@TWJC: The Beginning
Few things here, first:
Kids don't love a bad guy, the IWC does.
As a father of 2 kids that are in the "Cena demographic" and also the stay at home dad that takes them to school every morning, last school year I didn't see a single John Cena shirt on any of the other kids when I dropped mine off. The popular wrestlers, at least around here (yeah, I'm not about to say this is how it is everywhere, I'm not stupid), are The Miz, Undertaker, Hitman, Stone Cold and most recently my kids new favorite wrestler is R-Truth. Yeah that's right, the guy that attacks "Little Jimmy". They absolutely love R-Truth because he gets got by lil Jimmy. My 8 year old daughter has a crush on Alberto Del Rio, and my son is begging me to buy him a "Hello, I'm AWESOME!" shirt for school next year.
Point being the kids have just as diverse a taste in wrestlers as we do. The difference is that they're willing to play ball at live events and have fun cheering the good guy and watching the older crowd play off them. They start the "Let's go Cena" chants not because they wants Cena to win, but they want to see if they can make more noise than the older group which will inevitably call back "Cena sucks!" So it becomes a game to the kids to see who can be louder and actually has very little to do with Cena himself.
The kids WILL always cheer the good guy, but when you ask them who their favorite wrestler is, it's very likely to be the top heel. That said, a lot of kids I've talked with during playdates and such (yeah when you're a dad playdates are very different than the arts and crafts crap mommies do on their playdates) find CM Punk to be boring.
The content of what CM Punk talks about is over their heads, but for a guy like R-Truth, with whom the kids can identify they find him to be very entertaining even if they are split on whether or not they like him. It's kinda like when I was a kid and hated Bobby The Brain Heenan passionately, when I grew up I realized he was the best thing WWE has ever had. Not comparing R-Truth to Heenan in terms of quality only in what role they're filling. R-Truth is a guy the kids love to hate.
Now, so what right? What does any of this have to do with whether or not John Cena should or should not turn heel? The kids do not really get the double entendre's in John Cena's raps either. So turning him heel and expecting him to go back to just being the Dr. of Thuganomics would not work.
What works about John Cena with the kids is that he actually includes them in his promos. He makes them feel like they're a valuable part of the audience, and that's exactly what R-Truth does as well and that's why they are so over with the younger audience as either a face or as a heel. Cena's heel turn could be great, but he has to be sure to include the kids in his promos, like R-Truth does.
Mike Mizanin is a truly engaging and charismatic person children find to be hilarious. From my perspective, I think it's too soon to push him to fill Cena's role, but I think The Miz is the perfect person to fill that role given more time for his character (not Mike the person, but The Miz character) to mature.
I've suggested in the past that The Miz could be turned into the top face easily. If he were put in a relationship with Maryse, and do a Randy Savage-esque face turn, where Maryse turns face, and has a clean breakup with The Miz because she just doesn't agree with the way he conducts himself in the ring, then turn Morrison heel and have the two get back together as a tag team again, only to have Morrison turn on The Miz at their first PPV and beat the holy hell out of The Miz, enter Maryse with a weapon such as a tazer to kick his ass and run him off, Miz & Maryse reunite and now Miz is everybodies new favorite wrestler. At which point he could easily fill the hole left by Cena turning heel.
Now there's certainly a few tangles in that, but nothing that can't be worked out and nothing that any other storyline doesn't also have to deal with. This would also have to be something that happens over the course of at least a full year, having one thing happen, and solidify for 3 months or so before the next step takes place. In the end, The Miz is every bit as entertaining as Cena is on TV interviews and other spots outside of WWE TV, and he's doing that stuff now as a heel, so Cena certainly could continue to do the same as well. I'm not even saying that's what should be done but that is, I believe, a good example of what would work.
What this would do is open up a whole new line of stories & feuds for Cena to start working on the next phase of his career, putting over the younger guys. Cena is in his mid-30's now, perhaps it's a LITTLE soon for him to be doing that but there's no reason at all that he can't be pushed back into the top dog status again later with another big run. Right now it wouldn't hurt anyone, and it would help the company as a whole if he were to turn heel and push a new generation of young faces into the spotlight.
Also, you talk about merchandising. Cena would still sell a ton as top heel. Not as much obviously but when you fill the void he left with a new top face, his merchandising sales would skyrocket, and in the end, it's not going to be a huge difference. Cena's sales won't drop THAT much, and if you get someone with mass appeal like The Miz, it's very likely he could push merchandising sales even higher, not because he's a more popular champion than Cena but because the combo of Cena has top heel and Miz as top face is more marketable than Cena as top face and Miz as upper mid-card.
Now, don't get me wrong, I'm not in a major disagreement with what you're arguing either. You're very much right in a lot of what you're saying when you're talking about why it shouldn't be done. The only part I'm really arguing against is that it COULDN'T be done. It could be done, and it could be better than what it is now simply because what we have now isn't that stellar.
Should it be done? That's a much tougher question, because like you say everyone has their own, frequently vague ideas of what it means to have it "done right." I have my own ideas of how it could be done right, and sure you COULD rip it to shreds, critics can do that about anything no matter how good the idea is. The only real test is how successful it is once received by the fans when it actually is put into play.
Right now the fans are split on John Cena, which is exactly what you want if you're going to do a turn, because the fanbase doesn't change in terms of numbers, it just flipflops who the demographic is.
So while I'd tend to think, yeah it should be done, the real test is on the writing team to create a good story-arch for Cena to use in a guideline for his promos, and for that to go well it has to be something very natural and easy for Cena to identify with so that he can do a believable job every step of the way. That is what is needed for it to be "done right."
I myself have been wondering whether or not Cena is another Bret Hart or Bill Goldberg, in that they both got pissed off about the direction their character went in terms of being a role model to the kids, and if that has something to do with Cena not being a heel already.
Bottom line, without a face to be the sterling example for the kids, like I think the Miz could be in a year or so, there's no one, and I doubt that's going to be acceptable for the WWE. Cena could be the children's anti-hero, but that's what R-Truth is right now so there's no point in that. So if he's going to turn heel, he pretty would have to go back to Dr. of Thuganomics and grow his old fanbase, which he could do easily enough, but not without a guy like The Miz to fill the void he leaves.
From what I've heard vince wants cenas heel turn to be the most spectacular in history!so i honestly dont see it happening any time before wrestlemania if anything it will be reminiscent of SCSA heel turn either while facing the rock or the night after on raw because who would be matter more to the fans then him somehow screwing the rock at wrestlemania or the night after
