#i want to do one for cody bc i think hed love it

[zealfruity]

Writing a comedy fluff series of oneshots in my brain right this second

At a spa day w massages and skin treatments and everything, thinking “i gotta bring a clone here”

[pitayatea]

Talk is Jericho: The Emancipation of Jon Moxley

(i highly recommend listening to the episode if you have time, its a great listen and it goes a lot into jons thought process behind his leaving and the timeline from august until he left. if you dont have time or just want a rundown before you listen to see if youd be interested, i complied a list of points in the episode,,, i guess? idk.)

(none of these are in order im horrible at listing things but all of this was discussed at some point):

- mox started the podcast saying he harbors no ill will for wwe, how grateful he is for the time he spent there, how they helped him grow as a person, etc. he also talks fondly of the make a wish program and the fans and everything.

- there's a good bit of him talking about renee and describing her as his best friend, his soulmate, and how even if they had nothing it was fine bc they had each other. prime otp shit we stan. im sorry i love their relationship.

- jon describes a time where he was approached about a promo describing him doing stupid stuff that an idiot would do (riding a unicycle backwards, sharing pizza with a homeless dude, etc), and asking that it be changed because he doesnt want his character to be seen as an idiot. the line was taken out and readded by vince. when he confronted vince, vince didnt see the issue and described the segment as good shit and thought it described the dean character perfectly, which jon took as being described as an idiot.

- jon hated his heel turn, and defined it as being heavily micromanaged and told numerous stories of fighting with scripts and writers and vince because they wanted to do joke shit that he didnt want to do. he hated the germaphobe angle, he despised the vaccine promo, and it was all stuff pushed by vince.

- he also talks about other promos he hated before his heel turn, and a lot of it started as early as the 2014 feud with seth (the hotdog cart, seth mannequin, etc.)

- i actually remember an older tij episode where he goes into detail about how it was vince who pushed the mannequin thing, and how he once walked into vinces office and found vince sitting in his chair, facing the mannequin, with weapons laid out, verbally describing what he wanted to do to the mannequin... do with that what you will.

- (aka vince is senile which,,, we been knew)

- both of the stories he told are extremely interesting: one describes the time he knew for sure he was gone and started counting the days, and the other describes the time he almost walked out.

- there was numerous lines during his heel turn that he refused to use and demanded to be changed.

- one of which was a joke about a pooper-scooper that got changed to the gas mask line. he describes literally having to go behind vinces back and rushing with writers to get a copy of the script without the joke onto vinces desk before the one with the joke got there because vince wouldve forced him to do it.

- he describes all the promos he did that night as confusing and not telling stories, and remarked that "if we didnt need to run around and try to not look like idiots, we could focus on telling stories", which flustered a writer he was with at the time.

- the writers and jon got a note from vince which stated "dean needs to understand why he needs to insult the audience. dean needs to read his promos verbatim and not try to rewrite them." jon remembers feeling like he got punched in the gut and lashed out in frustration at a writer (in retrospect, he admitted it wasnt the writer's fault and he was just emotional).

- "why do i work here? im a professional wrestler, who can tell stories and come up with promos and i believe i have the ability to talk people into buildings, i learned those skills years ago, and i wanted bring them to the wwe, and you just want me to say your stupid lines. if you want someone to stay your stupid lines, hire an actor because theyll probably do a better job of it than me. im not interested in doing it."

- he spoke frankly about the fact that wwe is a billion dollar company, run by an alleged genius, filled with adults, and they were talking about pooper-scoopers, and how ridiculous it sounds.

- after the pooper-scooper joke was removed, vince took the gas mask comment literally and tried to make jon go out with a surgical match. eventually, it was talked down to the hankerchief that made it into the final cut of the promo.

- vince once mentioned how jon had so much creative license, to which jon remarks: "what creative license? what creative license do I have? i do exactly what you tell me and its terrible crap. thats not creative license."

