Storylines gone wrong

[HBK-aholic]

Every year we get some great storylines from the WWE, as much as people like to pretend they aren't good. As recently as Summerslam I can think of 2; Edge and Undertaker, and Shawn and Jericho.

However, often storylines are ruined because its not the right time for them, or wrestlers are wrongly chosen for it. Forgetting about the way they work out, a wrestler being involved in a storyline somewhat out of the blue ruins the whole thing. And it turns what was a great idea sour, so people forget about the good intentions behind it.

If you could choose one wrestling storyline, and change the wrestlers involved, what would it be, and who would have been better?

I'll choose quite a recent one. I don't think Snitsky was the right person to be involved in Kane and Lita losing their baby. It was random, and I don't think he played the character that well. A few others could have been better.

 

[The Whole (Van) DAMn Show]

I've got one for you. Anyone notice that since the draft, they have tried to turn Batista heel. examples: when Punk accepted the title rematch after the Bash, he stormed out as soon as hearing "you're on." He started the whole Cena/Batista 1 upmanship when walking further from the tag during the match where they won the world tag titles. I know its just minor examples, but it seemed to me that they wanted to turn him heel, but as people continued to cheer him, they threw the idea out. I have a strong feeling that had Orton not been re-injured, they would have had him lead DiBiase and Rhodes to the ring during the Summerslam match, and causing a Double DQ. Then Batista would have turned and attacked Cena, starting up a new stable in Orton, Batista, and team Priceless, allowing them to Feud with Cryme Tyme and Cena, along with a 4th member, possibly someone like Kofi(get him into the main events) or even Deuce(he still hasnt debuted since being drafted to Raw)

 

[My$terio_Fan]

I'll go with the Vince's son storyline. It was widely reported that Mr. Kennedy was supposed to be his son, but because of either injury or drugs(i forget which one)Kennedy was unable to be the part so they ended up using Hornswoggle. The WWE really dropped the ball on this one. If Kennedy was still able to play the role, it could have made him the mainevent heel everyone wanted him to be. But since Kennedy was "unavailable" they should have chose another wrestler to push. Instead they made Hornswoggle the son, and the whole angle because a long drawn out comedy trip that was pointless. WWE could have made an instant mainevent heel but dropped the ball.

 

[Dead Kennedy]

This one is easy. Instead of having Khali win the Battle Royal to become #1 Contender for the WWE Championship a couple of weeks back and give us the clusterf*ck that was the SummerSlam match, they should have booked Hardy to win it. Triple H turns heel, Hardy loses the match at SummerSlam and the rematch at Unforgiven, but finally gets the WWE Championship at No Mercy. Khali should have been relocated to jobland.

 

[Kevin Do]

I've got one for you. Anyone notice that since the draft, they have tried to turn Batista heel. examples: when Punk accepted the title rematch after the Bash, he stormed out as soon as hearing "you're on." He started the whole Cena/Batista 1 upmanship when walking further from the tag during the match where they won the world tag titles. I know its just minor examples, but it seemed to me that they wanted to turn him heel, but as people continued to cheer him, they threw the idea out. I have a strong feeling that had Orton not been re-injured, they would have had him lead DiBiase and Rhodes to the ring during the Summerslam match, and causing a Double DQ. Then Batista would have turned and attacked Cena, starting up a new stable in Orton, Batista, and team Priceless, allowing them to Feud with Cryme Tyme and Cena, along with a 4th member, possibly someone like Kofi(get him into the main events) or even Deuce(he still hasnt debuted since being drafted to Raw)

now with that i say batista turning heel the line up would be


orton
Batista
Rhodes
Dibiase

while cena would have

Cena
JTG
Shad

now with this i would assume that a lo ng drawn out rivalry would insue and then leading up to survivor series with a 5 on 5 match. but over the corse of the time new people are added and since the HBK Y2J storyline is so good how about

orton
Batista
Rhodes
Dibiase
Y2J

while cena would have

Cena
JTG
Shad
HBK

now you rhodes and dibiase not near the level of cena or orton or anyone else, but the same level as Cryme time, why not add in the man that they screwed over in HARDCORE HOLLY! back in the day he was a main event player but no real depth so this could be his last who ra so to speak and then he can end up injuring himself and ending his career.

 

[simpsons_fanatic742]

Thinking about this, I have to go with the Vince McMahon Limo explosion. I mean that was pretty huge. Thye could of done great things with that. They could of had all of the wrestlers as suspects and throughout RAW they would be questioned and even make some of them look suspicious during matches and segments. The finale could of been huge also, but it didn't happen. The whole Chris Benoit murder/suicide put that whole storyline out of play and it was never discussed again. Vince McMahon's son storyline was the replacement, but I think the limo explosion would of been way better.

