Where have NXT's characters gone?

[gr1990]

At the end of the Balor/Nakamura match when they were placing it alongside Sasha/Bayley and Zayn/Neville as an all-time NXT classic, it really highlighted how it's gone from being a show full of great, well-developed characters that the audience has watched grow and whose matches are elevated massively by the story surrounding them to just putting name talent in the ring together, using the same character and iconography from their pre-WWE work, and the inevitable good-to-great match happening, but it feeling completely hollow because WWE has done nothing to develop or enhance these people.

Aside from No Way Jose (who is pure novelty sideshow), does anyone who debuted in NXT in 2016 even have a gimmick/character that WWE can take any kind of credit for? Is there ever gonna be room on the roster for that to happen if they've only got an hour long TV show and so many shiny indy toys to show off? A lot of them have become flops on the main roster, but the likes of Tyler Breeze, Bo Dallas, Enzo and Cass, Emma, Bayley when she still hugged people, and the Vaudevillains were entertaining as hell and all virtually unknown before WWE. They've been replaced by guys who trade entirely off reputations gained elsewhere and often have no gimmick beyond their wrestling style. Remember when NXT was fun AND full of good wrestling? You could almost call it po-faced today.

[Allie Kitsune]

To Dusty Rhodes' Grave.

[The Kevstaaa]

Bayley still hugs people. In fact, her character development is one of the best things NXT has done. She started as a "just happy to be here and starstruck" fan and grew into a champion over years.

[Abdullah]

They've stopped trying in that regard. I'll never understand how you have a feud like Bayley/Asuka spanning for months, where you couldn't find two more different characters. Then do almost literally nothing with it.

NXT has gotten very complacent about its success and its ability to sign anyone. That's pretty obvious.

[Bo Rida]

Yeah I've been thinking about the same thing.
Bo's breakdown, Neville taking shortcuts as champion, Zayn's attempts to win the big one, Bayley gaining the steel she needed, Sasha becoming The Boss, Owens using his family to excuse his actions, Tyson Kidd's whole "Fact" run... they were all a huge part of what made NXT. They were stories and characters that developed rather than static characters in a series of unlinked events. It wasn't just a matter of who would win the match but how they did so and the consequences of that.

I can only assume Polaris is right and Dusty was largely responsible for developing those characters and their stories, I believe another writer went to Smackdown too.
I think call-ups, injuries and a number of foreign stars may have contributed to that part of things being neglected too.


It hasn't gone completely though, Jordan and Gable's relationship has been a highlight of NXT over the past few months and of course many are still in the stage of being built and may have some payoff later.

[Deleted]

There's an ebb and flow to this sort of thing, there's gonna be some gaps once the draft comes and we'll see what kind of characters we get then. Right now we have a good slew of some pretty well established guys. I still think their shows are great. It's not a completely lost art, Austin Aries' recent big swindle against No Way Jose was one of my favorite segments all year.

[A Platypus Rave]

they decided to focus on in ring stuff over spending a lot of times on segments

but they still exist.

Jordan And Gable as mentioned and the Revival being the old school roughnecks.

The Authors of Pain being the big monster heels with Paul Ellering

Samoa Joe being the final boss style destroyer.


Do they need to focus some more on it? Absolutely but they aren't entirely gone either.

[xxshoyuweeniexx]

Jul 15, 2016 12:47:16 GMT -5 Allie Kitsune said:

To Dusty Rhodes' Grave.

Bingo. Even though we still have stuff like No Way Jose, we'll never get that period where we had a lot of out there gimmicks like the Vaudvillains, Enzo and Cass, and Bayley before her gimmick basically became John Cena with boobs.

[Mozenrath]

Loooooooooong tiiiiiiime paaaaaaaassiiiiiiiiing

[Abdullah]

Jul 15, 2016 13:30:16 GMT -5 Bo Rida said:

Yeah I've been thinking about the same thing.
Bo's breakdown, Neville taking shortcuts as champion, Zayn's attempts to win the big one, Bayley gaining the steel she needed, Sasha becoming The Boss, Owens using his family to excuse his actions, Tyson Kidd's whole "Fact" run... they were all a huge part of what made NXT. They were stories and characters that developed rather than static characters in a series of unlinked events. It wasn't just a matter of who would win the match but how they did so and the consequences of that.

If NXT was just really good matches with backstage interviews, it never would have gotten over as it did.

It's not even about characters. It's about using those characters to tell stories. Again, using Asuka as an example, she came in with such mystique and uniqueness but now they're sliding back on that to make her just a really good wrestler. There's a point where things get too minimalist.

NXT is at that point.

[Bo Rida]

Oh I forgot to add that where it really stands out is with some of the women, the likes of Billie Kay and Peyton Royce seem to be stuck in limbo.

