I'm surprised there's not already a thread on this.

 

For those who didn't see it, Raw was in Montreal this week, and of course the WWE has to bring up the 8 year old(!) 1997 Survivor Series. Shawn went into a huge spiel about screwing Bret and how he'd do it again.

 

Cue Bret's music & titantron.

 

As the hugely pro-Bret crowd collectively creams their pants, the music runs longer and longer and... oh that dastardly Shawn was only joking! What won't he do next?

 

The crowd booes and is pissed off as the realisation sets in that Bret isn't showing up. But matbe, just maybe, he'll show up at the end of the night.

 

He doesn't. Instead, Shawn slaps Hogan in the sharpshooter, to doubly piss people off.

 

 

Aside from the asininity of bringing up Montreal yet again, this is WCW level retarded. Everyone and his mother knows that it wasn't "really" Shawn's decision to play the music. It was Vince and / or the other bookers. Give us some credit. So the heel heat is transferred from Shawn to WWE as a whole. Intentionally irritating people who have paid a lot of money to come and see your show? Brilliant work.

 

It's a shame that it's Bret who's being built up like this again, as all reports are that he won't be working any angles for WWE. None. So there's no need to mention him whatsoever. Oh - there's the DVD. But are the DVD sales worth doing this to your audience? Of course not.

 

Wrestling has a history of simplistic angles. In the 1980s, Shawn would call Bret out a few times, then Bret would finally come out and the two would fight. It's hardly rocket science. You build the anticipation and deliver.

 

I'd bet that the crowd weren't expecting to see Bret at the show before it aired. Sure there'd be some speculation, with it being Montreal and the misleading article on WWE.com, but nobody was expecting to see him there. Going so far as to play his music, and then pulling it away from people? That's just being dicks.

 

Besides, Edge and Matt Hardy was so much cooler when WWE first pulled that. A few weeks ago.

Eh, I thought it did a good job of getting HBK heel heat. Although I was disappointed that Bret didn't make an appearance. I don't expect him to wrestle, guest ref. or anything like that...but I'm sure he could still cut a promo and have JR shill his DVD on commentary. Of course, that's even doubtful. I really don't expect to see Bret on WWE TV again.

I thought it was a good move and it was entertaining so I didn't see any problem with it. Michaels was going to get boo'ed regardless of what they were gonna do so they might as well have milked Bret's popularity.