Festival of Friendship vs CassGate

[Wildcat66]

This year we've seen two popular friendships break up within our very eyes, Kevin Owens and Chris Jericho and Enzo Amore and Big Cass.

Kevin and Chris first joined forces before SummerSlam to take on Enzo and Cass. They would win that match and eventually Kevin would go on to win the Universal title, Chris stayed with Kevin and they formed a bond; helping the other win their match. Eventually, the friendship came to a crashing halt when Kevin gave him a present during their 'Festival of Friendship' and then proceeded to attack him.

Enzo and Cass's friendship lasted a lot longer than Chris and Kevin's, dating back to 2014 when they teamed up to take on Mason Ryan; originally meant to be a heel tandem, fans began to love them so much that they effectively turned them face.

In 2016, they would finally make their main roster debut and feud with many tag team and even earning a few title matches along the way, even though they never won any of the matches; they still had a lot of fans on their side. In the weeks leading up to Enzo and Cass's breakup, Enzo and Cass had been both getting attack by a mysterious superstar; some of the suspects in question would include The Revival and Big Show.

In the end, Kurt Angle (with a little help from Corey Graves) revealed to the world that it was Big Cass who attacked Enzo Amore and he proceeded to give out a long, passionate rant on how he truly felt about teaming with Enzo and officially severed their friendship.

Both angles have received praise for how it was executed, but the question now lies on us to decide...which angle was done better?

 

[Fire Marshall Bill]

I'll go with the FoF. Cass's turn seemed a little awkward to me. Just seemed to me that once Cass admitted it was he who attacked Enzo, Enzo might've done something about it. I know it can be written off as stunned surprise, but heel/face turns are often executed best with sudden actions, not a speech telling someone why you attacked them previous weeks followed by another attack.

If Cass had immediately attacked Enzo upon everyone watching the video of him setting up his fake attack, I think that would've been better. He could've then explained why he did it and walked off to close the show.

The FoF was accomplished very similar to this scenario and it made the incident seem more impactful.

 

[LBGetBack]

Hands down, Owens-Jericho. Chris is just on a different level.

I think a Jericho turning on Michaels in 2008 vs. Owens turning on Jericho would be a closer contest.

 

[BestSportsEntertainer]

Festival of Friendship, and it's laughable to compare the two.

Big Cass is not in the same universe as Jericho and Owens when it comes to mic skills. Neither is Enzo.

Also what have Enzo and Cass even accomplished? They don't have a memorable feud. Owens and Jericho were Universal Champion and US Champion. Jericho was easily the most entertaining thing on Raw, while Enzo and Cass were mostly forgettable. Sure you can blame booking, but that doesn't change the facts.

Cass' heel turn was executed really well, but Festival of Friendship is infinitely times better.

 

[The Perfect Max]

The Festival of Friendship was executed really well, and that was discussed at length at the time so I won't explain why. But it was better. Having said that, I did enjoy the break up with Cass and Enzo. I wasn't necessarily a fan of the whole Angle and Graves involvement, but when it got down to the explanation and revelation, I enjoyed it. No, as above posts have said, typically the best heel turns don't begin with a long winded explanation, but happen with a sudden hit. But I felt this was different for a reason. Cass really told us the truth and while that could have waited until next week, for him to explain why he did what he did, he did it to Enzo's face with no shame and then humiliated him again. I think that was quite powerful. Admittedly, it would have been better if I cared more about these two. Don't get me wrong, I really liked them as a team. But they weren't given as much to do as they should have been in their main roster tenure, and perhaps a title run of some sort would have elevated the significance of this turn. I don't see it leading to a feud on the same level as Jericho and Owens, although I think WWE will give it a good go.

Overall, the break up of Jericho and Owens was better, but we know just how good they are. Cass and Enzo did their parts well and I'm excited to see where it leads. It was good, but not as good.

 

[Jack-Hammer]

The Festival of Friendship may well be the single best segment of its type in history. When it was announced, I wasn't looking forward to it at all as I figured it'd be loaded with some sort of cheesy, cornball comedy that was designed first and foremost to entertain Vince. However, the segment turned out to be highly entertaining, genuinely funny, continued to play up the unique chemistry between Jericho & Owens and put genuine heat on Owens when he ultimately turned. WWE had been teasing a break up between them off & on for a while, teasing tension was reaching a boiling point only to have it be a con that the two of them were able to pull off. Owens' turn on Jericho was both surprising and predictable in that we were surprised at how sudden it happened but predictable in that we knew it was going to happen somewhere along the line.

