FanPost

Retroactive Reconstruction: Royal Rumble 2015

WWE.com

Welcome back to another edition of Retroactive Reconstruction! Here, we take a look at abortive, not-quite-there, or otherwise abysmal gimmicks or angles or characters or even events before pulling them apart and putting them together into something that could have worked better. It's fantasy booking at its finest! Today, we take a look at one of the dumbest recent events that should have been so easily fixed.

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I'M BACK, BABY.

…Okay, in all seriousness, the best excuse I can give for my absence of posting on this site is…well, it's a multi-part issue, really.

1.) I was moving, and for the past two weeks or so I was more interested in getting everything out of my house and into our new house than in anything else. Thus, I would be so tired that I couldn't even conceive of writing a few words, let alone an ostensibly funny and informative piece for CageSide Seats.

2.) …I have to confess that, in the months after Wrestlemania and as Seth Rollins' title run dragged on, I started to get severely burnt out with what I was watching. I mean, it felt like I was in a rut: the same things were going on, nothing was changing, and everything was flanderized to ridiculousness. It felt like they weren't trying. It felt like they didn't care. It felt like they were content to just sort of…sit and let things be.

But then a few things happened.

A.) Kevin Owens let John Cena know exactly what he felt about being "given advice," and now we have a made fucking man in record time. Seriously, the last group/performer to get this over this quickly (and as a heel!) was the Shield. It boggles the mind.

B.) We finally get to see the NXT Women get called up, and though there were a few eyebrow-raising moments (Sasha with Naomi and Tamina? Really?), it was amazing. And revitalizing.

C.) But the biggest one of all had to be (at least for me) the announcement that Jushin Liger is coming to NXT to face Tyler Breeze.

You know what that means?

Anything is possible now. Because there is a precedent. Want to start fantasy booking a match between Liger and Neville? You can, because Liger worked with WWE. Wanna see the King of Strong Style Shinsuke Nakamura cave in Kane's face with a Boma Ye? It's possible, because Liger worked with WWE. You wanna see a tag match between Okada and Tanahashi against Cena and Zayn? You can, because Jushin Liger is working with WWE. And even if these situations all never come to pass, that's ok. But the magic is back again. And with that magic makes me realize something…

…there's a lot of catching up to do, isn't there?

I'm adding a new wrinkle to this series of mine. Instead of just characters and gimmicks and angles, let's have a little bit more fun. Let's dig into some events that could have gone over waaayyyy better than they ended up going.

So let's get down to business. Let's talk about one of the biggest botches in recent WWE history.

Let's talk about the Royal Rumble, 2015 edition.

BACKGROUND

Coming into the Royal Rumble, there was both a sense of unease and a sense of urgency amongst the fans, and no doubt amongst the WWE brass. 2015 was really the year where WWE finally decided to pull the trigger on the idea that John Cena is no longer the guy (as far as we know) to be the champion, and it was time to crown a successor. Now, Cena would eventually take part in a mind-meltingly good triple threat match against Brock Lesnar and Seth Rollins, so it's not like they were kicking him to the curb without a gold watch/severance package, but the Royal Rumble itself was seen as the grand crowner of whoever the next "guy" was gonna be. And if you had no knowledge of the inside workings of WWE, you could have entertained several notions of who would take over. Dean Ambrose. Dolph Ziggler. Bray Wyatt. Who was gonna be the guy?

But that would have been stupid. Because everyone knew who Vince McMahon and the brass wanted to be as the next champ.

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In all honesty, the biggest issue with the ascension of Roman Reigns had nothing to do with whether or not he could be the guy. He certainly could. The biggest (and, really, only) issue with him was timing. And that issue of timing has proved to be the bane of WWE Creative's (re: Vince's) existence over the past few years. Because while they certainly have good ideas, the problem is that they are often very spotty on pulling off those ideas at the moment that they need to go off.

And the timing for Roman Reigns winning the WWE Championship, on more levels than one, was atrocious. He was good…but he'd been heavily protected in tag matches with the Shield and with Dean Ambrose, existing as the tactical nuke hot tag. He'd had one…solid match with Randy Orton at SummerSlam 2014, and then he suffered a hernia that KO'd him for several months, causing him to miss the "Team Cena WITH STING vs. Team Authority" angle of Survivor Series. But even though he was gone, he was never…gone from our TV screen. The WWE promoted him heavily, and acted as though it was no big deal that he was gone. And in doing so, they couldn't have been more obvious in their telegraphing that Roman Reigns was the heir apparent, and the golden boy.

And that rankled more than a few fans, creating a veritable powder keg upon which the Royal Rumble 2015 sat, seemingly oblivious of the peril.

