Whether they win or lose at Survivor Series, SmackDown is beating RAW

Back in July, when WWE split up their roster into two distinct brands with their own wrestlers, writers, and storylines, there was concern from many fans for SmackDown. Yes, it was going live, and would surely get more attention in that capacity on Tuesdays than it had as a taped program airing on Thursdays, but the roster just seemed so thin to many. Where those many saw thin, though, others saw opportunity: SmackDown was going to be a place for the underutilized to stand out and get their chance to shine.

WWE World Champion AJ Styles has become the most important wrestler on the blue brand, with a major focus every show. Dean Ambrose has finally come out from under the shadow of his former Shield brothers, Seth Rollins and Roman Reigns, by sticking in the main event, often opposite Styles.

Dolph Ziggler and The Miz revitalized their careers and the Intercontinental Championship with a series of matches that were far better than even the optimistic expected. The women’s division is continuously in focus from top to bottom, and features newer wrestlers in key roles more often than that.

Talking Smack is a major WWE breakthrough, airing on the WWE Network for roughly 30 minutes after SmackDown concludes, breaking down the night’s action, interviewing the talent, and helping add motivations and storyline progress to an already consistently logical wrestling universe.

The stories and opportunity are the most important part of this universe SmackDown has created — it’s a self-contained wrestling show, where everyone interacts with everyone else, and anyone can win at any time. That’s not hyperbole, either: James Ellsworth, a chinless comedic character, has defeated AJ Styles twice and is now the mascot for team blue at Survivor Series.

Now, Ellsworth got help in those “wins,” as one came through interference by Ambrose, and the other was due to Styles beating Ellsworth so incessantly that the refs called for a disqualification. Still, though, this RAW jobber, there solely to lose in a hurry, has become a star on SmackDown, with his own shirt and everything.

He’s emblematic of what makes SmackDown work — everyone is important, and everyone should be featured. It’s the major thing that made the Attitude Era work — everyone likes to point to the shock value of the late-90s as bringing eyeballs back to WWE, but the fact that RAW is WAR made consistent sense while WCW’s Nitro was often a thoughtless, pointless use of your Monday thanks to its slavish devotion to New World Order storylines that went nowhere is what helped WWE win the Monday Night War. And it’s what’s helping SmackDown combat RAW in the brand split war.

On RAW, the focus is so often on how what is happening affects authority figures Stephanie McMahon and Mick Foley. They’ve struggled to show off their entire women’s division consistently, with nearly every story having something to do with Women’s Champion Charlotte and her seemingly only opponent, Sasha Banks. The tag division seems so much smaller than what SmackDown features despite having the significantly larger roster to accommodate a three-hour show vs. a two-hour one.

The exclusive Cruiserweight Division has been a bust on RAW, to the point that they will likely lose the belt — and the entire division — to SmackDown on Sunday so that someone who can figure out how to work them into the show is given that task. RAW’s primary champion, Kevin Owens, is often thrust into a secondary role, unlike what AJ Styles is seen doing on SmackDown.

Motivations are harder to find, or, at least, harder to keep consistent — these are all issues that have plagued WWE programming for some time, but they’re that much more obvious when there’s a show on the next night managing to avoid all of them.

This isn’t to say that RAW should be just like SmackDown. The more kinds of wrestling shows out there, the better: niche programming is how you can have 1,000 channels and feel like there’s barely anything on television, but it serves an important purpose, too, as there is something for everyone. SmackDown went back to the best part of the most successful era in WWE’s history to craft their story telling.

RAW is sticking with the variety-show feel that has characterized much of the post-Attitude Era WWE. RAW is where you’ll see celebrity appearances, musical guests, and mention of a world outside WWE. SmackDown is where Heath Slater celebrates winning the tag-team titles by screaming that he can now afford a double-wide trailer and feed his many, many kids, because we had the time to learn about everything that makes Heath, Heath.

That also means that we care about what makes Heath Heath, and we’re celebrating along with him.

Those are two shows serving different audiences, but there is also a Venn Diagram out there with plenty of overlap. WWE’s foray into niche programming runs deeper than this, too: they have NXT, which seems even more like minor league wrestling — and not in a pejorative sense — since the brand split helped strip the roster for parts, leaving behind many still learning the craft.

Just like people watch the D-League or college basketball in the interest of seeing future basketball stars or go to minor league baseball games for a glimpse of the future of MLB, people will watch the future of WWE at NXT.

WWE will debut another show, a cruiserweight-exclusive titled 205 Live at the end of November. That’s a way for them to appeal to fans who love styles not seen as often in WWE, such as those from current independent wrestlers, or maybe from Japan, Mexico, and elsewhere.

That’s four wrestling shows per week for United States audiences, plus two reality shows: Total Bellas and Total Divas, both on the E! Network: that’s another way to capture an audience outside of WWE, but also get in on that Venn Diagram overlap action. NXT and 205 Live are both WWE Network-exclusives, while RAW and SmackDown are both on USA Network.

WWE making their two core brands very different is intentional. At some point, when RAW figures out how to be what it wants to be, there will be plenty arguing in favor of the traditional top brand instead of going blue.

That time is not now, though. RAW looks to be the favorite in at least two of the three Survivor Series-style matches that will go down at the titular event, in what has been promoted as a Sunday night for bragging rights. They might take the show, but they aren’t the show, not while SmackDown is pushing all the right buttons.