Get Corrupted

Wrestlemania XXX was last weekend — you can watch it if you subscribe to the WWE Network.  One of the best matches of the night for a wrestling lover like myself featured the creepy, sexually ambivalent Bray Wyatt, shown here flirting with his two man-toys before the match.

Wyatt is forever trying to attract more men into his “Family” — to recruit them into his twisted alternative lifestyle.  You can read more about his attempts to corrupt his opponents in my articles “Fantasies Do Come True” and “Not Enough Hugs.”

At Wrestlemania this past Sunday, Wyatt had the opportunity to try to corrupt the ultimate good guy, John Cena.  Wyatt fell to his knees, opened his arms wide, and begged Cena to “finish me!”

The commentators explain that Wyatt wants to out Cena as a monster — to incite the “hero” into showing his inner beast by getting violent. This “Come to the Dark Side” gimmick has been used before in pro wrestling — such as when former WWE wrestler Kenneth Cameron coaxed his old friend Tommy Taylor to turn Heel.  I recall he told Tommy to “finish” the referee.

But the term “finish me” could have another, more sexual meaning — the request of an excited lover pleading to be sent over the edge.  The implication of this “finish me” request could be that Wyatt in fact wants to corrupt Cena — not by turning him a monster, but by turning him into a mate.

So the tension of the match is: will the incorruptible hero cross the line?  Will he accept this pervert’s invitation to get naughty?  Will he break the rules of society and prove himself to be a deviant just like Wyatt?

Cena, as usual, drops to his knees, submissive before the dominant male.  He degrades himself like this so often, I’ve named this “Cena Position.”  Given the question of whether Cena will be corrupted by Wyatt, we wonder if all this obedient kneeling indicates an acceptance of Wyatt’s invitation.  Is Cena truly about to “finish” Wyatt?

Wyatt for his part is always brilliant at amping up the sexual tension of his matches by gently holding his victims, by mounting them, by stroking their hair.  He does all that intimate gay stuff with Cena, his groping hands wandering all over Cena’s vulnerable face and exhausted body, further tempting Cena to cross to the Dark Side — to accept Wyatt’s proposition.

The day after Wrestlemania, the WWE announced the number of subscribers to their online network: 667,287 (including me.)  One would think that is a pretty damn good number.  Each subscriber pays $9.95 per month so WWE grosses about $6.5 million per month, or nearly $80 million per year just from the Network.  Did their monthly Pay-per-Views bring in that much revenue?

In any case, the stockholders are not impressed — they expected over one million subscribers.  The WWE stock price has now been Atomic Dropped from $30 per share to $21.97.  The WWE Network could be in danger of being forced to tap out.

But maybe WWE has only themselves to blame.  Maybe their product is getting too clean and prudish. For example, Wrestlemania — their flagship event — just wasn’t very sexy.  I had a hard time choosing a match to write about for this article!  I finally settled on Wyatt-Cena because of Wyatt’s queer antics and creepy flirtation (which we’ve seen before.)

In general, the wrestlers at ‘Mania wore too many clothes, including Wyatt in his pajama pants and Cena in the usual jeans shorts.  We sure didn’t see much skin from The Undertaker, The Shield, or the New Age Outlaws either.   Some of the best gear was involved in the Battle Royal, but you can never really get a good look at what you want to see amid all the chaos in a Battle Royal.  I’m only grousing because I care.

Also, you can call me crazy, but the cameramen sure seemed to be avoiding the best money shots.  A wrestler’s body would be sprawled out on the mat and you’re thinking: “OK, they will now zoom in there and give me some of that” — and they’d pan away, or give you a view from the cheap seats, anything but the main attraction.  Do they have some policy that Wrestlemania needs to be G-Rated?  Do they ban all images of “CNA” (“Crotch N Ass”) to keep this event classy?

It is as if the WWE is faced with the same dilemma as their Baby-Face, John Cena:

(1). Cross to the Dark Side and deliver the sensual, homo-erotic, raunchy imagery that is sure to be popular (just as lecherous Bray Wyatt is popular), or

(2). Stay clean, polite, and carefully censored, delivering a performance suitable for all ages (but unlikely to give anybody a hard-on.)

Just as Cena stayed on the straight and narrow (by refusing to strike Wyatt with a chair, by not joining Wyatt’s perverted Family), so too did the WWE opt to keep Wrestlemania clean and boring.

I would argue Cena would be more popular with the fans if he’d get some tight trunks and show us his cock, and WWE Network would sell more subscriptions — easily exceeding their goal of a million members — if they’d zoom in on it.

But Cena sticks to the same old formula, wearing his jorts, refusing to take Wyatt’s bait by fighting dirty, and using his Superhero powers to win in the end so that justice was served (yawn).  Same old stuff from WWE as well, pushing good old stale Cena as they’ve done for over a decade while burying one of the freshest, most provocative wrestling characters in creepy Bray Wyatt.  If Cena wants the crowd to stop “booing” him, and if WWE wants to save their Network, they ought to get corrupted.