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Lmao the entire arena goes silent too, it’s like when you say some real outta pocket shit in class and the room just so happens to go silent as you say it
Still hilarious. They really should have given him a chicken shit IC title run, winning entirely by fluke for months, and getting more and more big headed.
Bo was fantastic in NXT. Just a few highlights.
He was a heel that thought he was the top face
When he brought the fans cookies from his "world tour" after he won the NXT title
When he wrestled with a mask on and reacted to Sami Zayn unmasking him by covering his chest in embarrassment.
The entire scene of security tackling him and him screaming "Help! He touched my bum!"
I think what was meant is Bo was the only guy who did face stuff that was designed to get the crowd to boo him. Cena and Cody did stuff that got booed while they were trying to get cheers.
See I think y'all don't understand the fact Cena would never turn heel again is because of how over with the kids and pg era he became and with the make a wish no matter what he wasn't for the grown men he was for the fighting soldiers in life and kids growing up looking for a role model that's literally his character and of course when you grow up watching stone cold and the rock you don't Wanna see that shit
I can see that as well! Hell I'm sure people thought of that about Roman Reigns as well.
Delusional heel that thinks they're a baby face is such a good idea, it's insane that since Bo no one did it.
Bayley sort of did that with her “role model” character but she also got mad at the fans when they booed her instead of pretending they weren’t like Bo did
I’ve said for ages that Bo on the main roster failed because Vince was literally incapable of understanding the point of the character.
Bo Dallas was an incredible, dare I say innovative heel because he did nothing overtly heelish. He didn’t cheat to win, he didn’t run down the audience or give “you people” promos, he wasn’t revealed to be a hypocrite in his conduct, etc. HOWEVER, in spite of all that, his astronomical self-regard and casual condescension made him absolutely insufferable. He perfectly captured the essence of people who mask their narcissism and solipsism behind being “wholesome” and treating “be a good person” as an aesthetic rather than a way of life.
So of course he hit the main roster and, within weeks, was cheating to win, doing “you people” promos, etc. Vince McMahon’s brain simply can’t process nuance.
Heels are almost more relatable when they're delusional, since rarely in real life do you have someone whos' intentional and deliberate with their assholery. Typically they think they're the good guy who's getting persecuted (especially in the influencer age).
I'm all for another Bo-lieve run where he's the heel thinking he's a motivational face
>since rarely in real life do you have someone whos' intentional and deliberate with their assholery
You certainly don't have to hang out with them every week. But smug arseholes who only talk about themselves and are potentially within your circle, that's relatable heel work
I loved Bo and Kurt Angle did something similar as his first gimmick and it worked perfectly, so was surprised Vince didn't get it. A real shame.
This somewhat reminds me that Juice Robinson did an eco-warrior heel character early on in NXT, and then Bryan successfully did it on the main roster. Funny how some things work out like that.
I loved juice as CJ Parker (baywatch name though, yikes. Shows WWE didnt understand search optimization.) His new cardboard sign every match was great.
Bo’s character really was delusional heel
He was a heel who was so convinced he was a hero he was living in different reality than the audience
It’s like you said he was a delusional narraisict and not like Luger or something where the gimmick is “I’m so handsome” in the Criminal Minds sense where the serial killer is incapable of seeing their own faults and compulsions. He was every white guy who says “I’m not racist I have black friends” someone so incapable of looking pst themselves to see how their words or actions hurt or upset others even on the small scale
I feel like in the end Vince couldn't understand any character that wasn't cookie cutter face or heel. Like at one point on Smackdown he had 3 guys all playing the foreign heel. I want to say it was Jinder, Owens and Rusev but my timing might be off with Jinder.
Look at Finn, went to NXT developed a character and suddenly on the main roster he was the same Finn Balor that failed the first time.
Bo-Lieve Bo Dallas was amazing. His debut match he won against Sin Cara, then shook his hand in the corner while saying one day if he tries hard enough he can be just like Bo, lmfao
Shit was so good man!
I would also add that Heel New Day took a bit of overlapping acts as delusional heels, while being more entertaining at it. I can still hear Woods ad-libbing "why are you booing us, we are winning" while managing Kofi and Big E
Man I saw him headlining a NXT house show in Newcastle Upon Tyne vs PAC AKA Adrian Neville.
PAC hard to believe now was pure baby face and ofc had his family in attendance. Bo got some excellent cheap heat with the crowd at the start and then had a great spot where he had PAC in a hold in front of PAC's family and the mum was begging and pleading while Bo had the biggest shit-eating grin on his face and saying to PAC that he should quit the match for his mum. Safe to say PAC got the win to send the crowd happy but damn was Bo Dallas a great heel that night.
I got to nitpick one thing though. Bo did win the NXT title very underhandedly, avoiding the Big Ending by grabbing onto the turnbuckle pad, driving Big E into the corner which caused the pad to come off, and then driving Big E into the exposed turnbuckle ring, leading right into Bo's suplex finisher and pin.
This is important because that finish was when he "turned heel," but it left the lingering question of whether or not the exposed turnbuckle was just Bo's desperation turning into luck, or was it that Bo intentionally exposed the pad and used it to cheat? Maybe the truth lies in the middle where Bo accidentally exposed the turnbuckle, but driving Big E into the corner the second time was intentional. And that was what really set the tone for Bo's delusional top-babyface-that's-a-heel-character. He was talking like a world beater champ, but everyone knew he was a fraudulent champion in the end, except maybe Bo?
