Kick Out At 2!

A few posts ago, I submitted an idea on how I would “fix” John Cena.  I put forth this idea based on the fact that I don’t like the current John Cena character, as well as the fact that the majority of the fans on the Internet, and a good percentage of the fans in attendance at any given WWE show, seem to agree with me.

Then, I started thinking.

A lot of the new thoughts were brought on by WWE’s newest T-Shirt, unveiled at the TLC PPV on Sunday.  A shirt that now simply states “Cena Sucks.”  It’s a very interesting concept for the WWE…selling merchandise against one of their superstars, not to mention their MAIN guy at that.  The WWE announce staff have started referring to John Cena as one of the most controversial WWE Superstars of all time based on the very vocally divided reactions he gets from the crowd in attendance.  The shirt plays off of that, as in small print at the top it says “Let’s go Cena” and then has the large print “Cena Sucks,” a dueling chant that we’ve been hearing a lot more of here recently.  However, what I find pretty interesting is the fact that the dueling chants are pretty much even.  Oh, there’s the very distinct differences in the tones of the chants, pretty much showing that guys don’t like Cena, but women and kids are very much in his corner (for the most part, allowing for spill over on both sides…but you really can’t deny the timbre in the chants), but one side of the chant never really seems to outweigh the other.

I got to thinking about another star, back in the day, who had a very divided audience; Bret Hart.

Now, I’m not going to start comparing the two as wrestlers, promo men, or anything like that, just the reactions and how they’re playing off of them.  Bret in 97, for all intents and purposes, was a heel.  But, why?  Think back to that run of the WWE.  Bret was upset that the crowd had chosen Steve Austin and Shawn Michaels to cheer as opposed to him.  But, other than cut promos against the others in the company, he was pretty much still the same Hit Man he had always been.  That’s what made the people in Canada love him, as well as the people pretty much in any country except for America.  He was still the wholesome wrestler who was there to try do what he did best…it was everyone else who turned on him.  Sound familiar?

I’m not big on John Cena “turning heel” because I think it’s bad for business.  John Cena makes that company so much money, and to suddenly turn everyone against him is going to lose a lot of money in sales to his key demographic…kids.  That’s the key to this business today.

The Attitude Era is over.  WWE isn’t making programming specifically for an 18-34 demographic anymore.  We’re in the PG Era, and kids are the primary focus.  Kids are what drive that company and make them money right now.  And almost every kid I see in the audience of a WWE show is decked out like a miniature John Cena, complete with shirt, hat and arm bands.  I was talking wrestling with one of my friend’s little boy the other day, and we were talking about who we liked.  I would bring up guys that I liked, like Christopher Daniels, or The Miz, and any time I brought up someone who was a heel, his reaction was always “I don’t like him, he turned to the dark side.”  That made me smile, because there was someone who still bought in.  There was someone who hadn’t been smartened up yet, and someone who liked cheering the good guys and booing the bad guys.  That’s why you can’t turn Cena heel like everyone wants.  John Cena as a guy who runs down the baby faces, sneak attacks them, etc, isn’t going to be someone kids want to cheer.  He’s going to be someone who’s “turned to the dark side,” so to speak.

I also think that the biggest reason that people want Cena to turn heel is so that they can cheer him again.  That’s a very weird idea.  He’s the company’s biggest babyface, yet he gets booed.  The people that boo him the most (the Attitude Era demographic, for lack of a better term), will talk about how much they liked him when he was a heel, and how he’s such a good heel and that he should hurry up and turn.  Everyone wants him to turn heel so that he can be “interesting” again, but in a lot of ways, I’m calling it what it is…they want to cheer John Cena again.

How many of your favorite wrestlers are heels?  A lot of mine are, honestly.  Since 96-97, it’s been cool to like the heels.  That’s why nWo and DX shirts sold like hotcakes and why Steve Austin and The Rock are two of the biggest guys in the history of the industry.  I’ll argue that Steve Austin never really “turned face,” they just changed who he was wrestling.  His attitude never changed, really.  They just stopped having him feud with faces and changed him over to feuding with heels.  The crowd turned him face in their cheering of him, and WWE followed suit.

Thing is, I don’t think that’s really how it works anymore, at least not with the entire audience.  When you have someone like The Miz selling T-Shirts, we’re living in a wrestling world that still embraces the heel.  So, when that happens, anyone who doesn’t act like a heel doesn’t get cheered…or, becomes a “heel” in the simplest terms.  Being a “face” or a “heel” now doesn’t always have to be about how you act…it can simply be how the crowd reacts.  To a huge part of the audience, John Cena is a heel .  They want him to lose.  They will pay to see him lose.  Look at July.  A “heel” CM Punk VS a “babyface” John Cena, and everyone in Chicago was there to see Cena lose.  Tons of people bought that PPV to see Cena lose.  That, pure and simple, is an old school heel.  Someone people will pay to see get beat up.

If you don’t like John Cena’s character right now, I present to you that he’s the biggest heel in the WWE.  Bigger than Mark Henry, bigger than Miz, bigger than Alberto Del Rio.  He does things that irritate you.  He does things that you don’t like.  He makes you want to see him lose.  Sounds exactly like a heel to me.

He’s Bret Hart in 97, and you’re America and your kids are Canada.  It’s a very interesting time and I’m waiting to see how they play it off.

Shane