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The Art Of The Heel Turn - Ten Turns That Worked, And Ten That Flopped (Pt. 4)

We've finally arrived at the final part of our look at The Art of the Heel Turn (here's Part 1, Part 2, and Part 3). Today we will dive into our six final turns, three of which worked, and three of which flopped. The format has changed a bit for this final part; instead of starting with one that worked, we'll be starting with a flop. Let's get right to it before Seth Rollins shows up and ruins everything and I get forced into a tag match with John Cena as my partner.

One That Flopped

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Eddie Guerrero (2005)
The Turn:
In 2005, Latino Heat turns his back on lifelong friend Rey Mysterio, committing terrible, violent acts and revealing that he actually fathered Mysterio’s son
Why It Flopped: No one wanted to hate him.

I’m going to go ahead and say this up front: out of every entry on this list, this is the one that I most struggled with including. The reason being is that pretty much everything Eddie did during this time was just unbelievably fantastic. From the "How Eddie Got His Heat Back" promo to every match he had with Rey Mysterio, Guerrero could do no wrong. Every beat, every mannerism, all of it was pitch perfect. So why is it here as a flop? For two very simple reasons.

During the summer of 2005, we were greeted to a special bedtime story from uncle Eddie. Ever since Wrestlemania that year, Mysterio and Guerrero had been firing on all cylinders, with each match between the two being better than the last. Eddie was one of the best heel workers in the business, and this feud proved no different. But around July, someone in WWE Creative felt that the feud was lacking something, and something (as is too often in the case in professional wrestling) was a paternity scandal.

That’s right: in the middle of one of THE classic wrestling rivalries, someone said "sure, they’re both doing phenomenal work, but shouldn’t they be fighting over something more? Like, I don’t know, custody of a child. Yeah, that could work great." So during this special story time with Uncle Eddie, we were told a tale of Rey Mysterio’s junk not working properly. If you go back and watch that promo, I’m pretty sure you can hear Vince McMahon cackle as Eddie mentions Rey’s faulty equipment.

So, what was poor Mysterio to do? He and his wife just wanted a child, but he wasn’t man enough to finish the job (as it were). Guerrero, being the good friend that he is, goes out and impregnates a "ring rat.," and then grants onto Rey and his wife a child. Well, that was awful nice of Eddie, wasn’t it? We should all be so lucky to have such a friend.

This lead to one of the most ridiculous setups for a ladder match in history: instead of a title, or $10,000, or the service of Terri Runnels, or a contract for a world title shot, these men would be battling for custody papers of Rey’s son Dominick (who was actual Eddie Guerrero’s son Dominick). All the while a ring rat sat at home watching TV and saying "oh, THAT’S what happened to that baby I gave birth to. Huh."

Anyways, the two had one of the best ladder matches of all time, Vicki Guerrero showed up, and Mystero hugged his son in the middle of the ring while Vince screamed about no one mentioning broken penises.

Sure, all of that sounds pretty bad, but it could almost be forgiven considering just how good Eddie was at playing a heel through all of it. So what was the issue? How could this turn ever be seen as a flop? Well, let’s look at the second reason this is here.

No one wanted to boo Eddie Guerrero.

As I mentioned before, Eddie Guerrero was one of the all time great heel workers. The man understood the art better than almost anyone in the business, and he played the role with such unbridled joy that it shone through with every performance. That strength became the very thing that made this turn not really work. We just loved being entertained by Guerrero so much at that point in his career that we wanted cheer him. Any other star in that role would have been back to jobbing on Main Event as soon as the angle had drawn to a close, but even after the impotence jokes, the attempt at taking a son away from his father, the brutal beatings week after week, we still just wanted to cheer him, to let him know how great we thought he was.

As entertainment, it was incredible. Looking at it strictly as a heel turn, it flopped. And we were all ok with that.

