-Blurred the lines between reality and fiction. many believed WCW was real while WWF was the fake cartoon crap (which it was pre- and post-Attitude Era)
-NWO, and many other creative decisions and match types, was fresh and innovative (at first)
-the cruiserwieghts brought an exciting new feel to pro wrestling. WWF didn't have them and felt pro wrestlers needed to be big in order to be good/successful.
-no over the top gimmicks. for the most part WCW had real people as wrestlers. Hall and Nash used their real names for example. in WWF they were Diesel and Razor Ramon. this helped to further the "reality" of WCW. WWF still had cartoon gimmicks- trashmen, clowns, cowboys, mounties, police men, you name it, WWF had (granted, some of these got over, but for the most part fans were sick of it).
-the overall dullness of WWF. like i said above, early-mid 90s WWF was getting old. nothing new and innovative. WCW was that freshness pro wrestling needed.
-MONEY. WCW was owned by Ted Turner (owned CNN, TNT, and TBS- pretty much the king of cable TV for a while. and of course, a billionaire.) he basically gave executtive producer Eric Bischoff a blank check, which theoretically, gave WCW unlimited resources to work with.
-a handful of little things that went a long way such as Goldberg, Booker T, reinventing Hulk Hogan (Hollywood Hogan), etc.
-edgier programming. more violent matches, the females were sexy and showed it off, and more more adult storylines WWF was family oriented while WCW targeted a more adult audience which made it mainstream in pop culture.
when these factors started to fall apart, so did WCW. writing got stale, cruiserweights started getting no respect and jumped to WWF, new standards and practices meant a less edgy product, just an overall loss of freshness and innovation, and of course, WWF entered the Attitude Era and became number 1 in the wrestling world once again.
WCW was successful from its inception due to the staleness of WWE. WCW also bought the biggest star at that time which was Hulk Hogan. They started one of the most popular factions of all time the NWO which in my opinion was the begging of the attitude era. They had one of the most intimidating stars of all time in Goldberg. They also had a excellent cruiserweight division which was different from the land of giants in the wwe. In short WCW did a lot of different things but eventually the WWF caught on and did it better.
they put on a diverse show from top to bottom and had a very deep roster. The nWo/Hogan vs WCW/Sting angle was hot for a while, but Hogan's ego ruined the climax at Starrcade. Instead of just doing the clean job, he had to have some shady finish written in, because of his massive ego.
The cruiserweights were cool, but I feel like some of the foreign talent promoted there were not given the respect they really deserved. And Bischoff can not take credit for bringing them to the states. Paul Heyman initially did that. Not that I blame Bischoff for stealing these guys, but let's give the real credit where it is due. Bischoff was more interested in signing them only because of ECW and Heyman, who also had more respect for them as performers. (ie: Misterio losing mask incident....BIG deal to Mexican wrestlers......didn't even lead to midcard push or any elevation)
Goldturd had a cool gimmick with being an invulnerable beast on a streak of making short work of opponents and being undefeated, BUT........unlike many big stars, Goldturd's success was all in a board room. A gimmick given to him. None of it had anything to do with any sort of skills of his own. The guy only knew a few moves and was clumsy at them (taking out Bret Hart with a simple head kick) and was a black hole of charisma on the microphone. Being as it's all scripted, they could have shaved someone else's head bald, had them yell "Whose Next?" and win a bunch of short scripted matches. Like many of the veterans he leaped in front of. And one of them might have had a better longterm career after the "streak" thing was done.
WCW also held down a ton of guys in the midcard who could have been main eventers, while pushing the same matches with ol timers over and over and over........WWE was making stars for the new gen, while WCW only pushed Goldturd (initially only because he looked like Steve Austin who they could not get) and DDP, and they waited way too long to pull the trigger on DDP being champ.WCW would not let potential new main eventers have the chance............ever. it got sickening after a while.
then, the nWo Wolfpack. the original "Wolfpack" was Hall, Nash and Syxx. They had a certain theme. WCW decides to make them a splinter face group of the original nWo and what do they do? They fire Syxx, break up Hall and Nash, and put freakin Lex Luger in the group. No sense of group identity or theme. Let's just throw anyone whose a big name in here because. WCW's writing often blew chunks. not that i still didn't enjoy many parts of it at times.
They found some good cruiserweights that were bringing a new style of wrestling to the U.S. Plus they had a ton of money to buy anyone that was for sale.
WCW was good when they gave me good, athletic, hard hitting Wrestling Matches. When they gave me mediocre matches they were no longer as good.
mid card was promoted properly.
