The gimmick that got away

[MattRhys20]

Just been browsing some old episodes of RAW on the WWE Network (the greatest thing on the internet besides Sophie Dee) and I managed to grab the episode last November when RAW was in Manchester, England.

The match concerned Santino and Los Matadores v 3MB, only 3MB came out as 'The Union Jacks'.

Fast forward the next week to 'Country RAW' and R-Truth tags with Xavier Woods to take on 3MB, only this time as 'The Rhinestone Cowboys'.

Now I can't be the only one that thinks this should have carried on as it was. Each week that they go to a city with some kind of musical influence or famous artist, have 3MB come out and parody it.

On the way back from college the other day, I came up with the following scenarios.

Miami: The Pitbulls (parodying Pitbull)
New York: 75 Cents (50 Cent)
Brooklyn: Kay Z (Jay-Z)
Anywhere in California: The Sandmen (The Beach Boys)
New Jersey: Non-Jovee (Bon Jovi)
Detroit: N and N (Eminem)

And so on until they broke up

 

[Rich the UK WWE Fan 2k14]

That "Union Jacks" gimmick was one of THE stupidest things ever IMO.

The only good thing was they won in England.

More to the point, how the hell are you watching the WWE Network? Your location says London, England?

 

[MattRhys20]

That "Union Jacks" gimmick was one of THE stupidest things ever IMO.

The only good thing was they won in England.

More to the point, how the hell are you watching the WWE Network? Your location says London, England?

I have a holiday home in Florida, so I used that address to sign up, then just installed a blocker to get around the viewing restrictions

 

[Jack-Hammer]

I think this would get old very quickly. The novelty of 3MB becoming a parody of various social stereotypes or, in this case, popular recording artists just doesn't have very much of a shelf life. I believe that there's a possibility that WWE officials realized this and decided to end it after doing it only a couple of times.

Besides that, I remember reading that Heath Slater is on hiatus for some undisclosed personal reasons and that there's no timetable given for his return. Also, when you consider that WWE has been taking tag team wrestling seriously again for quite a while, there hasn't been much visibility for comedy teams or jobber tag teams in general like 3MB or Los Matadores. That's been especially true during WrestleMania season and whatever potential 3MB may have once had, it's long since gone.

 

[Rich the UK WWE Fan 2k14]

The only one out of the trio who has any talent is Drew McIntyre IMO, and even he's destined to be mid card for life, due to Vince McMahon's thing for burying non-Americans unless they're a 20 stone fat guy who does 2 moves and has limited to no mic skills, Alexander Rusev anyone?

 

[NancyBenoit]

There is not a gimmick on planet earth revolving around those three clown faced jobbers that could ever work. At this point I highly doubt any of them will ever be significant again, we will always see them as 3mb. I mean the leader has red hair...red hair, gross, then there's the muslim and the english weirdo so yea that was the gimmick that would've saved them.

 

[MYGold]

I'm legitimately pissed off that I opened this thread.

It's just impossible to fathom a thread about 3MB. There's a reason they're not even on TV to job anymore. They suck.

 

[Nick Black]

They're whole gimmick should just go away. The only enjoyable things about them have nothing to do with the full group. Watching Slater get decimated by legends was hilarious. McIntyre is a great wrestler who will never be more than he is. But all 3 of them together as a band is just stupid. Nobody cares and nobody ever did.

 

[JohnJohnson]

The only people who should do parodies are DX, because comedy jobbers just aren't funny. I've said before, if they are going to make them entertaining then team them up with Santino, Hornswaggle and Khali and give them "J.O.B. Squad" T shirts. Keep 3MB heel and keep the other 3 as faces but have them on the same team. Have matches where Khali accidentally chops Jinder over the head and they all get into 3 stooges-like antics. Have them argue over who's in charge and show them performing pranks like locking Hornswaggle in a locker or putting fireworks in Jinder's bag at the airport. We'd have nostalgia, something the kids can enjoy and something much better than having 3 jobbers dress as English rockstars, cowboys, or rappers.

 

[jackall88]

I know this strays away from the general discussion forum but I just wanted to voice my opinion on this Santino/Emma gimmick. This is the stupidest gimmick I've ever seen on WWE-everything is dumb from the music to the kissy kissy between them. Whenever these 2 come on Raw or Smackdown I turn the channel. End this ASAP!

I 100% agree with you. It was the worst part of an enjoyable Raw on Monday.

 

[lil steroid meat]

The idea of the gimmick has excellent potential but seeing how out of touch the WWE is when it comes to anything outside of what a focus group tells them, I just know the execution would be poor.

