Line #35 YMMV/BrayWyatt


1	* AlternativeCharacterInterpretation: Was Bray Wyatt an actual malevolent entity who possessed Husky Harris' body, or was he just Husky Harris, who, after being punted by Randy Orton, went mental and started seeing things?
2	* AndYouThoughtItWouldFail:
3	** Many detractors were puzzled at the whole idea of Bray's new gimmick being a friendly kid's show host until it was later revealed that it was a platform for Bray's new dark side called "The Fiend". Nowadays, it's nearly impossible to find people who dislike the gimmick.
4	** Likewise his "Firefly Funhouse" match at ''Wrestling/WrestleMania 36'' had people wondering how the hell that would work. Many people were amazed at it was a cinematic that made a lot of references to Wrestling/JohnCena's life all while Wyatt psychologically ''broke'' the Cenation leader.
5	* SugarWiki/AwesomeMusic:
6	** His [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LUuaqKuMmrY entrance theme for "The Fiend" persona]], care of the band Music/CodeOrange. Basically, it was a DeathMetal take on Mark Crozer and The Rels' "Live in Fear", and it properly hammered down that the new Bray was ''way'' more terrifying than before.
7	** After his 2022 return, he used a new, original song by Music/CodeOrange called "[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l89VxkNRGEw Shatter]]" that even those who missed his old theme(s) agreed was amazing.
8	** And while a TearJerker in every way you can imagine, {{Music/Needtobreathe}} gave Bray the most fitting sendoff one could get, with "[[https://youtu.be/KG4YSjKGzmw?si=tsqXGpIZR69v1-8s Everknown]]".
9	* BadassDecay:
10	** Suffering this after several underwhelming ends to feuds with Wrestling/JohnCena and Wrestling/ChrisJericho. While Bray is still considered one of the better in-ring talkers, his promos have started to lose credibility due to him having little impact on his opponents (particularly John Cena) and having no clear goal or focus. It's gotten to the point where WWE attempted a retool on the entire Wyatt family, having Harper and Rowan "break free," and Wyatt to enter into singles competition and putting him into a feud with [[Wrestling/JonMoxley Dean Ambrose]].
11	** Seemed to be getting a bit of his mojo back, looking very dangerous in his feud with Wrestling/RomanReigns and reconstituting the Family along the way... but then started trying to mess with Wrestling/TheUndertaker and Wrestling/{{Kane}}. [[BeCarefulWhatYouWishFor At the same time.]] Being the shortest one of his stable doesn't help when he is going against the Brothers of Destruction. Harper can take a concentrated beating from Kane and Undertaker. Bray? Not so much.
12	** ''Wrestling/EliminationChamber 2017'' may have finally cured the decay with him winning the WWE Championship in the titular match, concluding by pinning both Wrestling/JohnCena and Wrestling/AJStyles cleanly, then following that up two nights later by ArcWelding his creative difficulties over the years into Sister Abigail's prophecy to his character and then beating both Cena and Styles again in a triple threat rematch by pinning Cena — again clean, and this time after being attacked by Wrestling/LukeHarper before the match!
13	** Then, typically, undone again when his feud with Wrestling/RandyOrton, which had been thought to be resolved, started up again when Orton turned on him and beat him at ''Wrestling/WrestleMania 33,'' ending his championship reign after only a month and making it jarringly obvious that the whole point of the feud ''and'' Bray's title win was just to put Orton over again for his 13th World Championship on the Grandest Stage Of Them All. Oh, and this means Bray loses at ''[=WrestleMania=]'' yet ''again!''[[note]]He's now 0-4 after he was beaten by Wrestling/JohnCena at ''XXX'', Wrestling/TheUndertaker at ''31'', and the entire Wyatt Family was collectively humiliated by [[Wrestling/DwayneJohnson The Rock]] and Cena again at ''32''[[/note]] And considering he'd supposedly absorbed the power of Sister Abigail (after Randy had burned down the Wyatt compound) to become more powerful than ever, the fact that he then ''lost'' means the Bray Wyatt character has pretty much no credibility left now. Even worse, it made Bray Wyatt,who was previously a great example of a MagnificentBastard, look like a gullible fool. "The [[ChronicBackstabbingDisorder guy who betrays everyone]] betrayed me! How could this happen?!" Bray is one of the tragic few cases of someone who's come out of a run with the World Championship ''worse'' off than he was before he won it!
14	** His late 2017/early 2018 feud with [[Wrestling/MattHardy Woken Matt Hardy]] largely involved Hardy upstaging Wyatt in the war of mind games, and concluded with Wyatt being defeated in an "Ultimate Deletion" match and dumped into the Lake of Reincarnation at the Hardy Compound. Given the lake's name and [[Wrestling/ImpactWrestling previous feats]], fans who think the Bray Wyatt charaxcter has been irretrievably damaged by the years worth of BadassDecay have speculated that this will be used to repackage Windham Rotunda in a new gimmick, or at least to "reboot" Bray Wyatt after all his defeats are given time to be forgotten. He came back at [=WrestleMania=] as a face to aid Woken Matt Hardy in winning the Andre the Giant Memorial Battle Royal, the premise being that the Lake somehow freed him of Sister Abigail's influence, with Bray becoming Hardy's tag team partner in the process and later winning the Raw Tag Team Championship.
