REVIEW: P90X Generation Next

In a move nobody expected, the bean counters at BODi decided it was time to take advantage of the P90X brand before it faded into obscurity.

Which leads us to the release of the fully rebooted P90X under new trainer Waz Ashayer.  Indeed, BODi is exercising the right to use the intellectual property of what is probably the single most popular fitness series on the planet.  The original P90X, released in 2004 created a seismic shift in how video workouts were made afterwards.  It took off slow but when it got going it was an unstoppable juggernaut and to this day, 21 years later, in all it’s standard-definition video glory, is still being used by countless devotees.

You could count the pixels on both hands back in the day!

First, let start with obtaining Gen Next.  Well…you don’t.  You subscribe.  As per the limited fiscal influence of the Canadian Peso, it cost me $14 a month.  But when I terminate my subscription, that access is gone and I’m back to popping in old Tony workouts that I own.  But the dialogue on owning hard copies of media is one you don’t want to get me started on.

I should also clarify…that $14 got me P90X Gen Next but also access to the original P90 catalog and Tony’s One on One series.  Nothing else however.  No Body Beast, Dig Deeper, Insanity…just keep that in mind.  It’s probably a good thing as it at least gives a deal on the price.  Unless you’re chomping at the bit to do Brazil Butt Lift.

Gasoline and a match sold separately.

There are 14 workouts and the program runs 13 weeks but the workouts repeat so I’ll just go through them one at a time, starting with PUSH STRENGTH…

Push Strength

Push Strength is 2 blocks of 4 moves.  Given the “push” angle, Presses are the focus.  In the original, there would be special days for Chest and Back or Back and Biceps for example.  What I see here is a generic upper body day.  You also will not do rep counts.  Everything is timed.  It’s not necessarily better or worse, but it is a different approach.

Immediate concerns…no bar displaying what move you’re doing or about to do.  Really miss that.  No bloody idea why BODi has done away with that for just about everything they make now, but here we are.

The “minimalist” look will be another adjustment to get used to.

Plyometrix

This was a P90X staple back in the day.  If you got through Plyo X, you had some legitimate bragging rights.  Gen Next does a good job of sticking with the basics as nothing is needlessly complex.  Plyo jump squats, side jumps…it’s jumping.  30 seconds on, 30 seconds off.  There is one move however…plyo bench jumps…that I would probably advise not doing, or at the very least modify.  Or use a stable ply box.  A bench just seems a recipe for disaster unless you own something exceedingly solid.

You can, but I wouldn’t.

To compare, the original Plyo X was a slow progression.  Gen Next goes from cold to hot very fast, so don’t be afraid to do a longer pre-warmup on your own time.

Upper Body

Upper Body has a more P90X feel to it that Push Strength.  It’s old school presses, flyes, extensions, and pull ups.  3 blocks, one for push, pull, then mix.  Its less weight focused and certainly more circuit training.  Upper indeed goes after the whole upper body, and while you will indeed be tired at the end, it may not be a completely effective muscle building strategy.  It goes fast with very little explanation and each round feels like a “burnout round”.  Give yourself a while to get accustomed to it.

Active Mobility

Active mobility is a revised X Stretch.  That’s good, as X Stretch really wasn’t that rocket hot to begin with.  All stretches are active, such as lunges when you keep moving.  It’s a recovery day, so its fairly easy.

Lower Body

The original Legs and Back was a monster.  I’m sure nightmares of single-leg-wall squats still wake some of us in the night.

Gen Next however sticks with just the legs, although you do get some deadlifts in there.  Squats or various types, deadlifts and a little plyo to top it off.  Going back to the quality of your workout bench, be careful with those one-legged presses that have you balancing on it.  Modify with lunge-squats if you have to.  The workout ends with a 9-minute finisher of lunges, deadlifts and gorilla burpees.  Again, before starting, do a little pre-warmup of your own.  It’s barely 3 minutes long here.

Lower Body strikes a good balance of weights and plyo.

Cardio Boxing

Nothing against Waz or Cardio Boxing.  The problem is me.  I just hate fight-style workouts so dang much.

You’ve seen one of these you’ve seen them all

Punch/uppercut combos.  Slidin’ slippin’ and dippin’.  Now thankfully, Gen Next mixes the combos with a healthy does of cardio such as jacks and push ups, so it’s not constant air fighting.  And in all fairness, it is miles better than Kenpo X.  Kenpo X and Wesley’s standing horse stance rots my socks to this day.

