The Rock's Disappointing Character Turn Highlights Rocky WWE Raw on Netflix Debut
WWE basically positioned Monday's Raw Netflix debut as a WrestleMania-level event, yet it felt more like the Super Bowl.
And not in a good way.
While the endless wave of celebrities gobbling up all of the good floor seats and corporate back-patting stunk, nothing personifies the debut's flop quite like The Rock's performance.
Rather than trot out in his Final Boss character, Rock was just...Dwayne Johnson. Board member Dwayne Johnson pining for Hollywood roles, too. He shook hands and yapped it up with Cody Rhodes, even throwing out a Mama Rhodes reference that apparently doesn't mean anything anymore, then hugged and congratulated Roman Reigns as the real Tribal Chief.
Just like that, all of the careful, long-term storytelling and character developments—traits that have defined the Triple H era and spearheaded this golden era—went up in smoke.
These were non-kayfabe, inauthentic exchanges fans could shrug off if they happened at, say, a Hall of Fame event or something. Instead, WWE chose one of the biggest events in the sport's history to...steer away from what makes the sport so great.
There were other problems, too, with Rock just setting the tone right from the jump. WWE went major tone-deaf with the Hulk Hogan segment after plastering his beer company on the new (ugly, to some) ring mat. Actual real wrestling was few and far between with zero in the way of surprising or risky results.
And yes, the matches were great, but a certain other company gets grilled constantly for only focusing on bangers in the ring.
Other odd entertainment choices included...Travis Scott and The Undertaker.
Overall, it's just really hard to see exactly what about that show might entice new fans to come back next week. The three hours felt like six, which didn't help. The show didn't end on a cliffhanger, nor did it dangle big threads unpulled, so were new eyeballs supposed to be wooed by part-timers and retired guys waving and smiling?
The fact that John Cena can come back and rock the mic better than anyone else on the program is, to be blunt, a massive issue laid bare in front of a huge audience.
Once again, it's Rhodes who suffers, too. His so-so title reign is now in limbo and he looks like a dork for being chummy with Rock after vicious things he endured at the hands of Dwayne not that long ago, never mind getting pinned by him. All so he can apparently head into a 'Mania program with Cena.
Make no mistake—flop is a strong word to use. We'll undoubtedly see endless mega-streaming numbers, and the gravitas of it all surely made it feel like a big event for new fans. But that was not the version of Rock standard fans tuned in to see, and it was not the handwaving of continuity anyone wanted. We have to keep it fair—if AEW did something like this, that promotion would get cooked.
Monday night felt like a launching pad for WrestleMania season, a time to really start outlining how things might go. Instead, what could have been a Night 1 main event between CM Punk and Seth Rollins went to waste and Rock nuked feuds with Rhodes and Reigns.
Sure, WWE could walk back the other way in future weeks and months, even attempting to blur lines by having Rock admit he was just playing a bit for shareholders or whatever. But fans aren't stupid—when Rock was having a rough time in Hollywood, he came back motivated with a top storyline. Now that things seem to be getting better for him there again...he's backing out? When WWE didn't need him, last year, he was there, but now that they need him for the Bloodline and/or Rhodes, he's reverting out of character?
But again, Monday night came with expectations that the good stuff would continue. That huge, historic mistake of the sloppy handling of Rhodes surrendering his Royal Rumble win to Rock, only for the company to retract it, was a thing of the past. That sloppy stuff was supposed to be a relic of the cable television era.
Instead, it feels like the streaming debut was more of a warning sign. Triple H was in the post-match presser talking about terms like "shoot" and "work" while storylines went disregarded to the point the promos felt aimed at executives, not fans.
The question now becomes whether this will be a weekly feature on Raw. It's also interesting to think that when SmackDown went to Fox, these sorts of things didn't happen. Yeah, some goofy stuff, like Brock Lesnar squashing Kofi Kingston to appease networks, occurred, but pro wrestling was still pro wrestling.
If Monday night was some weird attempt to shift WWE into being more of a real sport like UFC at the behest of TKO, Netflix or whoever, and these types of programs continue, it will backfire on the company hard.
To put it another way, if this is what the Netflix era and the Rock are cooking, it just doesn't smell all that great.
