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| The Rey Mystery |
Luke Dormehl |
Rey Mysterio is imminently due back – here's what WWE has to do in order not to screw him up like last time…
After nearly a year of inactivity following yet another knee surgery, Rey Mysterio’s return to World Wrestling Entertainment represents a true high point of the wrestling calendar. Unless you’ve particularly missed “Vince loves cock” jokes on Raw and feel that some of the undercard wrestlers have been getting themselves over a bit too efficiently, this is without a doubt the most anticipated comeback of the year – and it should certainly make for some exciting television.
Even when the WWE roster has been at its most crowded Rey has played an important part in the show, attracting both the much-coveted Hispanic audience and the under-18 demographic. Next time you attend a WWE event or watch one on television, do a quick headcount of the people wearing Rey Mysterio masks. Despite having been (with the exception of a one-off appearance in March) off the scene for an eternity in wrestling terms, his popularity remains huge.
Or perhaps it’s less that his popularity remains huge and more that it has finally recovered from WWE’s destructive attempt to push him to the top in 2006. WrestleMania 22 should have been the biggest moment in Rey’s 18-year career. But as the boos grew louder and louder at Chicago’s Allstate Arena, as a hefty percentage of the 17,000 fans voiced their disapproval, it was clear that something had gone wrong. Something had gone very wrong.
It had not, however, always been this way. By the time he lifted the World Heavyweight Championship, Mysterio had been part of the WWE roster for close to four years and part of the American wrestling scene for well over double that – and in all that time, had never been anything less than a firm fan favourite. So how did WWE, almost unbelievably, turn its most genuinely loved babyface into John Cena, and how can it prevent the same thing happening again?
LITTLE BIG MAN
Vince McMahon doesn’t have a great history when it comes to pushing the smaller athlete. Indeed, as we discussed last month in our ‘Size… Matters?’ feature, Vince (God rest his soul) clings longingly to the attitude that bigger really does equal better, and that fans come to WWE events to see larger-than-life figures. And while Rey Mysterio has many things going for him, “larger-than-life” is most certainly not one of them.
Indeed, it would take fairly hefty lifts in his boots to bring him up to Paul London’s stature, let along to pass him off as something like a second Undertaker brother. It was therefore quite the pleasant surprise when Rey was not only brought into the WWE fold in 2002, but was actually given a good push. There were a couple of initial bumps in the road when it came to his distinctly un-WWE style but, generally, Rey was allowed to do his thang – and as a result he became one of the most over figures on the roster.
Flash forward to 13 November 2005 and the day that Rey’s friend and former AAA, WCW and WWE co-worker Eddie Guerrero passed away. For better or for worse (and, given both the catalyst and the eventual result, we’d have to say it was the latter) this was a turning point in Mysterio’s career – the point at which he went, in Vince’s mind, from being a popular midcard attraction to the company’s next big Hispanic figurehead.
Prior to his death, the plan had been for Guerrero to regain the heavyweight strap in an upcoming match against Batista and Randy Orton, and to go on to have a lengthy run at the top. With his sudden passing these plans were dramatically scuppered and, with a decided lack of potential headliners and the massive reactions that Rey received from fans, the decision was made to push Mysterio as a makeshift Eddie Guerrero.
The first evidence of this came when Rey replaced Eddie in the scheduled Raw versus SmackDown ten-man elimination match at the 2005 Survivor Series. The month after at Armageddon, his main event push continued as he was booked in another inter-brand match, teaming with the injured Dave Batista to take on the team of Kane and The Big Show. That match must hold some kind of record for the sheer amount of championship beltage held by its participants, with Kane and Show the World Tag Team Champions, Batista and Rey holding the WWE Tag Team Titles as well as Big Dave being the World Heavyweight Champion. Although the match ended with Rey being pinned, the new company he was in showed the level at which he was now being pushed.
VIVA LA EXPLOITATION
January saw Mysterio win the Royal Rumble in a record-breaking 62-minute effort that he had, beforehand, pledged to win in memory of Eddie Guerrero. This made it slightly obvious for the fans exactly who was going over, as there was no way that WWE would do anything that could be interpreted as disrespectful to Eddie’s memory. Right?
By having Rey win the Rumble, WWE was trying to recreate Chris Benoit’s victory from two years earlier, eventually recapturing that magic moment at WrestleMania when the longtime favourite would finally take home the gold. This was probably the highlight of Rey’s push and, left at this motive alone, would have been a perfectly wonderful way to see him standing in the spotlight. However, things went drastically downhill from here.