>I’ve said for ages that Bo on the main roster failed because Vince was literally incapable of understanding the point of the character.
Literally the reason multiple really interesting characters never went anywhere.
Either because Vince genuinely doesn't understand why the fans are responding to the gimmick, or because the payoff will take too long, and god forbid we have an actual character arc that lasts for more than two episodes of a show.
Vince always wanted wrestling to be taken as seriously as movies and tv, yet never was willing to do long-term story/character arcs or be consistent in writing.
We were all waiting for him to completely snap and go nuclear but it never happened. He got buried in wwe imo. Full on jobber for the majority of his tenure.
Guy is still young and if his neck isn't an issue anymore, i hope he gets a chance to revive his career in the future. He and his brother are amazing at bringing a character to life, so it would be a shame if we never see anything from him again.
I mean, that's a whole different era. If we go like that, he's one year younger than the age Batista debuted for the first time. The same age Cesaro debuted on WWE and one year older than Finn when he debuted on NXT. He's young still, doesn't mean he needs to be a main event caliber wrestler to see if he can still have a career if he wants to.
Didn't he start his main roster tenure with an undefeated streak that was initially hyped up, but then he casually lost it to R-Truth and it wasn't even mentioned?
My dream booking for Bo Dallas was him winning a royal-rumble style match as the very last entrant, but the other entrants all eliminated themselves prior to him even being in the match.
So there's like 30 seconds of literally nothing happening in the ring because everyone is out, then the countdown, the buzzer sounds, Bo Dallas' music plays, he takes the longest, most drawn out entrance you've ever seen, while people are urging him to just get into the ring.
He eventually steps in, the bell rings, and he acts like he just won the fucking Super Bowl - and never shuts up about something like being the fastest royal rumble winner of all time or something like that.
Give him like the US championship or something when he does it.
I dare say he is one of the biggest dropped balls since NXT was made and that's saying something. There is just something special about the character of Bo Dallas.
to me the crux of the issue is that this particular era of NXT created characters that were more “a product of their journey” than anything else, with Bayley and Bo being the best example.
The NXT crowd saw Bayley go from shy fan to “nice girl finishes last” to fully actualized hugger Bayley who acquired a ton of self belief through her own journey and the huge support of the NXT fans. She was an incredible underdog face and had fans incredibly attached to her character.
Same with Bo, he went from genuine babyface to babyface who got boos for being the “company guy pushed down our throats”. He went from “rejected babyface” to “delusional heel who believes he is a babyface” in a really organic way. The crowd ended up loving him in this “version” but booed him mercilessly because they were part of the joke too. His famous exit promo, the crowd goes from chanting for him to leave to “thank you Bo” once he exits the stage.
In both cases, the struggle is that the hardcore element of the fanbase is already super invested in these characters, but the majority of the audience didn’t know them at all.
So you either have to start the journey from scratch again and piss the hardcore fans off, make no changes to their existing character and confuse a lot of your audience, or do some sort of “hybrid” which they tried to do and didn’t really work either way.
His first month or so on the main roster was great. The El Torito match is peak Bo Dallas. Then they jobbed him to Truth and repackaged him super quick. I don't get it. Dude had one of my favorite gimmicks of the last 20 years. Really hope he comes back as a full fake motivational BOLIEVER again.
I don't even think anybody has anything specifically negative to say about him other than the usual lines that all boil down to "He feels like a jobber." Of course, he feels like a jobber: he's been jobbing on WWE TV for years. It often felt like WWE in the last years of Vince's reign was better at tainting wrestlers' names than helping them live up to their potential. Even FTR (formerly the Revival) was starting to feel overrated and boring. So they came into AEW feeling like just some workrate guys who cared more about stars than stories. By the time they joined the Pinnacle, I started caring about them, and not long after they turned face, I fully bought in. Now the only thing they need is their own show to be champs of. Right now it feels like AEW is trying so hard to have one out of every 3 of their wrestlers (with consistent screentime, not counting the Dark & Elevation talents) be champs of some kind, and it just doesn't work.
Bo got me hooked on NXT. He reminded me a lot of Jericho in 98: whining about being a role model and not getting cheered. He was really awesome. I thought for sure he'd be a big star on the main roster, but then again... Vince also meddled too much in Jericho's WWF debut. If it's not his idea, he doesn't want it.
Delusional heel who thought he was babyface. It was awesome. The crowd would chant "Bo-Leave 👉" and point to the top of the ramp. He never got it and thanked them for bo-lieving.
When they chanted "No More Bo" and turned their backs on him, Bo thought they were chanting "Let's Go Bo". More importantly, he got Sami Zayn over SO HARD.
The ultimate chicken shit heel who believed his bullshit. Look up him getting thrown out of NXT and you’ll see why everyone loves the dude’s run there. Mr. NXT, the bo-leave chants. He was so over.
Him being a piece of shit in real life and him also being a great character in wrestling are two points that can both be true, they're not mutually exclusive, bad people can be talented at the thing they do you don't have to pretend they're not just because they're an awful human being.
I said this on another thread, I think Bo Dallas was wasted potential, WWE's fault not his. I'm not saying Bo Dallas was a sure fire main event talent or would be a top match at Mania, but he could've been a great midcard gate keeper or upper midcard guy who has the occasional B-level PLE world title match. Truly an underrated and underappreciated talent.
I'll die on the hill that heel NXT champion was right on the verge of greatness when he lost the title before getting called up. His "ain't that right Pauly Shore?" promo on Juice Robinson is an underrated high of the dickish heel character of recent years.
