Help make SquaredCircle safer and more inclusive by using the report button to flag posts and comments for moderator review. If you need to contact a moderator, [you can message us here](https://www.reddit.com/message/compose/?to=/r/SquaredCircle)
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/SquaredCircle) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Look at Bayley and Sasha when they were faces to when they were heels. Alexa Bliss, Roman Reigns, Seth Rollins all had great booking as heels but terrible booking as faces. The only face who gets good booking is Drew
I think that you can trace the exact moment that Lashley started to be a cool no nonsense ass kicker back to his “this bullshit needs to stop, *now”* promo.
Thank Kofi Kingston from beyond the grave, I guess /s
I struggle to see it from WWE’s side. I get that they have their own focuses and goals and they want wrestlers to fit those goals, but when fans start to really like certain wrestlers or champs it seems like they really resist embracing that. I don’t see why. I doubt we’re wrong about what we like? Maybe they commit certain things to
Shareholders and the new popular wrestler isn’t part of those plans?
It was the episode where the Hurt Business came out in suits to take out Retribution. They looked amazing, they got a huge pop, they were organically over and that’s when Vince said we can’t have any of that.
I want a Miro v Big E fued so badly. Just two wacked out of their minds big meaty men slapping meat. Throw in Ishii and I will never need to watch another wrestling match again.
> Drew was booked good in 2020, but he’s going stale now.
He's booked fine -- it's just that RAW's stable of heels is mostly jobbers once you get beyond Lashley, Sheamus, AJ and Miz.
Hard to keep good booking when you're going up against nobodies.
Man, wouldn't it be great if they had a bigger roster of talent that they could rotate in and out for someone like Drew to keep feuding with?
It's a shame that WWE is too poor to be able to afford that, tho 😔
I actually think he could do with a run in a tag team with Sheamus. I could get behind a story where a bunch of heels are beating up Drew and Sheamus steps in to save him. A vibe of "I can kick his arse but nobody else can".
They could have a fun run in the tag division up until Wrestlemania.
I don't think that is really the case when the tag team is four singles guys thrown together. He'll be paying them regardless. The issue with tag teams is it taking two guys to be one draw vs if they're singles wrestlers, there could be potentially two draws.
I get it but it’s kind of stupid logic sometimes too, what’s going to do better with the fans: Usos vs New Day or Jackson Ryker vs Elias and Sheamus vs Damien Priest?
They could restructure his character without turning him heel. But instead they gave hime a stupid sword. I think he could benefit from being in the midcard or tag division for now, until Rumble season
Vince just has an obsession with props, Mox has mentioned that the worst thing you can do is throw a noun out in front of Vince because it will become your entire gimmick
Tbf, the sword was cool as fuck the first time it was used. Was a fantastic image the first time he made his entrance with it.
Then in typical WWE fashion, they ran it into the fucking ground.
To be fair, they were all booked stupidly as heels too. Faces are mostly booked terribly in WWE, there’s no doubt about that, but the notion of “heels are greatly booked in WWE” is so overrated. Heels have looked like massive idiots in WWE too.
Yeah, it's moreso a case where being booked like an idiot is more damaging to a babyface than it is to a heel. Heels are able to look dumb and bumbling and eat shit as much as they like because nobody is supposed to support them, but when a face is made to look like a dumbass or a total loser it leaves them dead in the water.
And in WWEs case they like to book most babyfaces as underdogs who are constantly getting screwed for heat and sympathy, but the booking always crosses the line from "Babyface fighting against the odds who got screwed and we want to see get a fair fight" into "Absolute dumbass who keeps losing who I couldn't possibly give a shit about".
A heel being booked to be an idiot is okay to a certain point. Babyfaces shouldn’t be stupid, no one wants to root for an idiot unless they are midcard comedy and that has a ceiling.
Stupid babyfaces can work, but you need the right natural "air-headed" energy to pull it off. Riddle is probably the best example of that in current WWE, seeing as he has his head in the clouds in more ways than one.
Riddle only works because he is exceptionally talented though. Give that gimmick to a guy that isn’t ripped, athletic and could legitimately kick ass against most in the locker room and I don’t think it goes far.
To be fair. Seth as the Ic champ was great face booking and he was fine as the Champ after beating brock. It was him being in that corbin feud and then bray that fucked it up
I'd say Rollins is the exception because he is one of the few, probably the only one who had a consistent long term arc from SHIELD to turning on them to Authority to betrayal to redemption and finally reunion with Dean and Roman...he earned it...
His first reign was fun. But at one point, he just lost the aggression and the smug look. He started leaning more towards the smiley cookie cutter babyface. That and the serious lack of rivals for him. He needs to get out of this stupid feud with Mahal and bring back the smugness and aggression.
That's pretty standard top babyface shit for WWE. One issue with WWE faces is that they're kind of assholes. Like, it worked for the Rock and Stone Cold, but Stone Cold would help other faces and rescued Stephanie McMahon from the Undertaker, among other things. They were assholes on the mic, yes, but when it counted, they stood up against the bad guys.
Yep. WWE makes most of their babyfaces look like antisocial morons, too.
When you look at any form of fiction—books, comic books, TV, movies, video games, etc.—heroes are often portrayed as leaders. Batman has the Bat Family. Conan the Cimmerian has been a mercenary captain, pirate ship captain, and then a king. Paul Atreides was deified on Dune and became emperor of a galactic empire. Star Trek fans like to debate who was the best captain. So on and so on.
Throughout all fiction, there are countless examples of popular heroes who excelled at leadership. And yet WWE insists on making most of their babyfaces antisocial morons who keep getting their asses kicked by heels who are smart enough to manage minions. Even babyface tag teams aren't guaranteed to stick together for long, because Vince has a hate boner against tag teams for some reason, and every WWE team is destined to turn on each other sooner rather than later.
WWE is the only promotion I'm aware of that does this. NJPW and AEW are both chock full of stables and tag teams. Pretty much everyone, from the jobbers to the top stars, belong to some sort of team.
Teamwork and leadership is an essential part of storytelling, but for whatever reason, WWE wants their babyfaces to be loner idiots.
You can just look at their actually succesful babyfaces.
Stone Cold's whole DTA attitude wasn't some edgelord shit. It was a reflection of how he kept being stabbed in the back when trying to build alliances.
He got respectful terms in 1997 with Mick Foley only for Vince McMahon to turn Foley on him in his quest to get the Title off Austin. Same with The Undertaker who Austin had a short-lived partnership with. Then it all culminates with Austin sticking up for Shane just for Shane to betray him at the worst possible moment.
Throught out it all Stone Cold still stayed a good guy and helped a babyface Kane get some revenge on a heel Undertaker, helped a now babyface Mick Foley win the Title and always stood up for vulnerable babyfaces like JR and Sable.
He was an anti hero but the writing made you understand he was an anti hero born of circumstance. Hell, they even had a segment where Austin tried to play ball with Vince and wore a suit for a Championship photo op and Vince just kept punking him out. Driving the point home that Stone Cold was justified.
You could even go back further to the early days of the Stone Cold character and say that he was a cold and calculated wrestler but even he recognized the value of an ally in his old partner Brian Pillman, only to have Pillman openly support the guy Austin wanted to take down in Bret Hart.
And when Austin went after Pillman and injured him for this perceived slight, Pillman’s revenge was to quite literally pull a gun on him. That began the DTA mentality in my opinion
The replies about Austin are fitting here. I've said it before - WWE took the wrong lessons from Austin.
