4 Times WWE Shouldn’t Have Broken the 4th Wall
When the WWE breaks the fourth wall what they’re doing is reminding you that the rest of the show is fake and that the part you’re watching right now is the real part even though you know this real part is also fake making it a completely different kind of fake and oh. my. god. I’ve gone cross-eyed. It’s like having that “uh, did you know wrestling is fake” guy show up for one segment of the show and then disappear or the equivalent of someone wishing you a Merry Christmas while wearing a “Santa is dead” t-shirt. This is four times the WWE shouldn’t haven broken the 4th wall.
4. Dustin Rhodes is SEVEN in WCW
Dustin Rhodes was all set for a WCW debut as a new character, called Seven, whose gimmick was that he was made up of nightmares and playing off the seven deadly sins. The problem was that one of the debut vignettes portrayed his Seven character as haunting a child from outside his bedroom window while the boy slept. Sleeping, as some of you may recall, is when nightmares typically happen. That all checks out. Now, most people would understand this was supposed to be the boogeyman, but someone in Standards and Practices of TNT viewed it as a pedophile, leading many to wonder what the hell kind of boogeymen that guy had to deal with as a child. Weeks worth of hype led to Dustin Rhodes coming out as Dustin “THE DUSTIN RHODES” Rhodes and whining about how Vince Russo wanted him to play a silly character. May have been a good point coming from literally anyone who hadn’t made a career off playing a golden transvestite who obsessed over movies and wore wrestling pajamas to the ring.
During the promo, Dustin complains about how he left the WWE because it was full of terrible gimmicks and refuses to paint himself up like a clown anymore, and what I must assume was like a big buffet of feet in his mouth, the very next match featured Sting and immediately after that was a promo by Vampiro. Oops. It also brings us the classic line where right smack dab in the middle of his promo Dustin Rhodes stops and says, “Oh, my name is Seven now by the way,” with all the enthusiasm of a brick wall introducing itself. To make matters worse it exposed the entire show as being something we shouldn’t want to watch and this angle never went anywhere due to so many rewrites having to happen and the death of a new character. This means the show just continued to be silly with no explanation as to how or when it was supposed to be watchable again. It’d be like a stranger walking inside your house and calling you an idiot, and you reply, “OH YEAH?” and then ignore him while you eat paint. You can find this segment on November 8th, 1999 on the WWE Network.
3. Hogan Doesn’t Job, Brother
The infamous Bash at the Beach incident. The story here is that Vince Russo had been lobbying for Booker T to become champion because he saw money to be made in the Harlem Heater. The idea was for Hulk Hogan to face Jeff Jarret and lose to build up Jarret as champion so that it was a bigger deal when Booker T beat him at the next PPV. That was the plan up until the very day of the pay-per-view anyway when Hulk Hogan decided randomly that he kinda wanted to be World champion now and whatever, no biggy, so he rewrote the show so that he won instead. Or so he thought. Despite Hulk Hogan’s creative control clause in his contract, Vince Russo went full speed ahead with the original plan where Hogan would not become champion.
To stroke Hulk Hogan’s hard throbbing ego like Heather Cole, Vince Russo did let him win the title by having Jeff Jarret collapse in the middle of the ring and allowed Hogan to easily pin him for the three count. He then told Hogan it was basically a toy and that the real World title would be decided later that night in a match with Booker T and Jeff Jarret. Hogan cut a promo that most thought was a good work-shoot promo, which turns out was completely a shoot, as Hogan went on to actually sue the WCW for violating his creative control contract. Booker T later wins the World title, which would have been a bigger deal had Hogan not already reminded everyone that there was no reason to watch such a shitty show. If you want to watch it, which according to Hulk Hogan I don’t know why you would, but you can find this on the WWE Network at the 2000 Bash at the Beach.2.
2. Carlito Breaks a Literal 4th Wall
There are times in wrestling when you’re supposed to suspend your disbelief to enjoy the show. The Undertaker is a magical zombie mortician, Kane is a burnt victim who isn’t burnt but does control fire except when he doesn’t, and Lana can wrestle. But a line should be drawn in between disappearing caskets and ACME sponsored weapons. During a feud between Carlito Carribean Cool and Hornswoggle, which is a way no one should have to start a sentence, Hornswoggle was attempting to escape from Carlito in a Tom and Jerry mouse chase around the arena. Right when you think Carlito has him cornered, Hornswoggle drew a door in the wall with a sharpie and ran through it. There’s… There’s nothing else to say here. Don’t find this on the WWE Network.
We can file this in the same category as R-Truth exploding, Zeus escaping a movie to face Hulk Hogan, and WWE’s ECW One Night Stand PPVs. These things don’t exist.
1. CM Punk “Pipebomb”
CM Punk drops a “pipebomb” where he criticizes the direction of the company on a live microphone at the end of a WWE Monday Night RAW. The microphone was cut off at the end which led everyone to believe it was real. CM Punk comments on Vince McMahon never pushing real wrestlers in favor of wrestlers no one wants, how Triple H was a doofus, and how The Rock and Cena were a bunch of kiss asses. It seemed refreshing as CM Punk was saying things the IWC was already thinking. It became apparent as time went on then that CM Punk wasn’t necessarily saying things he believed so much as he was saying things the IWC had been saying. He was playing the role of the “every man” the same way Cena and Stone Cold did, except he was doing it from the point of view of the internet fan. This got CM Punk over huge as he was hitting all the notes everyone wanted to hear and was constantly blurring the lines between real and fake, even though virtually nothing changed at the hands of CM Punk himself.
Unfortunately, the part where it was a fake revolution was lost on a lot of people and it began a domino effect that the WWE couldn’t undo. Fans began revolting against the WWE in the same vein as CM Punk when believing their voice was more important than it really was and forcing the WWE to change plans to silence the vocal critics. In the wake of this new entitlement period people like Batista and Roman Reigns were getting booed based on how they weren’t Daniel Bryan – a problem the fans probably should have taken up with God and not the WWE — which eventually evolved into subjectively justified hatred/dislike for Roman Reigns. All this happened because CM Punk dropped a “pipebomb” in 2011 and we’re still feeling the affects to this day. WWE also encouraged the fans to “hijack” the show and that if they do it long enough they will get their way. Terrible news for Seth Rollins and Dolph Ziggler, but fantastic news for beach ball sales.
READERS: Name an angle so unbelievable that you were embarrassed of being a wrestling fan
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