Some day, someone with too much time on their hands (like me) who likes to think about trivial matters (again...me) will probably write a book about the launch and demise of the Adam Rose character in WWE.
One element of that push that seemed like it might catch on, and that Creative might actually push, was the member of his Rosebuds entourage dressed in a rabbit suit. At various times in late 2014, it appeared that that character and the reveal of whoever was inside the costume, could become a bigger star than Rose himself.
In a great two-part interview with Raj Giri over at Wrestling Inc., one of those mysteries is revealed, as P.J. Black, who worked in WWE as Justin Gabriel, talked about his time in the bunny suit, and some of the proposed plans for the character.
Black's version of events is another example of how little is appears that WWE puts into anything other than the top acts and stories - and how frustrating it must be for a performer lower on the card to break out when you're given the shell of an idea, and your ideas for building on that are routinely shot down with no alternatives given:
It started out as just a little character, then it kind of evolved from that. Then I'm like 'If I'm not going to be this Dare Wolf character, let me make this Bunny really f-cking cool.
Me and Adam Rose sat down and wrote out stories to make this bunny and evil bunny, because he wanted to be a heel so bad. We wanted to do like the Donnie Darko thing. We had an awesome mask made by the people who do The Walking Dead makeup, the same people who make Kane's masks. We had things filmed, and all of these ideas to turn this bunny into an evil, sadistic character. Adam Rose was going to be like a Marilyn Manson character.
Everything got shot down. Each time I'd come up with something or Adam would come up with something, it'd get shot down. An idea that I thought was great and everyone thought as It's more frustration, it gets disheartening. It makes you lose passion for what you're doing.
While something that dark probably wasn't going to fly even with things less strictly-PG than they were a few years ago, it's the lack of any long-term plan that's annoying as a fan and must have been maddening for a wrestler. And Black says that he and Rose had some other ideas that might have lead to legendary moments, even if they crashed and burned - such as revealing that a certain Chairman of the Board was under the mask:
They were just doing it week-to-week. I think they wanted it to end up being someone who was returning. Someone like Kurt Angle or Jeff Hardy, somebody cool like that. Anyone else on the roster, it wouldn't have been cool. It wouldn't have been a shock.
I came up with an idea for the bunny to become really hardcore, he has dried blood all over him, sitting backstage grumpy smoking cigars. It's like when people hit their all-time low. The bunny should be going through ladders, tables, and coming close to winning championships, but doesn't because he's too f-cked up. Then maybe the bunny gets knocked out backstage, and a ref shows up and it's Vince. That's the only shock factor it could be, if it's someone on the roster. Then Vince wakes up and just goes 'I don't know what happened. I put the suit on and I just blacked out.'
Everyone loved the idea, it just never came to fruition.
In the end, it was that sense of nothing ever getting a chance that made the 34 year old decide to move on:
That's an idea of how frustrated I was, because that was just one idea. Everyone loved it and nothing ever happened. I had so many ideas, and obviously not every single idea was great. I was just like 'nobody's ever going to listen to me here, so see ya.
Check out both parts of the interview for more of the former WWE Superstar talking about being on the first season of NXT & Total Divas, the Nexus angle, his experiences with Triple H and thoughts on NXT today, his future in Global Force Wrestling and more.
Disappointed we never got a payoff for the Rosebud Bunny? Thoughts on Justin's backstage experiences?