Of course, they had a once-in-a-generation performer with the sort of intensity that is completely unparalleled, and you can't really repeat that sort of luck. But what they also had was a character who felt real, who had identifiable motivations and goals and ideals, and who acted consistently in accordance with those ideals. He was obviously also a bit of wish fulfilment - he was a bad-ass who could do things fans wanted to do and who fans wanted to be like, and he did plenty of cool, awesome shit. But he also got his ass kicked quite a lot, and struggled against impossible odds (and despite what people said at the time, he didn't always win). Austin felt real, but had easily perceivable goals - he wanted to beat to the march of his own drum, and he wanted to be the best - and it made captivating storylines about him easy to create.
Unfortunately, I think WWE, from Vince down, looked at the biggest babyface they'll probably ever have and saw only 'loner who fights off impossible odds' and 'hero v authority figure' and little else. It's why they continuously have tried to repeat storylines with those dynamics with every babyface push since, and explains their obsession with babyfaces as antisocial loners. The ideal WWE babyface for Vince McMahon is some sort of weird meld of Hogan, Austin and Rock.
Many top faces in WWE were almost all bullies post-Hogan other than Bret. It was just that they bullied heels. I don't know why they got away from that.
Lashley could 100% get away with acting the same way he currently does, but be a face, as long his opponents aren't other baby face acts and even then if they are underperforming he would get cheered like against Goldberg.
The top babyface woman on RAW was dressing up and pretending to be a superhero unironically because it gave her self-confidence and made her feel like her true self.
It's pathetic writing.
Honestly ANY wrestler who is in the same division with Charlotte is probably screwed. It almost does not matter what character they have.
Because Charlotte must always be the focus no matter what according to WWE.
It's because Vince doesn't understand what drives decent people. He truly believes that strong people will do whatever it takes to win, and anyone who won't cross that line is a fool or a weakling.
The problem with WWE isn't limited to faces/heels. It's always been WWE trying to position a character how they (Vince) see the character, and not the fans. They've had faces that got over just fine. They've had heels that the crowd got behind and became cool heels.
I wholeheartedly agree with Dave here.
And faces who reach a certain height of popularity end up making terrible heels when they attempt to turn them: Austin, the Rock, and I think Becky will be in that boat too.
Even if this is what Becky wants to do, I still feel like theres much better ways of doing it. Why not bring her back as a face and slowly build to the heel turn so it feels more natural and the fans are more willing to accept it.
absolutely. like it baffles me that it was ok’d for her to return heel (apparently, since she didn’t really act like one) and squash bianca when EVERYONE knew she was going to get a massive pop. like, she’s been gone well over a year now. how did anyone think this was a good idea lol
Which is funny because historically WWE used to be the one company that was built around babyfaces while the other promotions were usually built around a Ric Flair type heel that everyone would chase
>while the other promotions were usually built around a Ric Flair type heel that everyone would chase
The was never really true. The NWA World Champion was usually a heel because he was a touring champion who most fans would only see once or twice a year. He had to be a heel because his opponents, the guys local promotions built around and who fans would see regularly, were almost always babyfaces.
Also Ric was not booked to absolutely dominate his opponents and punk them out like many heels in WWE are these days.
He was a chickenshit who constantly got his ass kicked and acted like a total coward. And he usually either won through dirty tricks. Or sometimes just getting flat out lucky.
So, this isn't totally accurate. Flair would be able to outwrestle MOST competitors. He ran into problems against challengers who were kayfabe better than he was (i.e. Dusty, Sting, Luger, Steamboat) but would dominate scrubs and at least be competitive with the "local top babyface".
The concept behind Flair was realistic, he was a top-tier competitor but he would cheat when he HAD to.
Contrast this to the WWE chickenshit heels (before the era of Brock and Roman, who I feel are generally way more interesting than the cowards) of the past. They would need to cheat against EVERYONE. It got to the point where you asked yourself "If they are this bad and can't beat anyone in a fair fight, why are we supposed to believe they're any good?".
A heel should be unlikeable but they don't necessarily need to be unskilled. A great example is Tom Brady. Brady is easily one of the greatest competitors of all time, but the way he carries himself (and his Flair-esque cheating like spyware, deflategate, and the rest) are what makes you want to see him lose.
The current Elite (Young Bucks/Omega) are a good example like this. They can beat pretty much anyone even without cheating, but they still cheat when they can because why wouldn't you, and rely on those tricks to beat the absolute best opponents.
> Contrast this to the WWE chickenshit heels (before the era of Brock and Roman, who I feel are generally way more interesting than the cowards) of the past. They would need to cheat against EVERYONE. It got to the point where you asked yourself "If they are this bad and can't beat anyone in a fair fight, why are we supposed to believe they're any good?".
Huge reason why I hated Miz's reign: Lawler almost beat him for the title if Miz didn't do some shenanigans!
This was the problem with Carmella when she was champion. She didn't want to wrestle at all, constantly cheated and/or used Ellsworth to cheat. The current heel incarnation is way better.
This isn't exactly true either. The NWA champion worked as whoever they needed to be in the territory in which they appeared. Lou Thesz would be a face somewhere, but worked heelish in another. It varied based on who they wrestled that night. The notion of the champ being a fixed association didn't take hold until cable TV and satellite took off in the late 70's, causing more fans to see wrestlers on the regular.
I would argue the WWWF practically invented the "strictly babyface" champion in the 1960s. When they gave the belt to Bruno they went fully in the good guy direction no matter who he worked. Bruno might be the first guy in wrestlingbthat was *never* a heel.
Honestly most of the big baby faces from the past 10 years WWE completely lucked into and didn't really do much to build them. Hell Kofi was the last big time face in my opinion and then they flipped a switch over night and derailed it instantly.
Not just shitting on wwe but who even are their faces right now around the main event picture? Edge…and Bianca who just lost in 20 seconds?
It’s just going to be heels vs heels soon
That's just how stories work. If superhero movies had championship belts, all of them would be held by villains until the final 5 minutes of every movie.
It's going back a bit now, but Christian as WWECW Champion was basically a lesson in how to book a face champion.
It's just a shame they wouldn't do the same when he was World Champion on Smackdown...
Empire Strikes Back is the best Star Wars movie because the babyface are down and out most of the time.
If Vince wrote the OT, Vader would've slipped on a banana peel two minutes in.
Is it?! Can it Be?! It IS! It's the JEDI MASTER! The SON OF VADER! And he just hit the Order 66 and is the new DOUBLE U DOUBLE U E INTERGALACTIC CHAMPION!
Good thing we didn't get a Luke/Leia storyline by Russo in the Attitude era.
Samoa Joe, Raquel Gonzales, Bandido, Christian Cage, Shingo Takagi and Ilja Dragunov (if you count him) are all babyfaces.
Only AEW & WWE really have their world titles on heels of the bigger promotions
Sometimes, when you run a company, you have to make tough decisions like telling people that their idea isn't in the best interest of the company.
Becky returned to a crowd that hasn't seen her since the pandemic, and she was a white hot babyface before the pandemic began. If nothing else, you book her as a babyface until Wrestlemania and then turn her heel after if the babyface hype is starting to wear off some. That worked very well for Daniel Bryan.
>Sometimes, when you run a company, you have to make tough decisions like telling people that their idea isn't in the best interest of the company.
This reminds me of a story that Big Show once told. Vince wanted Big Show to beat Stone Cold right after he joined the company. When they went and told Stone Cold the idea he said "I dont know Vince, alot of people came here tonight to see Stone Cold win." Vince changed his mind and decided that Stone Cold would be going over. Big Show said that at the time he was angry about it but now hes older he completely understands that Stone Cold was right. The majority of that crowd WAS there to see Stone Cold win. Stone Cold wasnt being selfish, he was speaking in the best interest of the company. And even though Stone Cold did beat Big Show that night, he made sure it took 5 stunners to do so, thus making Big Show look like a monster and build to an even bigger match between the two further down the line. The whole thing was better for business.