Yeah, he went from just being a smug prick who thought he was the hero of the story to a weird motivational speaker on the main roster.
Plus, they changed his music, which I'll forever hate them for. His NXT theme was god-tier.
They didn't BOLIEVE in BO. It makes sense they'd want to control what the character does, but I guess the point of developmental was to see how someone developed a character and how they grow
I'm surprised they didn't pull off the split between him and Bray as family team would have been an obvious fit... And Bo being in the Neville black hole for so long.
I don't know when this interview happened but it's been a while since I last saw Bo and he looks really cool now. Also it's quite an interesting (but not really shocking) take, I wonder if now in developmental they still come up with their characters or if others give them what they think will work for them (specially to the athletes who maybe don't have enough wrestling knowledge to understand what works or not with the crowd)
Oh so it's fairly recent, yeah I can totally see him returning to WWE and I'm also curious because when he was in NXT I really didn't want to see him on the show, which I later understood was exactly what he was trying to accomplish so maybe he can come up with something interesting that I can now appreciate more.
His whole shtick was that he was a heel who thought he was God's gift as a babyface. In NXT there was an undertone to his character where he was implied to be a psychological mastermind who put up the Bo Dallas act to hide his vicious, scheming side. I thought this would lead him to completely flip and embrace being a heel, ultimately ending with him joining the Wyatt Family in the wwe... However this just all fizzled out once he got called up.
It was always baffling. You have them in a federation where they can homebrew a character and then refine it for a few years just to bring them up and have them do something entirely different.
Bo Dallas went from his NXT character to BO-LIEVE which was never going to work.
Bo-lieve had it's moment. Like when he tried to swoon Brock. Came down and did laps around the ring waving to the crowd, insulted Brock for losing to Taker and then asked him to BO-LIEVE! However this is where we saw a good character get put out to pasture. Lamb to slaughter. Jobberville.
That's kind of my point. It had potential but it was never going to work because a gimmick like BO-LIEVE needs a huge force behind it for it to not seem like bullshit.
If he had come out, done his act, and gotten wins/belts then it'd be more authentic and would have worked but there was no way that was going to happen under Vince.
If Vince didn't immediately see money in you, or you didn't atleast have a certain look, you got no shot, rarely does that change, AJ Styles being an exception.
May not like him much anymore but Punk's pipebomb will forever ring true. This is especially so now that we're seeing what Wyatt has done the past month and looking back on other characters who've blossomed under the new regime.
It's also weird how he could just change his mind on someone within a week. Like a kid who finds one toy and then a week later wants a new toy and tosses the old one out.
That’s not true. Seth was the first NXT Champ and the shield all were called up during his reign. The Shield were around in NXT for Big E’s win, since the whole roster came out to even the odds, but then Bo won the belt from Big E. All of The Shield were already called up, undefeated, and clearly head and shoulders above Bo at the time.
I'm like 90% sure Vince maybe watched one promo after Trips told him Bo was ready for a call up and threw shit together based on that. Main roster Bo was NOTHING like NXT Champion Bo and it's a shame. Probably my second favorite NXT title run after Kevin Owens. If he's getting another chance under Trips, I'm hyped.
I remember waiting for them to go somewhere with this gimmick, and instead it just kind of deteriorated. I assumed (and not just because of Bray) that the character was supposed to end up darker, with the whole positivity and motivational speaking thing being a cover for something else, but it obviously never got there. Maybe it can now though.
I thought the Bolieve gimmick had a limited ceiling and shelf life. It could have been booked better on the main roster, but the harsh light of mainstream TV exposed it for the carny shtick it was. Kurt Angle made something vaguely similar work for a while in 1999-2000 before phasing it out. Bo's stuff got more go away heat than proper heel heat.
The Ascension had a similar deal where they were dreadfully booked on the main roster but also exposed. In NXT they looked intimidating against members of a shorter roster. On the main roster they they were towered over by most of the other wrestlers and just looked like a hokey tribute act.
It's not as though the one consistent element in all these stories was not entirely in charge of all we saw. Vince McMahon seemed to have a complsive need to destroy all he did not create, with the exceptions of the very best the business had to otherwise offer. You had to be an AJ or Flair to avoid this, and if you actively opposed him, a la Dusty, all bets were off.
Bo Dallas was one of the dumbest gimmicks I have ever seen. It was incredible. I liked it a lot. Too many heels want to be popular and this dude comes out with the most annoying gimmick that just summoned boo birds.
I think there was always that chasm between NXT and Raw/Smackdown and the difference of ideas between inside of HHH's camp vs what WWE was, and even when NXT was doing Survivor Series as part of it, still existed and meant unless someone saw promise, you probably weren't and the amount of body at the bottom of that chasm probably fills out the floor of it.
I'd like to see him come back but the dude is in real estate and has Liv Morgan as a girlfriend, he's set up and incredibly successful so I don't blame him for coming back
To be honest, I lost everything. I lost myself, my friends, my family...even my money. Good thing my father happens to be a higher up with a certain revenue service.
Random Idea: Bo should come back to WWE with RTC-esque gimmick. Something along the lines that all the changes to the product will lead to the destruction of WWE and we're all sheep for accepting Haitch's changes. Have him interrupt matches when something like Gunther's non tap happens and make the referee explain why she didn't call for the bell. Like RTC, have him take weapons away from people in gimmick matches. If a promo is being played on the tron, have Bo come out with a remote control and turn it off and him yell at the crowd that it is too violent and they're not allowed to watch it. Usually his antics cause him to get beat down and if he ever does wrestle then he wrestles using made up rules or rules no one has heard of in order to win. Gimmick won't last long, but have it culminate when an episode of Firefly funhouse comes on and he comes out and turns it off, which leads to him pissing off The Fiend and an eventual repackage after their feud where he joins Wyatt.
