Should WWE drop the Kayfabe Character Ideology?

[NotoriousWWE]

For months now I have listened to crowd reactions and it always seems to me that on RAW (Seeing as its LIVE and therefore can't be edited), a lot of heels get huge crowd reactions and no its not heat its actually a big pop. Whether it be that they are from there hometown or simply because they are "The Best in the World at Everything they do" *cough* Jericho *cough*, they get massive reactions.

So I guess the question I pose is, Why do WWE need to keep this Faces/Heels mentality since superstars can easily get over as a fan favourite as a heel? For example, Daniel Bryan. He has managed to accomplish so much in 2012 simply because of his arrogant and cocky new personality that saw his character take a turn to the heel-side of things. If WWE were to drop the whole kayfabe character ideology I feel it would only be beneficial to the organisation and the superstars in attempting to get over, and can you imagine the feuds?

The benefits, there are so many. To begin with, feuds would be so much more edgy and interesting. Can you imagine the likes of a Pipe-bombing CM Punk feuding with a ruthless Sheamus? An egotistical Daniel Bryan taking on the veteran Chris Jericho? So many great match-ups could be built, with the crowd deciding who to route for.

Lets be honest, its easier to get over as a heel than it is as a face, because the usual WWE audience have no response whatsoever to a newcomer who isn't capable of really stealing the spotlight. So having the Face/Heel split dropped would enable so many to find it easier to get over.

And no, im not saying 'book WWE like UFC where fans can route for whoever" because they we as fans do want some sort of direction. Its just that I feel there are so many positives to just allowing the big split to end and allow superstars to just ride it out as different personas which are neither that of a heel or face, just unique. They can flip off the crowd, high-five the crowd its up to them. It just builds so much more interest from the crowd in my eyes if they are having to choose between two guys that they should actually really dislike.

 

[2Sweet_4Life]

D-Bryan Got over because of YES! YES! YES! Of course for people debuting its easier to get over as a heel it has always been like this. Also how can you drop heel/face? That is just stupid and be confusing if they kept switching between heel and face. Keep wrestling the way it is but don't edit out reactions for heels. Also Sheamus is so not over! His crowd reactions are totally added in but... He's friends with HHH. So i can see were you are coming from.

 

[BorkLaser]

I've been thinking about this for a while now. IMO they shouldn't drop it but they need to tone it down or change it a bit. Its getting too predictable, excluding rare cases, a heel will always back down from a fight, a heel is always a coward, a heel will never have a clean win in an important match such as a title match (something has to happen such as interference or distractions). A face will never cheat and always win clean, a face will always call out the heel and challenge him, a face that's a main eventer will never tap out (this recently happened at extreme rules where Sheamus passed out instead of submitting). Also, what I hate the most is that heels are friends with heels and faces with faces. Today they are enemies, next week the heel has a face turn, the week after that they are friends.

They should give everyone a certain character and gimmick and he has to stick with it. Nowadays their actions are usually based on being a heel or a face and this is something I really hate. During the last Smackdown, Randy Orton RKO'd Sheamus for accidentally kicking him, this is what I like, where his actions depend on his character and not on being a face or a heel. It gives the wrestlers depth in their characters and makes them all different from each other.

 

[Ol'Canucklehead]

Last time I checked wrestling is fake and for the most part so are the characters. Kayfabe is very important to wrestling because it gives it a semblance if realism.

Another reason would have to be that I don't think they as a company can get behind a heel. With good vs. bad, good usually always wins in the end and that is something the company can get behind. Not "our champion just smashed a bottle of Jack over someones head".

What you need to realize is that you can't have it both ways. If you were to scrap the heel/face tradition then the wrestlers would just be themselves and in some cases would be boring and never get out of their shell. And also remember, wrestling is fake and they are actors following a time tested script. The majority of fans want o see the good guy win. Even when Stone Cold was a face he was still the one getting the messy end of the stick and did so much act like a heel he just didn't take crap.

 

[justin71]

Why throw away an aged old formula that history has proven that works? All to often a face(besides Cena) gets a heel reaction they turn and vice versa for heels...