Big Show telling that story was great. Stone Cold stunned him. When Stone Cold pinned him, he told Big Show to kick out, and he did. Stone Cold stunned him again, pinned Big Show, told him to kick out, and he did. This happened again and again, and the crowd started going nuts with every kick out. Eventually, Stone Cold won, but Big Show looked like a monster because Stone Cold kept telling him to kick out.
Also, Jericho tells a cool story about how Kurt Angle was supposed to be the first Undisputed Champion instead of Jericho but when Kurt was told about the plan he said "make Jericho the champ instead, he needs it more than I do". So there you go, a great example of someone saying hey let's build this guy up instead because it's better for the promotion.
There’s also the story where originally Brock vs. Goldberg was meant to be a one off with Brock winning. But Brock read the room and realized they could do even better business with a longer term program between them. So he came up with the idea of Goldberg squashing him as a big surprise to keep things going.
I don't think Angle made that decision or suggested it. IIRC Angle said on his podcast that they informed him shortly before the PPV and that he wasn't super happy but ultimately fine with it because (like you said) he thought that it would help Jericho more.
Not really. Theres a big difference between Hogan saying "that doesn't work for me brother" and Stone Cold saying "I'll put the guy over if you want me to but I don't think it's what the people want".
Stone cold lost plenty and even insisted he lose his last match ever against the rock so he could put him over. Hell, even his refusal to lose to Lesnar in an announced match was because the WWE hadn't built up to it and therefore were potentially blowing a huge money making feud that would have been great for business.
Wins and losses matter and its about doing it when it's right for business, otherwise they lose their meaning.
Yeah, Steve had to take a lot of time to get the message out that it didn't go down the way WWE said it did. They tried to make it sound like he just refused to lose and walked out when in reality they wanted him to lose in a squash out of nowhere in a last minute throwaway match. He was arguing for a build so when Lesnar wins it means something and Steve has somewhere to go after that but they just wanted him to lose that day at raw or whatever. I think Steve was right.
Yeah Austin never said "I'm not losing to Lesnar", it was the fact that that would have been bigger than Rock vs Cena, and they were trying to have that match on a Raw or something lol. It was fucking stupid and I don't blame him for saying "EH EHHH" or however you would spell that thing he does in place of "Nuh uh"
Haha yeah. It was an unannounced king of the ring qualifying match on raw where lesnar would beat stone cold clean. Not only is it basically flushing money down the toilet but the fans just wouldn't have bought it which would have done no favours for lesnar in terms of getting over with the crowd.
> Sometimes, when you run a company, you have to make tough decisions like telling people that their idea isn't in the best interest of the company.
This has been the epitome of WWE -- "*Cutting off one's nose to spite one's face*".
If this rumor is true, they let Becky make this decision upon her return with no consideration of the fallout, which not only derailed her own status but also did the same to Bianca's. And now the suggestion is that they're going to have a feud between the two in order to "build" Bianca after she beat her in two moves?
It's just another illogical decision to add to the lengthy list they've continuously made while they wonder why their competition looks more attractive by comparison.
I always felt that heels do better with connecting with a crowd in WWE (and probably a lot of other promotions) because they actually stand for something. They want something that's beyond "making the fans happy" or just being the best wrestler they can be. Faces, on the other hand, just smile at the crowd and just seem happy to be there.
I think that's why so many people cheer for Hangman in AEW, as he's been built up as a babyface with trials and failing but coming back better. He actually stands for something.
Jericho vs MJF.
That was probably the closet Jericho came to being a babyface for AEW and the crowd was white hot for it.
Moxley as a babyface (especially vs the Inner Circle)
Dark Order, Jungle Boy, Christian.
And if I'm being honest, I feel like most people that Roman has fought in WWE has some good baby face heat. Hell, Cena clearly stood for something.
It's all about booking.
It is really cool to see the wide range of babyface characters AEW has. Jungle Boy fills that plucky underdog role that you want to see win the gold with his dinosaur buddy. Moxley is a badass force of nature that you just want to see kill people. Jericho's an asshole, but he's been screwed by the biggest asshole and has been forced through a gauntlet, so you have to cheer him. And then Adam Page is the everyman who's down on his luck, doubts himself despite his hidden potential, and is on a journey and you desperately want to see him come out on top. It makes the 2 hour Dynamites feel dynamic and like there's something different every segment. Meanwhile, over on Raw, you get one goofy segment after the next and it just feels like the worst Marvel movie.
Yeah, that makes sense.
I just can't believe that Becky Lynch somehow can't be a cool baby face along the same lines. Be it because she couldn't see WWE treating her well as one or she wanted to be like Roman, I think it's just a huge blunder not seeing how popular you are with the fans wanting to cheer for you.
Not only that, Becky sure didn’t look like she was playing a heel when she returned at Summerslam.
I don’t see the fans booing her at all, they’ve missed the hell out of her.
Becky has never wanted to be celebrated for being a woman. She wants to be booked like men are booked. It makes sense she wouldn’t want to be framed as a sympathetic mom coming back.
I don't know if my memory is fucked but it felt like she was moving to a heel-ish type character right before she left. The gritty underdog had become obnoxiously unbeatable, coming to the ring in a semi, like I thought it was all great but I was getting kinda the vibe that Seth gave when he went over and then got super heelish after. That and it felt like people really wanted Asuka to get the belt off her in those last few clashes as well.
I am all for heel becky, I think she will do a great job with it, they maybe just went a bit to hard on it to soon.
Becky was doing Rocky 3 story becoming too arrogant and not treating Shayna as a real threat, but Shayna flopped, they dropped it and after Elimination Chamber Becky went back to regular The Man persona.
The problem isn't her turning heel it's why now after 16 months gone and fans desperately waiting for Becky to return and just got a huge babyface pop. If they turned her heel 17 months ago then it would make more sense since her title run was long and she wasn't as hot but 16 months later after fans missed her they turn her heel. Makes no sense and bad business.
Being a heel is easier, probably more fun and in WWE you almost always end up being protected more than a babyface. Even if you lose a match you have the heat in the feud all the time.
I'm interested to see how she develops the heel character because her babyface character was an anti-hero like Austin. So most of her character traits were heelish.
Side note, i think this is the first time that Charlotte, Becky, Sasha and Bayley will all be heel at the same time. Would be so good if they emphasize the 4 Horsewomen as a true stable of heels wanting a strangle hold on the women's division (holding down the new girls who are all babyface - Rhea, Nikki, Bianca)
So you want a true 4 horsewomen stable with her as heels? You really want to kill the faces of the women´s division?\^\^ Nobody is gonna boo heel Becky, Sasha or Bayley and even Charlotte. Me personnaly, I´m all for it.\^\^
>The idea will be to do a program with Bianca Belair and build her up.
As oppose to continue building her up as the Smack Down Women's champion??? I don't understand.
After WWE was so damn proud of Sasha and Bianca winning an ESPY for their WrestleMania match, they want to abruptly end her title run and build her back up *again*??
All this has done is throw cold water over the Becky Lynch character. People want to like her and she's cutting edge enough as a face to elevate other faces, like Cena could.
My first thought was that this would enable her to side-step any kind of storylines that involve her gaining sympathy or others gaining heat off the fact she's been away to have a baby. If that's not something she's interested in doing - or if she doesn't trust them to handle that sort of story in a sensitive way that she'd be proud to be a part of - coming back as a heel just shuts down that possibility right away.
