Got a question for the wrestling fan, "smarks".

[mjr]

Ok, my wife and I were just talking about this.

We're curious how "marks" (i.e. the ones who think the feuds are real, etc.) reconcile major changes to a character, mainly in the WWE.

For instance, "Albert", or "Prince Albert" is now "Lord Tensai". It's the same dude.

Same thing with Mick Foley/Cactus Jack/Mankind/Dude Love. Same guy, different characters.

"Leapin' Lanny" Poffo, and "The Genius". They were the same guy.

Same with Val Venus/Sean Morely.

Even John Cena, when he first broke in, was "The Prototype".

Big Bossman was Big Bubba Rogers in WCW.

We were just wondering how they reconciled that.

[AnaKhouri]

As for Mick Foley, all his personalities were contained in one person- he 'had' multiple personality disorder.

I don't know about the others.

[Zapper]

If they're dumb enough to think it's real, I don't think figuring out different personas is much of an issue.

[dendawg]

As a longtime WWE fan (pre rock & wrestling. ) and somewhat of a smark, I kinda enjoy finding out previous characters portrayed by a wrestler, then again I'm also a bit of a useless info junkie.

Seriously though, it's best not to put too much thought into analyzing the storylines. It's way better just to go with it, realize it's entertainment, and enjoy the show.

[PizzaDrone]

Interesting question! Weirdly, some of the gimmicks speak for themselves. I'm not sure, but I think I remember commentators referencing the fact that Tensai used to work for them before, but underwent a spiritual/physical transformation in Japan before returning. Val Venis' previous persona was mentioned a couple of times too if I remember correctly and was sort of brushed off as, 'yes, I was an adult performer...now I'm in power' kind of deal, although my memory is a little fuzzy.

The problem is, wrestling is so profoundly unlogical (one only has to look to the irish whip for evidence of this - a staple move but makes no sense at all!) that it makes any sort of continuity incredibly difficult. In the same way that they trade off nostalgia, but often require fans and obsessives to forget important facts (the most recent being ignoring HHH/Taker's Wrestlemania 17 match before their latest 2) there's just no winning, but they do like their inside jokes too.

[Jay 2K Winger]

Generally, unless the previous persona is acknowledged, it's assumed that it's a different guy.

Example: Glenn Jacobs, the man who wrestles now as Kane, was previously known as the "fake" Diesel and then as Isaac Yankem, DDS. However, this is never acknowledged on air, thus, it's treated as though they really were completely different people.

It's difficult to say how the real "marks" reconcile them. In the case of Albert/A-Train/Tensai, they do acknowledge he'd been in WWE before, without stating specifically who he was. I think they said something like "he went to Japan and 'went native' while wrestling there."

As for John Cena, he was never "The Prototype" in WWE. On the indies and in OVW, yes, but that's always treated as being "not in WWE," and thus doesn't count.

If they ever acknowledge a previous persona on the air, they'll usually come up with some throwaway line that can be easily stated for the first couple of months by the commentators to explain the change in gimmick. Like Jack Swagger, for instance. The change in his character from 'All-American American' jock-type to 'Real American' anti-immigrant militant by saying that Zeb Colter's "brainwashed" him.

[mjr]

Generally, unless the previous persona is acknowledged, it's assumed that it's a different guy.

Example: Glenn Jacobs, the man who wrestles now as Kane, was previously known as the "fake" Diesel and then as Isaac Yankem, DDS. However, this is never acknowledged on air, thus, it's treated as though they really were completely different people.

It's difficult to say how the real "marks" reconcile them. In the case of Albert/A-Train/Tensai, they do acknowledge he'd been in WWE before, without stating specifically who he was. I think they said something like "he went to Japan and 'went native' while wrestling there."

As for John Cena, he was never "The Prototype" in WWE. On the indies and in OVW, yes, but that's always treated as being "not in WWE," and thus doesn't count.

If they ever acknowledge a previous persona on the air, they'll usually come up with some throwaway line that can be easily stated for the first couple of months by the commentators to explain the change in gimmick. Like Jack Swagger, for instance. The change in his character from 'All-American American' jock-type to 'Real American' anti-immigrant militant by saying that Zeb Colter's "brainwashed" him.

I thought I recalled John Cena wrestling as "The Prototype" at Raw several years back. Though that might have been a dark match or a tryout. But I understand your point.

I'd forgotten all about "fake Diesel" and Isaac Yankem, DDS.

That's almost like when they got Undertaker's buddy Brian Lee to play "Fake Undertaker", and fans would refer to him as UnderFaker.