I've seen enough Cryme Tyme, Xavier Woods, R-Truth, Thuganomics John Cenas to know that when it comes to urban culture, it's like they go out of their way to get the oldest, whitest, out-of-touch dudes to put on a blindfold and give them a crayon to handle the script-writing duties.

It would work for older, more contemporary acts, but Jay-Z? Eminem? 50? They'd just throw them out there with baggy clothes, fake jewelry and a fitted and have them say "Yo" over and over and when the audience gives them "please get all the way the fuck out of my line of vision" heat, Vince, HHH and co. will get excited that they are "getting over".

However, the concept of this gimmick is great for a comedy jobber group and I would definitely rather see this than silly shit like dance off's for the obligatory 10 minutes of comedy/cool down time for RAW.

 

[lil steroid meat]

The only people who should do parodies are DX, because comedy jobbers just aren't funny. I've said before, if they are going to make them entertaining then team them up with Santino, Hornswaggle and Khali and give them "J.O.B. Squad" T shirts. Keep 3MB heel and keep the other 3 as faces but have them on the same team. Have matches where Khali accidentally chops Jinder over the head and they all get into 3 stooges-like antics. Have them argue over who's in charge and show them performing pranks like locking Hornswaggle in a locker or putting fireworks in Jinder's bag at the airport. We'd have nostalgia, something the kids can enjoy and something much better than having 3 jobbers dress as English rockstars, cowboys, or rappers.

This is also a great idea, gives these guys something somewhat entertaining to do.

 

[hacksawrowdyhogan]

No way eminem. We love the silver bullet band so they could be the 3 bullet band. Maybe even our heritage of Motown! I can't believe eminem was someone's first thought. I have met him and my mom works at the middle school Hailey attended. Huge fan but he isn't the motor city.

 

[enviousdominous]

On a personal level, I did want to see 3MB become something bigger than just this generation's version of the job squad. It was neat to see them come out with a band gimmick unique to their location, I imagine that the creative direction of their stable was slightly compromised in that fans were starting to actually like them.

I think if the WWE pursued the creative direction of having 3MB depict an aspect of music unique to their location, the crowd would have warmed up to them. I don't think it would have lasted, but it would have been neat to see them show some heart in a losing effort against The Shield or The Wyatts. Just disappearing abruptly seems to have even left their haters asking "Was that it?".

 

[Mustang Sally]

A while back, 3MB was getting a lot of TV time.....always losing, but showing up on our screens quite often. Since then, perhaps coinciding with Heath Slater's unexplained absence, they've been gone. The easiest thing to conclude was that their gimmick has been abandoned by WWE; and that's probably what it is. The company made that strange attempt to revitalize matters with the ridiculous name changes (the Union Jacks?)

I kind of hoped they were taken off the air to disband the team and perhaps repackage one or more of their guys (Drew!).....but after seeing them turn up a week ago to have Big E take down both McIntyre and Mahal in a handicap match, my guess is that 3MB is still in limbo; that the company has no plans for them, individually or collectively, but all three remain on the roster.

Beats the unemployment line, I suppose.

 

[TheICChampion]

Beats the unemployment line, I suppose.

Oh, trust me, they'll get there soon enough. Maybe they should put Drew Mcintyre with Sheamus and/or Wade Barrett. Why didn't they do that whole "United Kingdom" storyline like in SVR '12? Maybe not winning every single title, but it would have been interesting. Keep Regal as a mouthpiece and everyone else as the a$$kickers. And why not have Heath Slater do that whole "Clem" thing? Take JBL off commentary and have him be Slater's mouthpiece. Replace him with, say, Byron Saxton or Alex Riley. Hell, put Miz on commentary for a while, see how that works out.

 

[mikeyboy]

The only people who should do parodies are DX, because comedy jobbers just aren't funny.

Dx were not funny either , they were the most overated group of wrestlers ever.

 

[@smarkmouth]

Hold on, the topic title is "The gimmick that got away", and we're not referring to Shawn O'Haire as the Devils Advocate? "I'm not telling you anything you didn't already know." Forward thinking at the time, a calmer, sophisticated version of Mr. Bray Wyatt, only to end up debuting as Roddy Piper's lackey.

We're not referring to Jeff Hardy's heel turn in TNA, only to lose steam due to Jeff's significant personal issue.

We're not even referring to Ryback's unbeatable gimmick, dropped because CM Punk vs The Rock was indeed, the money match.

We're talking about... 3MB?? As mentioned above, the parody gimmick is a trope in wresting, done by DX, Gillberg, even Big Show. The only change for 3MB I can fathom is a turn from heel jobbers to face jobbers, and even that would infringe on the J.O.B. Squad gimmick. I'm not griping about gimmick infringement. The arts in general are a big stew of unoriginal content, but if this is the gimmick that got away, please, let's not lose sleep over it.