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There's a great apocryphal story out there about how, in the aftermath of Wrestlemania XII where Shawn Michaels defeated Bret Hart to achieve the boyhood dream, Vince McMahon allegedly remarked that he'd rather see a stadium half-full cheering for the guy he liked than a full stadium where…the allegiances were a little less clear. Or that the and were bored. And, admittedly, I'm probably misremembering the quote a little myself. It comes from the rumor that fans were so goddamn tired that they were leaving in the middle of the match between Hart and Michaels, despite it being a good match. So, in a roundabout way, what I'm getting at is that Vince McMahon has always tried his hardest to cram what he wants down the fans' throats, for better or for worse.

And, for whatever reason, the WWE fanbase in 2015 just doesn't seem as accepting of that shoveling than they were in the past. Maybe it has something to do with how society thinks in the 21st century, where being told what is good for us by an authority figure (of sketchy reliability) is treated with suspicion and even outright rejection. You can probably psychoanalyze the cultural zeitgeist a little better than I to figure that one out. But whether or not one cares that much about the ramifications of WWE refusing to adjust with the world as it changes, one thing was definitely clear.

The fans were showing all sorts of signs that Roman Reigns was not their Peoples' Champion, and they would not be happy if he walked out of Philly with the Royal Rumble under his belt.

…And yet we all know what happened.

WHAT KILLED THE EVENT?

Based on my PhDs in Gimmickology and Anglenomics, as well as my Masters' in Smarkometrics, I have concluded that there were FOUR major things that killed the WWE Royal Rumble of 2015.

First, a failure to remember and understand history

The previous year, the Royal Rumble was marked by infamy when Rey Mysterio came out at #30 and was given the first (and only) heel turn of his WWE career, and then Batista got booed the fuck out of the building when he eliminated Roman Reigns to win the Rumble. And, interestingly, some smarmy talents (looking at you, Chris Irvine) suggested that the fans were being dumb because "They cheered Roman in 2014 but are booing him in 2015! That just proves what we always thought: the internet wrestling community is all a bunch of whiners and don't know what they're talking about!"

On one hand, he's got a point: the internet is filled with whiners who don't know what they're talking about who put together fantastical reconstructions of things that they can't change no matter how much they want it to be-hey wait a minute…but that's where his rightness ends.

We were cheering Roman Reigns in 2014…because he wasn't Batista. And we were booing Roman Reigns in 2015…because he was Batista.

If you can't figure that distinction out, then maybe it isn't the fans that don't know what they're talking about.

Second, Daniel Bryan's elimination

Not the fact that he was eliminated. Just the matter of how he was eliminated.

Here's a thought experiment for you. Imagine, if you will, the turning point of The Dark Knight Rises. Bruce Wayne has been willed back to health with some medieval back surgery and training, and now is about to make the jump that up to this point no man has ever made before to escape a hellhole prison that Bane left him in to rot and die. We're given the majestic buildup, the crowd of prisoners below him are chanting and cheering him on, and right before he makes the leap a swarm of BATS come out and start swirling around him, and he closes his eyes in complete calm. Imagine that moment as he takes the great leap...

…and he misses the jump and is dashed on the rocks below. Movie's over. Bane wins and Gotham is destroyed. Also, Santa Claus isn't real, you fools.

That's how the fans felt watching Daniel Bryan get eliminated in the 2015 Royal Rumble.

Daniel Bryan comes in at number 10. He was the 11th man eliminated. He got to eliminate one guy in Tyson Kidd. And how was he eliminated?

…I honestly couldn't tell you, because of the fact that A.) Kevin Dunn should have been fired for the shitty camera work on the exchange, and B.) Bray Wyatt didn't even do anything impressive to knock Bryan off of the apron. Just a basic sort of move, and just like that, Daniel Bryan is out. Gone. Bye-bye.

Let me point out that in two of the last three matches Daniel Bryan had had before this, he had gone over Randy Orton, Batista and Triple H. HE WENT OVER EVOLUTION AT WRESTLEMANIA 30 AND ONLY GOT TO ELIMINATE TYSON KIDD IN THE ROYAL RUMBLE.

Also? DANIEL BRYAN AND ROMAN REIGNS WERE NEVER IN THE RING TOGETHER AT THE SAME TIME.

There was a deflated silence as the crowd realized that Daniel Bryan wasn't gonna win. And not even compete! He got tossed out like a jobber. Not even halfway through.

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And then Philly decided to get revenge the only way they knew how: actively hate-watching the rest of the match.

Third, the nonsensical booking of the future and the past

Here's the thing: up until that point, the rumble was going just fine. There were some great nostalgia moments with guys like Bubba Ray Dudley and DDP, and Bray Wyatt was looking like a monster. He even got to grab a mic and taunt people, knocking them out one by one like CM Punk did a few years before. He looked like a beast.

