Not giving the audience what they don't want - the curious case of Roman Reigns

Not giving the audience what they don't want - the curious case of Roman Reigns

What a remarkable ending to the 2015 Wrestlemania. Whether you were a fan of the finish or not you have to give it to WWE. They lived up to their "anything can happen in the World Wrestling Federation!" mantra of old.

Perhaps this is what creates the love hate relationship the WWE universe has with the company. WWE at it's best is like nothing else produced on television. But of course what has made the ending of Wrestlemania 31 all the more remarkable is that there was no indication that Roman Reigns would not walk out of the event as the new world heavyweight champion.

credit: www.totalprosports.com

Yet here we are less than 2 weeks after the biggest event in pro wrestling and Seth Rollins is the man with the title. Not undeserving one must add but still curious nonetheless. Even more curious than this though has to be the handling of the situation Roman Reigns and the WWE found themselves in going into the marque event and where they find themselves now.

As a life long fan I have always been very fascinated by the business of professional wrestling. Intrigued. Yes that's the right word. Things have changed. Boy oh boy have they changed. 

The hardest thing in wrestling these days seems to be keeping the attention of the fans. I am intrigued by the perceived power the pro wrestling fan has these days.  Put quite simply the Hulk Hogan school of creating a babyface and the fans eating it up is dead. 

It's debatable when this ended considering wrestlers like Batista were still common place in the mid-2000s but the curtain raiser that is the Internet certainly went along way in exposing just what these incredible men and women go through just to make it to WWE's developmental system. The average fan no longer care who wins the most matches. Nor do they care about how loud the 'face roars or how thick his neck and arms are. So the question is why? 

2 men come to mind: Daniel Bryan and CM Punk. Both were veterans of the wrestling industry before they made their WWE debuts. While it is not uncommon knowledge that a lot of wrestlers spend considerable time in the indies before making it big; in previous times, before the internet, this was not common knowledge. For all you knew Bret Hart was just a youngster sheltered and groomed like an Olympic athlete rising through the ranks. Not many had any clue of the rigors men such as the 'Hitman' had to go through making his way to the WWE nor was it perceived that Bret was a better wrestler than Hulk Hogan. Not commonly anyway. I mean Hulk Hogan was the best in-ring performer and that was why he was champ. Right?

I digress somewhat. The point is that the appreciation fans have for wrestlers is no longer as cut and dry as it once was. I look at Daniel Bryan and CM Punk as the premier example of fans waiting for their favorites to latch onto something they want to cheer for. Would the "Yes! movement" have been as popular as it became had Bryan not latched on to it? Would the 'pipe bomb' suit anyone else but CM Punk? These were indie darlings who had, by the smark audiences's standard, earned their way to a world-champion-making-gimmick. No one, from that point was going to tell the fans who they should like and who they shouldn't. 

Ah Roman Reigns. Reigns could not possibly have been prepared for the backlash he received and to be fair to him he didn't really do anything that would have, traditionally, warranted it. He was pretty much the same babyface he was when he was getting universal plaudits save for a slight dip in promo skills. I could give my opinion on why Roman lost the audience but I have already digressed enough. But, as I alluded to, fans want their favourite 'hard workers' to get in ahead of Reigns. Put simply Reigns went the old school route of being pushed as the best before the fans perceived him as such. To cut a long story short it did not work out for Reigns and he currently has a higher boo to cheer ratio than John I'll-be-a-babyface-until-the-end-of-time-no-matter-what Cena. Yup. That bad.

So do WWE respond by giving the audience what they want? No. They respond by not giving the audience what they don't want. In one of the most ingenious and perhaps defining (history will tell) finishes, Rollins came out and gave a collective fuck you to the "should Lesnar retain or Reigns win?" debate. Go back to that word intrigued. Intrigue. Intriguing. An Intriguing ending in more ways than one. Reigns never lost to Lesnar. Lesnar has still not been pinned for well over a year now. They're both still monsters, WWE has a full time champion and lots of money matches still waiting on the table.

But not giving the audience what they don't want is the most intriguing part of it all. See I don't believe that the audience necessarily wanted Brock as champ or Rollins as champ. They simply did not want Roman as champ. I hear people say often that the roles are being reversed. Heels are getting cheered as 'faces and 'faces are being booed as heels. But what I refuse to believe is that the audience just does this on a whim. Are either one of Lesnar or Rollins a bad heel because they couldn't get a sufficient amount of heat to elevate Reigns? No. For my money both are terrific heels. Put them in a match with Bryan, Ziggler, Ambrose etc and they will elevate them. Big time. 

So well played to WWE. They still know how to play the game. Perhaps they are still out of touch with what their audience wants. Perhaps they don't know what you want. Perhaps they don't even think you know what you want. But gosh darn it do they respond well to what you don't want.