7 Ways WWE Recently Blurred The Lines Between Reality And Storyline

7. The Miz Returns As A Movie Star; Summer Rae Returns As A Jilted Lover

WWE StudiosWWE StudiosEarlier this spring, both The Miz and Summer Rae took some time off from WWE to film The Marine 4: Moving Target (coming soon to a DVD player near you). Recently, both have returned to television, but they came back in very different ways. Summer Rae returned first, frustrated at being dumped by Fandango via Twitter. She has since engaged in a seemingly stalled feud with Fandango€™s new squeeze, Layla. When The Miz showed up last week, he had embraced his Hollywood €œcredentials€ and taken on the persona of an A-list movie star, almost a poor man€™s circa-2003 Rock. That is not meant as a slight or even a suggestion that it€™s a bad gimmick, but considering that a fellow superstar appeared in the same movie, why wouldn't both be looped in €“ or at least mention that Summer Rae had a role in the film and acting didn't go to her head. Where things really could take an odd turn is when WWE does the inevitable ads for The Marine 4 and has cast members and the director praising Miz for his work, while he€™s playing guy we€™re all supposed to hate. The truth is, WWE has had several wrestlers try their hand at acting €“ Kane, John Cena, Randy Orton, Big Show and Ted DiBiase €“ and none of them came back with a €œHollywood€ gimmick. And that€™s for good reason. Fans don€™t tune in to watch wrestlers who took a month off to star in a direct-to-video movie gloat about how they€™re a major film star. At least when The Rock did it, he had starred in a film that grossed nine figures. And it€™s somewhat incongruous for WWE to tell fans to boo The Miz on Raw, but pay to own his latest movie.
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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.