 

[Twanfusco]

I also like the stable idea of orton, batista and team priceless however i cant see batista joining them because he is liked too much and would never get away with the kind of evil stuff orton does, i think cena turning and joining orton would be much more exciting and more believable as he could be sick of all the boos he gets, he could potentially be as hated as orton but i dont see the wwe doing it bcos of the cash he produces as a face. Main eventers in stables generally work tho and raw is begging for the heel dominance/babyface underdog storyline.

I also think that while the kane/mysterio storyline is interesting, it doesnt have longevity.

I agree 100% with the hornswoggle/vince storyline, soon as we found out it was him i stopped caring completely, storylines as huge and teasing as that should also allow for some good matches to go along with it.

The storyline that i thing went wrong in the worst way was easily the wcw/ecw invasion. It had a few great elements like austin being non-violent then we get the old austin back then him turning heel, then angle turning heel and the rock returning to help and austin being jealous of rvd. But all the wwf heel turns were to make up for the lack of stars on the wcw side, yeah maybe there were contractual issues with some of the bigger wcw "stars" but they could have played it all so much better. As to how though, i have no idea ,am stuck lol i should be a wwe writer.

 

[AFC1986]

One that I think went drastically wrong was the whole May 19th thing with Kane. They had him hearing voices causing him to snap and they could have had him go on a spree of attacking people like he did when he turned heel in 2003, but they completely ballsed it up and he ended up losing to the fake Kane at Vengeance 2005. The WWE could have had Kane doing something more productive, but instead made him look weak. And the Katie Vick stuff Kane did with Triple H was just stupid. He was supposed to have killed Katie, then they had footage of Triple H dressed as Kane getting into a coffin and committing necrophilia. The whole thing was disgusting and there should be no place for stuff like that in wrestling

 

[TThomas6128]

A storyline that went wrong was the 8-18 edition of RAW. Not just one n particular the whole show aside from the Jericho-HBK stuff. The whole show was crap and if WWE does not start putting on better stuff everyone will become more and more disappointed. I mean everything was bad/ EVERYTHING. Aside from Jericho can anyone tell me anything positive from RAW last night. World Championship SCRAMBLE??? WTF. This aint the Hardcore title. Lets make the title more meaningless by having six title changes in 20 minutes. Its ok for fans to believe that 6 pinfalls can be accounted in 20 mins when a normal main event goes for 20 minutes and we get one pinfall. This stuff is garbage and the main feud on Smackdown is near over . . . Triple H is BORING as a FACE. Where do you go from here? Cluster****ville thats where. We are entering the 2008 of the new WCW . . . Welcome BACK Mr. Russo.

I mean you have your world champion win on PPV only to lose the next night in his home town in a "clean" finish. Then you announce that Shane and Steph is there only to have Mike Adamle announce the BIG announcement WTF ever. I am so happy WCW is back in business. Ohhh lets bring the nWo back for the 25th time why we're at it. Maybe people will really believe that they are taking over this time. I personally believe it would be better than this lame a$$ $hit we have now for sure.

 

[IrishCanadian25]

This is an AWESOME thread. The newest evolution of HBK-aholic.

The reformation of the 4 Horsemen. With...Paul Roma? Seriously? This guy was stiff as a board. And while I respected the fact that he was more of a straightedge than the rest, he was a terrible fit for the Horsemen.

Roma replaced Tully Blanchard, who had failed a drug test. Mind you, it's almost impossible to replace Tully in the IV Horsemen. But ROMA!? Plus, the Horsemen were faces at this time, and feuded with Barry Windham and the Hollywood Blondes. If the IV Horsemen needed a new member as a babyface team, why not Ricky Steamboat? He was wasting time teaming with Tom Zenk in "Dos Hombres" and getting bitch slapped by Pillman and Austin! Bobby Eaton, Marcus Bagwell, etc. All would have been fine choices over Roma, who evidently did not fit.

 

[Joaquim Akaem]

Thinking back a little bit further than last week, (this is the old school thread after all) One that stands out for me is the classic "whodunnit?" from 2000.

I'm talking about the time when Stone Cold got ran over, This was a massive angle that went on for months. There was all sorts of speculation, and there was a point when every star on the roster was at ringside and everyone was accusing each other, it was one of the best played out storylines of recent times. That is until the end when the culprit turned out to be Rikishi. For me that was a total letdown, I seen Rikishi as nothing more than a midcarder who got cheap pops by dancing with Too Cool.
So the "phatman" gets this super heel push straight into a main even feud with Steve Austin, gets his ass kicked on 2 straight PPV's and fades into obscurity. I'm pretty sure they tried to save it and have Triple H involved in the attack somehow, but I just think the whole push was wasted on Rikishi in the first place.