Right away, WWE lost confidence in Rey as a main event star and decided to give his push to Randy Orton – but of course, it had to take things one step further. The following week on SmackDown, Orton interrupted Mysterio’s victory speech-come-dEddiecation by throwing out one of the most tasteless lines in wrestling history: “Eddie ain’t in Heaven, Eddie’s down there – in hell.” This goaded Rey into accepting a number one contendership match with the bag-crapper at No Way Out, which he subsequently lost. It was clear that Vince McMahon wanted Rey out of the main event and that he wasn’t above exploiting the name of a dead wrestler in order to do it.
Before long, however, McMahon’s mind changed and Rey was back in good graces and back in the WrestleMania match, thanks to Teddy Long making it a Triple-Threat title match. So, if it wasn’t bad enough that he lost his title shot in the first place, he looked even more incompetent when Teddy Long took pity and had to give it back to him. So it was, at WrestleMania, that he overcame both Orton and Kurt Angle to capture his first ever World Championship. This should have been the ultimate, happy ending payoff of Mysterio’s push – a chance for him to avenge Eddie and to receive his magic ‘WrestleMania Moment’. Instead, the fans booed him.
Perhaps it was the blatant exploitation of Guerrero’s memory that upset fans, as what was initially seen as a genuine tribute to his friend had now become the cheapest of cheap heat (with Rey dropping Eddie’s name at every possible opportunity to get the easy “Foley pop”). Perhaps, after years of seeing Rey jobbed to larger athletes, his sudden ‘miraculous wins’ seemed a bit too farfetched. Or perhaps fans had tired of his increasingly predictable WWE-friendly. Whatever the reason, the fact that Rey Mysterio – one the company’s biggest faces – was now getting booed at the biggest show of the year was cause for concern.
REY MISGIUDEDO
Regardless, Rey’s title reign got off to a decent start on the post-Mania SmackDown. Orton – on his way out to serve yet another a suspension for whatever transgression he had committed that week – was chosen to do the job to the new champion and the two had another solid contest, ending with Mysterio picking up the clean pinfall. After the match, he celebrated with his family and cut a short promo where he thanked the fans for their support.
The next few weeks were less than good. Mysterio was not featured on the show in any kind of a prominent position and, worse still, his faults and failings were actively being pointed out for everybody watching. JBL, the company’s first choice for a challenger, repeatedly made pointed remarks about Rey’s height (or lack thereof) and described the new champ as a “Latino Heat cheap tribute character”.
For those following our series of articles on how to become a wrestling promoter (see page 52), undermining a wrestler by pointing out his obvious shortcomings should be at the top of the list of ‘Things Not To Do When Building Up A New Champion’. Bafflingly, Rey wasn’t booked to make a rebuttal; instead, he spent his promo time demeaning his own abilities, such as admitting that he had been about to tap out to Kurt’s Angle Lock and had only been saved by Mark Henry’s interference. Further, WWE would only put him in backstage segments where he was hidden away from the crowd, terrified of the increasing number of boos he was being greeted with.
Speaking of Mizark Henry, this was another huge problem with Rey’s title reign: the opponents. Having won worldwide acclaim and popularity through his high-flying, daredevil matches with cruiserweight-sized stars likes Psychosis, Juventud Guerrera and Dean Malenko, the first thing WWE did upon giving him the World Championship was to put him in there against blundering oafs like Henry and The Great Khali who made him look like both a small child and a champion incapable of having a good match.
And the worst thing about these matches was the fact that not only was Rey booked to lose almost all of them, but he was utterly squashed in every one. We’re not sure exactly who snuck into Vince’s office and switched the How To Build A Credible Champion tape with an old episode of Wrestling Challenge squash matches, but they certainly did Rey no favours. Indeed, his entire title run was presented as a fluke – he may have “won” matches and “defended” his title, nobody wants to see an incompetent champion who constantly gets beaten up.
By the time he finally lost the title to King Booker at the Great American Bash, Mysterio had been reduced to a joke. The fans that had questioned his ability to carry the belt now outright mocked him, and his supporters didn’t have much of a counter-argument. As champion, Rey was always going to find it an uphill battle to convince fans that he could run with the ball (it’s called the World Heavyweight Title for a reason) and the support of the office should never have been an issue. But the fact that management made him look like a fool for the entirety of his title reign makes us wonder why they even bothered in the first place…
For the rest of this feature, check out issue 17 of FSM – available at WH Smith and all good retailers. (For US readers we are now carried at Borders, so check for local availability or click here to subscribe.)
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