Earlier this week I had a thought come in my head – “You know, if you put Orange Cassidy in an angle with The Rock, having Cassidy do his usual ‘ignore-you-because-I-have-no-fucks-to-give’ schtick would probably work to have The Rock get angrier than he’s ever been – like white-hot-I-will-brutalize-you-in-the-middle-of-the-ring rage.” Not that I want Cassidy to jump ship to WWE, though I think the Triple H regime would handle him well. However, arguably, AEW and WWE is truly the last forbidden door – people go one way or the other but you never have them truly acknowledge the other, and have cross-programming material. So, I thought, if that Forbidden Door was to open, with The Rock on the table – how would I do it? As someone who, like Tony Kahn, has spent a fair amount of time playing not only Total Extreme Wrestling, but also Total Extreme Warfare and Extreme Warfare Revenge, I feel like I can put some good ideas out there.
Tony, Triple H, in the event you decide to read this, you have my permission to use these.
The lynchpin, I think, for making this work, is Paul Heyman. Heyman has tremendous respect from both the WWE universe and outside as the Mad Scientist of ECW. It’s what makes having Paul E. as the manager of The Bloodline a big deal. However, a big part of The Rock’s character, especially as a heel, is his ego and arrogance. He will never be a Paul Heyman guy because he doesn’t think he needs a Paul Heyman. Roman is also arrogant and egotistical – but he also recognizes the value of having Paul as a consigliere. With The Rock running The Bloodline, why wouldn’t he cut Paul loose, and not only that but kick his ass on the way out, like what happened to Jay and Sami?
So, say on Raw, Paul tries to talk his way out, appealing to his utility as a strategist and as the brains of the operation, and when that doesn’t work and he knows he’s going to get the boot (literally), he brings up The Rock’s weakness – when he goes up against people whose backgrounds are outside of the WWE and they are hungry, he gets blindsided – bringing up his loss to Foley as an example. He then brings up who does The Rock think was scouting guys like Cody Rhodes for Roman, to make sure he was prepared if and when they came into the WWE Universe? Right before the beating starts, Heyman threatens that if Rock crosses him, he’ll open the Forbidden Door.
A couple weeks later, while Rock is cutting a promo, generally running the locker room down, Paul comes back, and after some bantering back and forth, Rock goes to hit him again, when Orange Cassidy comes to make the save. This leads to the no-sell promo – Orange just stonewalls Rock’s verbal offense, refusing to bite at any of the lines meant to set up catchphrases (“What’s your name”, that sort of thing). Rock goes for a bit, starts to lose his cool, and tries to physically attack Orange, only for Orange to just evade everything, with hands still in pockets – maybe even with him dodging a clothesline leading into the no-hands kip-up, before leaving the ring. As Cassidy walks to the back, Rock demands a match.
Backstage Rock confronts Triple H, who establishes that under Paul’s contract he can bring his own talent in – making him the gatekeeper of the Forbidden Door. On the AEW Side, Rock contacts EVPs Matt & Nick Jackson, who allow The Bloodline to show up and wreck Sue’s rental van, and we are off to the races – leading into the Forbidden Door pay-per-view. As far as the WWE announcers go – The Bloodline are the assholes. Not “Our Assholes” – they’re just The Assholes”. This isn’t an invasion by AEW – this is a big event, where you get to see matches you never have seen before. Our big matches will be (operating from the perspective that nobody’s injured):
The Rock vs. Orange Cassidy in Hell in a Cell
But wait, you say, Orange Cassidy isn’t a main eventer. Why The Rock? Well, because the match would be interesting and really fun, in part because of the build-up. To a degree, it would be using some of the same playbook as Cassidy’s feud with PAC – but that’s okay because there’s a chunk of the WWE audience that hasn’t seen it – and also it’s a good playbook, and one that The Rock would work well in. The core conceit of this is, “Make The Rock angrier than he’s ever been in his entire career.” Take advantage of the fact that back in the day he was in a fair number of hardcore matches and brawls that went all over the arena – particularly when he was with The Corporation – though he’s not considered a “hardcore” wrestler the way that Foley is. In short – if The Rock is pushed too far, he can become a monster, and what does that mean for the rest of the Bloodline? What should help make this work is to have Cassidy take his hands out of his pockets very early in the match, with a real “Oh, I’m in danger” reaction. Maybe as further set up, Rock pays a social call to Mick Foley, and then quietly swipes Barbie (Mick’s barbed wire-wrapped two-by-four), and have him bringing that out in the match serving as Cassidy’s hands-out-of-pocket moment.
Ideally, The Rock taking the pin in this match wouldn’t hurt him in the slightest, because the objective is show just how brutal and nasty he can be when he’s pissed off enough, which also creates and opening for the other members of the Bloodline – if you want to do a face turn down the road – to be scared about being around him, as someone even more potentially abusive than Roman. Speaking of the other members of the bloodline.
Jimmy Uso and Solo Sikoa vs. The Best Friends (Trent Baretta & Chuck Taylor) w/ Danhausen
This covers a big chunk of the rest of the bloodline feud – particularly the attack on Sue’s van. Having Danhausen be a part of this would also be great, as a fun build-up match on the card. While I don’t want the Bloodline to have a total route, I like the idea of wrecking Trent’s mom’s van as being equivalent to kicking a puppy.
Roman Reigns vs Hook
Now, we need a guy who can go up against Roman, have a great match, and bring a level of intensity to the proceedings that would sell him as a total threat to Roman – but also is in a position where if he eats a pin it won’t hurt his credibility or make AEW look weak. What do we do? Send Hook.
That’s 4 matches, and I’d like 7-8 on the card. I have a few ideas.
The Golden Lovers (Kenny Omega & Kota Ibushi) & vs. The New Day (Xavier Woods & Kofi Kingston)
The feud between Omega and Woods (as Austin Creed the Gaming Influencer) has spanned the ages – with the last installment of it being at a Giant Bomb E3 event at 2019, the last in-person E3.
Clearly, this insult cannot be left to stand – so let’s finally get the dream match we’ve been waiting years for.
Hikaru Shida vs. Kairi Sane
Let’s not leave the women out of the equation – Hikaru Shida and Asuka, back when she wrestled as Kana, had some really great matches back in Japan, but she’d never wrestled against Kairi Sane. So, while we’ve got the opportunity to get these matches on the table, let’s take them.
Nia Jax vs. Nyla Rose vs. Abadon vs. Tamina
I think this just might be the wrestling equivalent of a Hoss Match. Them, or maybe Abadon, or Awesome Kong – just if you want the wrestling equivalent of Miro and Powerhouse Hobbs beating the crap out of each other, I think this will do it. But wait, why are the AEW people not tagging with each other? Well, have you seen Abadon?
Thunder Rosa vs. Rhea Ripley
Since I’m booking this, let’s give one more women’s match than Tony Kahn normally does, and we’ll showcase either current or former champions from both promotions, to spotlight the range of our women’s divisions – along with giving another possible dream match.
The final card would be:
- Jimmy Uso and Solo Sikoa vs. The Best Friends (Trent Baretta & Chuck Taylor) w/ Danhausen
- Thunder Rosa vs. Rhea Ripley
- Nia Jax vs. Nyla Rose vs. Abadon vs. Tamina
- Roman Reigns vs Hook
- Hikaru Shida vs. Kairi Sane
- The Golden Lovers (Kenny Omega & Kota Ibushi) & vs. The New Day (Xavier Woods & Kofi Kingston)
- ME: The Rock vs. Orange Cassidy in a Hell in a Cell Match.
So, what do you think – is this a Pay-Per-View you would watch?
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