But I remember back to when Triple H first started wrestling. I wonder if some of the younger fans know what Triple H stands for, and how he got that moniker.

"The Connecticut Blueblood", Hunter Hearst Helmsley.

[Jay 2K Winger]

Yep, HHH = Hunter Hearst Helmsley. "The Connecticut Blue Blood." Hence also why his finisher is called "The Pedigree."

I don't recall the reason they gave for the change in his character from snooty aristocrat to anti-authority degenerate.

As far as I recall, Cena never wrestled as "The Prototype." If he dropped that name at some point, it was probably as a nudge-nudge-wink-wink to the smarks. Cena's debut was on Smackdown, not long after Vince McMahon coined the "ruthless aggression" term, when Cena answered an open challenge by Kurt Angle, and gave him a pretty competitive match.

Cena started out as a pretty bland, if keyed-up and aggressive, guy with trunks whose colors tended to be those of the local popular sports team (at a DC house show, it was burgundy and gold, the Redskins colors).

He was actually on the verge of being cut and "future endeavored"* when a member of the creative team overheard him freestyling on a bus on an overseas trip.

The Halloween episode of Smackdown was coming up, so they had Cena dress up as Vanilla Ice and freestyle backstage at someone, and it just continued from there. He'd wear throwback jerseys and sneakers, wore the chain and lock pendant, and would freestyle rap before his matches to insult his opponent. He started to become extremely popular

Then Cena was tapped to star in "The Marine," so they tweaked his character, had him stop rapping, wore his merchandise pretty much all the time, swapping the chain-and-lock for dog-tags, had him salute and ... well, the rest is history.

To use another example of a dramatic change in character-- Brodus Clay. He'd been on TV for a while as an NXT runner-up and enforcer for then-heel Alberto Del Rio, and was taken off TV after Wrestlemania that year. He rehabbed an injury or two, I think, and then started working on "Superstars," one of WWE's C-level shows. He was a big, mean bully type, steamrolling through jobbers. They started running vignettes on TV where he likened himself to the monster hiding under your bed, calling himself 'the fall of humanity.' Then they had John Laurinaitis (Executive Vice President of Talent Relations and the Interim General Manager of Raw) start delaying his debut, week after week.

When Brodus finally re-debuted, it wasn't as the evil monster, but the dancing Funkasaurus. They explained the change in a WWE.com-exclusive video where he basically said he was tired of being angry and negative all the time.

This is one of the problems WWE has right now. Despite having five hours of mainstream programming with Raw and Smackdown (eight hours if you include Superstars, Main Event, and Saturday Morning Slam), they don't give time on the air to show some of these little vignettes or videos. WWE.com and their YouTube channel (and now their WWE App) have all these videos that would go a long way to furthering character development, but a lot of fans probably never see them.


Funny story about Glenn Jacobs/Kane. He took some time off at one point, rehabbing some injury. When he came back, he'd changed his mask and outfit, exposing his mouth for the first time, and ditching the one-sleeve top. He'd also slimmed down a bit, wasn't quite so bulky in build as he'd been before his time off. I had another friend who commented to me, "I think they got someone else to play Kane. He looks like the guy who played the fake Diesel." I responded, "...you do know that Kane was the fake Diesel, right?" He didn't know that, and was surprised.

* - a term used by smarks for wrestlers who are fired/released from their contract and "wished all the best in their future endeavors" by the company.

[dendawg]

I'll just leave this here for those who get confused about wrestling slang:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glossar...restling_terms

[El Pollo Guerrera]

Same thing with Mick Foley/Cactus Jack/Mankind/Dude Love. Same guy, different characters.

"Leapin' Lanny" Poffo, and "The Genius". They were the same guy.

Big Bossman was Big Bubba Rogers in WCW.

Since these weren't specifically answered, I'll tackle these.

One thing about the WWE is that they didn't really like using a wrestler's gimmick when it was established in a different company (ESPECIALLY in WCW). That's why they let Mick Foley run with the "Mankind" thing. It was after years of great work that they acknowledged the fact that he was "Cactus Jack" elsewhere, and that "Dude Love" was the character he came up with when he was a young fan dreaming about wrestling (he even did a home movie as Dude Love, where he did a flying splash off the roof of his house).

As for Poffo, he became a heel. He always read poetry before his matches, so they made him into the 'superior intellect' kind of bad guy.

