The Wyatt Sicks are back, for now.
Last week on Smackdown, the faction that was dormant for nearly six month reemerged at the end of the show to attack the rest of the tag team division, implying that they would be a part of the brand going forward.
The problem is, this was essentially where they started on Raw less than a year ago with an impactful debut before the steam of the stable fizzled out quickly because of a lack of direction or teams to work with on the show.
As the edition of Smackdown went off the air, Nikki Cross, a talented performer that has done the best with whatever she was given during his WWE tenure, brought a birthday cake to the center of the ring where the group gathered. Uncle Howdy, portrayed by Bray Wyatt’s real-life brother, paid tribute to his late sibling when he blew out the candles in honor of Windham Rotunda’s birthday.
Don’t get me wrong, as I’ve written in the past, it’s a wonderful tribute to Bray Wyatt, and the lack of progress with the faction isn’t meant as a knock on the notion to always keep Bray’s work remembered in some form or fashion, but at the same time, a tribute gimmick by nature is limited in what can be done with it.
Proof of that is that the Wyatt Sicks debuted on Raw last year and then spent half of that time completely off the radar because management hasn’t truly figured out how to book or market the stable. This isn’t to say it’s not possible, but how does a gimmick specifically designed to honor a performer that passed away become incorporated into the landscape of WWE programming to be used to create compelling television?
There’s a fine line between the continuation of a concept and a tribute act.
I’m not sure WWE brass has found a way to truly make the Wyatt Sicks a concept inspired by Bray, but still something that can stand on its own. Obviously, the fact that the gimmick is being used to honor someone that has passed will make them a baby face stable, but their presentation has been rather ambiguous, including their debut last year when the scene backstage was any staff member in sight was down while sparks flew from different parts of the building. Was randomly attacking the rest of the tag division a baby face move?
The biggest issue, at least for the first six months that the Wyatts were on television, was that they were only paired to work with other factions so there simply weren’t many options. Along with that, and this becomes key toward the development of the group as a whole, none of the individual characters were spotlighted to establish them as anything beyond just members of the stable. Dexter Lumis has done well in the past with what he was given to do, his performances were solid even if some of the booking was cringe worthy. But, what has been done to establish him on an individual level with his role in the Wyatt Sicks? The same could be said for Joe Gacy, that’s not to say that he should be in the main event of Wrestlemania, but what does the WWE audience truly know about him? His NXT run was in front of a much smaller audience so what has he done on the main roster to explain his association with the group? We’ve discussed Nikki Cross, she’s always worked with whatever she was given to do, but what exactly led her to the Wyatt Sicks beyond that management needed enough wrestlers to represent the characters from the Firefly Fun House?
I wrote an article last year about Bo Dallas’ role in the company after the faction initially disappeared from television and mentioned that maybe he was being miscast? Bo Dallas is definitely a solid performer, but he’s not Bray Wyatt. That’s not meant as a jab against either of them, but rather to point out that what worked for Bray won’t automatically work for his brother just because the gimmick itself is a sincerely wonderful tribute. More specifically, while there’s no doubt that Bray was an incredible performer, it’s important to keep in mind that the majority of character work later in his WWE tenure didn’t get over. If that was just the way he was booked, and there’s an argument to be made that it was, or if the concepts were too out-of-the-box for professional wrestling is almost irrelevant in the grand scheme of things. The point being WWE brass doesn’t have a good track record of promoting or presenting the Wyatt gimmick in a successful manner. Remember, they used Bray as a glorified enhancement talent to get other competitors over to the point that he had to be repackaged as The Fiend. After Bray got the Fiend gimmick over, he was booked to be set on fire and looked like a burnt marshmallow more than a menacing monster.
The bottom line is, the WWE released Bray Wyatt in 2021 and he spent a year outside of the company to ultimately build anticipation for a very memorable return the following year at Extreme Rules so there was a point in time that management didn’t mind if he explored the free agent market. With the previously mentioned track record that the writing team has with the Wyatt gimmick, should there really be optimism to have five careers involved with it?
There were rumors that Alexa Bliss could be involved with the group, but her momentum declined when she had a hiatus from WWE programming not long after her surprise return at the Royal Rumble earlier this year. All things considered, it seems like there are just too many red flags working against the odds of this stable to be successful on any long-term basis unless the office wants to keep them as an occasional wild card when needed, but again, there are five wrestlers that have already spent six months on the sidelines for the next move from the office.
Sure, there’s a chance that the WWE has a plan in place for the Wyatt Sicks going forward, but the fact that they didn’t have anything for the group to do for almost six months suggests that the return on Smackdown last week was more of a spur of the moment decision with a plan to get them back on WWE programming, but not what to do with them going forward. I’m still not sure that Bo Dallas is truly the guy that can successfully portray Uncle Howdy, and I’m not saying anyone else should either, but to point out again that a gimmick that worked for his brother doesn’t automatically work for him. The harsh reality is that with as unique as Bray Wyatt was as a performer and as unique of person as the real-life Windham Rotunda was, it’s possible that he was the only one that could truly portray the leader of the Wyatt group. While not nearly as successful because his life was tragically cut short so suddenly two years ago, given the nature of the character, Bray Wyatt had some comparisons to The Undertaker. It’s almost unfair to make the comparison because there will only ever be one Undertaker and it’s more or less unanimously agreed upon that nobody else could’ve done the character the way that Mark Calaway did to make it work to such a legendary degree, but maybe in a similar fashion Windham Rotunda is the only performer that could’ve portrayed a successful Wyatt character.
What do you think? Share your thoughts, opinions, feedback, and anything else that was raised on Twitter @PWMania and Facebook.com/PWMania.
Until next week
-Jim LaMotta
Email [email protected] | You can follow me on Instagram, Facebook, & Threads @jimlamotta89