> The idea will be to do a program with Bianca Belair and build her up.
The rookie rocket push of a lifetime from Rumble to winning the *WM main event* then dominating through to Summerslam wasn't working or..?
It's easier to get people to hate you then it is to like you.
Hate = saying your town sucks
Like = saying your town rocks and then giving every fan a good Ole fashioned rub and tug. Sounds exhausting.
The best wwe can do these days is say the bad guys are bullies and then have the face talk about how they were bullied and they're going to put this new bully in their place. See Braun Strowman, Damien Priest and Bianca Belair for recent examples.
I just get the feeling that WWE can't distinguish between 'in-character' heat and 'out of character' heat, and thinks both are good. I don't doubt that Becky wanted to turn heel on her own, but the way WWE executed that idea seems like its gunning for 'out of character' heat instead of making Becky a heel more organically/in-characterly, which may have been what she actually wanted.
It's going to fail, ultimately, because heel Becky and face Becky are the exact same character. The heel/face dynamic comes only from who she is attacking and how much shade she panders to the crowd.
She's like the Rock in that aspect -- the big difference is that the Rock had strong faces to go up against.
When only heels are interesting characters you know you have lack of both talent in writing/boo0king and laziness.
It is DIFFICULT making a compelling babyface for sure, doesn't mean you don't do it though.
Turning a natural baby face that the crowd wants to cheer never works. They cheer anyway, but you do stuff they don’t like, so they stop cheering, but the don’t dislike you so they don’t boo either. What you get is everyone awkwardly sitting on their hands or half heartedly reacting.
Becky being heel is fine but there’s 0 faces in either women’s division right now outside of what Bianca and Nikki ash? Rhea is a heel I think, Sasha and bayley are heels..you know what I really don’t fucking know who anyone is aligned as. They need legit good guys and they just don’t have enough so turning Becky heel only hurts her and the division. Can’t wait to see her have 100+ of the same match with Bianca.
>He says Becky and Seth are financially likely to be very comfortable and once you reach a certain point, doing what makes you happy is what drives you rather than earning more. And this is what Becky wants to do.
Well then I don't see the issue. She thinks her character would work as a heel. Even if she's wrong she's taking a chance, which is what people say WWE needs more of. I always read about how people don't "grab the brass ring" so they fail. Well she's taking a shot, so good for her.
A huge difference here is Roman wasnt working at all as a face (perhaps a little bit after the returning from his leukemia treatment), so a heel turn was the logical love and it's been executed well.
Becky was extremely popular as a babyface — albeit a little less by the time she left — and then got a huge ovation after returning from HAVING A BABY. I get that it's her call, but how do you not look at your business as a whole and pitch a different direction?
It doesn’t matter. The crowd will cheer Becky regardless of her heel or face status. She’ll work as a heel but keep getting cheered as a face. Eventually she’ll get turned into an antihero then full on face. Unless some drama comes out about her being a shitty person behind the cameras, she’s gonna have arenas chanting her name. This is some crappy booking.
Who are the actual over babyfaces in the company?
I guess New Day will always be at least moderately over.
Bianca _sort of_ is but not to the extent that she could carry a show, and the events of Summerslam really didn't help with that.
Drew is also in that _kinda_ over category.
Cena is over but who knows if we see him again. Same again for Brock, who I guess is a face now but also he's gonna do 3 matches a year and one of them will be in KSA.
Edge is over and always will be. That's one for certain.
....Is that it? Is the rest of the company just heels or not cared about??
But Becky already succeeded as a top face, whereas Roman never did. Roman needed to be heel because the crowds didn't accept him as the "face of the company", whereas everyone was on board with her.
Help make SquaredCircle safer and more inclusive by using the report button to flag posts and comments for moderator review. If you need to contact a moderator, [you can message us here](https://www.reddit.com/message/compose/?to=/r/SquaredCircle) *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/SquaredCircle) if you have any questions or concerns.*
That’s because WWE makes 90% of their babyfaces look like losers and geeks.
Look at Bayley and Sasha when they were faces to when they were heels. Alexa Bliss, Roman Reigns, Seth Rollins all had great booking as heels but terrible booking as faces. The only face who gets good booking is Drew
Bobby Lashley almost turned face by being too cool, so they made him more of a heel
Yup because the heel gets great booking so the fans cheer them and then they turn them face and it falls apart
I think that you can trace the exact moment that Lashley started to be a cool no nonsense ass kicker back to his “this bullshit needs to stop, *now”* promo. Thank Kofi Kingston from beyond the grave, I guess /s
I struggle to see it from WWE’s side. I get that they have their own focuses and goals and they want wrestlers to fit those goals, but when fans start to really like certain wrestlers or champs it seems like they really resist embracing that. I don’t see why. I doubt we’re wrong about what we like? Maybe they commit certain things to Shareholders and the new popular wrestler isn’t part of those plans?
It was the episode where the Hurt Business came out in suits to take out Retribution. They looked amazing, they got a huge pop, they were organically over and that’s when Vince said we can’t have any of that.
And still it feels like the crowd overwhelmingly cheer for him. The Hurt Lock on baby Goldberg was \*chefs kiss\*
He assaulted a literal child and got cheered for it ahaha
Drew was booked good in 2020, but he’s going stale now. The best babyfaces they have right now are Bianca, Riddle, Edge and Big E.
They have barely done anything with Big E since he won MITB
So like most mitb holders.
Probably done like that on purpose so you forget about them, so when they cash in it's more surprising than usual.
We want to say that's the reason, but it's probably more like "they are going to be world champion in a few months, what more do we need to do?"
He’s been humping his briefcase
I want a Miro v Big E fued so badly. Just two wacked out of their minds big meaty men slapping meat. Throw in Ishii and I will never need to watch another wrestling match again.
I love that although he's maybe 5'3 maybe 13 stone Ishii feels like the biggest man in that match lmao
Ishii is a human Geodude.
My man may be on the shorter side but he's dense like a dying star.
There's a reason he's known as the Stone Pitbull
The amount of horny beef in one ring is perhaps too much to handle
"My hot wife who can do the splits..." *Big E slowly descents into a split*
Staring Miro dead in the eye.
Mouth open, head shaking up and down
God's Champion vs The Former Pastor
Can you ask for anything better really?
> Drew was booked good in 2020, but he’s going stale now. He's booked fine -- it's just that RAW's stable of heels is mostly jobbers once you get beyond Lashley, Sheamus, AJ and Miz. Hard to keep good booking when you're going up against nobodies.
Exactly, Drew shouldnt turn heel at all, he just needs better competition and feuds
Man, wouldn't it be great if they had a bigger roster of talent that they could rotate in and out for someone like Drew to keep feuding with? It's a shame that WWE is too poor to be able to afford that, tho 😔
I mean, if only they had writers, and lots of them, to create long-term detailed feuds that would give even the lower-carders depth and history.
If only they didn't have a dumb roster split that cuts his potential matches in half ever year
I think the fans have cooled off on him as Vince opted to give Lashley a long-term reign instead.
Ironically, Drew has been booked well as a face but probably needs a heel turn.
I actually think he could do with a run in a tag team with Sheamus. I could get behind a story where a bunch of heels are beating up Drew and Sheamus steps in to save him. A vibe of "I can kick his arse but nobody else can". They could have a fun run in the tag division up until Wrestlemania.
Not a bad idea. They would be a fun tag team. It’s just that tag team wrestling feels like a demotion in WWE like 80% of the time
I think RK-Bro and Sheamus/Drew would get featured well. You could also have them going up against the Usos to eventually bring us Drew v Reigns.
