For the better part of the 2000s, the WWE seemed to have a formula for making WrestleMania feel bigger. Instead of building and booking to one main event, they treated us to what felt like five main events. It’s a concept known as the ‘big five’ – err….at least in my head it is. But, if you Google ‘WrestleMania big five,’ you won’t find much. So maybe this whole thing is living solely in my own head.
Anyway, I wrote about what seemed like a paradigm shift in the marketing and build to WrestleMania two years ago, when I also tried to define and provide examples of this concept. Courtesy of Wrestling News:
A bit of a paradigm shift has taken place in recent years on the “Road to Wrestlemania.” In the past, most of the show’s main events started building around Survivor Series or the Royal Rumble. Wrestlemania XXVIII’s main event started its build the night after Wrestlemania XXVII, when John Cena challenged The Rock a full year before the show.
WWE pieced together a “big five” and built towards those five main events beginning in the late fall or early winter. Look at Wrestlemania XX as an example – Triple H vs. Shawn Michaels vs. Chris Benoit, Kurt Angle vs. Eddie Guerrero, Goldberg vs. Brock Lesnar, Undertaker vs. Kane, and Evolution vs. The Rock n’ Sock Connection. Wrestlemania XIX is another fine example, and we might as well mention Wrestlemania 22 here as well.
What made Wrestlemania so big during that run between 2001 and 2010 was the emotional payoff after months of storytelling. Now, the focus has shifted from the pure wrestling aspect of Wrestlemania to the overall spectacle of it.
Sitting here in 2019, it feels like this concept of a ‘big five’ is definitely a thing of the distant past.
The main event storyline for WrestleMania 35 is really the only one that was born out of a late 2018 angle, when Charlotte Flair took Becky Lynch‘s spot against Ronda Rousey at Survivor Series. What’s the longest running program besides that? Shane McMahon vs. The Miz? Hell, while we knew #KofiMania would inevitably happen, the WWE Championship match wasn’t made official until last week.
The program between Brock Lesnar and Seth Rollins has cooled off considerably. Kurt Angle‘s retirement match didn’t exactly get over. Randy Orton and A.J. Styles, while it’s made for some fun promos, feels thrown together. All in all, it just feels like the build to this year’s show has been lacking in excitement. This is the second year in a row this has happened. It’s the third or fourth time it’s happened in the last five years.
WrestleMania 33 definitely had a big event feel with several matches that marked the culmination of months-long build (HHH-Rollins, Jericho-Owens, Goldberg-Lesnar, Orton-Wyatt). Maybe you include WrestleMania 31 for the lengthy programs between John Cena and Rusev, Rollins and Orton, and Triple H and Sting. Otherwise, these have been some sloppily thrown-together ‘Manias from 2015-19.
Now, when it comes time for the show – it could go either way. WrestleMania 31 proved that we can get a pretty damn good show out of a WrestleMania season that didn’t feel much like WrestleMania season at all. Conversely, WrestleMania 32 showed just how bad it can get. We’ll see where WrestleMania 35 fits on that spectrum come Sunday.
But, thinking back on it, it assures me that nowadays, WrestleMania is more about the grandiose event, the spectacle, the pageantry, the media blitz, and creating hours worth of content than it is storytelling.
Then again, maybe I’m the only person in the world who noticed this concept and actually looked forward to it. We may never know.
Full circle, folks.
Alright, I’ll quit being the old man telling kids to get off his lawn.
MORE WRESTLEMANIA COVERAGE
Building the Perfect WrestleMania Card
If The First Wrestlemania Happened In 2019…
I’m All For A Big Batista Match At WrestleMania 35
Matches I Do and Don’t Want to See at WrestleMania 35
People Were Mad About Charlotte Being Added to ‘Mania Main Event
Podcast: The Greatest WrestleMania Main Event Of All Time
Re-grading WrestleMania 21
The SoBros Fantasy Wrestlemania Challenge Is BACK For 2019!
The Top 35 WrestleMania Matches In History
Who Should Get The NXT Call-Ups After Wrestlemania 35?
Stoney Keeley is the Editor in Chief of The SoBros Network. He is a strong supporter of Team GSD and #BeBetter. “Big Natural” covers the Tennessee Titans, Alabama Crimson Tide football, the WWE, and a whole wealth of nonsense. Follow on Twitter @StoneyKeeley
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