- he booked it immediately after the show, got into the hotel, and immediately thought (after thinking that he needed a drink) that the entire segment was a waste of time because they got nothing done, and he didnt get why everyone was celebrating afterwards. he remarked that after doing six promos in one night, he couldnt say what the story was, who the characters were, and that the angle was dead, if it wasnt already.

- jericho agreed that the creative process of going through vince is awful and that it burns you out and that, at the end of the night, the match was the easy part.

- jon was never scared of getting fired for being outspoken, because he still did the work. if he couldnt convince vince that it wasnt a good idea, hed go out and try hard to make it good.

- jon woke up to a text from a writer describing the vaccine segment, and he responded that he "fucking hated it" and the writer texted back "yeah, i know".

- by the time he showed up to the building, word had gotten out that he wasnt happy with the vaccine promo. vince knew jon wasnt happy and called him to his office to reassure him that the bit wasnt comedic, and that its good stuff and its well written and would get him so much heat. he explains all of this while laughing, immediately proving that it is comedic, and said there was no props involved, to which jon replied "then whats with the actor we hired to play the doctor or the giant syringe? are those not props?"

- jon was ***EXTREMELY*** uncomfortable making comments about romans leukemia, and didnt even want to say the lines that got on tv, and sounded audibly pissed off when talking about it. when he confronted vince, vince said that roman needs to be in the story, that dean turned on both roman and seth, and that roman is a key part of the story.

- both jericho and jon then talk briefly about the 'vince jedi mind trick', where he makes things seem better than they actually are, and jon fell victim to it in that promo despite considering himself to be immune. he immediately regretted the lines as soon as he said them.

- there was a line in a promo talking about romans cancer that jon refused outright to say, and wouldnt even say it on the episode. all he said is that the wwe wouldve lost sponsors (esp the susan g. komen sponsorship) and someone (likely him) wouldve gotten fired. vince tried to convince him to say the lines but he absolutely refused and it was a matter of "ok i guess youre not comfy bc its roman" and not "its extremely offensive" with vince agreeing to not force the promo. jon then said it wouldnt have mattered to vince anyways bc he wouldnt have been blamed for it, and it wouldve been jon who took all of the heat. he then makes a comment in case whoever was responsible for the promo was listening:

- jons wanted to leave wwe since july 2018, and almost walked out after an episode of raw during his heel turn due to creative frustrations.

- jon wanted to return from injury as a completely new heel character. he brought this up to vince twice - once in february, when they thought hed be cleared for wrestlemania 34, and once in july, before his actual return.

- in february, vince had stated that they could do what jon wanted to do. the story changed by july due to them advertising the shield for the aus super showdown and not wanting to take them off the billing.

- they then wanted him to return as seths buddy in his corner for summerslam. jon wanted to return at summerslam as a surprise, and vince had an original plan for him to show up at the go home show for summerslam and just,,, be there, but agreed to go with jons plan.

- the week of summerslam, a writer contacted jon while he was training with joey mercury and cody hawk in cincinnati that he was, in fact, showing up at the go home show for vinces original plan. essentially, vince lied to him to sedate him because jon says he was extremely outspoken about everything. he managed to talk vince and the writers into putting a little bit of action into the go home show.

- jon hated the line that seth said to announce his return ("since you have a scottish psycopath, i ought to have a lunatic in mine"), which was entirely a line planted by the creative team and wasnt the fault of jon or seth. he felt like it muddled the crowd reaction and the pop bc everyone was reacting in different ways and he thought they shouldve just played the music because "how can you screw that up?"

- hes been creatively frustrated since 2016 on smackdown.

- by the time he left the company, he hated the character of dean ambrose and couldnt look at himself in the mirror.

- they tried burying dean with the nia storyline and squash matches, but fans loved him so much that vince saw dollar signs and pushed for the shield reunion tour. if it wasnt for fans being behind him, jon wouldve been mercilessly buried.

- aew was not his main reason for leaving. originally, he wanted to go back to czw or the indies. he wouldve left the company no matter what - even if no other promotions existed, he wouldve left and created his own promotion.