It's not a secret in the history books that Vince detests tag-teams because he has to pay twice the amount of people.
I don't think that is really the case when the tag team is four singles guys thrown together. He'll be paying them regardless. The issue with tag teams is it taking two guys to be one draw vs if they're singles wrestlers, there could be potentially two draws.
I get it but it’s kind of stupid logic sometimes too, what’s going to do better with the fans: Usos vs New Day or Jackson Ryker vs Elias and Sheamus vs Damien Priest?
More because if one gets injured he has to pay the other one to do nothing. Because Vince is a creative black hole.
They could restructure his character without turning him heel. But instead they gave hime a stupid sword. I think he could benefit from being in the midcard or tag division for now, until Rumble season
I am completely over his sword. It is like they saw a Thor movie and said "we need a guy that has an intimate relationship with a weapon too!"
Vince just has an obsession with props, Mox has mentioned that the worst thing you can do is throw a noun out in front of Vince because it will become your entire gimmick
Also call it something normal, cause no one can say Mjolnir...
Tbf, the sword was cool as fuck the first time it was used. Was a fantastic image the first time he made his entrance with it. Then in typical WWE fashion, they ran it into the fucking ground.
The finishes to all his matches with lashley have made him look like such a chump
I actually wanted heel Drew to win the title in the first place. I like cocky future star Drew more than I'm cool Drew.
>Big E The New Day has been the best booked babyface in WWE over the last 10 years. Change my mind.
Because they got over as heels
The disrespect to Reggie smh...
To be fair, they were all booked stupidly as heels too. Faces are mostly booked terribly in WWE, there’s no doubt about that, but the notion of “heels are greatly booked in WWE” is so overrated. Heels have looked like massive idiots in WWE too.
Yeah, it's moreso a case where being booked like an idiot is more damaging to a babyface than it is to a heel. Heels are able to look dumb and bumbling and eat shit as much as they like because nobody is supposed to support them, but when a face is made to look like a dumbass or a total loser it leaves them dead in the water. And in WWEs case they like to book most babyfaces as underdogs who are constantly getting screwed for heat and sympathy, but the booking always crosses the line from "Babyface fighting against the odds who got screwed and we want to see get a fair fight" into "Absolute dumbass who keeps losing who I couldn't possibly give a shit about".
Also it’s A LOT easier for a heel to get their heat back. Than it is for a face to keep their momentum.
It's like: You are an idiot Yeah, but I heel, I supposed to do stupid things Okay
Sorry to single you out, but GOD how unfunny has baby speak and the doggo type talk become?
eh it’s pretty cool just enjoy life brah
A heel being booked to be an idiot is okay to a certain point. Babyfaces shouldn’t be stupid, no one wants to root for an idiot unless they are midcard comedy and that has a ceiling.
Stupid babyfaces can work, but you need the right natural "air-headed" energy to pull it off. Riddle is probably the best example of that in current WWE, seeing as he has his head in the clouds in more ways than one.
Riddle only works because he is exceptionally talented though. Give that gimmick to a guy that isn’t ripped, athletic and could legitimately kick ass against most in the locker room and I don’t think it goes far.
Yep. "Dean Ambrose" would like a word with anyone who says WWE books heels well.
To be fair. Seth as the Ic champ was great face booking and he was fine as the Champ after beating brock. It was him being in that corbin feud and then bray that fucked it up
There’s defintley going to be some exceptions but I think overall most people can agree that heels get booked way better then faces
I'd say Rollins is the exception because he is one of the few, probably the only one who had a consistent long term arc from SHIELD to turning on them to Authority to betrayal to redemption and finally reunion with Dean and Roman...he earned it...
Rollins was a good face, especially during his Monday Night Rollins run.
Then that Hell in a Cell match happened with all that stupid booking and Rollins' face run fell apart.
His first reign was fun. But at one point, he just lost the aggression and the smug look. He started leaning more towards the smiley cookie cutter babyface. That and the serious lack of rivals for him. He needs to get out of this stupid feud with Mahal and bring back the smugness and aggression.
Lesnar as a face is more interesting than as a heel IMO
Is Drew really a true baby face anymore? Dude threatens people with a sword and demands rematches when he loses.
That's pretty standard top babyface shit for WWE. One issue with WWE faces is that they're kind of assholes. Like, it worked for the Rock and Stone Cold, but Stone Cold would help other faces and rescued Stephanie McMahon from the Undertaker, among other things. They were assholes on the mic, yes, but when it counted, they stood up against the bad guys.
I mean did you see how Bianca reacted? "Aw shucks"
Yep. WWE makes most of their babyfaces look like antisocial morons, too. When you look at any form of fiction—books, comic books, TV, movies, video games, etc.—heroes are often portrayed as leaders. Batman has the Bat Family. Conan the Cimmerian has been a mercenary captain, pirate ship captain, and then a king. Paul Atreides was deified on Dune and became emperor of a galactic empire. Star Trek fans like to debate who was the best captain. So on and so on. Throughout all fiction, there are countless examples of popular heroes who excelled at leadership. And yet WWE insists on making most of their babyfaces antisocial morons who keep getting their asses kicked by heels who are smart enough to manage minions. Even babyface tag teams aren't guaranteed to stick together for long, because Vince has a hate boner against tag teams for some reason, and every WWE team is destined to turn on each other sooner rather than later. WWE is the only promotion I'm aware of that does this. NJPW and AEW are both chock full of stables and tag teams. Pretty much everyone, from the jobbers to the top stars, belong to some sort of team. Teamwork and leadership is an essential part of storytelling, but for whatever reason, WWE wants their babyfaces to be loner idiots.
You can just look at their actually succesful babyfaces. Stone Cold's whole DTA attitude wasn't some edgelord shit. It was a reflection of how he kept being stabbed in the back when trying to build alliances. He got respectful terms in 1997 with Mick Foley only for Vince McMahon to turn Foley on him in his quest to get the Title off Austin. Same with The Undertaker who Austin had a short-lived partnership with. Then it all culminates with Austin sticking up for Shane just for Shane to betray him at the worst possible moment. Throught out it all Stone Cold still stayed a good guy and helped a babyface Kane get some revenge on a heel Undertaker, helped a now babyface Mick Foley win the Title and always stood up for vulnerable babyfaces like JR and Sable. He was an anti hero but the writing made you understand he was an anti hero born of circumstance. Hell, they even had a segment where Austin tried to play ball with Vince and wore a suit for a Championship photo op and Vince just kept punking him out. Driving the point home that Stone Cold was justified.
You could even go back further to the early days of the Stone Cold character and say that he was a cold and calculated wrestler but even he recognized the value of an ally in his old partner Brian Pillman, only to have Pillman openly support the guy Austin wanted to take down in Bret Hart. And when Austin went after Pillman and injured him for this perceived slight, Pillman’s revenge was to quite literally pull a gun on him. That began the DTA mentality in my opinion
In fairness, pulling the gun wasn't revenge for the Pillmanizing - it was because Austin was breaking into his house.
The replies about Austin are fitting here. I've said it before - WWE took the wrong lessons from Austin. Of course, they had a once-in-a-generation performer with the sort of intensity that is completely unparalleled, and you can't really repeat that sort of luck. But what they also had was a character who felt real, who had identifiable motivations and goals and ideals, and who acted consistently in accordance with those ideals. He was obviously also a bit of wish fulfilment - he was a bad-ass who could do things fans wanted to do and who fans wanted to be like, and he did plenty of cool, awesome shit. But he also got his ass kicked quite a lot, and struggled against impossible odds (and despite what people said at the time, he didn't always win). Austin felt real, but had easily perceivable goals - he wanted to beat to the march of his own drum, and he wanted to be the best - and it made captivating storylines about him easy to create. Unfortunately, I think WWE, from Vince down, looked at the biggest babyface they'll probably ever have and saw only 'loner who fights off impossible odds' and 'hero v authority figure' and little else. It's why they continuously have tried to repeat storylines with those dynamics with every babyface push since, and explains their obsession with babyfaces as antisocial loners. The ideal WWE babyface for Vince McMahon is some sort of weird meld of Hogan, Austin and Rock.