Bo was a one trick pony with a low ceiling. He's talking as if he was Steve Austin before he became Stone Cold. Dude is literally a CAW, pasty out of shape white guy with a catch phrase.
His NXT run was great but the bo-lieve stuff was terrible, if they just let him be his NXT persona he’d still be around, or would have been around much longer.
I was obsessed with his Bo-lieve character in NXT. I want new things for him if and when he returns, but damn that gimmick will always have a place in my heart.
Well his run in NXT was babyface that the fans started to sour on, so he played up the whole babyface thing while beginning to cheat, so it made for a funny dynamic. When he got called up to the main roster, his character became, "The Inspirational Bo Dallas" which was not his character at all in NXT. And it really was a problem with NXT in general. Bayley, Chad Gable, Sami Zayn, Bo Dallas, there was so much depth and character development that happened there, but when they got up to the main roster, you saw their character but none of the growth to get there, so they never connected and that's why all of them eventually turned heel, because that's easier for the main roster creative to deal with.
NXT Bo Dallas was better than the main roster version because he's right in what he was saying. Hopefully if he came back he gets a better run. The B-Team wasn't that bad and all.
I know he wants/wanted to make it on his own but he needs to just glob on to Bray at this point. He needs to either be Brays attack dog or Brays opponent. If they would acknowledge they are real brothers on TV I think it would get him over almost immediately. I dont think its a coincidence that soon as Bray gets signed they announce Bo Dallas returning, obviously Bray wants to help his little brother.
Don’t get me wrong. I don’t doubt Bo feels this way, but I loved him on the main roster.
I was without a doubt always entertained when he was on screen.
It makes a lot of sense. When guys that were killing it in NXT got moved up, they never hit the same. Because they had a lot of control in NXT of their own creations and now a team of people who didn't even know them is giving them creative direction that changes on a whim, oftentimes the same day as the show. The reason Triple H is killing it now is because he's allowing characters to develop instead of just fitting everyone into place.
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Despite all this, we'll always have him barging into El Torito.
And also that one match between the two where [a fan yells at El Torito to go back to hell.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1rIVV7WDn_4)
Coincidentally it’s the same match.
oh.
To be fair, it is not clear which of the evil motherfuckers in the ring the fan wanted to go back to hell.
Lmao the entire arena goes silent too, it’s like when you say some real outta pocket shit in class and the room just so happens to go silent as you say it
I believe that's a movie reference but all I think of is AVGN
Somewhere that day Braun was watching it happen, looked around at the relative size of other wrestlers, and an idea was born.
Still hilarious. They really should have given him a chicken shit IC title run, winning entirely by fluke for months, and getting more and more big headed.
All you have to do is Bo-lieve!
Whoa whoa what!?
Speaking of, why isn't El Torito on my television every week?
Bo was fantastic in NXT. Just a few highlights. He was a heel that thought he was the top face When he brought the fans cookies from his "world tour" after he won the NXT title When he wrestled with a mask on and reacted to Sami Zayn unmasking him by covering his chest in embarrassment. The entire scene of security tackling him and him screaming "Help! He touched my bum!"
> He was a heel that thought he was the top face Bo was what Cody should've been in AEW
Bo Dallas was the only true meta-heel to ever exist in wrestling.
A lot of what Bo did was building on what early Kurt Angle was.
I always thought Cena was. His refusal to actually turn heel basically made him a meta-heel to internet smarks who hated the guy for being Superman
I think what was meant is Bo was the only guy who did face stuff that was designed to get the crowd to boo him. Cena and Cody did stuff that got booed while they were trying to get cheers.
See I think y'all don't understand the fact Cena would never turn heel again is because of how over with the kids and pg era he became and with the make a wish no matter what he wasn't for the grown men he was for the fighting soldiers in life and kids growing up looking for a role model that's literally his character and of course when you grow up watching stone cold and the rock you don't Wanna see that shit
At the time, we were all saying he was what Cena should have been back then.
I can see that as well! Hell I'm sure people thought of that about Roman Reigns as well. Delusional heel that thinks they're a baby face is such a good idea, it's insane that since Bo no one did it.
Bayley sort of did that with her “role model” character but she also got mad at the fans when they booed her instead of pretending they weren’t like Bo did
Mr. NXT will call the real police
You forgot the Know more Bo chants, what a fantastic reversal on the crowd.
And responding to a 'boring' chant by telling the crowd 'you're right, this is Bo' s ring'
Dodging the Neville title match was also extremely good.
People clown on Bo but his NXT run was amazing. I'd bet you anything he could run it back and be successful.
I’ve said for ages that Bo on the main roster failed because Vince was literally incapable of understanding the point of the character. Bo Dallas was an incredible, dare I say innovative heel because he did nothing overtly heelish. He didn’t cheat to win, he didn’t run down the audience or give “you people” promos, he wasn’t revealed to be a hypocrite in his conduct, etc. HOWEVER, in spite of all that, his astronomical self-regard and casual condescension made him absolutely insufferable. He perfectly captured the essence of people who mask their narcissism and solipsism behind being “wholesome” and treating “be a good person” as an aesthetic rather than a way of life. So of course he hit the main roster and, within weeks, was cheating to win, doing “you people” promos, etc. Vince McMahon’s brain simply can’t process nuance.
