I've said it before and I'll say it again, Triple H and his wife do not understand how heels work. There is more to being a heel than getting booed. The purpose of a heel is to make the face look like a star, to tell a story where the face is imperilled but fights back to win and look like a star at the end when their hand is raised in triumph, if the heel is protected more than the face that basic story doesn't work. Feuding with Triple H or Roman Reigns, you go up against a heel who is booked and protected like the face and win or lose, their opponent doesn't come out with the same momentum they had going in, having lost a little of their shine in the eyes of the fans.
If being booed was all it took to be a great heel, the bottom wouldn't have fallen out of WCW in 1998 after years of being booked around the heavily protected Hulk Hogan at the expense of all faces.
I'd probably amend this to saying the main roster booking doesn't quite understand how heels work.
But eh...whatev, guv.
It's time for me to really overthink some shit and ramble incoherently. Brace yourselves, meatbags.
I'll say that this is kinda what some of the old school guys people are complaining about.
You know, whenever Old Man Cornoodle goes on his rant about how nobody gets emotionally invested in the wrestling anymore?
I think it's heavily related to things like this.
People can buy into the narrative WWE spins if it's things people are interested in seeing. If nobody wants to see the story the WWE spins the only narrative the fans have left to get invested in is the meta-shit. So you have people following dirt sheets or at the very least are savvy enough to know Roman is the uncrowned "Corporate Champion," so in order to maintain any type of emotional investment that narrative is what the audience projects upon the show and his matches.
The high rollers in WWE can pretend like that's what they want, but somebody,
somewhere has to understand that when the audience projects that type of narrative stuff on to the show, technically that wouldn't even make Roman a heel.
It'd make
the company the "heel."
The Company wants you to cheer this guy despite him not really being all that impressive or interesting to watch.
So Roman becomes the representative of what the company wants, much like John Cena, but without the memorable promos or years of good will Cena fostered.
So...**** this company, Roman's gonna get booed.
WWE has cultivated that attitude with YEARS of Cena's shit where the booking was such a void you constantly had Cena win over guys people found more interesting, engaging or just take to them because the minute you inserted Cena in any feud, people are aware he has the promotional juggernaut of the company behind him so practically EVERYBODY he faces becomes the underdog.
The company refused to tell the story of Cena being that Corporate Champion that Vince wanted all those years ago, despite that clearly being the story most of the people watching were telling themselves anyway.
So you get crowds never really getting into WWE things like they used to.
...and really if you've been watching long enough, why wouldn't The Company be the main heel?
You've had to watch guys like Jericho and Angle be sacrificed to get Cena over.
You've had to sit through Shelton Benjamin almost getting that push but...somehow..not panning out.
You've had to see MVP almost get that push, but...somehow...not panning out.
You've had to see Kofi almost get that push, but...somehow...not panning out.
You've had to see Christian almost get that push, but...somehow...not panning out.
You've had to see Dolph "Back When I Was A Gold Nugget, Not A Shit Nugget" Ziggler almost get that push, but...somehow...not panning out.
You've had to watch Zack Ryder fight back from the brink, almost get that push, but...somehow...not panning out.
You've had to see them initially botch the shit out of the "Divas Revolution" possibly so Stephanie can finally have a positive social media presence.
You've had to see the fans almost threaten to riot come WM for them to actually give Daniel Bryan his due...but then still find ways to **** him over in storylines afterwards.
You've seen them do...whatever the **** it is they're doing with Bayley...and Sasha...
I may be embellishing and projecting for a minute, but if you've seen a good portion of this and just have some amount of savvy about what it is the WWE tends to do...
The only thing you have that's the easiest to grab on to is your disdain for the company because you know you can't get too emotionally invested because they like to **** over people who get "too popular" or find any excuse not to push a person who doesn't fit who they want.
So yes, while there's a lot of benefit to Hunner parroting the "I don't care how people react, as long as they react!" line, any fan who is savvy about this stuff knows even that line is horse shit:
WWE lowers crowd mics to soften negative response.
WWE blatantly edits out negative crowd reactions in Youtube videos and replays.
Oh no, they
clearly care what reaction Roman gets.
Maybe the thing is, if Roman's merch sells are decent but the crowd boos the shit out of him...
Maybe people know Roman gets a cut of his merch sales, which would support Roman himself, but boo the shit out of him on the show because there's awareness that his booking is the shits.
Perhaps that's the message people are giving best they can.
...but anyway, ultimately I think people by-and-large aren't emotionally invested in the WWE product is because the meta-narrative of it is so much more interesting. People's reactions to Roman are an example of that. And that's the WWE's fault.