Big Bubba Rogers was in WCW, became Big Bossman in WWF/E... again, the whole "Cactus Jack/Mankind" thing, but that happened at a time when the WWF was into wrestlers as more cartoonish characters and not wrestlers... wrestlers with 'day jobs', kind of.

That whole thing was also flipped on it's head when the NWO debuted in WCW in 1996. Then both companies started to openly refer to their wrestlers by their previous gimmicks, and there were even a few threatened lawsuits over it.

[Jay 2K Winger]

Pollo has a point. Both of the 'major' wrestling promotions (WWE and Impact) want to "own" the characters/gimmicks of their wrestlers. Many jokes have been made about the names that wrestlers are given in FCW (WWE's developmental territory, eventually incorporated into their NXT brand). Sometimes the names are okay, sometimes not. They often have to ditch the character they made, if they don't want to sign the rights to it to WWE.

Given the tendency for WWE to 'bury' indie stars-- put them on TV, often with no opportunity to get their characters over, and have them get squashed by WWE-made wrestlers-- it's not surprising that most take their 'WWE name' and a new character, rather than sign away their own proven characters/names. When the Dudley Boyz' contracts expired with WWE, there was a lot of noise made when it came out that the Dudleys' names had been trademarked by ECW, and been purchased by WWE. This left Bubba Ray Dudley and D-Von Dudley pretty damn pissed off. They turned up in TNA/Impact not long after as 'Team 3D,' Brother Ray and Brother Devon (and sometimes called 'The Deadly Boyz' in their few indie appearances). Eventually, when they actually broke up the tag team, they became Bully Ray (who got into the best shape of his career and revitalized his character), and Devon, who floundered for a while until he ended up as a key member of the Aces & 8s stable.

This is one reason a lot of indie fans were shocked when C.M. Punk debuted in WWE's ECW with that name. It meant he'd signed the rights to the name to WWE. If Punk had washed out (which nearly did happen, at a few points), it would have meant he'd have had to come up with a completely new ring-name and possibly, character as well. Obviously, this did not happen, as Punk became one of their top stars, but that's not always the case.

[KhirasHY]

That's why they let Mick Foley run with the "Mankind" thing. It was after years of great work that they acknowledged the fact that he was "Cactus Jack" elsewhere, and that "Dude Love" was the character he came up with when he was a young fan dreaming about wrestling (he even did a home movie as Dude Love, where he did a flying splash off the roof of his house).

Mick Foley actually tells quite the story about how Mankind came to be, if you read "Have a Nice Day" (which, btw, is very well written and funny). He was mere moments away from being named Mankind the Mutilator (he described Vince McMahon's mouth moving in slow motion - MEW-TI-LAH-TAWR) and saw his career dying the second that hit the airwaves. In a moment of brilliance, he managed to improv the idea for Mankind's name being a pun, someone who would scream about mankind (as a whole) and Mankind (as an individual) in the same sentences, being appropriately deranged. It was the interview series Jim Ross did with him that really got the character over with the crowd though...which led to Dude Love and Cactus Jack seeing the light of day. That popularity is also more or less what led to him eventually hitting the top ranks of the company.

Yep, HHH = Hunter Hearst Helmsley. "The Connecticut Blue Blood." Hence also why his finisher is called "The Pedigree."

I don't recall the reason they gave for the change in his character from snooty aristocrat to anti-authority degenerate.

That actually goes back a while in terms of description, back to the time of The Cliq (Shawn Michaels, Kevin Nash, Scott Hall, and Paul Levasque/HHH), which is what they were referred to backstage. When Nash and Hall left the WWF, there was an unplanned celebration with Michaels and HHH in the ring that happened on air...and McMahon flipped out. With Hulk Hogan, Nash, and Hall in WCW, McMahon couldn't afford to get rid of Michaels...and HHH bore the brunt of the retribution from that night. He was relegated to the douchebag character role and the midcard as a result, and seemed fated to vanish.

Michaels intervened eventually, and was able to smooth-talk McMahon into changing the character as his partner in the original DX; since Bret Hart was now leaving the company as well, and Steve Austin wasn't quite the sensation he would become, Michaels was still more or less the #1 person in the company, so he got his way. Later on, the HHH character proved he could be funny as hell when the expanded DX (heels at the time) filmed an unplanned spot where they laid siege to a WCW show, and found themselves receiving huge cheers a week later. The rest, as they say, is history.

I've actually always loved the wrestling industry...I watched it a lot as a kid, but as an adult I found myself more and more fascinated with the background workings of the industry. It really is an interesting thing to see, though it is often depressing seeing how much the athletes themselves suffer for what they do.