Edge Says Fans Shouldn't Expect "52 Superkicks [And] 84 Flip Matches" From Him

Edge was a guest on a recent episode of Busted Open where he promoted his new movie Money Plane coming out on July 10. He also talked about his feud with Randy Orton praising Orton for being a natural in the ring but also explaining that he can push Orton to be better than he can be.

"I push Randy to his capabilities, but he doesn't even understand his capabilities because Randy just does," Edge explained. "He doesn't need to think. He just has this innate instinct that comes through three generations of doing this. I don't know if I've ever seen anybody to his extent. Kurt Angle is close coming from where he came from, but Randy, he's special man, but he doesn't realize how special he is. Me coming back, I think, can reinforce that and push him to be what he can be."

Edge named dream opponents that he would like to face in WWE, but he explained that he needed to face Orton first when coming back to WWE. He talked about wanting that old-school NWA feeling and getting it when he returned at the Royal Rumble.

"That being said, I needed him to see if I could do this," Edge stated. "Sure, I want to get in there with Aleister Black, Austin Theory, Damian Priest, Angel Garza [and] Cesaro. God, there's so many guys I want to get in there with, but I needed to start with Randy to see where I was at. I had to start with Randy, and I knew that coming back [and] having this cherry of a story dropped on his lap that Randy would step up. He just needed something to be able to sink his teeth into.

"I just knew it, but then the next night after the Rumble, when I heard people screaming, I was like, oh my God. This feels like like old-school NWA Dusty Rhodes. This is what I was hoping for, but you never fully know right? When I heard those screams. I was like, this is gonna be so much fun."

Edge responded to the social media critiques that his matches with Orton have gotten like how the last man standing match at WrestleMania may have gone a little long. He responded by saying how you can't try to satisfy what he calls "two percent of the audience" and how people would have complained about his match no matter what happened.

"Here's what I have to get used to. The last time I wrestled, there wasn't social media to the extent that there is now. To the extent where people seem to treat it like it's the Holy Grail not understanding that it's probably two percent of the audience. So in the grand scheme of things, not that big a deal, but it's still there, and for me what I found it was like people complaining about the length of it.

"You know what? We just went out and worked. We had to entirely switch everything up on the day because of the time of the day it was actually being shot. So we just went and worked. Didn't say two words to each other. Just fought. What I found interesting is that people were complaining about the length of the match, yet they were probably the same people that for nine years were saying, you got to come back. You've got to come back. You got to come back. You can do this. You can do this. You can do this. OK, I'm back, and now you're going to complain about the length of my first match?

"I could have come back and done a two-minute match with four finishers and a kick-out, and you would have complained about that. So what is it? Is it 18 minutes that you need? That time is OK, but 41 is not. Got it. OK. You consider the source and realize that there's always going to be some jaded wrestling fans, and you can't work solely for them."

One of Edge's goals was to show that "selling sells". Edge explained that character and selling are the most important part of wrestling and how younger wrestlers need to focus more on their characters to be successful.

"You have to understand the entire totality of the audience and also try and bring back some casual viewers," Edge said. "What I want to try and do is remind people that selling sells because it's what this is based on. Character and selling. Wrestling moves are not going to get you over. They aren't. Selling and character are going to get you over. If you don't have your character fleshed out, you're just going to go out and do wrestling moves, and it's going to look like this physical form of ballet. It's gotta look like a fight, and your character has to be developed in order for people to care.

"I have 20 years worth of TV under my belt. So it's easy for me to say that, but I truly think that if you put that challenge in front of the talent today and say, OK, you gotta find your character. You gotta have an idea, and if you have that idea and that kernel of truth in your character, that's your North Star. Follow it. It's never gonna point you wrong. As long as you can keep that in everything you do, whether that's a promo, whether that's a match or whether it's a spot, if you always keep that North Star in mind, you're going to be fine."