And then, towards the end of the match, Vince McMahon deployed the IWC's most hated superstars.

I don't have a problem with monster heels that are big and strong eliminating fan-favorites. That's what gets them heel heat. What I do have a problem with is when those heels were wrestling back when Clinton was still President, and when they eliminate the stars of the future in anticlimactic ways.

Dolph Ziggler tries a flying nothing and gets a KO Punch, and then tossed out of the ring. Bray Wyatt, the workhorse of the Rumble, gets eliminated with little fanfare. Dean Ambrose has a brotherly love moment with Roman Reigns…and then he gets eliminated with little fanfare…Leaving Roman Reigns against Kane and the Big Show.

See, anyone who knows me knows that I have strong opinions about the Big Show, but this is easily my most hated moment. The smugness on Big Show's face seemed to be deliberately antagonizing the fans, in a sort of "Hey, don't look at me, I didn't book this shit!" kind of way. But there's a difference between heeling and just being an asshole to make Vince McMahon happy. And this was the latter.

Oh, and how did Roman Reigns eliminate the two giants? Did he show that he is really fucking strong (he is) and just beat the piss out of them for eliminating his friend Dean Ambrose? Did he spear Kane, no-sell a KO Punch (I would have marked the fuck out for that) and then Samoan drop Big Show over the ropes?

Or did he rely on the tired cliche of "two uneasy ally heels start arguing, and then you flip them over the ropes when they aren't paying attention"?

It wasn't just that the others looked like crap, Roman Reigns looked like a weak, pansy little bitch. A conniving rat. A Sith Rollins, if you will.

Not strong.

Fourth, the incredibly cynical post-match attempt at a cheap pop

So Roman Reigns wins the match, to the absolute displeasure of Philadelphia. Big Show and Kane, furious at having been made to look for fools, decide to re-enter the ring and layeth the smack down on this rooty-poo candy ass jabroni who should have known his role and shut his damn mouth.

With a lead-in like that, you can probably guess who came to save Roman Reigns.

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At first the crowd went apeshit, because no matter what he does the Rock will be cheered. But then, as he entered the ring, the reaction became incredibly mixed. Because it was at that moment that the Philly crowd recognized two things.

1.) The Rock had just come out to save his cousin, and wasn't about to play into our deepest smark fantasies by hitting his own family with, like, the Rock Bottom.

2.) Wait a minute…did WWE seriously think we wouldn't smell this cheap attempt at a cover-up?

The fans recognized that entrance as the equivalent of covering a sinkhole on the highway with a plywood board, and reacted accordingly. Because they aren't fucking stupid; they knew that the WWE had probably realized someway through the Rumble that Roman was going to get nuclear heat, especially with the anticlimactic way that Daniel Bryan got eliminated. And so one can probably imagine that they asked Rock to go out and try to deflect some of the boos. But while I'm sure Rock had already planned to go out there and help Roman, I get the feeling that WWE was also thinking "Heeyyyy, Dwayne. Wanna take some of the heat off, buddy?"

And Philly called their bluff. I can only imagine the choice words that I would have given Vince if I was The Rock in this situation.

Look at that gif. You can see Roman's smile fade as he realizes that what was supposed to be a crowning achievement in his life, the biggest moment of his career up to that point…getting completely and utterly rejected. How heartbreaking.

And it could have been avoided!…Well, at least mitigated.

RECONSTRUCTION

This is actually really, really easy.

But first you have to swallow the bitter pill: considering how things had been booked, you still have to have Roman Reigns win the Royal Rumble.

I know, I know. You're probably thinking like this...

But consider this is Vince McMahon we're dealing with here. He's not going to completely re-write a PPV that has his golden boy winning. So you make the golden boy look good, while salvaging the others too.

Have Daniel Bryan come out a little later into the match. That both A.) protects his neck and B.) creates a fever pitch of anticipation for when the first strings of "Flight of the Valkyries" blares through the stadium. Let's go with…20. Big E can take his spot at 11.

Now, things are gonna get crowded towards the end, but you wanna have the final eight look like this: Bryan, Reigns, Ambrose, Ziggler, Ryback, Wyatt and the IWC hate-seeking missiles Big Show and Kane. Crowded? Sure. But here's one way to do things.

Have the babyfaces all realize something: the enemy of my enemy is my friend. So let's all go get them!

