The night after WrestleMania XXX, vignettes were run alerting fans to the impending arrival of Adam Rose, a party-going chap with a penchant for lollipops and bunnies (well, a man in a bunny costume). The clips showed Rose partying on a tour bus with a sizable entourage. It was a departure from almost any character WWE had put forward in some time. Unfortunately, Roses first feud, against Jack Swagger, didnt set the world on fire, and having the announcers make a mockery of the gimmick didnt help, either. Rose did nothing of consequence until he teamed with the Bunny, which eventually led to an insanely stupid feud that saw Rose losing the support of his Rosebuds as he turned heel. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bKAKLM2wjwk One of the criticisms that cropped up shortly after Rose debuted was how the Adam Rose gimmick works well in a place like NXT, where crowds are smaller and more intimate, versus the bright lights of WWE arenas, where 10-12 strangely costumed partygoers look incredibly small. If WWE was serious about Rose, they should have had a couple dozen Rosebuds from the get-go to make it seem like a bigger deal.
Scott is a former journalist and longtime wrestling fan who was smart enough to abandon WCW during the Monday Night Wars the same time as the Radicalz. He fondly remembers watching WrestleMania III, IV, V and VI and Saturday Night's Main Event, came back to wrestling during the Attitude Era, and has been a consumer of sports entertainment since then. He's written for WhatCulture for more than a decade, establishing the Ups and Downs articles for WWE Raw and WWE PPVs/PLEs and composing pieces on a variety of topics.