Over 20 years later, and you still shame us.

Myofascial Release

My first introduction to myofascial release was P90X2.  To this day, I still love my rumble roller.  Gen Next gives us a taste of that old glory with a foam roller and a tennis ball.  If you have tight tendons then this is the kind of thing that can transform your life.  And at 23 minutes, it’s not too long at all.  Waz uses a simple half-size foam roller which is a must for any fitness stockpile.

Absolute game changer.

Pull Strength

Pull Strength is 44 minutes with dumb-bells and a pull up bar.  Pull ups, clean-jerk presses, upright rows, Romanian deadlifts and pullovers are but a few of the items on the menu.  2 sets of 4 moves doe 3 times through with a 6-minute finisher burn-out round of pull ups, rows and flyes.

Now, about that finisher round, there’s one move…swings.  Be careful.  Don’t do it in front of a window or any carbon based lifeform that values it’s face.

There’s almost a pleasant Body Beast feel to Pull Strength.

Speed and Agility

Tony never really had an aggressive Speed and Agility option.  Plyo X was probably as good as he got in that realm.  That gift generally fell on Shaun T’s doorstep.  So it is with great interest that Waz steps up to the place.

Of course, where Shaun T has the edge, and probably always will, is music.  Shaun could make one feel they were in a spy movie.  Every beat was synchronized with the body and added a spike of adrenaline you could tap in to.  The music here, and to be honest, in all of Generation Next, is very subdued.  Often forgettable.

Some good, aggressive music would be a huge upgrade here.

Workout itself is zippy, exhausting and while the upper gets some work, the legs will see the most benefit.  Lots of fast lunges, lateral shuffles, plyo pushups, bench hops.  This will certainly develop that fast twitch muscle.

Core Circuit

I feel this was meant to compete with Ab Ripper X.  And if so, its good, with one little caveat…its 38 minutes of activity that the old Ab Ripper accomplished in about 15 minutes.  It does more than just crunches…but it is mainly crunches.  Specifically, two blocks of 4 moves, each 30 seconds long.  Now consider that those 23 minutes of extra time could be used to play guitar, take the dog for a walk or churn a batch of butter.  A lot of times with abs, I like to get it over with.  Core Circuit feels like going the long way around.  But it is better at instilling mobility so they both have their place.

Active Flexibility

So you wanted to know if there was going to be a Yoga X.  Well Active Flexibility is it.  It’s stretching in motion with the usual suspects: yoga poses and lots of them.

And all in significantly less time than Yoga X.

I’ll wager that anyone who did Yoga X back in the day has long since moved on.  90 minute video workouts just don’t have a long shelf life.  Sure, we did the original.  Yes, we felt like we did something huge when it was done.  Yes, it was amazingly effective.  But after while we hit the fast forward a little more each time until finally Yoga X collected more dust than an 86 Dodge Omni.  So the completely do-able time of 40 minutes here is a welcome change.  Waz is very methodical, very little jokes…what can I say, I liked this.

Full Body Strength

Full Body Strength is 45 minutes in the meat grinder with dumbbells and pull up bar.  As per usual, you get barely a 3 minute warmup.

First block is compound movements that combine top and bottom, such as press squats or Deadlift / row combos.  Not sure I’m a fan of the complexity.  I tend to like focusing on one body part at a time but there is room for lots of variety in fitness, so it doesn’t hurt for me to try something different.

2^nd block is tempo.  No compound motions.  Slow and savage.  Slow down pull ups, push ups, squats.  Block 2 is more targeted.

For the finisher, it’s a medley of body weight motions and some with weights.  Again, that task bar would really help a guy out.  3 times through, no rest.  Good luck.

Acceleration/Deceleration

This is better thought as Speed and Agility Part 2, or controlled speed.  It’s a good cardio alternative.  There’s not really a definitive line where acceleration or deceleration happens with moves like Heismans, shuffles, hops, squat jacks.  You just naturally move quicker at certain parts of a motion and slower at others.  It’s controlled mobility, that’s probably the best way to describe it.  Waz is a little goofy in this one to a bit of an annoying degree, and if there’s one aspect of his training style that fails to connect, it’s the oddly timed laughter.  But maybe I’m just an old curmudgeon.

Full Body Power

That 3 minute warm up just does not cut it so hit pause and proceed when ready.

Rather than regular motions, explosive power is used.  Barbell swings to start and moves are progressively added to increase complexity.  I think the biggest winner here will be the lower back.  Be mindful with swings…form is key.  A killer mod for this one would be to ditch the dumbbell and grab a kettlebell.