Almost anybody could have been the driver of that car for any number of reasons, X-Pac could have shot to mega fame bacause he had his alliances with HHH, which would have made his reasons more realistic, he was awesome back in 2000 aswell and could have easily stepped up to main event level. Jericho and Benoit were just about making it in WWE at that time and either one of them could have easily played the part sucessfully. One Chris being a rabid wolverine and the other being a cocky oppertunist, either would stop at nothing to eliminate their biggest threats to their sucess.

The corporate ministry thing was confusing for me, If Vince was the leader of both groups..... why were they fighting each other for so long.. and the collaboration of the groups contradicted the whole point of them starting a gang war in the first place. But on the otherside however... who else could have possibly played the part of Undertakers "higher power" than Vince himself, it was a lose-lose situation and I think WWE backed themselves into a corner on that one. Involved a lot of good matches thou.

 

[TThomas6128]

Ok then lets really think back instead of last week. What about the WCW Robocop storyline. LoL that was awful. What about the Shockmaster? That was awful too. One major storyline I think went wrong And many people may or may not agree was The WCW/ECW invasion storyline. I personally did not like it whatsoever. I mean who really cared.

 

[Father:_Polley]

So so many storylines which had potential ruined by a series of unfortunate choices

1) The explosion - ruined by VKM having to break kayfabe following the Benoit incident...salvaged (?) by making Hornswoggle Vince's son because Kennedy's suspended...no wait, he's Finlay's son now.

As for older storylines gone wrong:
2) The Eddie Guerrero vs Rey Mysterio over Dominick was pretty awful. Not because of the wrestlers, it just was a poor storyline. This is followed by a similar thread in

And now...my all time favourite poor storyline.

Al Snow vs Big Boss Man - Al Snow ditches Head, gets a dog-sized rat, calls it Pepper, eats it, has a Kennel from Hell match. Cages and Rottweilers made for an interesting match on paper. Instead, we get 4 slobbering dogs with their handlers defaecating at ringside, and an awful match in the ring.
To me, the story could have been decent. Snow and Bossman were rivals at the time, had history and could have put on a good hardcore match. Instead we get Al Snow going mad following the loss of Pepper and a poor match.

 

[klunderbunker]

First thing that popped into my head here was the Gobbledy Gooker. This thing was hyped for weeks and weeks, and it's a dancing turkey? Seriously that's the best you can do? Have a new wrestler come out of there. Or a hot woman manager, anything but a damn bird. Did that thing ever show up other than at WM X7? It was a pointless idea that took up months of build up for absolutely no payoff. There were great possibilities there, and nothing came of it. Not a damn thing.

 

[HBK-aholic]

One that I think went drastically wrong was the whole May 19th thing with Kane. They had him hearing voices causing him to snap and they could have had him go on a spree of attacking people like he did when he turned heel in 2003, but they completely ballsed it up and he ended up losing to the fake Kane at Vengeance 2005. The WWE could have had Kane doing something more productive, but instead made him look weak.

I have to disagree here, I loved it. I fail to see how Kane looked weak in any part of this storyline. His lack of mental stability was great, and it was the Kane that I love. Randomly going around attacking people because he's a recluse and doesn't know any better. The WWE handled it really well and Kane played the part perfectly.

 

[mikeRC]

The Hornswoggle Vince storyline is probably the worst one that has ever been done but since that's already been talked about i'll jog your memories about another terrible storyline.

Kurt Angle vs Booker T
This must've been back in 05 betwen wrestlemania and Kurts move to Raw. These two could easily have a 5 star match and were probably two of the best wrestlers on smackdown but the creative team decided to stir things up by having Kurt Angle try to rape sharmelle. although the matches were good, what the hell posessed the creative team into turning their greatest wrestler into a rapist. it was a massive misuse of talent and a sick storyline that Kurt hated doing and if it wasn't for his matches and storyline with HBK all people would remember of Kurt in 05 would be how he raped Booker T's wife.

Rey Mysterio vs Finlay
This isn't an example of a storyline that went wrong but more of an example of a storyline that could have been so great. Thes two were having great matches both on smackdown and at ppvs and alongside Matt Hardy and MVPs storyline and i think Batista and Taker were feuding (although i may be wrong here) they were the highlight of the show and worked brilliantly together. Finlay was statring to get major heat for faking an injury at No Mercy only to kick the shit out of mysterio after the match which lead onto a decent stretcher match at Cyber Sunday. Then stupidly after Three months of feuding at survivor series Finlay turned face so that he could help continue the god awful Vince and Hornswoggle crap. they ended a great feud with great wrestling to keep one of the worst storylines ever going.

 

[ThePhenomenalAlexSlack]

I don't think this storyline was bad as much as it could have been done a little better but what about the new breed vs the ECW originals. It ended with a decent 8 man tag at wrestlemania, but I think it could have been a little longer and involved more than just those 8 guys, not to mention the WM match should have been a hardcore match.

