Fandango, WWE's Latest Attempt at Trolling the Audience

Will this troll job ultimately doom Fandango or propel him? Photo Credit: WWE.com

WWE fans have been breathlessly awaiting the arrival of Fandango for months now. The repurposed Johnny Curtis started appearing in vignettes at the beginning of November, and since that time, he's been stoking coals both ironic and earnest in those who have been waiting and waiting for him to debut. That moment was supposed to have come on Smackdown, but he was offended at Matt Striker not knowing how to pronounce his name and walked out on his match with Zack Ryder. He made it to the dais at least on RAW to cancel on Kofi Kingston face to face at least for a similar reason. Justin Roberts didn't pronounce his name to his liking either.

If you as a fan are pissed off, well, I think that it's working. It's a tried and true wrestling technique. Trolling has been part of heel wrestling strategery for as long as I can remember. The theory is that if you promise something like a debut or a new move, and you keep delaying the payoff in an arrogant manner, the people will boo you. I personally love it and hope he continues to delay his debut until there's a good reason for him to actually get in the ring. Y'know, tell a goddamn story.

However, I feel like I'm different from a lot of other fans in that I am somewhat of a trolling aficionado. I can take a lot of baiting and teasing and still be entertained, but I understand if others get sick of Fandango's delaying and end up not reacting to him when he finally does get in the ring. That begs the question whether WWE is actually doing him a service by building him in this manner.

One thing that Fandango has in his corner is that he's throwing himself all in on the character. It's cheesy, but it's one of those pro wrestling gimmicks that could get really popular in the right circumstances, even if it hearkens back to those occupational gimmicks the company ran into the ground in the mid-'90s. Rather than driving the dancing into the ground first, the trolling aspect of him refusing to get in the ring establishes a character. He's not just a dancer, but he's a diva, a primadonna. It's layered character building, a great way to make a three-dimensional character out of a cardboard gimmick.

It also bears noting that there's a huge elephant in the room that the Fandango character could also end up getting over and drawing massively homophobic heat from WWE crowds. I give those fans a lot of credit for finally recognizing that Mexicans are people too, but I'm not entirely sure that the state of sexual orientation relations are at the same level. I'll be happy if I'm wrong on this though, way happy.

Getting back on track, I think that even though it's great WWE is trying different things to help mold fuller characters, this first layer they're building with Fandango is a risky one. The thing about people is that they don't like to be trolled by and large, and the line between "booing because they're being trolled" or "not paying attention because fuck you, I don't like being trolled" is somewhat hard to see. If there's any hope for WWE to get success out of this tactic for Fandango, it's the fact that several successful trolls have scored high profile jobs on popular shows on political television and ESPN. Will this end up propelling Fandango into a Skip Bayless groove, or will people not care? Either way, I applaud WWE for taking this route.

Mainly because I love a good troll.