One That Worked

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Triple H (2002)
The Turn: Shawn
Michaels returns after 4 years, gets the band back together, gets Pedigree’d, and the drummer spontaneously combusts off screen
Why It Worked: Perfect Timing/History/Trolling

I’ve said here before, and I will say it again: Triple H is one of the best all time heels in the business. He was so good as a heel that after getting knocked out for 8 months with a quad injury (which happened while part of the full heel Two Man Power Trip with Steve Austin), we all CHEERED him on his return in 2002. Triple H was the only villain during the Attitude Era to truly touch Mr. McMahon in terms of heat, and he seemed to revel in those boos at every arena he received them. Once the 2002 Royal Rumble came around, we just couldn’t help but cheer our favorite villain, so we did. We cheered for him for the next several months, and then Shawn Michaels returned.

How great is this? DX can get back together! It’ll be just like old times!

And there they were, our favorite bad boys coming out to that theme, in those T Shirts, saying the lines and hitting all the right spots. This was perfect, and everything we could have wanted.

Stop me if this sounds familiar: Triple H, in the ring with a super athletic guy, celebrating a big moment, and then hitting a Pedigree out of nowhere. Daniel Bryan truly is a student of Shawn Michaels.

The troll job for this turn was spot on. If this had just been a segment with the two men talking with no mention of DX, we would have grown bored, or we would have smelled "turn" from a mile away. Why go through all that trouble just to turn when the crowd clearly loves you?

Because that’s good heelin’.

As mentioned above, the timing of this couldn’t have been better. Shawn wasn’t going to get booed on his return. It had been four years. He needed a villain, and Triple H will always play that role well. This led to a phenomenal match at SummerSlam that year, and if you have the Network and have never watched it, go. Go now.

One That Flopped

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Undertaker (2002)
The Turn: JR gets humiliated, Limp Bizkit blasts through the arena, BikerTaker demands respect
Why It Flopped: Nostalgia, Mainly

OK, confession time: I loved BikerTaker. At the time it was a fresh character change that blended well with the direction of the company, and Mark Calloway was totally believable as a badass on a motorcycle (seeing as how he‘s usually a badass on a motorcycle out of the ring). His short feud with Triple H in 2001 is still one of my favorites, and his rivalry with Kurt Angle featured one of my all time mark out moments, During a house show near my hometown, Angle came out and cut a cheap-heat promo that led into him bad mouthing Undertaker’s wife at the time. The next night on Raw, Angle comes out, Taker’s music hits, Taker grabs the mic, says "I heard you like to mess with people’s wives," and thus commenced a thorough ass-beating on the Olympic gold medalist.

Having said all of that, I absolutely hated Heel BikerTaker. The turn itself occurred on an episode of Raw when Vince McMahon was trying to force Jim Ross into joining the "Kiss My Ass" club (good God, that’s painful to type). Suddenly, Undertaker’s music hit and we all knew that finally, finally Vince was about to get what he deserved. Instead, Taker picks up the mic, cuts a brief "shoot" promo about all the years he’s had to kiss Vince’s ass, and then asks Ross if he was going to kiss the boss’s ass. When JR answers with a resounding "hell no," Taker shoots back with "Is that because you think you’re better than me?" One big punch later, and Taker is a heel, forcing JR to do the unthinkable.

That was it. That was the turn.

A good heel will change some things about their character, maybe add a few dirty moves in the ring, change up their ring gear, get new entrance music, any little details they can find to differentiate themselves from their face work. BikerTaker cut his hair. He still came out to that stupid Limp Bizkit song (remember when WWE used to announce Limp Bizkit was the "WWE’s favorite band"? Yeah, I don’t know why I stopped watching around that time either), and still drove down on the custom chopper. Before he was an unstoppable badass. Now he was an unstoppable badass with short hair. What the hell? At least with the Dead Man version of the gimmick he could fall back on some supernatural evil to get some heat. BikerTaker was never going to work as a heel because, let’s face it, the character was designed to be the prototypical version of a face of that era. It was Undertaker playing Stone Cold. No one was going to boo that, and just like Eddie Guerrero above, that’s more or less what happened.

