Opinion by Da-Met

Why do some wrestlers get over and others don’t? It’s a simple enough question with many simple answers. They don’t have the workrate. They don’t have the charisma or mic skills. They can’t work “WWE Style.” They have political enemies. The writers are just shitty. These simple answers can go on and on. Leaving aside the outside features such as the issue of political enemies, when the writers DO put a wrestler on television and try to give him (or her) some sort of push, big or small, what determines whether it’s a success?

While all the answers I gave above can certainly work in a logical fashion, I submit that what determines the success of a character in a storyline is quite simply put, the journey. It’s something that it seems the current writers do not understand. Some of their storylines occasionally have “the journey.” On that same token many do not. I’ll elaborate on what I Mean by the journey.

For a wrestler to truly get over in a real sense (which means in an Austin sense, not in a Scotty Too Hotty “The Worm” sense), they need to change, and grow. All too often however, the writers see that as a sudden heel turn or a simple promo. That’s not what it means at all. It means that over time, sat he audience gets to know the character, there has to be an added layer to each step of the storyline.

I know what you’re saying, hey Da-Met, this is wrestling, things like character development don’t matter! I submit however, that they do matter, but we just don’t see it sometimes. I will give two examples of how the journey did (and did not) help a character and the storylines. Both of these are cases of very over babyfaces attempting to turn heel.

Case number one is Steve Austin’s failed heel run that began at Wrestlemania X7. I use “failed” rather liberally because although I was very entertained by his antics as a heel (his vignettes with Angle and Vince were pure gold), he was a comedy heel, and the run was not a success in any meaningful business way. What were the buyrates for Backlash and Judgement Day again? Thank you. But anyways, back to the story.

I personally was a major advocate of Austin turning heel, it was a storyline I was waiting since 1999 to see. However, when it happened, it was a sudden turn with no buildup. As a matter of fact, the wave of momentum was pointed the opposite way with fans rallying behind Austin. Once he turned heel, there were many attempts to truly get him over as a vicious heel (beating up JR, bullying the Hardyz, beating on Lita). These were desperate attempts after the heel turn to try to get real heel heat on him. A well executed heel turn should have already had him over as a heel. This may sound like I’m rambling from the point, but I’ll come back to it…

Case number two is the heel turn of Chris Jericho in late 2001. Amidst the flopped InVasion angle, the storyline between Jericho and The Rock came out of seemingly nowhere and in my mind remains the best they’ve done all thorugh 2001 and 2002. In this storyline however, Jericho’s character underwent a journey. First there were seeds of dissention between him and The Rock (who had an established history, many times the two had teamed up on RAW and SD, even if they were not “friends” per se). Then they set up a match at No Mercy. They set up a dynamic with Jericho “always losing the big one.” Then come No Mercy, Jericho, a face, used a chair to win aand at the end of the match Rock handed Jericho the chair silently as if to say “You beat me, but you needed this…” Their next encounter was on a RAW where Rock won the WCW title back and Jericho “snapped” and beat him up afterwards. But yet that was not the singular moment of his heel turn. Then came the final match at Survivor Series where he put WWF’s fate in jeapordly when he attacked The Rock.

See where I’m going with this? Jericho’s storyline had a step by step escalation of tension and layers that added to make the story more coherent and let the fans FOLLOW his character each step of the way. Jericho’s character underwent a significant journey, from face to heel. Austin’s character didn’t undergo any sort of journey, it just happened, and then the WWF was left with a heel who was simply not over as a main event heel and needed desperation tactics to try and get him there. Jericho’s heel career meanwhile prospered (for a while, until his feud with McBoobs and The Glass Ceiling, but that’s a different story).

Why are Booker T and Goldust so over? Is it because they had lots of funny segments? Sure, but so did Head Cheese (Al Snow and Steve Blackman). Booker T and Goldust started as an odd couple pairing, and Booker T didn’t particularly like Goldust. Now, while Booker may not be singing love songs or any such thing to Goldust, you can tell they are friends. They hang out backstage. Booker was wearing Goldust’s shirt. They jest. It wasn’t sudden; it was something the fans followed for months at a time. Not only that, but the nWo part of the storyline (which many thought was a waste) helped the storyline greatly. Booker joined the group, and Goldust warned him that they would turn on him… and they did. This strengthened their friendship. Wrestling fans may not notice things like this off hand, but subconsciously, they do. There’s history and there’s a journey taking place.

In the weeks leading up to King of the Ring, many fans on the internet were bemoaning the upcoming main event push of Brock Lesner, claiming he was simply not ever enough. He had been squashing midcarders for 2 months, so why wasn’t he as over as he should have been? He didn’t undergo any journey or change. It was just, come in, fight, squash (except for the ridiculous DQ loss to the Hardyz, but I digress). Now look at the two months between KOTR and Summerslam. He went into King of the Ring, won the tournament (defeating fan favorite RVD), and earned a title shot. He had a month of feuding with RVD, then onwards to the title shot he earned. By Summerslam time he was incredibly over. It wasn’t simply feuding with RVD and Rock that did it (though that helped), it was the fact that his character had a purpose. He won the King of the Ring, he earned a title shot, now he’s going for a higher goal. The character of Brock Lesner underwent a journey.

Why are wrestlers like Bradshaw, Albert, Big Show, and other stupid HOSSES that WWE loves so much not over enough to be at the top of the card (even though you just know Vince wants to)? Here’s a secret… if WWE writers knew the difference between their usual week by week booking and the journey, they could make all three of those wrestlers main eventers and make the fans care about them. Now in this case, I’m just as glad they don’t, but the fact that they’ve attempted to give pushes to those wrestlers without giving them any sort of journey speaks volumes about their understanding. Oh and the story going on with Bubba Ray and HHH? Guess what, if done right it’s gonna get Bubba over huge. Why? Because he has purpose, he is undergoing a journey, and (if HHH doesn’t squash him and kill his heat) it will make the fans truly care about him far more than teaming with Trish, fighting Big Show, or beating Benoit/Guerrero would do.

So in conclusion (this has gone on a lot longer than I intended, but I’m at school on break so hey, its better than studying), it’s not the jokes that get a wrestler truly over. It’s not the promos. It’s not the squashing. It’s not even the wins and the losses (although all of the previous things certainly help). It’s the purpose of character, what he does to achieve that purpose, what the character does to get to that point. Simply put, it’s the journey, stupid!