There’s been a lot of talk the past couple weeks about WWE being a little bit looser with regards to their TV-PG rating. Officials are said to be focused on growing their teen and young adult audience, and allegedly believe that a return to Attitude Era tricks like swearing and sexual innuendo is a way to do it (heh-heh, he said “do it”, heh-heh).
The production team definitely seemed to be going “edgy” with this zoom during Lacey Evans’ entrance for the main event of Extreme Rules last night (Sun., July 14):
Kevin Dunn please relax pic.twitter.com/ZRgGsOCiF3
— WrestlinGifs (@WrestlinGifs) July 15, 2019
All that’s missing is Taz screaming about pigeons.
So, they definitely did that. And Renee Young definitely exclaimed “jeez!” when they did it. She did not, however, curse into a live mic during the opening match...
"Shane's Fucked" - Renee Young #ExtremeRules pic.twitter.com/o5pkygB47l
— Bradley (@bgfxco) July 14, 2019
*rocked
— Renee Young (@ReneeYoungWWE) July 15, 2019
That’s basically an auditory illusion. You can hear it as an f-bomb, but not once you know what Renee is actually saying. Then it only sounds like “rocked”.
Which isn’t to say WWE won’t have their announcers proclaim a wrestler as “f***ed” in their quest for teen viewers. But hopefully they leave the derrière close-ups to Joey Ryan’s sponsors.