The other big issue during this point was that people were starting to miss the Dead Man. People were missing the unholy beast that came out to the funeral dirge with Paul Bearer standing by his side, gold urn in hand. It’s sort of the unspoken aspect of wrestling; sure, we love the reality, and we love guys like CM Punk dropping pipe bombs and Triple H heeling it up as the COO of the company, but we also love a guy who has the magical power to control the arena lights and can appear on the stage in a bolt of lightning. It’s why, even though most of us here hate it, Kane still gets main events. It’s why arena’s pop when Bray Wyatt blows out the lantern announcing that they’ve arrived at whatever arena they’re supposed to be in. No one did supernatural wrestling better than the Undertaker, and we just wanted that guy back.

Having said all of that, it’s a true testament to the man Mark Calloway that he spent this heel run trying to build up younger stars. From being eliminated in the 2002 Royal Rumble by Maven (what an awful, awful, wrestler) to making Jeff Hardy in a ladder match on Raw that same year, Calloway truly was a company man in the best way. It’s just a shame that everything else about this period for the character was so…..bleh.

One That Worked
Vince McMahon

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The Turn: Bret screwed Bret
Why It Worked: Vince gonna Vince/Reality

Ah, the Montreal Screwjob. Back in Part 1 I talked briefly about the Screwjob, The "angle" that led to WWE slowly gaining ground in the Monday night Wars. The formation of the NWO made people pay attention, the Screwjob made sure they didn’t look away. In one brief moment of peeling back the curtain, Vinnie Mac became the greatest villain the WWE has ever had, a role that the company is still trying to recreate to this day (and his daughter Stephanie seems poised to reach that height any time now).

A little over a year after the infamous "Curtain Call," we once again were treated to a moment beyond kayfabe, a moment of scandalous reality that made us want to watch because it was clear things had not gone according to plan. The big question was "ok, how do they get themselves out of THIS one?"

The answer, in retrospect, is obvious. But at the time no one knew what to expect when Vince McMahon, Color Commentator, would sit down for his first interview as Mr. McMahon, Egotistical Owner of the WWE. No other heel turn was ever so expertly done as Vince calmly saying "I didn’t screw Bret Hart. Bret screwed Bret." WE should have all stopped watching. We should have heard that line and said "screw this company, I’m following Bret to WCW, where he will clearly have a phenomenal career for years to come."

But we didn’t.

We needed to see more of this character, of this man who had never been much more to us than a fool enamored with maneuvers. And suddenly, we had a man for our beer swigging, ass kicking, Stone Cold Stunning anti-hero to go after.

One That Flopped

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Stone Cold Steve Austin (2001)
The Turn:
At Wrestlemania XVII, Stone Cold proves that he would truly do anything to win the WWE Championship by selling his soul to THE DAMNED DEVIL Vince McMahon
Why It Flopped: Austin 3:17 says "I will not get booed ever (WHAT)"

Stone Cold Steve Austin is arguably the biggest wrestling star in history (and judging by the reactions during the opening of Wrestlemania XXX, he may have strongly gone over Hulk Hogan in the minds of many). His character was the perfect avatar for the working man, a gruff antihero who wasn’t afraid to stand up to the boss and fight for what he felt he deserved. His rivalry with Mr. McMahon saved the company and helped wrestling reach popularity it hadn’t experienced since the 80’s, and hasn’t come close to seeing since.

Then it happened (WHAT). At Wrestlemania XVII, Austin shook hands with the devil himself (WHAT). For the first time in years, Stone Cold was a heel (WHAT).

And no one was willing to accept that (WHAT).

When Hulk Hogan turned "Hollywood" in 1996, the timing couldn’t have been better. People just didn’t care much about the Hulkster anymore. He needed something big to remain fresh. Throughout that year Hogan’s crowd reactions made John Cena look like a face that was loved by all in comparison. People were ready for change.

Austin in 2001, not so much.