Have Ambrose, Reigns and Bryan just start kicking the shit out of Kane. And have Wyatt temporarily work with Ziggler and Ryback to get Big Show. To get Kane, we'll have a chain finisher: first, have Kane try to throw Dean Ambrose through the rope-NOPE clothesline from Ambrose, which staggers Kane who walks into a Superman Punch which causes him to stagger back against the ropes which gets him knocked over by TKTBCASHBRR (The Knee That Beat Cena And Should Have Beaten Roman Reigns) from Bryan. As the three of them are sprawled over recovering, have Big Show toss the other three guys off of him (they'd dog piled him) and grab Ziggler for a chokeslam. In comes Da Big Guy with a running shoulder block to break up the attempt, and then Wyatt kicks Big Show in the gut to get him to double over. Cue a Ziggler super kick to get Big Show staggered on the ropes. And then, after screaming "FINISH HIM!" in the center of the ring, Ryback gets a running start by bouncing off the other ropes and then Meathook Clotheslining Big Show out of the ring.

That's two! Ryback and Ziggler will be hanging on the ropes, and the cameras can linger on them as they look at each other, flash cheesy smiles, and maybe even get in a bro fist bump...

…only for Wyatt to come in from behind and get them over the ropes. Hey, he's a bad guy, remember!

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He turns around and howls at someone of the tired babyfaces to come get him. He takes a threatening step towards Roman Reigns…and then Dean Ambrose just straight up tackles Bray, smashing the Eater of Worlds up against the ropes and then they go over…and then they just keep fighting, disappearing off into the crowd somewhere far away (and setting up their feud for Tables, Ladders and Chairs fuck those Stairs).

That leaves two.

And here's where things get tricky. First, have Daniel Bryan and Roman look at each other, nod solemnly, and then circle like prizefighters. Have them lock up a bit, and then let things get a little hectic...

…and then we're going to go back in time and pay homage to one of the most unintentionally hilarious moments in WWE history.

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Without the whole "Vince McMahon legitimately tearing both of his quads to prove that Kevin Nash is a sissy" deal, we're gonna have Roman Reigns and Daniel Bryan go over the ropes at the same time. And let chaos reign. Refs come out. They separate Roman and Daniel Bryan, who are both so in the moment that they can't even discern that they're not in the ring anymore. Finally, they cool down enough…to hear the strains of Motorhead.

Out come Triple H and Stephanie, who announce that Roman Reigns fell out of the ring second, thus he won the Royal Rumble. This will be especially good if it's clear as day that Roman went out first. The fans will be livid and Daniel Bryan will need to be held back by the entire security detail as he completely loses it. But the camera needs to show Roman Reigns in this moment.

Instead of looking satisfied, he's shaking his head and clearly muttering to himself "Nah, man. This isn't right. It ain't right." And the show will end with Roman the winner…but clearly unhappy.

The following night on Raw, have Daniel Bryan interrupt a promo from the Authority and snarl over how they've kept screwing with him again and again, but this is the last straw. As Triple H smugly remarks something like "There's nothing you can do. You didn't see the replay, we did." Have Roman Reigns come out and say that Daniel Bryan has a point, and then have him cut a promo along these lines:

Look, man. Ever since I was little I wanted to say that I was the WWE Champion. And all through my career I've dreamed of getting there. I busted my ass last year in the same spot, and I set a record for eliminations and I almost did it. So I trained twice as hard and worked till I couldn't feel anything but pain and I. Did. It.

And I can't enjoy it. Because I don't even know if it was real or not, or if it was some way to screw him over. I don't know any of those things, but here's what I do know.

(points to Bryan)

I know that you don't believe I deserve this spot. And I know that there are fans out there who don't think I deserve it either. And I know that Daniel Bryan, man I love and respect everything you've done and what you're capable of, you've been doing nothing but whining all right and with all due respect why don't you take this chance to put your money where your mouth is and settle it the old-fashioned way: Memphis. Four weeks. You and me. Old school. Winner take all, and gets to go hunt the Beast at Wrestlemania. We'll settle this "technicality" once and for all. And whether you think I deserve my chance or not, come FastLane you will be looking up at the lights and you can BELIEVE THAT!

He storms off, and the Authority book the match because hey why not? It keeps Bryan out of their hair and it distracts Roman Reigns, too.

Have everything proceed after that point as it did, with FastLane actually having a better build for the hellacious beatdown that Bryan and Reigns put each other through. And then, from there, we get ready for Wrestlemania…and this wonderful moment.

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Was it a little messy? Sure. But anything would have been better than what they gave us in 2015. Here's to hoping that they learned their mistakes from 2014 and 2015, and that 2016 isn't a complete massacre.

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Another Reconstruction in the books! Let me know what you think in the comments below. Agree with my madness? Disagree with my methods? Let me know. Tune in next time, where we take a look at…well, you'll just have to wait and see.

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