Greatest and Worst character transformations

[Amazing Blue]

The two I chose aren't really character 180's but more like character developments

Bubba Ray to Bully Ray
Now, I'm not a huge watcher of TNA, but I will watch it every now and again. The Bubba to Bully switch, I think, was the enzyme that was finally able to let Bully break through from the his stigma as a "Tag-Team wrestler". We got to see a more in-depth character with bully, rather than the "Devon, get the tables" schtick we'd all been seeing for years. (Don't get me wrong, I would still love to see someone get 3D'd through a table at least one more time.)

Christian to Captain Charisma
Now, I know that this change wasn't as tremendous of a career boost to Cristian as the Bully switch was, But after splitting up with Edge, Christian seemed to be lost. Destined to be a jobber. But who knew giving him a haircut and a microphone would send him to the top (of the mid-card that is.) I really enjoyed his matches as Intercontinental champion, his feud with Booker-T, and the ever popular "Peep Show."

 

[Wolf Pac]

Tugboat to Typhoon to THE SHOOCKKMAAASSSTTTEEERRRRR! - I'm suprised this hasn't been mentioned yet. I don't really know a lot about Tugboat and Typhoon besides Typhoon having a successful tag team run with Earthquake as The Natural Disasters but The Shockmaster was pretty much the nail in the coffin for Fred Ottman's career. Even if that botch hadn't happened, the Shockmaster was doomed to fail right from the start. Nobody would've been able to take a guy wearing a stormtrooper hat painted silver and covered in glitter, jeans and a long black vest seriously. And that voice, man, good god! Actually what was The Shockmaster even supposed to be? Next thing, Shockmaster comes out for his War Games match at Fall Brawl dressed as a builder, and then he's never seen again. I can't think of anything in the wrestling universe that's worse than The Botchmaster.

Brutus Beefcake - The Barber stuff in the WWF was fun, but all that good will went down the drain in WCW. The heel turn where he became The Butcher was ok as people turning on Hogan is something we expect to see though Beefcake headlining Starrcade was questionable. After that though we had to endure the idiotic run of The Man with No Name, The Zodiac (who had his face painted like a Zebra), The Booty Man, and The Disciple. And he was the only member of Warrior's oWn faction.

 

[Makaveli31]

Brutus Beefcake - The Barber stuff in the WWF was fun, but all that good will went down the drain in WCW. The heel turn where he became The Butcher was ok as people turning on Hogan is something we expect to see though Beefcake headlining Starrcade was questionable. After that though we had to endure the idiotic run of The Man with No Name, The Zodiac (who had his face painted like a Zebra), The Booty Man, and The Disciple. And he was the only member of Warrior's oWn faction.

Can't really include Ed Leslie. His was not "character transformation" he given outright new gimmicks with no link to his past gimmicks. For instance, the "Butcher" was never referred to as the "Barber" even though we all knew who it was and it goes on and on.

Now if you want to say the transformation of the original "Brutus Beefcake" gimmick which I think was a Chippendales-ripoff of sorts to the "Barbe"r we could go with that.

 

[jason497]

Johnny Curtis into Fandango, obviously.

Marcus Alexander Bagwell into Buff "the stuff" Bagwell.

The Sandman from a surfer looking goof to a beer chugging cane swinging badass. lol

 

[Matisyahu]

Edge's various transformations - I just couldnt resist mentioning Edge because there was a huge difference in character as he progressed and matured throughout his tenure in the WWE. Originally he debuted as a silent, mysterious man who would jump the guardrail to begin his matches. Then with his "brother" Christian, joined Gangrel and The Ministry of Darkness before finally becoming the goofy "5 second pose" Edge and Christian team who captured something like 8 or so tag titles before eventually breaking up after Edge won The King of The Ring and became a singles star. Eventually, Edge won the first money in the bank title and successfully cashed it in on Cena to become WWE champ and adopt The Rated R Superstar moniker. Then later stole a win over an injured Mr Kennedy who had just won his own briefcase to ultimately take it from him and cash in on The Undertaker I believe, to become the World Heavyweight champion. All in all Edge made a huge over haul of his career and became a huge success for it.

 

[HBKistheHOF]

Since the title read "character transformations" & not gimmick changes, I'm assuming something as simple as a face or heel turn or changing managers counts as a "transformation".

Since of the classic and/or obvious ones have already been touched upon, I will touch on a couple newer ones & a couple that are sort of "on the line" so to speak.

-Fantastic Transformation:
Husky Harris to Bray Wyatt - While I enjoyed Husky Harris, Bray Wyatt is like freakin' Stone Cold Steve Austin times x10 compared to the Husky Harris character. Wyatt was obviously still green in his original debut & some time in NXT has seemed to do nothing but spawn one of the most interesting & compelling characters & stables in the history of WWE.

Johnny Curtis to Fandango - I will admit I never liked Johnny Curtis & I never wanted to see him on my television screen. & while Fandango isn't my favorite superstar by any stretch of the imagination, I enjoy his work now & once again I think some time in NXT did nothing but make him blossom into a much more complete WWE Superstar.

-On The Line:
Wade Barrett to 'The Bare Knuckle Brawler' - Most would agree that from the original promos that this character shift for Barrett to the cool, underground, fighter could have been what he finally needed to reach that top tier in WWE. Some might say that a win at this Sunday's MitB PPV could still propel the Fightclub-esque Superstar to a new level, unfortunately I think this fighter will remain underground.

Jack Swagger 'The All American American' to "We The People!" - I think many would agree Swagger was great before but he needed a mouth piece, a slight revamp & a solid push. Low & behold, that is EXACTLY what he got, even to a better degree than some might have expected but soon after he got a DUI, lost to Del Rio at Mania & lost a rematch to Del Rio at Extreme Rules in an 'I Quit' match, after which he would take some time away from the ring. Swagger's stock has seriously dropped but he is back, in the MitB match & is now also teaming with Antonio Cesaro. Will Swagger get just what he needs again or will he be the half of the duo that falls behind??? Only time will tell if Swagger can make anything of what little he has left but I'm not holding my breathe.

-Just Awful:
Albert/Tensai to Sweet T - While most never liked the Tensai gimmick & it didn't get over, I thought it worked well & with some minor tweeks could have been a very good gimmick, not to mention Matthew Bloom has always been a better heel. Now he is a goofy babyface with Brodus Clay & is basically the joke/jobber, face tag team. It's just sad, considering he was beating John Cena on RAW when he first returned.

Hart Dynasty Natalya to The Farting Manager of Khali & Hornswoggle - While I enjoy AJ Lee & some of the other Divas are attractive, Natalya is a 2nd Generation Superstar & the only WWE Diva with any true talent inside a ring. She should be the main focus of the Divas Division, hands down! But instead she has gone from Divas Champion & managing the Hart Dynasty to doing a gimmick where she couldn't control her gas & hangs out with Khali & Hornswoggle. While she wasn't very high up to begin with, I don't think I can recall another WWE Superstar or Diva falling so very far in such a short amount of time.

 

[shalliin]

For me it's the Real Man Steven Regal instead of the British Lord Steven Regal as one of the worst.

Sid Justice turning into Sid Vicious refined further into Psycho Sid was both good and bad, but this was happening around the time Vince started to move into a reg sized face vs massive heel series of feuds for everyone on the roster in the early 90's. Seriously, look it up and most feuds have mid sized faces against massive heels with Undertaker and HBK being some of the few exceptions.

Tugboat turning into Typhoon was good in a way since it gave us the Natural Disasters.

Macho Man's many changes from face to heel to both to announcer and so on.