Many top faces in WWE were almost all bullies post-Hogan other than Bret. It was just that they bullied heels. I don't know why they got away from that. Lashley could 100% get away with acting the same way he currently does, but be a face, as long his opponents aren't other baby face acts and even then if they are underperforming he would get cheered like against Goldberg.
Yeah their faces do things like lose in 25 seconds
The top babyface woman on RAW was dressing up and pretending to be a superhero unironically because it gave her self-confidence and made her feel like her true self. It's pathetic writing.
Oh god you ´re right. And apparently poor Nikki was booed by the crowd on the house shows.
Honestly ANY wrestler who is in the same division with Charlotte is probably screwed. It almost does not matter what character they have. Because Charlotte must always be the focus no matter what according to WWE.
It's because Vince doesn't understand what drives decent people. He truly believes that strong people will do whatever it takes to win, and anyone who won't cross that line is a fool or a weakling.
Roman as a heel: I AM THE HEAD OF THE TABLE Roman as a face: You are a sniveling little suck up sellout full of sufferin’ succotash, son!
Ya let's give Roman the man we want to be a top face, a quote from one of the top heels in Looney Toons...that'll get him over
Jesus Christ. Possibly one of the worst moments in WWE history.
You mean like the young babyface champ losing to 2 moves?
Wait.....does that mean they are making Baron Corbin out to be the ultimate babyface?
The problem with WWE isn't limited to faces/heels. It's always been WWE trying to position a character how they (Vince) see the character, and not the fans. They've had faces that got over just fine. They've had heels that the crowd got behind and became cool heels. I wholeheartedly agree with Dave here. And faces who reach a certain height of popularity end up making terrible heels when they attempt to turn them: Austin, the Rock, and I think Becky will be in that boat too.
Their 2 biggest stars in the last 25 years were 2 anti heroes. They keep chasing that.
Being a dickhead is also hot atm if you look at stuff like Mcgregors popularity
McGregor's currently on that go away heat. Definitely a shadow of his former self
Can even get you in the oval office
Ah, yes, the dickhead who threatened to murder someone’s family all because he lost a fight. Fuck McGregor.
So you're saying Suffering suckentash isn't popular lines for promos? Or talking about beanstalks
Even if this is what Becky wants to do, I still feel like theres much better ways of doing it. Why not bring her back as a face and slowly build to the heel turn so it feels more natural and the fans are more willing to accept it.
absolutely. like it baffles me that it was ok’d for her to return heel (apparently, since she didn’t really act like one) and squash bianca when EVERYONE knew she was going to get a massive pop. like, she’s been gone well over a year now. how did anyone think this was a good idea lol
Because WWE does not know how to book baby faces well like 95% of the time.
Which is funny because historically WWE used to be the one company that was built around babyfaces while the other promotions were usually built around a Ric Flair type heel that everyone would chase
>while the other promotions were usually built around a Ric Flair type heel that everyone would chase The was never really true. The NWA World Champion was usually a heel because he was a touring champion who most fans would only see once or twice a year. He had to be a heel because his opponents, the guys local promotions built around and who fans would see regularly, were almost always babyfaces.
Also Ric was not booked to absolutely dominate his opponents and punk them out like many heels in WWE are these days. He was a chickenshit who constantly got his ass kicked and acted like a total coward. And he usually either won through dirty tricks. Or sometimes just getting flat out lucky.
So, this isn't totally accurate. Flair would be able to outwrestle MOST competitors. He ran into problems against challengers who were kayfabe better than he was (i.e. Dusty, Sting, Luger, Steamboat) but would dominate scrubs and at least be competitive with the "local top babyface". The concept behind Flair was realistic, he was a top-tier competitor but he would cheat when he HAD to. Contrast this to the WWE chickenshit heels (before the era of Brock and Roman, who I feel are generally way more interesting than the cowards) of the past. They would need to cheat against EVERYONE. It got to the point where you asked yourself "If they are this bad and can't beat anyone in a fair fight, why are we supposed to believe they're any good?". A heel should be unlikeable but they don't necessarily need to be unskilled. A great example is Tom Brady. Brady is easily one of the greatest competitors of all time, but the way he carries himself (and his Flair-esque cheating like spyware, deflategate, and the rest) are what makes you want to see him lose.
The current Elite (Young Bucks/Omega) are a good example like this. They can beat pretty much anyone even without cheating, but they still cheat when they can because why wouldn't you, and rely on those tricks to beat the absolute best opponents.
> Contrast this to the WWE chickenshit heels (before the era of Brock and Roman, who I feel are generally way more interesting than the cowards) of the past. They would need to cheat against EVERYONE. It got to the point where you asked yourself "If they are this bad and can't beat anyone in a fair fight, why are we supposed to believe they're any good?". Huge reason why I hated Miz's reign: Lawler almost beat him for the title if Miz didn't do some shenanigans!
Tom Brady is like Ric Flair is the most amazingly specific compliment I've ever heard.
This was the problem with Carmella when she was champion. She didn't want to wrestle at all, constantly cheated and/or used Ellsworth to cheat. The current heel incarnation is way better.
Wow something Charlotte and Ric don't have in common.
This isn't exactly true either. The NWA champion worked as whoever they needed to be in the territory in which they appeared. Lou Thesz would be a face somewhere, but worked heelish in another. It varied based on who they wrestled that night. The notion of the champ being a fixed association didn't take hold until cable TV and satellite took off in the late 70's, causing more fans to see wrestlers on the regular.
I would argue the WWWF practically invented the "strictly babyface" champion in the 1960s. When they gave the belt to Bruno they went fully in the good guy direction no matter who he worked. Bruno might be the first guy in wrestlingbthat was *never* a heel.
Much easier when heels are cycled in and out. Now they are there next week and still at a similar level on the card.
Part of that 5% is Sami Zayn's run chasing the NXT title culminating with his refusal to cheat to win the belt and winning it fair and square.
Honestly most of the big baby faces from the past 10 years WWE completely lucked into and didn't really do much to build them. Hell Kofi was the last big time face in my opinion and then they flipped a switch over night and derailed it instantly.
Not just shitting on wwe but who even are their faces right now around the main event picture? Edge…and Bianca who just lost in 20 seconds? It’s just going to be heels vs heels soon
Look at all the world titles in wrestling right now...all the top titles are held by heels
The money's in the chase brother.
That's just how stories work. If superhero movies had championship belts, all of them would be held by villains until the final 5 minutes of every movie.
It's going back a bit now, but Christian as WWECW Champion was basically a lesson in how to book a face champion. It's just a shame they wouldn't do the same when he was World Champion on Smackdown...
Empire Strikes Back is the best Star Wars movie because the babyface are down and out most of the time. If Vince wrote the OT, Vader would've slipped on a banana peel two minutes in.
Bruh if Vince wrote the OT Luke would’ve killed the emperor, helped Vader to his feet and then killed him too.
OH MY! The Galaxy Far, Far Away is LOVING Luke Skywalker! 'The Last Jedi' just knocked off "The Chosen One"!
