“WWE has come to terms on the release of Bray Wyatt. We wish him the best in all his future endeavors.”
It’s been a hard time to be a “Monster” in WWE. In a matter of a few weeks, wrestlers like Braun Strowman or Aleister Black have been released. Last year, The Undertaker retired. Kane is pretty much retired too. The darker sides of the human being seem not to be welcomed anywhere in the WWE’s own universe. For more than a decade, the different faces and worlds of Bray Wyatt had never stopped questioning our beliefs, think about our personal inner worlds, just because he was our favourite monster, as Wyatt or The Fiend.
Like he was singing, he really had the whole world in his hands. Windham Rotunda made his debut in WWE’s developmental territories in 2009 as a third-generation wrestler. His grandfather is Blackjack Mulligan, his father Mike Rotunda, better known as The IRS, two of his uncles, Barry and Kendall Windham, and his younger brother Taylor Rotunda better known as Bo Dallas. On June 2, 2010, he joined NXT under the name Husky Harris, with Cody Rhodes as his WWE Pro. He would quickly turn into a villain and become a member of The Nexus. After a few months of feud in the main roster, he returned to developmental to team up with his brother.
In April 2012, Rotunda debuted a new repackaged character, Bray Wyatt, who initially associated himself with Eli Cottonwood in FCW. When WWE rebranded FCW into NXT Wrestling, Bray Wyatt debuted on the July 11, 2012, episode of the rebooted NXT taped at Full Sail University, where he defeated Aiden English. Despite an injury, Wyatt stood as the patriarch of The Wyatt Family, a reunion of Monsters, alongside Luke Harper and Rowan. A year after Wyatt’s debut on NXT, the family was announced to debut on RAW. The vignettes showed The Wyatt Family’s backwoods origins and Rowan wearing a lamb mask.
Describing everything The Wyatt Family had done would be terribly long but they had been afraid of no one and nothing. John Cena, Randy Orton, Kane, CM Punk, Daniel Bryan, Sheamus, Dean Ambrose, Chris Jericho, Seth Rollins, The Undertaker, The Rock, all were the targets of The New Face of Fear. When The Family was dissolved, Wyatt became WWE Champion. Orton pledged allegiance to Wyatt and refused to face him at WrestleMania 33. However, this was revealed to be a ruse as Orton destroyed The Wyatt Family compound, including Sister Abigail’s grave, two weeks later, and defeated Wyatt for the title at WrestleMania 33, ending Wyatt’s reign at 49 days.
After a feud with Matt Hardy, both became the Deleters of the World and started to team up, to the point of becoming RAW Tag Team Champions. With Hardy taking time to heal injuries, Wyatt unveiled a brand new world to the WWE Universe in April 2019. The Firefly Fun House was a WWE programming depicting a sinister buzzard puppet, a witch doll, and various other toys but mostly a new Bray Wyatt as the host of a surreal children’s program, alongside Ramblin’ Rabbit, Mercy the Buzzard, Abby the Witch, and Huskus the Pig Boy.
During the initial segment, Wyatt destroyed a cardboard cutout of his old self with a chainsaw, and cheerily told viewers that all they had to do for him to “light the way” was to “let me in”. As the segments became more sinister, he then appeared in more sinister clothing and a demonic mask, a persona he called “The Fiend” that was here “to protect us” that made Wyatt become a 2-time WWE Universal Champion. If the characters were beyond brilliant, The Fiend was not used well, with some bad bookings and a terrible red light during the matches. The addition of Alexa Bliss to the Firefly Fun House was full of expectations but, in the end, was not working without The Fiend himself. Wyatt had been away from the ring since WrestleMania 37, losing to Randy Orton. He made an appearance on RAW the next night for a Firefly Fun House segment, indicting he was getting ready for a fresh start.
Today, the wrestling world is in shock. Of all the firings that have happened in the last few months, this one is particularly unexpected and offensive. Bray Wyatt might not be the most talented wrestler, technically wise, but he was mastering something only very few wrestlers do, the art of storytelling, something that has been terribly missed over the last few years. Through characters extremely worked, detailed and rich universes, he was bringing us into them, made us a part of The Wyatt Family. He made us love The Fiend, a sinister Monster, a freak only wrestling is able to put in front of our eyes. To quote a wrestling writer and friend, “If there’s no spot for Bray Wyatt in your roster, there’s a genuine problem.” Because wrestling is a world made for monsters to help us dream of the worst, and we, fans, love that.
All pics and videos courtesy of WWE