Bully noted that Edge and Orton have each picked up a win their feud and asked if there are plans for one more match to. Edge hopes that there will be a trilogy and talked more about his Backlash match and his goals for what he wanted the match to be.

"To me it has to be a trilogy," Edge expressed. "We had Backlash, and I was really proud with with everything that was kind of put in front of us. I was happy with how that turned out and contrary to the experts, it was not taped over seven or eight hours. It was once straight through, and then we went back and did four pickup shots. Now, I've seen people like complain about the the DDT and the lockup, and I think that's a total of two seconds of the entire match. So if that ruined the entire match for you, then you have bigger issues.

"I get it. Everybody needs something to complain about, but here's how I look at it. That for me was a huge test to see where I'm really at wind wise [and] wrestling wise in this new incarnation of how I want to wrestle going forward, and I know that some of our audience is very conditioned to these 52 superkicks [and] 84 flip matches. That's not going to be me, and it never was me, but especially now, I want the match where Bret Hart and Taker and Jerry Brisco and William Regal are going to text me after.

"I go OK, that's what I was gunning for, and that's what this is gonna be. If that takes a re-education of the industry and a re-education of the fan base, then so be it. That match, I was really happy with how it turned out, and where I was at even with the torn triceps, I was just really really happy because I had an opponent that I knew would just do and be present in that moment. That is so key."

Edge had gotten injured during a pick-up shot of his match at Backlash. He admits that he did not like the pick-up shots but takes blame for them as they were his idea. He revealed what Vince McMahon's reaction was to the pick-up shots.

"We did those two shots. Now that being said, those pick-up shots, I hated them, and it was my idea," Edge revealed. "So I'm fully fully guilty of it. I was like great. Greatest wrestling match ever. There's no such thing. It's completely subjective. So what can we do that's different, and as I was driving down to Orlando, I was like maybe some GoPro type pickup shots. Maybe that will add a different element.

"I saw the first cut without any of that in. I was like boom, we don't need them, but Vince loved them, and I was like damn it. Damn it. Damn it. Damn it because now they're gonna be in there. He goes, we got to take these chances. We got to try because he is looking at it from a bigger landscape, and people can complain about that, but of course he's gonna do that just like as a promoter he's going to call it the greatest wrestling match ever."

Edge also gave more detail about the kind of match that he wanted at Backlash. He called his match against Orton "a love letter to wrestling."

"He's a promoter, and once I wrapped my mind around that like oh, this is just a tagline," Edge recalled. "We're not expected to go out and have the greatest wrestling match ever, and people who are fixated on that are missing the point. To me, that was a love letter to wrestling. That's what I wanted it to be. I wanted to be a love letter to wrestling. So yeah, I wanted Fink there, and I wanted the MSG, and I wanted old-school introductions, and Charles in a bow tie and a shirt and present this as a a love letter to wrestling. If that went over your head, then I can't help you."

While talking about how the third match against Orton needs to be different from their match at Backlash, Edge revealed a behind-the scenes moment during their superplex spot. He also joked about cutting the two seconds from the match that some fans complained about on social media.

"Now going forward, the challenge will be OK, what is the next chapter of this and how do we make it entirely different from Backlash? But that's fun, Edge admitted. "That's where you get into the nuances of the story. We tried different things like the superplex was live, and if you noticed on replays, they didn't shoot the entire ring because that cameraman, as we were climbing up, he slid in the ring and got in the back corner. So I'm taking my first superplex in probably 12 years, and I'm going oh, how's this going to feel?

"Then I see him climbing in. I was like, oh this this is going to look cool. That was the only shot that I was OK with because when we landed, he literally bounced. That one I was OK with because it happened live. It was within that 48-live straight through. I'm still going to request the director's cut like the Zack Snyder Justice League cut that cuts out those two seconds just for all the jaded ones out there. Take it out for them and honestly for me because I have OCD."

If you use any quotes from this article, please credit Busted Open with a h/t to Wrestling Inc. for the transcription.