Streaming Service ‘Pro Wrestling TV’ Grabs Broadcasting Rights to ‘Control Your Narrative’ Promotion
A new challenger has entered the pro wrestling ring — and it’s got a tag team partner along for the ride.
Today, upstart pro wrestling streaming service “Pro Wrestling TV” announced a new broadcasting agreement with “Control Your Narrative,” itself an upstart program in its own right. “CYN” was founded by pro wrestlers EC3 and Adam Scherr, formerly known as Braun Strowman in WWE, and offers a totally different take on pro wrestling as we know it.
As we prepare to launch next month, we are excited to announce that PWTV will be the exclusive home for #ControlYourNarrative content!
— Pro Wrestling TV (@ProWTV) March 2, 2022
Follow us for more announcements & how you can watch PWTV - a free ad supported service coming soon worldwide!#WrestlingCommunity #wrestling pic.twitter.com/o3vpljeaDW
CYN presents itself as a program full of individuals who didn’t get a fair shake from major wrestling companies. Blending pro wrestling, cinema, and counterculture art, CYN has released multiple “pay-per-view” events and will soon air a weekly episodic series in the vein of “WWE Raw” or “AEW Dynamite.”
“With PWTV, the way professional wrestling is consumed will change forever,” said CYN co-founder EC3 on his official Instagram page. “We are very excited to partner with PWTV to bring the stories, skills, and abilities of a distinct and driven group of talents to the wrestling world.”
In the era of live sports as a commodity, pro wrestling has been seen as an outlier for the most part — but it shouldn’t beif WWE’s influence on Peacock is any indication. Reports showed that 3.5 million paid Peacock subscribers have watched WWE content since the move from its standalone platform, the WWE Network, to NBCUniversal’s streaming service.
In January, it was reported that of the 1.1 million subscribers to WWE Network, one million successfully converted to Peacock. While it’s likely no other professional wrestling company can reach those numbers, there does appear to be room for other players in the space.
One wrestling company that’s looking for a streaming partner is AEW. With the natural synergy between AEW and WarnerMedia, its TV broadcast partner, HBO Max makes sense as a destination for AEW streaming content, but nothing is guaranteed.
They could choose to make a king out of Pro Wrestling TV or consider working with an established streaming provider, but their options would be limited. Peacock likely wouldn’t consider adding a WWE competitor to its platform and Hulu is still partially owned by NBC, so that could negatively influence any potential to bring them in.
A dark horse candidate could be Bleacher Report, WarnerMedia’s digital sports property that broadcasts AEW’s pay-per-views, but AEW may want to punch a bit higher with a streaming deal to build upon its success on cable.
Pro Wrestling TV is slated for an April launch with no other promotions signed on at this time. In addition to continuing to produce full-length cinematic wrestling features, CYN and PWTV will bring a unique perspective of presenting and distributing wrestling to the fans in the form of a seasonal television approach.
Each episode will build the stories of the wrestlers, their conflicts, and their journeys culminating each season with a live event special. “Through this approach, CYN believes the talent will have the freedom to develop and excel,“ says CYN co-founder Jedediah Koszewski.”