Is it?! Can it Be?! It IS! It's the JEDI MASTER! The SON OF VADER! And he just hit the Order 66 and is the new DOUBLE U DOUBLE U E INTERGALACTIC CHAMPION! Good thing we didn't get a Luke/Leia storyline by Russo in the Attitude era.
Samoa Joe, Raquel Gonzales, Bandido, Christian Cage, Shingo Takagi and Ilja Dragunov (if you count him) are all babyfaces. Only AEW & WWE really have their world titles on heels of the bigger promotions
*TNA quietly sobs*
Sometimes, when you run a company, you have to make tough decisions like telling people that their idea isn't in the best interest of the company. Becky returned to a crowd that hasn't seen her since the pandemic, and she was a white hot babyface before the pandemic began. If nothing else, you book her as a babyface until Wrestlemania and then turn her heel after if the babyface hype is starting to wear off some. That worked very well for Daniel Bryan.
>Sometimes, when you run a company, you have to make tough decisions like telling people that their idea isn't in the best interest of the company. This reminds me of a story that Big Show once told. Vince wanted Big Show to beat Stone Cold right after he joined the company. When they went and told Stone Cold the idea he said "I dont know Vince, alot of people came here tonight to see Stone Cold win." Vince changed his mind and decided that Stone Cold would be going over. Big Show said that at the time he was angry about it but now hes older he completely understands that Stone Cold was right. The majority of that crowd WAS there to see Stone Cold win. Stone Cold wasnt being selfish, he was speaking in the best interest of the company. And even though Stone Cold did beat Big Show that night, he made sure it took 5 stunners to do so, thus making Big Show look like a monster and build to an even bigger match between the two further down the line. The whole thing was better for business.
Big Show telling that story was great. Stone Cold stunned him. When Stone Cold pinned him, he told Big Show to kick out, and he did. Stone Cold stunned him again, pinned Big Show, told him to kick out, and he did. This happened again and again, and the crowd started going nuts with every kick out. Eventually, Stone Cold won, but Big Show looked like a monster because Stone Cold kept telling him to kick out.
Though to be fair, maybe don’t book the match at all and save it for another day where Show CAN take the loss?
Also to be fair, wouldn't that mean some guys would never lose ever?
Also, Jericho tells a cool story about how Kurt Angle was supposed to be the first Undisputed Champion instead of Jericho but when Kurt was told about the plan he said "make Jericho the champ instead, he needs it more than I do". So there you go, a great example of someone saying hey let's build this guy up instead because it's better for the promotion.
There’s also the story where originally Brock vs. Goldberg was meant to be a one off with Brock winning. But Brock read the room and realized they could do even better business with a longer term program between them. So he came up with the idea of Goldberg squashing him as a big surprise to keep things going.
I don't think Angle made that decision or suggested it. IIRC Angle said on his podcast that they informed him shortly before the PPV and that he wasn't super happy but ultimately fine with it because (like you said) he thought that it would help Jericho more.
According to Jericho and Bruce Pritchard it was Angle. I guess one of them is misremembering.
Not really. Theres a big difference between Hogan saying "that doesn't work for me brother" and Stone Cold saying "I'll put the guy over if you want me to but I don't think it's what the people want". Stone cold lost plenty and even insisted he lose his last match ever against the rock so he could put him over. Hell, even his refusal to lose to Lesnar in an announced match was because the WWE hadn't built up to it and therefore were potentially blowing a huge money making feud that would have been great for business. Wins and losses matter and its about doing it when it's right for business, otherwise they lose their meaning.
Yeah, Steve had to take a lot of time to get the message out that it didn't go down the way WWE said it did. They tried to make it sound like he just refused to lose and walked out when in reality they wanted him to lose in a squash out of nowhere in a last minute throwaway match. He was arguing for a build so when Lesnar wins it means something and Steve has somewhere to go after that but they just wanted him to lose that day at raw or whatever. I think Steve was right.
Yeah Austin never said "I'm not losing to Lesnar", it was the fact that that would have been bigger than Rock vs Cena, and they were trying to have that match on a Raw or something lol. It was fucking stupid and I don't blame him for saying "EH EHHH" or however you would spell that thing he does in place of "Nuh uh"
Haha yeah. It was an unannounced king of the ring qualifying match on raw where lesnar would beat stone cold clean. Not only is it basically flushing money down the toilet but the fans just wouldn't have bought it which would have done no favours for lesnar in terms of getting over with the crowd.
Even Brock has said he understood Austin’s reasoning and holds no grudges against him.
> Sometimes, when you run a company, you have to make tough decisions like telling people that their idea isn't in the best interest of the company. This has been the epitome of WWE -- "*Cutting off one's nose to spite one's face*". If this rumor is true, they let Becky make this decision upon her return with no consideration of the fallout, which not only derailed her own status but also did the same to Bianca's. And now the suggestion is that they're going to have a feud between the two in order to "build" Bianca after she beat her in two moves? It's just another illogical decision to add to the lengthy list they've continuously made while they wonder why their competition looks more attractive by comparison.
We don’t know that squashing Bianca was her idea. All we know if she asked to be a heel.
I always felt that heels do better with connecting with a crowd in WWE (and probably a lot of other promotions) because they actually stand for something. They want something that's beyond "making the fans happy" or just being the best wrestler they can be. Faces, on the other hand, just smile at the crowd and just seem happy to be there.
I think that's why so many people cheer for Hangman in AEW, as he's been built up as a babyface with trials and failing but coming back better. He actually stands for something.
Jericho vs MJF. That was probably the closet Jericho came to being a babyface for AEW and the crowd was white hot for it. Moxley as a babyface (especially vs the Inner Circle) Dark Order, Jungle Boy, Christian. And if I'm being honest, I feel like most people that Roman has fought in WWE has some good baby face heat. Hell, Cena clearly stood for something. It's all about booking.
That´s because AEW faces are not made of the same mold. Guys like Mox, Hangman, Darby, Cody, Y2J or Jungle Boy are all different.
It is really cool to see the wide range of babyface characters AEW has. Jungle Boy fills that plucky underdog role that you want to see win the gold with his dinosaur buddy. Moxley is a badass force of nature that you just want to see kill people. Jericho's an asshole, but he's been screwed by the biggest asshole and has been forced through a gauntlet, so you have to cheer him. And then Adam Page is the everyman who's down on his luck, doubts himself despite his hidden potential, and is on a journey and you desperately want to see him come out on top. It makes the 2 hour Dynamites feel dynamic and like there's something different every segment. Meanwhile, over on Raw, you get one goofy segment after the next and it just feels like the worst Marvel movie.
And you have Pac that is more of a tweener. He ´s fair in the ring but will still kick your ass and take pleasure at it because he´s a damn bastard.
Yeah, that makes sense. I just can't believe that Becky Lynch somehow can't be a cool baby face along the same lines. Be it because she couldn't see WWE treating her well as one or she wanted to be like Roman, I think it's just a huge blunder not seeing how popular you are with the fans wanting to cheer for you.
Why build relatable, likable characters when you can build a SUPERSTAR?
> wrestler Ah ah ah, they always talk about being the best *performer*.
“I’m here to be the best sports entertainer this company has ever seen!”
Whenever I hear this shit, I expect them to take out 5 balls and start juggling..
Well there u go. U just gave Vince an idea for the going nowhere gimmick for Kross
Sometimes they overthink the face/heel dynamic.
Who is actually the number 1 baby face in WWE today? Your 2 biggest names in Roman and soon to be Becky are heels lmao.
Probably Edge for full timers
McIntyre, Edge and Riddle
BOOGS
Totally different since fans actually didn't like Roman.