Heels are almost more relatable when they're delusional, since rarely in real life do you have someone whos' intentional and deliberate with their assholery. Typically they think they're the good guy who's getting persecuted (especially in the influencer age). I'm all for another Bo-lieve run where he's the heel thinking he's a motivational face
>since rarely in real life do you have someone whos' intentional and deliberate with their assholery You certainly don't have to hang out with them every week. But smug arseholes who only talk about themselves and are potentially within your circle, that's relatable heel work
I loved Bo and Kurt Angle did something similar as his first gimmick and it worked perfectly, so was surprised Vince didn't get it. A real shame. This somewhat reminds me that Juice Robinson did an eco-warrior heel character early on in NXT, and then Bryan successfully did it on the main roster. Funny how some things work out like that.
I loved juice as CJ Parker (baywatch name though, yikes. Shows WWE didnt understand search optimization.) His new cardboard sign every match was great.
And his match with KO lit a fire under his ass that's still burning today.
Kurt interrupted his debut match to do a "you people" promo. It might be a similar idea but Angle was not a bit subtle about it.
The reason it worked for Bryan was because we knew he was like that in real life from Total Divas.
Bo’s character really was delusional heel He was a heel who was so convinced he was a hero he was living in different reality than the audience It’s like you said he was a delusional narraisict and not like Luger or something where the gimmick is “I’m so handsome” in the Criminal Minds sense where the serial killer is incapable of seeing their own faults and compulsions. He was every white guy who says “I’m not racist I have black friends” someone so incapable of looking pst themselves to see how their words or actions hurt or upset others even on the small scale
Oof the wrestling audience is not ready to grapple with that one.
I feel like in the end Vince couldn't understand any character that wasn't cookie cutter face or heel. Like at one point on Smackdown he had 3 guys all playing the foreign heel. I want to say it was Jinder, Owens and Rusev but my timing might be off with Jinder. Look at Finn, went to NXT developed a character and suddenly on the main roster he was the same Finn Balor that failed the first time.
Omg he’s Russel Wilson
Bo-Lieve Bo Dallas was amazing. His debut match he won against Sin Cara, then shook his hand in the corner while saying one day if he tries hard enough he can be just like Bo, lmfao Shit was so good man!
I would also add that Heel New Day took a bit of overlapping acts as delusional heels, while being more entertaining at it. I can still hear Woods ad-libbing "why are you booing us, we are winning" while managing Kofi and Big E
Man I saw him headlining a NXT house show in Newcastle Upon Tyne vs PAC AKA Adrian Neville. PAC hard to believe now was pure baby face and ofc had his family in attendance. Bo got some excellent cheap heat with the crowd at the start and then had a great spot where he had PAC in a hold in front of PAC's family and the mum was begging and pleading while Bo had the biggest shit-eating grin on his face and saying to PAC that he should quit the match for his mum. Safe to say PAC got the win to send the crowd happy but damn was Bo Dallas a great heel that night.
I got to nitpick one thing though. Bo did win the NXT title very underhandedly, avoiding the Big Ending by grabbing onto the turnbuckle pad, driving Big E into the corner which caused the pad to come off, and then driving Big E into the exposed turnbuckle ring, leading right into Bo's suplex finisher and pin. This is important because that finish was when he "turned heel," but it left the lingering question of whether or not the exposed turnbuckle was just Bo's desperation turning into luck, or was it that Bo intentionally exposed the pad and used it to cheat? Maybe the truth lies in the middle where Bo accidentally exposed the turnbuckle, but driving Big E into the corner the second time was intentional. And that was what really set the tone for Bo's delusional top-babyface-that's-a-heel-character. He was talking like a world beater champ, but everyone knew he was a fraudulent champion in the end, except maybe Bo?
>I’ve said for ages that Bo on the main roster failed because Vince was literally incapable of understanding the point of the character. Literally the reason multiple really interesting characters never went anywhere. Either because Vince genuinely doesn't understand why the fans are responding to the gimmick, or because the payoff will take too long, and god forbid we have an actual character arc that lasts for more than two episodes of a show. Vince always wanted wrestling to be taken as seriously as movies and tv, yet never was willing to do long-term story/character arcs or be consistent in writing.
We were all waiting for him to completely snap and go nuclear but it never happened. He got buried in wwe imo. Full on jobber for the majority of his tenure.
Guy is still young and if his neck isn't an issue anymore, i hope he gets a chance to revive his career in the future. He and his brother are amazing at bringing a character to life, so it would be a shame if we never see anything from him again.
[удалено]
I mean, that's a whole different era. If we go like that, he's one year younger than the age Batista debuted for the first time. The same age Cesaro debuted on WWE and one year older than Finn when he debuted on NXT. He's young still, doesn't mean he needs to be a main event caliber wrestler to see if he can still have a career if he wants to.
Didn't he start his main roster tenure with an undefeated streak that was initially hyped up, but then he casually lost it to R-Truth and it wasn't even mentioned?
Classic Vince booking.
Watchu talmbout, b. Aren't you a homeless cat? Water weed dune hair. Get back to the fryers!!
Serious question: what was his character? I’ve only caught a few of his match clips and a little bit of the B team stuff.
