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Audience Shift: Difference between revisions
→[[Professional Wrestling]]: Fixing|links to disambiguation pages
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== [[Professional Wrestling]] ==
* The [[Three Month Rule]] aside, the [[World Wrestling Entertainment|WWE]] has undergone two major [[retool]]s to shift their audience appeal. Throughout the 80s, they had been geared heavily toward a family friendly product, headlined by [[Hulk Hogan]] and other colorful characters. Around 1993, with his top stars having been on top of the card for the better part of a decade, [[Vince McMahon]] shifted into the "New Generation" era, putting a bit more athleticism into the ring and gradually moving away from cards filled with one-sided [[Squash Match|squash matches]]. The idea was that the New Generation would attract a [[Shaped Like Itself|new generation]] of fans to the sport, headlined by [[Bret Hart]], [[Kevin Nash|Diesel]], [[Shawn Michaels]], [[Scott Hall|Razor Ramon]], and [[The Undertaker]].
** Spurred on by the more athletic product being delivered by [[WCW]] at the time, the New Generation Era morphed into [[The Attitude Era]] around 1998. [[Darker and Edgier|No longer making any pretense]] of being child friendly, the Attitude Era was aimed squarely at the rich in disposable income 18-to-25 demographic, with a heavy emphasis on in-ring violence, sex appeal, and more adult storylines. After WCW collapsed and WWE was left standing on top of the heap, the need for the Attitude Era had passed. The avid teen viewership was starting to grow up and move on and, thanks largely to its edgy product, younger viewers had been discouraged from watching. Starting in late 2002, the second major retool began with the rise of stars like [[John Cena]] and [[Randy Orton]], largely discouraging blatant swearing and over-the-top hardcore violence on the weekly shows and toning down the amount of female [[Fan Service]]. The result is a much more family-friendly, if not as revolutionary product, albeit one that acknowledges a more "educated" wrestling audience by not insulting their intelligence.
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