The situation with Enzo & Cass worked well for what it was. It wasn't a drawn out storyline compared to Jericho & Owens and it wasn't meant to be. While many of us thought that Cass was ultimately behind it, Cass himself being "attacked" created just enough doubt to where it was believable that he was a victim as well. After Enzo's interaction with Big Show, I was worried that WWE might go the route of doing something really stupid like having Show be the culprit out of jealousy because he wanted to be Enzo's big buddy instead of Cass. The reason I thought that was partially because of Show's imitation of the Jersey/New York accent and it'd fit in with some of the dumb stuff they've done with him in the past.

 

[Vanilla Midget]

I don't think it's a fair comparison at all. You don't really compare a work by a couple masters to a couple guys barely out of their first year on the main roster.

Yes, the segments both featured a best friend turning on the other, but Enzo and Cass have a level of closeness that Jericho and Owens didn't have. Enzo and Cass debuted together, whereas there was always something disingenuous about JeriKO.

The other massive difference is that the KO turn was a complete surprise, whereas the Enzo and Cass story involved a mystery that spanned multiple weeks with many suspects.

The Enzo/Cass split had more in common with the night Mick Foley solved who ran over Stone Cold. The execution was similar - we knew Stone Cold had been run over, as we knew Enzo and Cass had been attacked. We didn't know there was any major dissent between JeriKO

The night they revealed Rikishi as the culprit, then WWF commissioner Mick Foley revealed at the top of Raw that he would reveal the driver. He interview suspects throughout, before Raw ended with the swerve and heel turn.

The difference between who hit Austin and who beat up Enzo and Cass was that the swerve made sense. This is why they chose to have Cass cut a promo before attacking Enzo.

With JeriKO, it was all left field and unexpected - having Owens cut a promo there would have been too on the nose. It would have been almost cliche, "ok I beat you up, here's why, are you listening while you writhe in pain?"

If Cass knocked Enzo out, how could we be sure he heard it? It was supposed to hurt in a way that two guys who came into the company together would hurt. I'm pretty sure I saw a tear roll down Enzo's cheek (might have been sweat, who cares). He sold the shock - having a loudmouth just silenced spoke more volumes then if he opened his fat mouth again.

Cassgate was far from perfect. It did it's job effectively, and while it's disappointing these guys never got a tag title run, the fact that they didn't helped tell this story. The Rockers never held the tag titles before the barbershop incident.

Enzo and Cass aren't Shawn Michaels. Who knows if the split will be good, but the story played out and added some intrigue to Raw.

I'd say the Festival of Friendship and the Enzo and Cass split have some surface similarities, but everything under the hood from set up to execution doesn't compare. That's not because one is better (the Festival is a triumph, this is just a thing that happened) but they're just very different heel turns.

 

[MWRedskins]

Owens and Jericho and it's not even close in my opinion.

When i was watching the Enzo and Cass breakup, my hope was that we'd see American Alpha attacking Cass in that video footage and that's who the attackers were, i was more or less dreading a Cass heel turn and not because i dont think Cass can pull it off, he can, but Enzo is likely going to fade away after the initial feud because while Enzo has the "gift of gab" his in ring work is not that good and i see him just fading while Enzo will be in a great spot because after the feud with Enzo, he can move onto mid card feuds with Ambrose and other faces on RAW.

As for Jericho and Owens, there were 2 things different.....1) i didnt see it coming THEN. i expected Jericho and Owens to breakup, but like many people, i expected it AFTER Goldberg beat Owens. i saw the Cass turn coming from a mile away and when Graves stood up with the video, my first thought was it's going to show Cass just laying there on the ground without being attacked, so Owens' turn on Jericho was more unpredictable......2) it was done MUCH better, Cass just went off on him on the mic, then gave him a big boot. Jericho played up the comedy of them two being such great friends, gave him both good and really funny gifts which literally had me laughing....then Owens gave him a list and i again laughed thinking that he seriously gave him a new list, then you read it and i thought, oh this is going to be epic!!! and it was epic, the beatdown, the facial expressions on Owens. he did this perfectly.

So clearly Owens and Jericho.

 

[Navi]

Owens/Jericho wins this one hands down, it's not even close in any universe.

The two of them had chemistry unlike not many so that's what made it work so well. Sure Big Cass and Enzo have been together for most of their wrestling lives, but they don't have the spark or the comedic talent that Jericho or Owens has.

The Festival of Friendship was one of the funniest things on WWE TV in a long time. The only thing that comes close was when HHH and HBK were terrorizing Vince all those years ago.

The Fashion Police however and Southpaw Regional Wrestling deserve a nod as well.