10 Things WWE Wants You To Forget About 2017
This isn't a local company, for local people.
Is this the strangest year in modern WWE history?
Even if unwittingly, the company at long last tapped into the mainstream pulse by presenting a product fit for this post-satire world. It was the year in which Vince McMahon, sensing that the Network age affords him a level of control luxurious and self-indulgent even by his narcissistic standards, went full Vince McMahon. We saw the paradox that defines him manifested onscreen; the rank arrogance that was Jinder Mahal, WWE Heavyweight Champion contrasted with the universally-adored mega-hoss that is Braun Strowman. Vince, for better and too often for worse, has still got it.
In some respects, it was a year to both remember and savour. Goldberg made fools of the anti-nostalgia cynics by capping an emotive, redemptive character arc in memorable fashion at WrestleMania 33. The autumn months were at the very least interesting, and very dramatic, lifting the tedious hex of years past. WWE created and or reinforced new stars in Strowman, Alexa Bliss, and Elias - a triumvirate, incidentally, that might suggest WWE remains steadfast in its supposed superiority over the Independent circuit.
Given the year the elite stars outside of the WWE bubble enjoyed, it is a perception worth massaging...
10. The Public Image Battering
The departure of Mauro Ranallo revealed, yet again, the toxic culture at the dark heart of WWE - a culture all but flaunted by Vince McMahon by, for example, ordering the acrophobic Enzo Amore into an elevated shark cage at this year's SummerSlam.
Buried by influential backstage players for having the audacity to suffer from debilitating mental health issues at the onset of WrestleMania, Ranallo was given hush money to stay shtum. Though he eventually returned in the marginalised NXT environment, his brief departure set forth a deluge of criticism from the likes of Justin Roberts, whose own experience of bullying was chronicled with unflinching, depressing honesty. The alleged perpetrator, JBL, conveniently, if belatedly, left the company - perhaps to stave off immediate accusations of guilt.
Not that he's the problem; the man credited for creating the culture remains forever at its helm.
WWE obviously would rather you forget about the whole ghastly business, and (un)fortunately, the outlier appeal of pro wrestling affords them that luxury - even in a year in which the awful underbelly of the wider entertainment industry was exposed. The wider mainstream media simply doesn't get hits covering wrestling, unless one of its stars murders his family. Rich Swann's recent arrest lit up only a minuscule corner of Twitter.
It will take something far worse, sadly, to stem this tide.