[CATCH_US IS the Conversation]

Jul 15, 2016 13:38:18 GMT -5 xxshoyuweeniexx said:

Jul 15, 2016 12:47:16 GMT -5 Allie Kitsune said:

To Dusty Rhodes' Grave.

Bingo. Even though we still have stuff like No Way Jose, we'll never get that period where we had a lot of out there gimmicks like the Vaudvillains, Enzo and Cass, and Bayley before her gimmick basically became John Cena with boobs.

Bayley was always John Cena with boobs . The early stages of her gimmick where she was the childlike (possibly autistic) hug monster who everyone turned heel on was her "Rapper Cena" phase.

[A Platypus Rave]

Jul 15, 2016 13:52:34 GMT -5 Bo Rida said:

Oh I forgot to add that where it really stands out is with some of the women, the likes of Billie Kay and Peyton Royce seem to be stuck in limbo.

They are currently being used pretty much solely as enhancement talent.

When they are put more seriously on the roster proper their characters will develop more.

See Jason Jordan, Baron Corbin, Tyler Breeze, Alexa Bliss and to an extent Tye Dillenger.

[Deleted]

WWE is even getting like this. Zayn vs Owens is always great, but the story behind it is all stuff that WWE can't take credit for. It always comes back to "they knew each other before WWE and this is a continuation of that," which isn't great writing.

Overall though, yeah, NXT seems to have fully embraced the idea of just being a stop-over between the indies and RAW.

Though, tbf, most of the gimmicks they created in NXT didn't translate well to RAW/SD.

Enzo probably came outta the womb talking that kind of smack.
Owens, Zayn, etc were all guys who came into NXT with fully realized characters basically.

some guys succeeded but a lot of the "birthed in NXT" type gimmicks have fallen pretty flat on the main roster.

[mrbananagrabber]

Remember Enzo and Cass? The Vaudvillains? Hell, even Mad Max villains the Ascension? Now we've got last weeks gripping interview with TM61, the cardboard cut-out tag team of the most boring guys on earth. Who don't kneel.

[gr1990]

Jul 15, 2016 12:47:16 GMT -5 Allie Kitsune said:

To Dusty Rhodes' Grave.

I think with Dusty's death and Ryan Ward moving to Smackdown, we've learned who the real geniuses behind NXT were.

[gr1990]

Jul 15, 2016 13:33:30 GMT -5 @nichotine said:

There's an ebb and flow to this sort of thing, there's gonna be some gaps once the draft comes and we'll see what kind of characters we get then. Right now we have a good slew of some pretty well established guys. I still think their shows are great. It's not a completely lost art, Austin Aries' recent big swindle against No Way Jose was one of my favorite segments all year.

I hope so, the Aries/Jose segment was great, just about the first thing this year that looked like it belonged in the old entertaining and unpredictable NXT.

[Deleted]

I'd like to see some more former stars come back.
Think of the Wyatt Family. Bray was out for quite a while. The other two basically did non-televised events.

How cool would that be for them to "get back what they once were", recharge the batteries against a fresh group who could make them work hard to get back to main roster status?

You call it developmental, like the minor leagues in sports. Guys get hurt, rehab, them work out some issues in a few games for Triple A.
WWE guys get injured, rehab, then work out some issues in a few matches for Triple H.

[CATCH_US IS the Conversation]

Jul 15, 2016 16:21:44 GMT -5 @sandman said:

I'd like to see some more former stars come back.
Think of the Wyatt Family. Bray was out for quite a while. The other two basically did non-televised events.

How cool would that be for them to "get back what they once were", recharge the batteries against a fresh group who could make them work hard to get back to main roster status?

You call it developmental, like the minor leagues in sports. Guys get hurt, rehab, them work out some issues in a few games for Triple A.
WWE guys get injured, rehab, then work out some issues in a few matches for Triple H.

That would never happen. For the most part, ever since Full Sail NXT was a thing, the only main roster guys who showed up on NXT were lower card guys that WWE couldn't fit on the main shows consistently, so in WWE land, sending them down to "the minor leagues" often carried a negative connotation of "not good enough for the big leagues". We've seen guys like Sheamus, Miz, Dolph, and Ryback show up on NXT before and it was usually for nothing more than a one off squash match; the Wyatts would probably be the same.

Also "working hard to get back to main roster status" wouldn't fit the Wyatt Family. For the most part, they don't care about "wrestling stuff" (except when they have to cut an awkward forced promo about the Royal Rumble).

[Heinz Doofenschmirtz]

I'm still trying to figure out why they took the masks off of the Authors of Pain. It gave them some interest beyond 'they're managed by Paul Ellering'.

Less said about TM61 (Furnas and Lafon 2.0) the better.