What's my wrestling company called? ALL-ROUND COMBAT.
What's my vision for ARC? Here are the BIG points:
- Wrestling has ALWAYS been misogynistic in some way or another. Fuck that. ARC will be misogyny-free, sexism-free and femme-hate-free.
- My number-1 audience for ARC will be women. Wrestling has catered to males first and foremost for LONG enough.
- ARC will be built around INTERGENDER wrestling. Women will be the BIGGEST stars in the company and women will win the World Championship (the same World Championship that the men pursue) by fighting and defeating the men.
If ARC's women are to be showcased in the most profound, legitimate way as the biggest stars in wrestling, why not show them convincingly and decisively beating the top men in wrestling? They are capable of it, after all. ARC's women have a response to ANY physical threat that faces them.
Is it right to broadcast intergender violence on TV? After all, to general viewers, any televised display of violence by men towards women, whatever the context, could be perceived as a "glamorising" of violence against women.
In respect to this issue, ARC needs to be sophisticated enough to CONSISTENTLY establish that the violence is happening as part of a sporting contest between professional combatants and not "because crowds want to see men brutalise women."
The profession of wrestling is so important to ARC's male and female combatants that they can't afford to treat the in-ring situation as anything other than a WRESTLING match, which they MUST win to advance within their profession. They all understand that a match is a match, not a means of getting away with acts of violence. They fight to end the match the winner, not to vent aggression physically on the opposite sex. They cannot treat their opponents lightly, male or female, or their opponents will rip them apart to end the match the winner.
With all this understood, both sexes treat the other sex with respect. ARC's men understand ARC's women AS WRESTLERS and interact with them AS WRESTLERS. If the men don't treat the women with such seriousness and professionalism, it will cost them in the ring. Women in ARC are never viewed or presented as being inferior for being female. EVER.
As a result of this, none of wrestling's traditional backwards perceptions of women will factor into my company. Men and women fighting each other is completely normal and accepted, as it would be in a martial-arts academy. It is in the best interests of the men and women of ARC to understand each other thoroughly as opponents and AS WRESTLERS, so they welcome any opportunity to fight each other.
As long as the audience is educated to understand these contexts, ARC's intergender violence will not carry undercurrents of seediness or reinforce warped or toxic notions about male treatment of women.
- I want women to be at the absolute TOP of wrestling. Thanks to ARC, the next Stone Cold Steve Austin of wrestling will be female. ARC's women will be the most skilled, athletic and BEST wrestlers, the toughest fighters and most intelligent in-ring competitors. They will get sincerely bruised and bloodied in the craziest, grittiest most gripping and most legitimately savage combat scenarios. There will be no fight so insane, no opponent(s) so threatening, no environment so dangerous, NOTHING in ARC that these women cannot overcome, survive through and triumph within. To this end, ARC will be as unforgiving, unrelenting and unhinged as it can possibly be. PG? Think again!
- Most importantly, the women of ARC will be DIVERSE. I do not want to put only ONE idea of women out on TV and ONE idea of being a success as a woman on TV. I want as many types of women on ARC's broadcasts as possible, all given ample screen time with as many different characters, personalities, body types, styles of wrestling, pursuits, aspirations, cultural backgrounds, personal backgrounds and FIGHTING backgrounds on display as possible. This way, ANY female fan on Earth can get on board with ARC's cast of combatants without having to settle for an incredibly narrow base of female characters to connect with.
This diversity will, of course, also apply to the men. ARC's male cast won't be dominated by white, heterosexual, painfully-masculine combatants, fuck no!
- ARC will give wrestling fans the best wrestling product, but will also cater profoundly to the world's non-wrestling fans. Anyone who enjoys gaming, livestreams, concerts, parties, gripping TV drama, cult movies, cartoons, comic books, anime, MMA, nerdy junk, underground culture or very funny shit will feel at home watching ARC and won't feel like wrestling is an exclusive club that they're not invited to. ARC will be the most fun part of everyone's week.
- Finally, I want ARC to be the coolest shit on the planet, to set the trends that matter and lead pop culture instead of ignoring it, alienating people, or desperately trying to catch up with it, grasping awkwardly for relevance. ARC will define what is cool on it's own terms with it's own language. ARC will erase lame from wrestling.
That's my summed-up vision for the ultimate wrestle-company. Now let's go into the details!
Who is responsible for ARC?
All-Round Combat is founded in 2015 by wealthy media magnate Langford Hill, son of Lazarus Hill, the owner of the world's No. 1 wrestling organisation, WRESTLE-FORCE ONE (WF1).
Burnt out after twenty years of working for his father, Langford leaves WF1 and makes a fortune in the broadband industry. Langford loves the wrestling business but wants no part of WF1, feeling the company's philosophies about what wrestling fans want are stagnant, out-of-date and out-of-sync with the modern world. Langford knows his father is too stubborn to update his philosophies and fix the many things wrong with WF1.
Seeking to re-enter and revolutionise the wrestling industry, Langford attempts a buyout of WF1 from under his father. When this buyout is unsuccessful, Langford instead sets up a new wrestling company, one that will be purpose-built to take over and lead the wrestling industry. With his fortune, years of business experience and expertise in wrestling promotion, media production and global distribution, Langford has no trouble rounding up the right contingent of investors, executives, producers, agents, writers and wrestlers to bring his company, All-Round Combat, to life.
In five years, ARC, via intergender wrestling and female mega-stars, goes from debut to being the top company in wrestling.
How EXACTLY does it do this?
ARC builds it's women into wrestling's biggest stars by having them fight through an impressive roster of men, climbing up to the World-Championship division, where they will face and defeat the top male stars in the industry.
To make this accomplishment as meaningful as possible, two things need to happen:
1: The women and men of ARC will be kept in separate divisions for the company's first three years. During this time, the idea of ARC becoming intergender, and the women becoming world champions, will be subtly planted into fan's heads. Anticipation for this idea will build and build and BUILD until fans hype the arrival of an intergender ARC with intense passion.
After three years, the company will have grown to the point where it can make a serious impact by turning intergender. EVERYONE needs to be talking about and paying attention to ARC's move to intergender fighting. This can't happen if ARC is intergender from Day 1, as not enough people will be watching for it to make any impact.
2: During these three years, the biggest, coolest and most revered cast of male main-eventers in wrestling will be established. That way, once the intergender era of ARC begins, fans will realise that for the women to become world champions, they will have to eventually meet these top male wrestlers in battle, making the journey to the top genuinely intimidating and the women's eventual world-title victories a staggering achievement.
So what happens when ARC kicks off?
ARC is hot off the grid with overwhelming support from the world's wrestling fanbase, and not just because ARC is a new mainstream wrestle company with the right man for the job, Langford, not Lazarus, Hill in charge. ARC, as Langford quickly promotes, will be the only place to see a true wrestling LEGEND continue to fight, a legend who's staggering career was cut short, defrauded and RUINED by Wrestle-Force One: a legend who will now stand as an icon of fan-rebellion against WF1 and Lazarus Hill.
A legend named Ariel Montgomery.
NEXT POST - ARIEL MONTGOMERY: THE MOTHER OF ARC