- jon described feeling severe symptoms of depression during his last few months, to the point where he couldnt motivate himself to get out of bed or go to the gym or do anything. he even looked up symptoms on webMD to confirm what he was feeling - jericho also confirmed it the second jon started talking about it.

- he outright stated that vince and the creative process and the shit vince had built around the wwe since 2002 is killing the company.

- he does not want to compete with wwe, he just wants to try and push them to improve the product and try and get vince to step back slightly and not micromanage so heavily.

- jon only got paid 500 bucks for the shields final chapter special, which is the same price that extras get on main shows and the same price that unused roster members get for just showing up and sitting in catering. jericho then brought up that during a house show street fight between him and ambrose, they both only got paid 750. 500 and 750 are bare minimum prices for just showing up - so they barely got paid for a dangerous gimmick match on a house show.

- jon and cody have been friends since before cody left wwe, and used to sit backstage and watch old wcw matches while getting ready for matches.

- he considers codys experience to be similar to his, and that they both experienced the same frustrations at different times.

- jon and jericho both agree that tony khan (CEO of aew) is the exact opposite of vince, and is a bigger wrestling fan than vince is. jericho then brings up that he doesnt see how vince can be a fan any longer because hes been doing it so long without a break. jon agreed and stated that vince is never gonna retire and is def gonna die in the chair, and how he just needs to step back a little bit.

- jericho brought up how jon broke the internet and jon practically jumped at the chance to tell the story.

- "king of social media, mic drop bitches." that is the line of the century im sorry.

- the inspo for the original mox teaser released on may first was inspired by the first venom teaser trailer.

- double or nothing was already planned to be moxs first appearance when the teaser dropped, and he had to keep it on the dl to make sure no dirtsheets reported it and no one advertised him to be there. he admitted he isnt tech-savvy and everyone who hes friends with who is belong to wwe, and the dude who helped him film the teaser was sick nick mondo.

- the trailer took two days to film and cost eight grand, but jon admits he wanted it to be quality and didnt care.

- while filming the trailer, vince texted him to try and extend his contract for the europe tour bc shield money. his response was that he was committed to a film project, which vince took as him filming a movie and not him filming the trailer.

- jon didnt tweet the trailer, he had a social media expert time it to where it released at exactly midnight through some techno shit with twitter.

- roman and seth knew how unhappy jon was in wwe and they were understandably sad to see him go but they wanted him to be happy.

- he talks about how he told seth he was leaving: seth had responded that he was super bummed out, and jon told him that he "is a wild animal, babe" and has been contained for too long. seth immediately agreed, saying it was the perfect analogy.

- the way he describes it kinda describes seth being more broken about jon leaving than roman, which also correlates with seths responses to questions about him leaving. do with that what you will, shippers.

- from now on, nothing is driven by money for him. everything is driven by trying to be the best he can be. he wants that for everyone: he wants his friends to be the best they can be, he wants his wife to be the best she can be, he wants the fans to be happy and everything, but his happiness is the most important thing.

- he feels more passionate about wrestling now, and describes it as his first love and his only love besides renee. the way he describes it reminds me of cm punk losing his passion due to wwe, and i feel like he wouldve ended up exactly like punk if he stayed any longer.

- his favorite part of the business is promos, and the scripted promos made him loathe it. aew gave him his passion for promos and wrestling back.

- he compares himself to the dentist elf from rudolph. his closing line is "if you're an elf and you wanna be a dentist, be a dentist." jericho edits in an audio clip from rudolph at the end and its great.

- jon is looking forward to working with legitimately everyone in aew and thinks of it as helping draw eyes to the product and to other lesser known talent, similar to jericho.

- he doesnt want a war, no matter how much he jokes about it. he just wants to show vince that the way he runs his show isnt the only way and it definitely isnt the right way.

- jon, speaking directly to vince: "your creative process sucks. fix it."

(i listened to the podcast in full three times, and i repeatedly replayed segments to confirm everything. if i missed something, lmk.)