I’m so excited to start some work on the transmedia storytelling being done by Tommaso Ciampa and Johnny Gargano and how fans have been reacting to the story through their creation of Ciampa/Gargano slash. Here are some of my first thoughts on that work, and how it all relates to the encoding-decoding-recoding model I’ve written about.
When I first got into professional wrestling — way back in 2014! — my first favorite wrestler was The Miz. I was watching WWE Main Event, which aired Wednesday nights on our Ion TV channel. This was before the WWE Network was launched, and before I had any access to higher level cable channels like the USA Network, so Main Event become my entry into professional wrestling and the WWE. Then we got the Network and cable, bringing to use NXT, Lucha Underground, and more. And I started going to the live events put on by AAW here in Chicagoland. So since in the years since, I have had other favorites to add to my own fangirl roster, with Sami Zayn earning perhaps the biggest place in my heart — for his wrestling and his political activism.
Sami, unfortunately, keeps getting injured, and I no longer have…
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