 

[smokeyjoe414]

in short NO, in long NO NO NO, kayfabe is the central premise to pro wrestling, good guys vs bad guys, it shouldnt matter if a crowd cheers a heel or visa versa, 20 thousand people can cheer the rock but a few hundered will boo, to drop the format would lead to a lack of story, character and entertainment, if it aint broke dont fix it!

ps UFC is a sport, wwe is not, thats why we have heels and faces in wrestling and not in MMA, NFL,NBA MLS or NHL. Its entertainment not organised competition

 

[H33LTurn]

Well for starters, the WWE characters are loosely based on people in real life. There are good and bad people in this word, and good vs bad has been an instrumental part of entertainment for many years. And look at a guy like John Cena, who didnt get over because he was a heel. His success has come off the fact that hes incredibly marketable as a "good guy".

Also, it adds to the depth of the character. The only thing better than seeing DB as the asshole that his character is today is seeing him slowly transform from a humble rookie to the deuchebag who blames his gf for everything. Again, it goes back to that whole real life aspect of the wrestling business. We watch some of the most significant people in our lives go from good to bad to good and then around some more. It all adds to the experience and I think having an all edgy heel roster would get boring eventually.

 

[kor420]

D-Bryan Got over because of YES! YES! YES! Of course for people debuting its easier to get over as a heel it has always been like this. Also how can you drop heel/face? That is just stupid and be confusing if they kept switching between heel and face. Keep wrestling the way it is but don't edit out reactions for heels. Also Sheamus is so not over! His crowd reactions are totally added in but... He's friends with HHH. So i can see were you are coming from.

Really? Sheamus reactions are totally added in? Is this a proven fact? or is this just a IWC (i hate this guys guts because he's friends with so-and-so) rumor?
Please show me some kind of bona fide proof of claim stating that sheamus's crowd reactions are totally added in; show me something that tells me other than "i was there, i know".

This is whats wrong with IWC, they spread rumors than some unintelligent person comes along and takes the the comment about a person or a company as the truth.


OP:
No, i think they should leave it how it is, let things to continue how they are. People is going to boo/cheer who they want anyway.

 

[ProWrestlingFan]

Really? Sheamus reactions are totally added in? Is this a proven fact? or is this just a IWC (i hate this guys guts because he's friends with so-and-so) rumor?
Please show me some kind of bona fide proof of claim stating that sheamus's crowd reactions are totally added in; show me something that tells me other than "i was there, i know".

This is whats wrong with IWC, they spread rumors than some unintelligent person comes along and takes the the comment about a person or a company as the truth.


OP:
No, i think they should leave it how it is, let things to continue how they are. People is going to boo/cheer who they want anyway.

No Sheamus's reactions are added in. On RAW he gets a very less of a pop and on Smackdown they add in fake crowd noises. Smackdown has fake crowd reactions.

On to the topic,I agree with OP, Kafabe is a thing of the past. Now nearly 90 % of the fans know wrestling is fake and they become good guys and bad guys on purpose. Its not necessary to have 1 good guy and 1 bad guy to have a Wrestling match.

 

[Azane]

You can't remove kayfabe from wrestling.
It's like taking the ball out of soccer.

People tune in for the good vs evil aspects, the right vs wrong, heel vs face etc...

2 stars fighting for the hell of it don't really draw wrestling's demographic in.

 

[TM Punk]

I think a lot of you are taking the op a little too literally. I think what he means, and I totally agree, is that there needs to be a little more grey mixed in with the black and white. Why does chris jericho have to go out and wrestle kofi kingston every week? Why can't there be a highly competitive matchup between jericho and ziggler without one of them being a babyface? Vickie could still get involved, and jericho can still get a cheap win somehow without either man turning.

 

[gwarren]

I just think they need to reinvent faces/heels formula.

Back in Hulk Hogans time, an all American, clean hero got over really well, because society was more strict on things like swearing, nudity, etc.

In today's society, heels get over more because people like seeing rules broken and edginess. I think we could completely remove traditional "faces" and replace them all with tweeners (like Orton) and nobody would notice. Just look at most superhero movies today compared to the 1980s, the heroes are usually a lot dirtier and the villains more powerful.

 

[DirtyD79]

I just think they need to reinvent faces/heels formula.

