I have a soft spot for WCW.
If you have an audible account, I strongly recommend the audio book.
There is nothing any documentary could do that this book hasn’t already. It gets down to the exact reasons WCW failed, and it has nothing to do with creative choices. I strongly recommend it.
Are people really still interested in this crap? Like who cares, we already know why the company died. Not sure I need to see another video series about it.
I think it will always have interest by people. It is a fascinating story - especially in the world of Darkside of the Ring and Tales from the Territories.
But I fear this will easily just become another “look at dumb WCW everybody” type WWE produced content (especially because of Rock’s involvement).
Again, NITRO, the book, should be the final word on all of this. Cannot recommend it enough.
I’d imagine it will be like most “for the masses” wrestling content out there. There will be very little that’s new to us, but we’re also not really the intended audience. We will watch pretty much whatever they put out there because it’s about wrestling, but the aim will be to capture new/casual viewers who don’t know the story and don’t care about the minute details.
So… exactly like wrestling, now that I think about it.
With the series, I hope they dive deeper into the booking of the lucha and the lower to mid-tier scene during the WCW boom. The lower to mid roster was ridiculous with talent during this era.
It basically covers everything surrounding the launch of Nitro, right through to the end. It digs deep into a lot of the Turner side of things, that haven’t really been explored before.
I think this is what the issue is, people are assuming its going to be all about the end. If they do that, I agree, there is no need. But if its a docuseries that covers the entire run of WCW from the early 80’s to 2001, I do think that could be interesting.
The press release literally said “investigating the mysterious demise of WCW”.
If this thing ever comes out I doubt it spends more than 20 minutes covering decades of history and legacy before it starts having Meltzer and Bischoff give conflicting stories on the state of WCW in 1999.
I feel that the demise is the “selling point” so they are highlight that. If its the majority of the docuseries, then I agree with most of the negativity.