By Greg Parks, PWTorch columnist

Last week, PWTorch humorist Marc Warzecha satirized some ideas for new WWE DVDs. While it's true that the once burgeoning pro wrestling DVD market has seemingly petered out as of late, with few new titles to attract fans, there are still some viable options out there to market.

Most of the controversial and interesting subject matter has already been released. WWE's task is to continue to put out DVDs that will bring the home video market back to the prominence it once had. But what other subjects or titles are left that could interest fans?

WWE owns a lion's share of pro wrestling video libraries, yet seem to struggle to utilize it well. There are still DVD releases that may interest both casual and hardcore fans alike.

In lieu of single-subject theme DVDs, WWE has been putting out videos focusing on certain wrestlers lately, including Batista and John Morrison (slated to come out early next year). Morrison, at this point in his career, is a reach as far as putting out a DVD about him already. Batista is worthy enough and has a strong enough fanbase to likely sell a decent amount of DVDs. Who else is left? The big one is Chris Jericho.

A Jericho bio, along with matches not only from ECW, WCW, and WWE but from SMW and abroad could really do well. That's the big advantage he has over guys like Morrison and Batista is that there is a wide range of companies to choose matches from. Hell, you could do a DVD solely on his WWE run.

Another active wrestler WWE could consider is Randy Orton. While Orton and Jericho are both heels, which could hinder DVD sales, they put out an Edge DVD while he was a bad guy, too. I think both men are more deserving of DVDs than Morrison at this point.

Oh, and if you're going to do a DVD focusing on just one wrestler, give me a documentary on his life and career, like the Batista one, rather than a DVD of just straight matches, like Edge's. Oftentimes, that can be the most interesting part of the release. I don't know why they'd choose to do a documentary on some, but not on others.

As for past WWE superstars, WWE could start with "The Million Dollar Man" Ted DiBiase. He never won a World Title, but was a great character and often had solid in-ring bouts that could be featured on a DVD. He's on good terms with WWE, so a biography on him (despite his two autobiography books on the market) and some alternate commentary on matches would be fun as well. The problem would be that DiBiase also had a successful run in Mid-South Wrestling, one of the few libraries WWE has yet to procure, so footage of him there would likely be out of the question. His WCW run was as a manager, so there would be nothing to draw on from there, either.

WWE released an NWO DVD when Kevin Nash, Scott Hall, and Hulk Hogan were doing their thing for a brief time in the company. However, if DeGeneration X can have two DVD releases, why not the NWO? They were arguably just as big as DX in their hey-day. Of course, the fact that Triple H and Shawn Michaels have quite a bit of pull in WWE would probably mean the chances of the NWO getting a second DVD would be minimal; McMahon, who clearly didn't understand the NWO when he brought it into WWE, would also likely not be on board. Also working against WWE is the fact that Hulk Hogan is not on great terms with WWE, Kevin Nash is in TNA, and Scott Hall is largely MIA.

Other wrestlers who would be candidates of getting DVDs devoted to them would be Goldberg and Brock Lesnar. Goldberg worked with WWE on the "Rise and Fall of WCW" DVD, so he might be amenable to working with them on a project about him. Despite his star status, Lesnar being acknowledged at all by WWE after leaving them high and dry seems to be a longshot at this point. He hasn't spoken highly of his pro wrestling career in the media, and I wouldn't think WWE would want to glorify that by putting a DVD out about the guy.

A great idea that a lot of fans online would probably like is a DVD filled with failed gimmicks, dumb angles, and overall "wrestlecrap," for lack of a better term. I want to see a DVD of Beaver Cleavage, Max Moon, and Skinner. Give me a brief (BRIEF) profile of how they came about, maybe some comments from the person portraying them, and what happened to the person after the gimmick, a sort-of brief mini-documentary. Then one match for each lame gimmick. You could do a disc of gimmicks and a disc of bad angles, or something like that. It's the ultimate question of whether Vince McMahon can really laugh at himself by making a DVD full of gimmicks he signed off on that bombed. Plus, he can stick it to anyone that ever said "so and so will never make money!" Just put out a DVD with those bad gimmicks and he can answer that by saying, "they just did, my friend!"

While it's a bit unrealistic for WWE to put out season sets of shows like Monday Night Raw or Smackdown, a possible alternative idea would be to put them out in a year-in-review format. Take a year and show the highlights from the TV shows and PPVs, in-ring action, and angles that made that year memorable. A season set of Raw shows would be 104 hours. Let's say six hours for a disc (and that's just straight shows), four discs per set, that's 12 shows per set. That would mean there would need to be about five sets per year of Raw, and that, to me, just isn't feasible. A year-in-review would take the major highlights from those shows and showcase the best parts, which is what these DVDs should be all about anyway.

A "Before They Were Stars" set would be interesting; WWE, years ago, put out a set with that title, but it showed the wrestlers when they were younger. For my idea, they would show matches of them as wrestlers, but before they really hit it big. For example, I recently spotted, on Youtube, a dark match at a Raw taping several years ago that featured Brock Lesnar and Ron Waterman facing Rico and Randy Orton. This was before any of the three, who later made it to WWE TV, debuted. You could collect dark matches, or for guys like Shelton Benjamin, matches they wrestled on a show like Sunday Night Heat before they were pushed to the main roster. Include some OVW or FCW footage, and you've got a pretty interesting release there.

One release fans could be interested in would be mostly because of the lack of it on WWE TV. A DVD of cruiserweight matches would be entertaining, and seeing the number of units sold would be interesting; if the numbers were high enough, would it, like the ECW DVD, force WWE to bring back a cruiserweight division? Because McMahon doesn't see cruiserweights as selling points, it's unlikely he'd see a DVD as being successful. But with all the action WCW brought every Monday night with the cruiserweights, as well as WWE's late entry into the field to try to gain ground on the athleticism on their rival's show, would make for a release with tons of four-star matches. Of course, like hardcore matches, a DVD full of the same kinds of matches may be a bit of overkill, but the cruiserweights usually provided enough differentiation between them to counter the possibility of the luster wearing off.

There have been a number of DVDs released featuring the WWE Divas, but they were mostly on-location shoots. But there is a long history of Divas in WWE, and focusing a set on them, from the very beginning (wherever that may be- some would argue all the way back to Miss Elizabeth; others may say Sunny was the first true WWE Diva), with profiles of each woman who had an impact on WWE. It would allow the fan to see the transition from each generation of Divas to the next. There may not be a ton of matches to choose from, but WWE could substitute footage of photo-shoots, or whatever they deem necessary. Bringing back some of the Divas to comment on their time in WWE would be a bonus touch, too, to entice fans to buy the set.

These are just a few suggestions for future WWE DVD releases. There are probably more that fans could think of, and while one may immediately think that WWE has bled the DVD market dry, or perhaps even over-saturated the market, there are some viable options still out there, should WWE choose to go down those roads.

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Greg Parks writes a full-page feature column for PWTorch Newsletter (online edition) each week. He also covers WWE Smackdown every Friday night on PWTorch.com. He has contributed to PWTorch for more than ten years dating back to WCW Saturday Night.

[Torch art credit Grant Gould (c) PWTorch.com]

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