25 Most Iconic WWE Ring Entrances Ever
24. The Fiend (SummerSlam 2019)
There are so many examples of WWE's systemic incompetence in the final years before Vince McMahon resigned in disgrace that it sometimes becomes overwhelming to relive them. The Fiend being finished as a true threat to the top of the card by October 2019 after this debut in August might still top that lengthy, lengthy list.
Everything in the execution of the new gimmick was just about perfect thanks to expert handling of the character by pre-tapes that had aired regularly on Raw throughout the summer, but doing the same in front of live audiences was an entire new assignment that WWE seemed to have understood from the first few seconds. Wyatt's walk to the ring wasn't captured steadily by the cameras, as if to create a reality in which this bizarre hybrid simply couldn't be boxed in to the paths mere mortals take. If that sounds or feels too grandiose in the fullness of time, it didn't on SummerSlam 2019.
His exit was cinematically framed as if he was returning back to the pit of human nightmares from whence he came. Even a callback to his older self came in the form of a creepy new lantern, housed inside a deceased effigy of his former - and tired - gimmick. It was the beginning, the end, and the peak, but it was - for a fleeting moment - the perfect marriage of a company's broken creative mechanisms and Wyatt's own unique energy.