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| A fully realized character in a sea of shells Photo Credit: WWE.com |
Because the narrative is so simplistic and widespread, when there's potential for nuance, it immediately has the tendency to be swept under the crushing tsunami of the status quo, especially when that nuance is embedded within source code that looks so similar to what is normal. That's where Ryback fits in, or more appropriately, gets decimated. The clause "Ryback gets decimated" is not one that computes with him in his first year as a character in the company. Normally, when he cries "FEED ME MORE," he's fed in short order. Some dishes go down easier than others, and some repeat on him like hot wings and beer in a sensitive GI tract. It was the latter that had gotten him down so much. Six times by his count, the Shield left him laying for no other reason than "uh, justice." No one came to save The Ryback, even though Ryback was all too eager to saddle up with those who wanted to get revenge on the group that had wronged him.
According to the meatiest meathead of them all, John Cena, counting how many times you were left laying with no one willing to help you is analogous to counting how many beers you drank the last night. No one cares, he said, except there's a huge difference between pounding Natty Lites with your frat bros and being submerged under the weight of a three-hound of justice dogpile with the intent of rending your musculature from your skeleton. It's here where the disconnect is the greatest. A nuanced character with motivations that extend beyond BELT or shutting up YOU PEOPLE is now going up against one of the corny jock automatons, and not just any one, but the beta prototype (the alpha model was too busy yelling at an agent about how Brock Lesnar destroying his office didn't affect him at all).
See, Ryback is very much the thinking man's monster, but in the eyes of those who direct his narrative, the "monster" part is irrelevant if you think. Thinking means weakness. Brainpower isn't right, might is right! Ryback, by the law of the WWE Universe, should have been happy taking a beatdown from The Shield without anyone helping him, because friendship is another sign of weakness, and you haven't arrived until you've dispatched more than two people by yourself, preferably with one hand tied behind your back. But if you were to lift the environment away from the WWE and look at the characters by themselves, you'll see that Ryback is different than even the best of the heels that keep his company.
The motivation for when, say, Antonio Cesaro, bails out on a match or a confrontation is that "lol, he's a bad guy, bad guys is cowards!" Ryback never, ever bails without reason. When Daniel Bryan was kicking him like a beat up old soccer ball Friday, he didn't jump ship. He made his comeback and beat the man most likely to try and defeat him by flashing a Turkey Bacon Bravo in his face. When he does bail, he always has reasons. He's tired of being a victim of THE DAMN NUMBERS GAME. Or he doesn't want to team with a man with a bad wheel. OR he doesn't think wrestling a man who was still recovering from being victim of THE DAMN NUMBERS GAME was a suitable challenge for him. In reality, Ryback isn't a heel. He's sick and tired of being sick and tired. But WWE reality isn't the same as real reality.
Motivations really don't matter to the show runners, and that comes through in the commentary of guys like Michael Cole and Jerry Lawler. I give wrestling fans more credit than most people do, but I do admit that there are a large portion among the fans in the stands and at home who don't really care to think for themselves here (not because they can't... don't want to make that judgment about anyone without knowing them, but I do know that whether they have the capacity or not for critical thought, many people admit to "turning off their brain" while watching). Whatever the soundtrack tells them, they believe, and hey, it's way easier to them if that soundtrack does line up with what they see. On the surface, Ryback runs from fights. He has to be bad, just like Cesaro, just like Mark Henry (exception, this entire feud with Sheamus), just like WrestleMania XXV Randy Orton, or any other heel since the first time Vincent J. McMahon promoted a show under the banner Capitol Wrestling.
Whether it's intentional or not, WWE is doing a great disservice to one of their best characters right now. It shouldn't be surprising, but it doesn't mean it's not disappointing. It also speaks to a far larger problem WWE has and will continue to have with alignment until they change philosophies in the front office. The biggest shame though is that a lot of people, meta-fan or otherwise, won't be able to see how brilliant Ryback is because he's too obscured in the glare from the blinding light of how many 60-watt cowards exist in WWE's night sky.