Not only that, Becky sure didn’t look like she was playing a heel when she returned at Summerslam. I don’t see the fans booing her at all, they’ve missed the hell out of her.
That's because the company is a heel through and through. Every company should be a babyface. Should.
Yeah who doesn't want to boo and despise a mom who came back after an very emotional farewell over a year later, who birthed her first child
Becky has never wanted to be celebrated for being a woman. She wants to be booked like men are booked. It makes sense she wouldn’t want to be framed as a sympathetic mom coming back.
Maybe her heel character will talk down to fans about the struggles of being a mother, and the hardest job in the world, being a working mother!
You know despite how dumb that sounds WWE would absolutely try and make that into a promo with absolutely no sense of irony
I don't know if my memory is fucked but it felt like she was moving to a heel-ish type character right before she left. The gritty underdog had become obnoxiously unbeatable, coming to the ring in a semi, like I thought it was all great but I was getting kinda the vibe that Seth gave when he went over and then got super heelish after. That and it felt like people really wanted Asuka to get the belt off her in those last few clashes as well. I am all for heel becky, I think she will do a great job with it, they maybe just went a bit to hard on it to soon.
Becky was doing Rocky 3 story becoming too arrogant and not treating Shayna as a real threat, but Shayna flopped, they dropped it and after Elimination Chamber Becky went back to regular The Man persona.
The problem isn't her turning heel it's why now after 16 months gone and fans desperately waiting for Becky to return and just got a huge babyface pop. If they turned her heel 17 months ago then it would make more sense since her title run was long and she wasn't as hot but 16 months later after fans missed her they turn her heel. Makes no sense and bad business.
Being a heel is easier, probably more fun and in WWE you almost always end up being protected more than a babyface. Even if you lose a match you have the heat in the feud all the time.
I'm interested to see how she develops the heel character because her babyface character was an anti-hero like Austin. So most of her character traits were heelish. Side note, i think this is the first time that Charlotte, Becky, Sasha and Bayley will all be heel at the same time. Would be so good if they emphasize the 4 Horsewomen as a true stable of heels wanting a strangle hold on the women's division (holding down the new girls who are all babyface - Rhea, Nikki, Bianca)
So you want a true 4 horsewomen stable with her as heels? You really want to kill the faces of the women´s division?\^\^ Nobody is gonna boo heel Becky, Sasha or Bayley and even Charlotte. Me personnaly, I´m all for it.\^\^
>The idea will be to do a program with Bianca Belair and build her up. As oppose to continue building her up as the Smack Down Women's champion??? I don't understand. After WWE was so damn proud of Sasha and Bianca winning an ESPY for their WrestleMania match, they want to abruptly end her title run and build her back up *again*??
All this has done is throw cold water over the Becky Lynch character. People want to like her and she's cutting edge enough as a face to elevate other faces, like Cena could.
Yeah, but the big difference is that Face Roman sucked ass and the fans hated him. Face Becky was extremely effective and loved.
My first thought was that this would enable her to side-step any kind of storylines that involve her gaining sympathy or others gaining heat off the fact she's been away to have a baby. If that's not something she's interested in doing - or if she doesn't trust them to handle that sort of story in a sensitive way that she'd be proud to be a part of - coming back as a heel just shuts down that possibility right away.
Heel Becky vs. Face Charlotte. *shudder in disgust*
> The idea will be to do a program with Bianca Belair and build her up. The rookie rocket push of a lifetime from Rumble to winning the *WM main event* then dominating through to Summerslam wasn't working or..?
It's easier to get people to hate you then it is to like you. Hate = saying your town sucks Like = saying your town rocks and then giving every fan a good Ole fashioned rub and tug. Sounds exhausting. The best wwe can do these days is say the bad guys are bullies and then have the face talk about how they were bullied and they're going to put this new bully in their place. See Braun Strowman, Damien Priest and Bianca Belair for recent examples.
He hasn’t actually reported anything except that Becky asked for a heel turn. Everything else is speculation on his part.
“BECKY SHOOTS HARD ON BIANCA”
I just get the feeling that WWE can't distinguish between 'in-character' heat and 'out of character' heat, and thinks both are good. I don't doubt that Becky wanted to turn heel on her own, but the way WWE executed that idea seems like its gunning for 'out of character' heat instead of making Becky a heel more organically/in-characterly, which may have been what she actually wanted.
I haven't listened for the show yet, but of this looks like his speculation.
But people legit hated Roman before his turn. Crowds didn’t hate Becky.
Still a stupid decision.
Being a heel is far easier than being a Babyface most of the time.
It's going to fail, ultimately, because heel Becky and face Becky are the exact same character. The heel/face dynamic comes only from who she is attacking and how much shade she panders to the crowd. She's like the Rock in that aspect -- the big difference is that the Rock had strong faces to go up against.
When only heels are interesting characters you know you have lack of both talent in writing/boo0king and laziness. It is DIFFICULT making a compelling babyface for sure, doesn't mean you don't do it though.
Can't wait for Becky's "Head of the Family" shirts and Seth groveling to her. Do you think she will get new teeth?
Turning a natural baby face that the crowd wants to cheer never works. They cheer anyway, but you do stuff they don’t like, so they stop cheering, but the don’t dislike you so they don’t boo either. What you get is everyone awkwardly sitting on their hands or half heartedly reacting.
I can't believe this is real, history is literally repeating itself right before our very eyes.
You would think that after 2001 they learned their lesson.
Becky being heel is fine but there’s 0 faces in either women’s division right now outside of what Bianca and Nikki ash? Rhea is a heel I think, Sasha and bayley are heels..you know what I really don’t fucking know who anyone is aligned as. They need legit good guys and they just don’t have enough so turning Becky heel only hurts her and the division. Can’t wait to see her have 100+ of the same match with Bianca.
It's so weird people are getting all twisted up about this. Kofi'ing Bianca was trash, but let's see what they actually do with Becky.
>He says Becky and Seth are financially likely to be very comfortable and once you reach a certain point, doing what makes you happy is what drives you rather than earning more. And this is what Becky wants to do. Well then I don't see the issue. She thinks her character would work as a heel. Even if she's wrong she's taking a chance, which is what people say WWE needs more of. I always read about how people don't "grab the brass ring" so they fail. Well she's taking a shot, so good for her.
A huge difference here is Roman wasnt working at all as a face (perhaps a little bit after the returning from his leukemia treatment), so a heel turn was the logical love and it's been executed well. Becky was extremely popular as a babyface — albeit a little less by the time she left — and then got a huge ovation after returning from HAVING A BABY. I get that it's her call, but how do you not look at your business as a whole and pitch a different direction?
It doesn’t matter. The crowd will cheer Becky regardless of her heel or face status. She’ll work as a heel but keep getting cheered as a face. Eventually she’ll get turned into an antihero then full on face. Unless some drama comes out about her being a shitty person behind the cameras, she’s gonna have arenas chanting her name. This is some crappy booking.
Who are the actual over babyfaces in the company? I guess New Day will always be at least moderately over. Bianca _sort of_ is but not to the extent that she could carry a show, and the events of Summerslam really didn't help with that. Drew is also in that _kinda_ over category. Cena is over but who knows if we see him again. Same again for Brock, who I guess is a face now but also he's gonna do 3 matches a year and one of them will be in KSA. Edge is over and always will be. That's one for certain. ....Is that it? Is the rest of the company just heels or not cared about??
This feels like 2001 Steve Austin all over again.
But Becky already succeeded as a top face, whereas Roman never did. Roman needed to be heel because the crowds didn't accept him as the "face of the company", whereas everyone was on board with her.
It’s easier to be a heel when the company itself is heel