WrestleMania 28 was arguably one of the finest shows delivered, and The Rock vs. John Cena was a huge main event an absolute spectacle. It wasnt a technical masterpiece, nor did it have the best story, but the fans were heavily invested and the match had a genuine surprise ending when The Rock put Cena down for the three count. As The Rock held his arm up in the air in victory, Cena sat on the entrance ramp, clearly devastated by his loss in what would be his biggest failure on screen, but in the fans eyes not his biggest failure. So began the John Cena redemption story, and for one month John Cenas character was interesting again, but then he defeated Brock Lesnar after an absolute mugging and was back to being the Super Cena fans were tired of, fighting against John Laurinaitis and his People Power. When WrestleMania 29 came, The Rock was WWE Champion and John Cena had just won the Royal Rumble to set up the rematch of all rematches, the only problem was the ending could not have been anymore predictable everyone knew John Cena was going to win and claim his 13th WWE Championship. The build up itself was poorly done, The Rocks Hollywood commitments meant he missed a few episodes of Raw, and the WWE were trying to spin off this idea that John Cena was desperate for redemption and his defeat to The Rock last year greatly affected his personal life even costing him his marriage (something that was clearly not the case as mentioned earlier). WrestleMania rematches arent necessarily a bad thing, and are certainly not something new (Just that last year Triple H challenged the Undertakers streak for a third time and the Rock and Stone Cold had previously met three times at WrestleMania), but none of those matches had a degree of predictability about them. Yes, fans were very sure Undertaker would defeat Triple H, but the storytelling in the ring made them doubt themselves every step of the way. The match itself lost the spark the original had, the predictability of the ending completely killed any momentum as both superstars ending up constantly kicking out of their finishers (it certainly didnt help The Rock was severely injured during the match). When John Cena finally won, the fans turned on the main event and a chorus of boos rained down on the ring. Its hard to look past the disappointment clearly sketched in The Rocks face at the ending and rumours circled online as to just how happy the man himself was with how everything went down. This was supposed to be John Cenas night, this was supposed to a passing of torch reminiscent of The Rock defeating Hulk Hogan 11 years prior at WrestleMania 18. The truth was he didn't need the torch, Cena had been running with the torch for ten years now; the fans were just not buying it, and they made their voice heard in that arena, the next night on Raw and online - fans were ruthless in their disappointment and directed their anger towards John Cena once again. Once in a lifetime should have remained so. Thank you for reading, and what are your worst John Cena moments? Is he bigger failure than some might think or are we being too harsh? Leave your comments below.
An aspiring filmmaker, writer, traveller, and avid comic book fan, with an undying passion for calligraphy and chopping boards shaped like fruit. Genuinely enjoys receiving your hate mail.