In fact, going into Wrestlemania XVII, Austin had proven that his year off had done nothing to kill his momentum with crowds. He returned almost immediately into the title picture, and he started the year with one of my all time favorite matches, the Three Stages of Hell match with Triple H at No Way Out. Austin was so over that after losing cleanly to The Game, he jumped right into his feud with The Rock without skipping a beat (it helped that The Rock was just as over, and their second meeting was one fans had been clamoring to witness for months). After Wrestlemania XVII, all of that changed. Now Austin was just a McMahon lackey, an insufferable kiss ass so far removed from his original character that we all had to get neck braces due to whiplash. In the ring he was still the same guy, chugging beer and opening many a can of whoop ass, usually to gigantic cheers from crowds who still remembered the Stone Cold we all knew.

Even Austin himself admits that the turn didn’t happen at the right time. From his documentary "That’s The Bottom Line ‘Cause Stone Cold Said So":

"I was started to get to feeling like I was getting a bit stale. I always liked being a bad guy, and Rock was doing so good as a good guy and the top guy, I figured this would be the premier time for Stone Cold to turn heel. If I look back at my heel turn that night, and I look back on my heel run that happened from that point on…if I could go back in time I would never have done that."

Just like Eddie and Taker above, we just loved the guy too much to boo.

One That Worked

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Stone Cold Steve Austin (2001)
The Turn
: At Wrestlemania XVII, Stone Cold proves that he would truly do anything to win the WWE Championship by selling his soul to THE DAMNED DEVIL Vince McMahon,
Why It Worked: Depth Of Character/Stone Cold is Awesome (WHAT)

SWERVE!

I know, I know. This seems like a bit of a cop out, but stick with me here: Stone Cold’s 2001 heel turn at Wrestlemania XVII is one the greatest heel turns in history. The setup was perfect, and as shocking as it was, there had been some subtle foreshadowing in the build leading to the match. The story going in was that Austin would do anything, anything to be WWE Champion, and by shaking hands with Vince McMahon who kept his word. Who didn't immediately go slack jawed as Austin shook Vince's hand in the middle of the Astrodome?

From that point on we were treated to one of the most brutal, funniest, most entertaining heels the business had ever seen. During his tag team run with Triple H he was a bully, no different from that jerk at the bar who mocks you when you order a Virgin Daiquiri because you’re the designated driver. During the (god-awful) Invasion angle, he was an insufferable kiss ass who would do anything for his boss, Mr. McMahon. Suddenly the antihero bad ass had shown his true colors. He was no longer what we wanted to be, he was just who we were. While we all want to tell off our bosses and flip the bird to anyone who angers us, we also want to succeed and be as far at the top as possible. Austin’s heel run played out like a caricature of every Vince McMahon kiss ass we had ever heard horror stories of. Not a single backstage segment went by that you couldn’t look at Austin’s character and think "Heh, that’s probably what Hogan was like in the 80’s." If you ever need a good laugh, just go find some of Austin’s work with Kurt Angle from that year. You’ll have a smile on your face in no time.

This also shows another layer to the Art of the heel turn: it truly is an art, one filled with nuance and subjectivity. There really are no set rules for what works and what doesn’t, although there are some decent guidelines to follow. For ever person who hates a Big Show heel turn, there are ten others who thought it was the high point of his career. All of this feeds into why we love professional wrestling so much; and proves a point that I so wish WWE would realize now in 2014: when they stop trying to be everything for everybody and instead place the focus on putting out a quality product, they end up being just that.Thank you all so much in joining me throughout this series, and I hope you were able to get some enjoyment out of it, at least as much as I got from putting it all together.

I mentioned on Monday that I had something special planned for today, and I hope I don’t disappoint. After receiving a few comments about the small time frame most turns on this list were pulled from, I’ve decided on a new series to act as recompense to those readers looking for more classic stars to receive a mention. Starting on Monday, I’ll be going back in the past for an in depth look at the man who truly laid the foundation for the art of the heel turn: Gorgeous George. Until then, this is JW wishing you all a very happy Wednesday and hey what is Seth Rollins doing with that chai-

The FanPosts are solely the subjective opinions of Cageside Seats readers and do not necessarily reflect the views of Cageside Seats editors or staff.