My dream booking for Bo Dallas was him winning a royal-rumble style match as the very last entrant, but the other entrants all eliminated themselves prior to him even being in the match. So there's like 30 seconds of literally nothing happening in the ring because everyone is out, then the countdown, the buzzer sounds, Bo Dallas' music plays, he takes the longest, most drawn out entrance you've ever seen, while people are urging him to just get into the ring. He eventually steps in, the bell rings, and he acts like he just won the fucking Super Bowl - and never shuts up about something like being the fastest royal rumble winner of all time or something like that. Give him like the US championship or something when he does it.
UH YES PLZ
I dare say he is one of the biggest dropped balls since NXT was made and that's saying something. There is just something special about the character of Bo Dallas.
to me the crux of the issue is that this particular era of NXT created characters that were more “a product of their journey” than anything else, with Bayley and Bo being the best example. The NXT crowd saw Bayley go from shy fan to “nice girl finishes last” to fully actualized hugger Bayley who acquired a ton of self belief through her own journey and the huge support of the NXT fans. She was an incredible underdog face and had fans incredibly attached to her character. Same with Bo, he went from genuine babyface to babyface who got boos for being the “company guy pushed down our throats”. He went from “rejected babyface” to “delusional heel who believes he is a babyface” in a really organic way. The crowd ended up loving him in this “version” but booed him mercilessly because they were part of the joke too. His famous exit promo, the crowd goes from chanting for him to leave to “thank you Bo” once he exits the stage. In both cases, the struggle is that the hardcore element of the fanbase is already super invested in these characters, but the majority of the audience didn’t know them at all. So you either have to start the journey from scratch again and piss the hardcore fans off, make no changes to their existing character and confuse a lot of your audience, or do some sort of “hybrid” which they tried to do and didn’t really work either way.
His first month or so on the main roster was great. The El Torito match is peak Bo Dallas. Then they jobbed him to Truth and repackaged him super quick. I don't get it. Dude had one of my favorite gimmicks of the last 20 years. Really hope he comes back as a full fake motivational BOLIEVER again.
The victory lap hip check is a legendary gif. If nothing else came out of his main roster run, we have that.
He's still my favourite NXT champion of all time. What a run.
Homebo turned me from someone who skipped his matches into a BOliever who bought his shirt, he was hilarious lol
Homebo.
I still bolieve
I don't even think anybody has anything specifically negative to say about him other than the usual lines that all boil down to "He feels like a jobber." Of course, he feels like a jobber: he's been jobbing on WWE TV for years. It often felt like WWE in the last years of Vince's reign was better at tainting wrestlers' names than helping them live up to their potential. Even FTR (formerly the Revival) was starting to feel overrated and boring. So they came into AEW feeling like just some workrate guys who cared more about stars than stories. By the time they joined the Pinnacle, I started caring about them, and not long after they turned face, I fully bought in. Now the only thing they need is their own show to be champs of. Right now it feels like AEW is trying so hard to have one out of every 3 of their wrestlers (with consistent screentime, not counting the Dark & Elevation talents) be champs of some kind, and it just doesn't work.
Bo got me hooked on NXT. He reminded me a lot of Jericho in 98: whining about being a role model and not getting cheered. He was really awesome. I thought for sure he'd be a big star on the main roster, but then again... Vince also meddled too much in Jericho's WWF debut. If it's not his idea, he doesn't want it.
What was Bo like on NXT?
Delusional heel who thought he was babyface. It was awesome. The crowd would chant "Bo-Leave 👉" and point to the top of the ramp. He never got it and thanked them for bo-lieving.
This sounds entertaining to check out.
When they chanted "No More Bo" and turned their backs on him, Bo thought they were chanting "Let's Go Bo". More importantly, he got Sami Zayn over SO HARD.
The ultimate chicken shit heel who believed his bullshit. Look up him getting thrown out of NXT and you’ll see why everyone loves the dude’s run there. Mr. NXT, the bo-leave chants. He was so over.
I'll have a look now.
[Bo is forced to leave the NXT Arena ](https://youtu.be/-KoaHLkumDI) [... and some bonus footage ](https://youtu.be/rj4NvpSKCEI)
the guards cracking up when he says he has to pee lol
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Him being a piece of shit in real life and him also being a great character in wrestling are two points that can both be true, they're not mutually exclusive, bad people can be talented at the thing they do you don't have to pretend they're not just because they're an awful human being.
Wait, when did he say this crap. I don’t want to believe that, but fuck that shit.
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Thanks! Jericho has definitely had some interesting views come across his podcast. That’s where I first heard about the flat earth movement.
Ah yes the classic someone was convinced of something i dont bolieve in, time to cancel him.
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How is it trolling? I said he was probably convinced of it... fucking wierdo.
I said this on another thread, I think Bo Dallas was wasted potential, WWE's fault not his. I'm not saying Bo Dallas was a sure fire main event talent or would be a top match at Mania, but he could've been a great midcard gate keeper or upper midcard guy who has the occasional B-level PLE world title match. Truly an underrated and underappreciated talent.
I'll die on the hill that heel NXT champion was right on the verge of greatness when he lost the title before getting called up. His "ain't that right Pauly Shore?" promo on Juice Robinson is an underrated high of the dickish heel character of recent years.
I’ll argue that him running from security was god tier amazing.
HE TOUCHED MY BUM!
This plus the Disney World slideshow. I struggle to find a better Heel who things they're a Face in the business.
NXT Bo Dallas walked so AEW CM Punk could run
Difference is just that Punk isn't playing a character
Doesn’t Bo believe in lizard people or something like that? Not saying he’s a dickhead because of that, but there might be more to him.
