Babyfaces insulting foreign countries in WWE.

[Jingus]

Jingus- the sad thing about the whole Hassan thing is that his original gimmick was so creative and outside the box type thinking. But the WWE just couldn't stop themselves from going deeper into a rabbit hole and resorting to the shock value.

Oh yeah, it's obvious that Vince&Co. didn't get the gimmick at all. Over the course of a few months, Hassan and Daivari went from being whiny assumptive SJW types who were all like "fuck you for thinking that we're terrorists!" to generic swarthy savages who were more like "fuck you, we're terrorists".

 

Still, my larger point is that the older heat-magnet type of heel gimmicks simply don't work in a modern publicly-traded corporation. People today treat the wrestlers' actions of being indicative of their employer rather than being their individual expressions. JBL didn't get good heat from comically doing the goose-step during a match in Germany, he got fired from his side gig as a business news analyst.

[MFoy]

 

The other day I was thinking of something, if a heel either from a coastal city or from the UK, ripped into each city, not at the shallow levels we are used to heels ripping into towns, but at a deeper level. A heel goes in and says your sports team sucks, the crowd might cheer in agreement. But if a heel goes and cuts a promo about local systemic problems of a city or a region and really rips the city and its residents a new asshole it would be interesting... I don't think anybody has ever done that and I think it would get incredible heat. Like if a heel goes to Detroit and cuts a promo saying that 50 years ago the largest employer in the country was Ford paying a livable wage, but now its Wallmart paying a slave wage. And that his german car cost more than the average row home in Detroit. Then went on to talk shit about everything going on with Flint. That could get somebody stabbed on the way out the building. Or if the heel were to come to DC and cut a promo on the gentrification occuring currently in the city and how the city has the greatest income inequality of any city in the country. Those are just examples, but you get the idea

Isn't that what John Rocker basically did back in the late 90s?.

No way. John Rocker's criticisms were pretty base. He pretty much insulted the diversity of NYC.

[NotJayTabb]

Godfather called England nothing but a place full of fags when he feuded with Regal

Ha, I remember this (pretty sure Godfather made this insult despite Regal's decision to take the hookers instead of a match). It's quite odd being on the other side of a babyface insulting a country. Though I had always been a big Regal fan, I'm pretty sure a lot of my friends went from liking the Godfather to "Fuck that dickhead, hope Regal batters the twat" on that night.

[Jingus]

A question to our British members who have an ear for this sort of thing: did Regal even try to modify his natural Blackpool accent whenever he was doing his "foppish nancyboy" gimmick? I can't imagine how strange it must sound to y'all, hearing this character coming out of that mouth. The closest American equivalent I can think of would be if AJ Styles was given a Donald Trump gimmick, or if James Storm was forced to play the original "Greenwich snob" version of HHH.

[ButchReedMark]

He hasn't even got a Blackpool accent, to be honest.

 

The accent he uses on TV is certainly a lot more plummy and polished than his proper accent though.

[C.S.]

The closest American equivalent I can think of would be if AJ Styles was given a Donald Trump gimmick

 

JBL wasn't too far off from this IMO.

[El McKell]

if AJ Styles was given a Donald Trump gimmick

This would be gold, book it. Could actually be an improvement for AJ Styles' hair.