Bonus Workouts

Beyond the core 13, there are also a variety of bonus 5 minute workouts for Abs, Arms, Glutes, Shoulders and push-pull.  They’re self-explanatory and serve only to supplement.

CONCLUSION

Organizing my final thoughts on P90X Generation next was not easy.  Comparing a new creation to a classic that has hit almost apocryphal status is a daunting task.  Which one is better?  That question can assume one is good and the other is a goat turd.  And that is not the case here.  Generation Next is a good fitness program and in some areas, does the job better than its predecessor.

But I should emphasize…in SOME cases.

It’s easy to romanticize the original, but lest we forget it had some serious imperfections…Kenpo X probably the most glaring.  But ultimately, they’re so different from each other you could safely say the only thing in common is the name.

And to keep harping on production values, Generation Next is technically perfect.  Allow me to elaborate: The cast is perfect.  The set so clean it could pass a food inspection.  The original set in contrast, was very industrial.  The old cast members were mostly friends of Tony’s.  It had a very loose feel to it, like we were invited into the cool kid’s club.

In stark contrast, Gen Next is extremely polished.  It’s like I’ve entered a boardroom meeting of executives wearing Brioni suits and wouldn’t you know it, I’m in my favorite Saturday morning sweatpants and a rocking my “Where’s the Beef” t-shirt.

Being so streamlined, some very crucial things got left out.  A taskbar would have done a lot to keep that P90X feel.  And music.  It’s there, but it’s nothing you’ll remember, if you even notice it at all.  And that’s the big difference.  The original was a monster of a production.  The set was insane, music was perfect and have I mentioned the taskbar enough yet?  The original must have taken forever to assemble and plan.  This feels like it came together in half the time and half the budget.  That’s unfortunate.  There’s no reason a 2004 production values should eclipse 2026.

And not to talk smack, but this feels significantly more like a Joel Freeman LIIFT More series than having the spirit of P90X.  The logo is there.  But really, I feel it holds Waz Ashayer back.  He’s a good trainer.  But Bodi is trying to shove a Waz sized peg in a Tony sized hole.   He doesn’t need the P90X brand to give him any legitimacy, he’s got that all on his own.

But since BODi was hell-bent on a reboot, Waz was certainly a good enough choice.  His accent will pose no barrier whatsoever.

Hey, we got through Sagi.

He explains things as clearly as one can while moving at the fast-pace Gen Next demands.  True, he laughs a lot at his own jokes to sometimes an annoying degree.  But hey, Tony did the pterodactyl, so they cancel each other out.

Ultimately for those who grew up on the original, that magic may be hard to find here.  Or maybe, maybe I need to realize that P90X: Generation Next, is just what the name implies.  It’s for the Next Generation.  I’m not doing 20 pull ups anymore or extreme plyometrics.  Sure, I’m still in the game but there needs to be something for those after us.  I can’t walk up to Millennial Billy, hand him a used copy of P90X on DVD, slap him on the back and say, ”Here, this’ll put hair on your chest boy!”.  P90X: Generation Next, while certainly destined to never surpass the legacy of the original, does have the opportunity to provide something for the younger demographic.

Final verdict:  Is this our P90X?  Does it have the tradition and spirit?  Don’t hate me for saying this…but no, no it does not. Gen Next is very much its own thing and does not follow in the essence and pedigree of the original in any meaningful way.  P90X was more than just a series of physical challenges.  It was a group of friends trying to change the way home fitness was done.

But more importantly, P90X was Tony. 

You can’t separate the two, but dang, you have to admire Carl Daikeler for having the balls to try.  And that’s where I feel Waz was shoved into a fitness version of the Kobayashi Maru.  For those younger than 50, that’s an old Star Trek test in which Starfleet admirals shove a cadet in a simulator with a scenario where there is no way to win.  The cadet, however, doesn’t know this…and how they handle that inevitable defeat is ultimately how they are graded.  The good news is that Waz passes that test of character with flying colors.  But ultimately Generation Next will never be enough to take out the Klingon Battle Cruisers that keep coming.

Thus, to my veteran brethren I offer these words of encouragement.  Our original will always be there.  We need not tear down something new because it lacks the nostalgic allure of the old.  Generation Next seeks to draw in a new crowd of those who want to get leaner, faster, stronger.  That’s always a win.  We will, as was said, “always have Paris.”  Now, maybe those who walk in the path we’ve tread, can have theirs too.