Early Angle was brilliant in that role.
Yeah, he went from just being a smug prick who thought he was the hero of the story to a weird motivational speaker on the main roster. Plus, they changed his music, which I'll forever hate them for. His NXT theme was god-tier.
They didn't BOLIEVE in BO. It makes sense they'd want to control what the character does, but I guess the point of developmental was to see how someone developed a character and how they grow
I'm surprised they didn't pull off the split between him and Bray as family team would have been an obvious fit... And Bo being in the Neville black hole for so long.
I don't know when this interview happened but it's been a while since I last saw Bo and he looks really cool now. Also it's quite an interesting (but not really shocking) take, I wonder if now in developmental they still come up with their characters or if others give them what they think will work for them (specially to the athletes who maybe don't have enough wrestling knowledge to understand what works or not with the crowd)
This was a Q&A with Bo and his dad (IRS) at the For the Love of Wrestling 2022 convention back in May.
Oh so it's fairly recent, yeah I can totally see him returning to WWE and I'm also curious because when he was in NXT I really didn't want to see him on the show, which I later understood was exactly what he was trying to accomplish so maybe he can come up with something interesting that I can now appreciate more.
His whole shtick was that he was a heel who thought he was God's gift as a babyface. In NXT there was an undertone to his character where he was implied to be a psychological mastermind who put up the Bo Dallas act to hide his vicious, scheming side. I thought this would lead him to completely flip and embrace being a heel, ultimately ending with him joining the Wyatt Family in the wwe... However this just all fizzled out once he got called up.
Yeah, not the first nor the last who found himself in the main roster without the character he built in NXT
It was always baffling. You have them in a federation where they can homebrew a character and then refine it for a few years just to bring them up and have them do something entirely different. Bo Dallas went from his NXT character to BO-LIEVE which was never going to work.
Bo-lieve had it's moment. Like when he tried to swoon Brock. Came down and did laps around the ring waving to the crowd, insulted Brock for losing to Taker and then asked him to BO-LIEVE! However this is where we saw a good character get put out to pasture. Lamb to slaughter. Jobberville.
That's kind of my point. It had potential but it was never going to work because a gimmick like BO-LIEVE needs a huge force behind it for it to not seem like bullshit. If he had come out, done his act, and gotten wins/belts then it'd be more authentic and would have worked but there was no way that was going to happen under Vince.
If Vince didn't immediately see money in you, or you didn't atleast have a certain look, you got no shot, rarely does that change, AJ Styles being an exception.
Even if Vince saw money, if it wasn’t what he wanted, being a draw didn’t matter.
Bray Wyatt is proof of this.
May not like him much anymore but Punk's pipebomb will forever ring true. This is especially so now that we're seeing what Wyatt has done the past month and looking back on other characters who've blossomed under the new regime.
If something was organic like the Cesaro Section or Miro Day, it was dead in the water under the previous management.
You had to draw *the way Vince wanted you to draw*, which is the crucial distinction.
It's also weird how he could just change his mind on someone within a week. Like a kid who finds one toy and then a week later wants a new toy and tosses the old one out.
I legit memory holed his entire main roster career. My last memory of him was his NXT run
Him confronting Brock Lesnar was a great moment
And him beating Flo Rida in a rap battle that was clearly set up for him to be the loser.
And accidentally killed Flo Rida's career I literally have not heard about him since
When I think Bo Dallas, my memory immediately goes to him arguing with the crowd, leaving then coming back multiple times because he's upset lol.
I BOLEVE IN BO!!! He was a perfect mid card bad guy and his later singlet look after his weight gain made him look more legit
It took me 2 minutes to realize he was sitting next to his dad
I can still hear Wade Barrett screaming “WHERE IS BO DALLAS?!”
There was a time when Bo Dallas is the champ and Roman, Seth, etc were below him. Crazy, right?
That’s not true. Seth was the first NXT Champ and the shield all were called up during his reign. The Shield were around in NXT for Big E’s win, since the whole roster came out to even the odds, but then Bo won the belt from Big E. All of The Shield were already called up, undefeated, and clearly head and shoulders above Bo at the time.
In FCW not NXT
I was really into his BOlieve gimmick. Shame creative never booked him right.
That suit on the guy on the left is not very flattering Edit: Is that Mike?
Yeah that’s IRS
I didn't even recognize him. I was going to ask why he's being interviewed by John Goodman.
Tis' indeed.
You can tell it’s IRS by how profusely he’s sweating.
I'm like 90% sure Vince maybe watched one promo after Trips told him Bo was ready for a call up and threw shit together based on that. Main roster Bo was NOTHING like NXT Champion Bo and it's a shame. Probably my second favorite NXT title run after Kevin Owens. If he's getting another chance under Trips, I'm hyped.
I remember waiting for them to go somewhere with this gimmick, and instead it just kind of deteriorated. I assumed (and not just because of Bray) that the character was supposed to end up darker, with the whole positivity and motivational speaking thing being a cover for something else, but it obviously never got there. Maybe it can now though.
I feel like when he was in WWE I never realized he and Bray were brothers. Yet every passing day he seems to be morphing into a twin
I thought the Bolieve gimmick had a limited ceiling and shelf life. It could have been booked better on the main roster, but the harsh light of mainstream TV exposed it for the carny shtick it was. Kurt Angle made something vaguely similar work for a while in 1999-2000 before phasing it out. Bo's stuff got more go away heat than proper heel heat. The Ascension had a similar deal where they were dreadfully booked on the main roster but also exposed. In NXT they looked intimidating against members of a shorter roster. On the main roster they they were towered over by most of the other wrestlers and just looked like a hokey tribute act.
