As ever, the most polarising figure in the history of wrestling divides people when it comes to the subject of his in-ring abilities. Some protest that weve seen classic matches involving WWE bobblehead John Cena, that hes capable of great work when hes not phoning it in. Others point to the fact that a classic babyface doesnt need great mat skills or technical ability to do his job: Cenas character lends itself best to simple stories, good versus evil, hero versus monster, unstoppable force versus immoveable object. The former point can generally be shot down by pointing out how much better Cena is when his limitations are protected by working with a ring general capable of hiding them CM Punks a good example, as were Edge and Chris Jericho in their time. The latter is absolutely true, as far as it goes. The problem is that Cena is clumsier than a pianist in boxing gloves, brawls like a crying child and looks like a rank amateur when performing his own moveset. His STF hasnt even got the pretence of pressure applied to it it looks as though hes trying to massage his opponents ears with his elbows. When he tries to add new moves to his repertoire (dropkick and hurricanrana, anyone?) it literally looks like an angry kid threw an action figure into the air in a massive strop. All of which takes the educated audience completely out of the game when it comes to suspending our disbelief. One of Cenas strengths is that hes capable of believable selling but so inconsistently that he might as well not bother. Theres no point perfectly selling a beatdown for a third of the match if, one Superman comeback and a pinfall later, you show no ill effect whatsoever. Cenas a throwback a pre-Attitude Era wrestler sitting at the top of a post-Attitude Era roster. Every feud hes involved in brings his opponent down to that unrealistic cartoon level of performance, which is why he buries people without really meaning to: when your opponent suddenly no-sells all of your realistic and dramatic offence and half an hour of supposed punishing moves to bounce back like he has springs in his shoes and take you down with a tried and testing finishing combo thats telegraphed a mile off, and then celebrates with a huge grin and a swagger in his step, it doesnt matter how good you looked two minutes ago. You look like crap now.
Professional writer, punk werewolf and nesting place for starfish. Obsessed with squid, spirals and story. I publish short weird fiction online at desincarne.com, and tweet nonsense under the name Jack The Bodiless. You can follow me all you like, just don't touch my stuff.
