Thursday, October 12, 2017

Sami Zayn's Heel Turn and the Problem of WWE Storytelling

A heel? As if...
Photo Credit: WWE.com
The world's worst wrestler stood high above the Hell in a Cell structure waiting to do his signature move, “Falling to his death”. He is an artless hack, but because he is the multi-millionaire boss's son he gets opportunities that other wrestlers do not. He barely wrestles and only shows up from time to time elevating the level of dangerous spots wrestlers have to work with in the confines of PG. This man ended up falling from ludicrous heights and the crowd watched in the same way they'd pay close attention to a car accident on the side of a road. He can't realistically work within the confines of a wrestling ring in a satisfying manner, but he has this one skill that he comes back to over and over again, and the crowd screams because of the danger associated with the spot and the brief hint of nostalgia wrestling fans felt for the '90s, a time before their lives went to shit and Donald Trump became president, but his family gave money to our Sexual Predator in Chief, and his mother sits on his cabinet.

He's presented as the hero despite being everything the average American despises. The man he would soon elbow drop has a family. He's overweight, paid his dues by working his way up to the top, and through sheer love of this sport became obsessed with it to the point where it became his life. He grew up with WWE posters on his walls and idolized the likes of "Stone Cold" Steve Austin, something every fan popping for the nostalgia of a Shane McMahon fall did as well. Kevin Owens is the villain. For reasons that make no relative sense. He is the everyman, but he's despised. Shane McMahon is the spoiled rich kid who was given everything. When he lost to The Undertaker he was handed control of Smackdown Live. Despite losing every match he's been in he's constantly inserted into the main event on bigger pay per views. If you told someone these facts who had no real knowledge of pro wrestling or the WWE they would assume McMahon is the villain and Owens was the hero.

WWE prioritizes the worst qualities in people and condemns the salt of the earth indie worker who made his way up to the big leagues. It's a narrative inconsistency that has plagued the company, and not even close to being the only example of misunderstanding narrative complexity and logic in favour of the whims of Vince McMahon, who remains unchallenged in his old age. They should have learned their lesson that the voice of the people had changed when Daniel Bryan became a figure that damn near everyone could relate to, but concussions sidelined his blossoming superstardom, and in place of it the audience has been beaten into submission by a wrestler they've never warmed up to in Roman Reigns. Ratings are down. Attendance is down. Interest is down. And they can't figure out why.

Shane was framed in a wide-angle shot before he took his fall so viewers could see the full depth of height from where he stood to the table where Owens lay. In the bottom of the frame a hooded figure appeared just before the leap and pulled Owens off the table before Shane collided and dealt with the full repercussions of gravity. The figure was soon revealed to be Sami Zayn. Owens' longtime rival, friend and brother. The look on his face didn't ring with simplicity. It was not a situation where the heel sported a cocky grin or a smug gesture at foiling the hard on his luck babyface. This was the expression of a man whose emotions were conflicted and fully reckoning with his decision in real time to save the man who tried to end his career on multiple occasions in and out of WWE. Zayn pulled himself away from the wreckage as the commentary screamed repeatedly, “Why Sami? Why?”. He appeared defeated, knowing that he still loves Owens enough to save him. In WWE terms Zayn had just become a villain by sabotaging Shane.

But is that what really happened? The context of Zayn's face and his history with Owens told a different story. This was not an act of evil on his part, but an act of compassion, a moment of such pure empathy that it was a miracle within the confines of WWE, but because it is WWE and Vince McMahon is in charge. He ultimately doesn't understand the concept of what has been presented through French-Canadian best friends. A few weeks ago on an episode of Smackdown Live, Zayn confronted Owens and asked him what he was doing in this feud with Shane and that if he did enter Hell in a Cell his soul would be lost forever. Zayn was genuinely concerned for his friend's mental well being stating that he had never seen Owens act this deranged before. Zayn pulling Owens away at the last moment was him becoming a life raft for his friend. Forgiving him for all the damage they'd done to each other over the years and trying to bring the man he once knew back from the dead. The image of Owens crawling and reaching towards his best friend with a look of genuine shock behind his eyes only emphasized the pure act of love. Owens looked alive for the first time in weeks.