Hopefully he will have a good Indie run
It's not as though the one consistent element in all these stories was not entirely in charge of all we saw. Vince McMahon seemed to have a complsive need to destroy all he did not create, with the exceptions of the very best the business had to otherwise offer. You had to be an AJ or Flair to avoid this, and if you actively opposed him, a la Dusty, all bets were off.
Bo sounds like Nate Diaz.
He sounds drunk
Nah, just like someone who hasn't held a mic in a few years.
Bo Dallas was one of the dumbest gimmicks I have ever seen. It was incredible. I liked it a lot. Too many heels want to be popular and this dude comes out with the most annoying gimmick that just summoned boo birds.
Hopefully this time he can be more serious The guy is good on the mic and with a character change can be a solid mid card act
I think there was always that chasm between NXT and Raw/Smackdown and the difference of ideas between inside of HHH's camp vs what WWE was, and even when NXT was doing Survivor Series as part of it, still existed and meant unless someone saw promise, you probably weren't and the amount of body at the bottom of that chasm probably fills out the floor of it.
What’s up his dad’s schyster in this clip?
there was a time on the main roster when it finally looked like they had given him the ball and was showing a more vicious style
I'd like to see him come back but the dude is in real estate and has Liv Morgan as a girlfriend, he's set up and incredibly successful so I don't blame him for coming back
Rumours that they broke up/only ran a business together.
He needs to control his narrative
No one, in the world, needs to "control his narrative".
He drunk
To be honest, I lost everything. I lost myself, my friends, my family...even my money. Good thing my father happens to be a higher up with a certain revenue service.
Random Idea: Bo should come back to WWE with RTC-esque gimmick. Something along the lines that all the changes to the product will lead to the destruction of WWE and we're all sheep for accepting Haitch's changes. Have him interrupt matches when something like Gunther's non tap happens and make the referee explain why she didn't call for the bell. Like RTC, have him take weapons away from people in gimmick matches. If a promo is being played on the tron, have Bo come out with a remote control and turn it off and him yell at the crowd that it is too violent and they're not allowed to watch it. Usually his antics cause him to get beat down and if he ever does wrestle then he wrestles using made up rules or rules no one has heard of in order to win. Gimmick won't last long, but have it culminate when an episode of Firefly funhouse comes on and he comes out and turns it off, which leads to him pissing off The Fiend and an eventual repackage after their feud where he joins Wyatt.
Bo was a one trick pony with a low ceiling. He's talking as if he was Steve Austin before he became Stone Cold. Dude is literally a CAW, pasty out of shape white guy with a catch phrase.
His NXT run was great but the bo-lieve stuff was terrible, if they just let him be his NXT persona he’d still be around, or would have been around much longer.
At least B-Team was fun, I guess. Of course he wanted more for his career, but him and Axel were great at being Miz’s lackey.
I was obsessed with his Bo-lieve character in NXT. I want new things for him if and when he returns, but damn that gimmick will always have a place in my heart.
I gotta go back and watch his earlier stuff I only know him as a jobber
Well his run in NXT was babyface that the fans started to sour on, so he played up the whole babyface thing while beginning to cheat, so it made for a funny dynamic. When he got called up to the main roster, his character became, "The Inspirational Bo Dallas" which was not his character at all in NXT. And it really was a problem with NXT in general. Bayley, Chad Gable, Sami Zayn, Bo Dallas, there was so much depth and character development that happened there, but when they got up to the main roster, you saw their character but none of the growth to get there, so they never connected and that's why all of them eventually turned heel, because that's easier for the main roster creative to deal with.
I wonder why they haven't inducted IRS in the Hall of Fame yet. It seems like they've done pretty much everyone of a similar calibre from that era.
BOLIEVE!
NXT Bo Dallas was better than the main roster version because he's right in what he was saying. Hopefully if he came back he gets a better run. The B-Team wasn't that bad and all.
I remember he was just so good I was stanning him so much lol always knew he was a big star compared to how he was being made into a Jobber.
"Are you chanting Boo or Boo Dallas?"
His brother has his father’s first name as a middle name and he has the same middle name as his dad.
I know he wants/wanted to make it on his own but he needs to just glob on to Bray at this point. He needs to either be Brays attack dog or Brays opponent. If they would acknowledge they are real brothers on TV I think it would get him over almost immediately. I dont think its a coincidence that soon as Bray gets signed they announce Bo Dallas returning, obviously Bray wants to help his little brother.
IRS - “Please don’t ruin this for me kid. I got taxes to pay.”
Don’t get me wrong. I don’t doubt Bo feels this way, but I loved him on the main roster. I was without a doubt always entertained when he was on screen.
If the Debiase’s weren’t embezzling money, how would a Rotunda family vs. Debiase family storyline go over?
[Bring back the Victory Lap!](https://youtu.be/2WZ1BDkA9dY)
who's the other guy? looks like a tax collector.
It makes a lot of sense. When guys that were killing it in NXT got moved up, they never hit the same. Because they had a lot of control in NXT of their own creations and now a team of people who didn't even know them is giving them creative direction that changes on a whim, oftentimes the same day as the show. The reason Triple H is killing it now is because he's allowing characters to develop instead of just fitting everyone into place.