Brock Lesnar’s Return & WrestleMania in Saudi Arabia: Toxic People & Overreliance on Nostalgia

After Cody Rhodes beat John Cena for the Undisputed WWE Championship at this year’s SummerSlam, Brock Lesnar returned and hit the F-5 on Cena. The reaction in the stadium that night was shock and awe. There was a pop when his music hit, and fans cheered him on as he hit the F-5. The reaction online was, let’s say, mixed. For those of you who don’t know, Janel Grant has claimed that Vince McMahon offered her as a signing bonus for Lesnar. Promising that he would get to sleep with her if he signed. From there, she stated that Lesnar wanted a video of her using the bathroom, and after she sent it said he would have called her a bitch if she didn’t. They had two planned meet-ups, both of which fell through, one for the weather and the other for Lesnar getting too drunk and going to bed instead.

These don’t paint Lesnar in the best light, and while he isn’t one of the defendants in the lawsuit, he is linked to it in a very high-profile manner, and more could come out during the actual trial. According to sources, the WWE’s lawyers deemed that Lesnar was good to be brought back, but it is still a difficult situation on whether or not it’s worth it. It doesn’t surprise me that SummerSlam was also when they decided to stop doing press conferences, like they knew what kind of questions were going to be asked after seeing Lesnar come back.

The mixed reaction I mentioned is on whether or not Lesnar should’ve been brought back; on one side, you have the people who don’t think it should be an issue. Lesnar hasn’t been accused of anything more than being a sleazy ass, and hopefully not knowing that Grant was being forced to do this against her will. On the other side, you have the people who don’t see the point in bringing back someone who is linked to this whole thing, and his actions and the issue that can come from them mean he should be kept out of the company. I fall into the side that he shouldn’t be brought back, not until this lawsuit is completed, and his actual knowledge and role in it are fully clear. I don’t think there is a need for him to be there. I do think the WWE is opening itself up for PR issues if Lesnar is found to have known that Grant did not consent to being offered as a signing bonus, but still went ahead and tried to make plans to go through with it. That’s going to be a disaster for the WWE from a PR standpoint.

Taking away the whole Janel Grant stuff, what is the point of bringing Lesnar back? He is going to have this match with Cena, and then what? Go off into the sunset as well? I don’t see where he fits in the current landscape of the WWE. I don’t have any desire to see him face off with Cody Rhodes again. I don’t think he needs to be inserted into anything involving The Vision, Reigns, or any other top star. At most, I could see maybe a Gunther match. But only if he is going to bring his working boots and put Gunther over. Sure, there is a chance Cena requested it, there is a lot of history there, going back to when Cena was coming up and then Lesnar’s return to the company. So, I get it from that perspective, but there isn’t really any other reason for Lesnar to stick around. He is going to probably lose to Cena and then go back to his farm, until it’s time for his last match and Hall of Fame Induction (pending the lawsuit and what comes out.) Or if his daughter decides to get into the business down the road.

Bringing Lesnar back is a symptom of a bigger problem, not just of bring in toxic people (like Hogan at the first Raw on Netflix), but relying on older stars to generate cheap heat and pops. Case in point, when the WrestleMania 43 announcement was made the rumors started flying that the Saudi Arabian government is ready to pay a lot of money to get as many big names as possible. Names like The Undertaker, Steve Austin, and The Rock have been thrown out. The rumor was that they are willing to pay a much as anyone, wants to come back, what they want to have a match.

It isn’t completely surprising, this is the same government who asked for Yokozuna to be on the first show there, but it is also endemic of the culture of nostalgia that the WWE has created over the last 20 years or so. relying on stars of the past to show up when they needed to prop up a show. They could have been smart about this and used the past stars to give the rub to the younger generation, but more often than not we see the old stars getting put over the current talent. It’s been better since Triple H took over, but it’s an up-hill battle since we are missing a whole generation of potential mega-stars who could be being used to help the current generation get more over.

For every John Cena there are dozens of Cesaro’s. Cody Rhodes, CM Punk, AJ Styles and Bryan Danielson are exceptions, even then Rhodes had to leave to be taken seriously. If the WWE had spent more time focusing on younger talent, they wouldn’t feel the need to bring back toxic stars like Brock Lesnar and the government of Saudi Arabia wouldn’t feel the need to spend millions to bring in top names of the past.