 

[DJ]

One that nobody thinks about is the Hart Foundation 2.0.After Teddy Hart got the sack that left TJ Wilson,D.H Smith and Nattie with nothing left.He really fucked it up for them.

Another one was The New Breed/The Originals.GREAT feud.GREAT wrestling.But it was ruined by Punk's turn and turn back 2 weeks later.The mania match was good and the follow up on Sci-Fi was awesome.But who really came good out of that?Everyone kinda just ... lost all momentum.

Hassan vs Taker just stopped after 7/7.Haasan was great despite the role he played but at the GAB....He just got killed off because of something againist his power.Hell he took a fuck of a bump and then got fired days later....pretty lousy.

 

[DeadmanInc.]

The nWo/WWF "Terminal Cancer"

This was during the time where Vince and Flair were co-owners of the WWF. Vince was tired of not getting his way so he threatened to bring in the nWo and kill the entire company. The promo Vince cut when he announced the nWo's return was amazing. I actually believed that he wanted to kill his own company. Then for weeks they played promos to hype the nWo return. After the havoc they reeked in WCW, I couldn't wait to see what they would do to the WWF, especially since it was the original three that were returning.

Then came No Way Out. It was a huge disappointment. The nWo came out and said they "want to make friends". Then later on they went on to screw Austin out of the Undisputed Title. Still, nothing groundbreaking after all the hype that they were going to "kill" the WWF. They basically fell apart after Wrestlemania. Scott Hall went on to feud with Bradshaw (a huge step down after just feuding with Austin) and then he was shortly released afterwards.

That's why I consider the nWo's return a huge flop. They hyped their return as deadly to the WWE when all they did was feud with Austin/The Rock for a month and then slowly disbanded. The only thing good that came out of the nWo was the return of Shawn Michaels.

I think they had bigger plans for the nWo but plans changed due to factors out of their control. Hogan was STILL insanely over, hence the rush to get the Undisputed Title off HHH and onto Hogan. X-Pac simply didn't have the starpower to fill Hogan's shoes. Then Hall was released shortly after (I'm guessing due to his drug/alcohol problems), thus Nash was the only original left in the group.

 

[ndumelezi]

I know i'm probably gonna get trashed for this one but. I thought the millionare club vs (well i can't remember what the young guys were called maybe it was the new breed) wasactually a decent idea that had the wrong players. Heres my 3 main problems with it and why i think the teased tna version of it would be better.

1. They turned guys that should never be heel into heels, and guys that should'nt be faces into faces. Goldberg heel: yeah that went over well steiner face: how come him and goldberg just could'nt have stayed as they were. and then mysterio and kidman as heels whatever!!
The tna version though i don't think they are trying to do any massive turns with the exception of sting and jarrett of course. But them turning is not unbelieveable. The fans will accept those guys.

2nd putting people over that should'nt have been put over, main example billy kidman defeats hulk hogan WHAT!!!!!!!!!!!!!! In tna though the diffrence is not that great. You can believe that each of the participants can beat the other on any given day.

3rd They stripped all the titles and replaced them: i was a huge WCW mark but this reeked of desperation. And was done bad cause if you wanted to put the titles on someone else schedule matches and do some massive cheating to win them. I think tna's will be better cause it does'nt look loke it will involve everyone. The midcarders will still have their feuds.

So all in all i'm looking forward to tna hopefully doing right what i consider the most botched angle of all time.

 

[TThomas6128]

I ultimately believe that WCW trying all the stables was the ultimate decline of WCW. I mean nWo 2000 and the New blood vs The Millionaires was just plain garbage. They way they booked it. I believe that it could be good, but the way it was booked was awful

 

[Mr. TM]

The Spirit Squad was disappointing. All five of them looked hot at first, and they should have had a proper break up. Instead they ended up being buried by the reformed Degeneration X. All 5 of them could have had a decent WWE career. Only Kenny Dykstra has remained on the roster. A few of them could have formed successful tag teams (two person) and a couple of them could be in the Midcard.

 

[klunderbunker]

A storyline that to me was the greatest mistake of all time was the conclusion to Hogan and Sting. This was without a doubt the biggest angle WCW ever did. These two teased going at it for 17 months and finally the day arrived for the biggest match in the history of the company and the match that I've always thought would have been the final nail in WWF's coffin. But WCW, either deciding that this was the better way to go or caving into Hogan's demands, managed to screw it up. Instead of just having Sting crush Hogan, the match was booked with a false finish and almost a parody of the Montreal Screwjob. Just about every fan I knew back then started watching WWF just because of that one booking move and it gave WWF a last chance. When a single story lead to the end of a company, I'd say it went wrong.