Back in Hulk Hogans time, an all American, clean hero got over really well, because society was more strict on things like swearing, nudity, etc.

In today's society, heels get over more because people like seeing rules broken and edginess. I think we could completely remove traditional "faces" and replace them all with tweeners (like Orton) and nobody would notice. Just look at most superhero movies today compared to the 1980s, the heroes are usually a lot dirtier and the villains more powerful.

I agree. Give the babyfaces a few flaws like for example a second or third generation wrestler could feel like he or she needs to live up to the accomplishments of their parents. Maybe he or she tries to be good because they're worried what kind of message they're sending to their kids or trying to atone for personal demons in the past.

Or give the heels motivations beyond evil simply for the sake of being evil. Maybe he acts like a dick or she's a bitch because they were abused as kids or like in the case of Shawn Michaels joining JBL they need the money. Maybe you can have a heel who is insanely jealous and is overprotective of his girlfriend like Macho Man was with Miss Elizabeth or they get jealous seeing their kid wearing a rival wrestler's shirt.

 

[ultramattman]

At this point, WWE understands that some stars are going to get a mixed reaction. They finally began embracing the boos for Cena, for the biggest example. Obviously Daniel Bryan is in that category right now. It was happening with CM Punk before he turned face. WWE has embraced it, as they should. After all, a mixed reaction is even BETTER than a face or heel pop. What's better than a rabid crowd with half the arena cheering one wrestler, and half the other? That's what they tried to do with Rock/Cena, except it worked a little too well and ended up being 100% Rock.

As for dropping 'kayfabe', I'm not sure how you'd even do that. Dropping kayfabe means dropping storylines. Unless you're just going for a straight-ahead Fake Sports Tournament, you've got to have characters.

 

[ultramattman]

OP does make a great point - it's impossible to be a good heel today without getting cheered by half the audience. And it's only going to get moreso going forward. TRUE heels have to be genuinely irritating performers a la Vicki or Johnny.

 

[Jack-Hammer]

Without the heel/face mentality & character roles, you essentially take out the core of all pro wrestling storylines. The single greatest and most widely accepted angle in any form of scripted entertainment is the age old story of good vs. bad. Take that out of the equation, and you take the heart out of wrestling.

WWE, WCW & ECW all went the route you're talking about during the Attitude Era. Contrary to what you might hear from AE marks, this was one of the worst aspects of the Attitude Era. There stopped being good guys or bad guys, a sense of right and wrong was no longer there. Everything was in shades of gray and damn near every wrestler on the roster, especially the ones that seemed to matter most, were morally ambiguous tweener/anti-hero characters. As a result, you often had roster fulls of guys who were so much alike that it watered down the roster.

Some fans do cheer for heels simply because they want to, usually the smarks that think it makes them "cool" to cheer for the bad guys. All in all, however, most fans ultimately want a sense of someone to cheer for and someone to rally against. Without that, then what's the point?

 

[Dyscord]

I think a lot of you are taking the op a little too literally. I think what he means, and I totally agree, is that there needs to be a little more grey mixed in with the black and white. Why does chris jericho have to go out and wrestle kofi kingston every week? Why can't there be a highly competitive matchup between jericho and ziggler without one of them being a babyface? Vickie could still get involved, and jericho can still get a cheap win somehow without either man turning.

Agreed. When you have Heel vs Face, you're really limiting your matches. I've always wondered why they can't have a heel vs heel or face vs face. Maybe because they feel that the crowd wouldn't be as into it. Personally, if done right, a face/face match can be very well done. Take Cena and Punk. If they ever have that match again and they're both face, it would work rather well.

 

[The Champ]

I'm all for shades of gray when they work, but getting rid of the concept of the heels and faces entirely is a bad move. Without it, you take away a lot of great moments over the years that have resulted from people playing their face and heel characters to perfection. There's nothing wrong with wrestlers playing extensions of their real life personalities, but there also has to be some performance aspect to it, because it is just that - a performance. You'd have to turn down a lot of the personalities significantly, and fans wouldn't be as invested in the matches because you don't have the same kind of emotional attachment.

In short, more gray, fine, getting rid of faces and heels entirely, no.