Photo Credit: WWE.com
That isn't the story WWE went with even though it was laid bare in front of them. On this past week's Smackdown Live, Owens spoke of Zayn being his guardian angel, which lines up perfectly with the narrative these two conveyed at the Hell in a Cell pay-per-view. He spoke of Zayn being his brother and his friend bringing him back to life. Things begin to go off the rails when Zayn came out and laid into Shane McMahon for not giving him the chances he deserved on Smackdown Live, and while true, these are not issues that give weight to the complex narrative that the best friends originally presented with their bodies and facial expressions only two days ago. Zayn was cocky, brash and full of himself, acting much like Kevin Owens. He expressed that Owens helped him see the light when he powerbombed him on the apron and now he has become a disciple of Kevin Owens.

In a good company this could be the beginning of a narrative about Owens brainwashing Zayn and breaking him down into submission and turning a good man into a bad one with an eventual comeuppance for former by the hand of latter. However, WWE is rarely interested in the long con. They are a company that loves to open Christmas presents in November. Sami Zayn is merely a heel now, a good guy that WWE tells you is evil because he gets screwed over by the man. WWE positions people like Kevin Owens, and soon to be Sami Zayn, as heels who take short cuts, but the opposite is true. If anyone has taken shortcuts it is the babyface, Shane McMahon. The textbook definition of a shortcut is being handed everything due to nepotism. Shane falls upward in real life and in the confines of WWE narrative. Zayn and Owens have to work for everything, and they are deemed evil for it.

It should come as no real surprise that a company whose sole interest is capitalism would fail at understanding the difference between good and bad, but it goes beyond simple morals into something much deeper. WWE doesn't understand what forgiveness or friendship even looks like. What happened between Sami Zayn and Kevin Owens is an act of such purehearted humility on the part of Zayn that it is foreign in the eyes of Vince McMahon, a man who has burned bridges with damn near every wrestler he has come into contact with, and in some cases tried to ruin their careers afterward. Have you ever wondered why nearly every tag team in the history of WWE has broken up due to friction and one man turning on another instead of amicably departing and finding new avenues for themselves as singles wrestlers? It's because Vince doesn't understand friendship, but he does understanding stabbing someone in the back. He's an expert.

These moments recently that have seen longtime friends come together in WWE, like Zayn and Owens, and The Shield are fundamentally at odds with the kind of narratives Vince understands. It's why Zayn is now presented as evil and The Shield reunion feels half-baked and ill-conceived on a narrative level. The WWE audience will continue watching, but they will continue to not feel like something's wrong whether they can pinpoint the reasons or not. It's been said many times that Vince is out of touch, and that's true, but structurally maybe wrestling is too. WWE storytelling and presentation trickles downward and seeps into independent companies and international promotions, and as a whole that needs to stop. The evolution of wrestling into its next chapter as an art form, one that can achieve unique highs, is only possible if you are willing to glide on the wings of those willing to soar.

Kevin Owens and Sami Zayn are exactly the type with an attention to narrative that can only be described as wrestling's own Odyssean epic. If given some level of creative control over their incoming narrative the two will likely create greatness. They always have. The juxtaposition of their presentation on Smackdown Live and Hell in a Cell of Sami Zayn and Kevin Owens distinctly shows that within the hands of WWE writers and Vince McMahon that their story will be simplified to a point of redundancy, but in the hands of Zayn and Owens it is complex, unknowing, mysterious and ripe for narrative highs and lows that verges on the cinematic. If wrestling is to ever compete on an artistic level with theatre, literature, and film it must be open to creatives who challenge the pre-existing norms of what wrestling storytelling can look like or be.