15	** His 2019 repackaging initially appeared to successfully reverse this trend, with Bray's debut match as the Fiend eliciting massive pops from the audience and widespread acclaim on social media, although with the caveat of leaving his fans even more desperate for WWE to not screw up his character again … And they promptly ''did'' screw up his character again, first with the ''Wrestling/HellInACell 2019'' debacle and then the loss to Wrestling/{{Goldberg}}, starting what could be seen as the path towards the end of Bray's WWE career with his absolute ''burial'' at the hands of the same man who'd derailed his last run, Wrestling/RandyOrton. After Orton defeated The Fiend at ''TLC'' 2020 in a Firefly Inferno match, burning him to a crisp, he feuded with The Fiend's PerkyFemaleMinion Wrestling/AlexaBliss until The Fiend returned from the dead at ''Fastlane'', helping Alexa win an intergender match against Orton, a farce where Orton was unable to lay a hand on Alexa as she used "magic" to make him vomit black goo and cause lighting rigs to fall from the ceiling on him, and Orton and The Fiend were scheduled for a rematch at ''[=WrestleMania 37=]'' in a... normal, no-stipulation singles wrestling match. Five minutes into the match, Alexa turned on The Fiend by distracting him, setting him up for Orton to beat with a single RKO (a move The Fiend had completely [[NoSell no-sold]] the last time they'd fought), before revealing on the follow-up episode of RAW that she's turned on The Fiend because... she was [[EvilerThanThou more evil than him]] and didn't need him any more (and that she had a new "friend", a rag doll named Lilly). Orton went on his merry way victorious, completely unbothered by the entire affair, Alexa began antagonizing the RAW women's division with magic shenanigans, and Bray returned to the Firefly Funhouse for one last episode to announce he was looking forward to "a fresh start" before completely disappearing from WWE screens altogether, with it initially emerging that he was dealing with unspecified health issues, and needed time off.[[note]]While it was initially reported that said health issues were mental health issues due in part of the death of his good friend, Brodie Lee, those rumors turned out to be completely false.[[/note]] However, it later turned out that creative had nothing for him, and he was released at the end of July 2021 (after reports that he was planning to return that August). The ''[=WrestleMania=]'' loss stung more, thanks in part to reports that Bray had previously been set to ''win'' the feud against the man who had literally tried to ''kill him'' before plans were torn up and changed to a pointless Orton victory at the last second. It also emerged that WWE had never had any endgame in mind for the Bray/Orton feud and had basically been [[WritingByTheSeatOfYourPants winging it]] the whole time. When even Wrestling/VinceRusso is calling you out for inexcusably mismanaging your talent (and you can't find any real grounds to disagree with him), you know you've screwed up.
16	* BrokenBase:
17	** It got broken just several hours after ''Wrestling/WrestleMania XXX,'' where Wrestling/JohnCena won his match with Bray Wyatt (Wyatt's first [=WrestleMania=]). Some people claim that Wyatt was buried by losing to Cena; other people are saying that the Cena victory was the start of an eventually Wyatt-dominated feud. Still, others are saying Wyatt was elevated by the match itself due to the amazing display of storytelling involved with credit for this varying from half-Wyatt/half-Cena to being all down to Wyatt himself.
18	** The base got broken in a whole new way after the debut of the Fiend gimmick, between those who adore the Fiend for it's depth, attention to detail, creativity, performance and feel that Bray Wyatt is perfectly capable of a decent match when he's allowed to do his own thing and not be bogged down by terrible creative decisions like the 2019 ''Wrestling/HellInACell'' match, and those who see the Fiend as an overrated, overly goofy and pretentious gimmick tied to wrestler who they see as incapable of having a good match (unless carried by a [[Wrestling/BryanDanielson Daniel Bryan]]). Perhaps as a symbol of this, ''Wrestling/TheWrestlingObserverNewsletter'' named The Fiend the Best Gimmick of 2019, only to name it the Worst Gimmick one year later in 2020.
19	* CreepyAwesome:
20	** The only other CreepyAwesome trio in the WWE that could match him and the family would be The Brood.
21	** The Fiend is a sinister MonsterClown with glowing gold eyes and a metal remix of "Broken Out in Love" who absolutely ''mauled'' [[Wrestling/FergalDevitt Finn Balor]] in his debut match with the audience on his side. His trademark lantern was replaced by a ''model of Bray's head''.
22	* DesignatedHero: The Fiend was this when he was treated as a face, despite having essentially brainwashed Wrestling/AlexaBliss into being his follower and generally behaving like a horror movie villain. Sure, he was mostly going up against Wrestling/RandyOrton, who's a sadistic psychopath in his own right, but it came off as an EvilVsEvil situation at best.
23	* DracoInLeatherPants: Much like [[ComicBook/TheJoker the character who inspired his gimmick]], Wyatt became universally beloved by fans as soon as he unveiled the Fiend and practically became a WWE icon overnight, which led to him becoming lopsidedly favored by audiences even during matches against unambiguous heroes. This role-defying popularity is so strong, in fact, that Wyatt was almost singlehandedly responsible for the death of Wrestling/SethRollins' audience approval following the latter's referee-stoppage victory against him at ''Wrestling/HellInACell 2019'', remaining popular himself after the universally-hated match while Seth was left with XPacHeat of the kind not seen since Wrestling/RomanReigns.
24	* EnsembleDarkhorse: Wyatt and his gimmick were likely not meant to be anything significant, but his captivating promos and unsettling character caught the attention of [[SmartMark older male fans]] in a manner not unlike Wrestling/{{The Shield}}, resulting in a surge of popularity and a continued push. He not only was called up to the main roster much earlier than most expected, but also got cheered while feuding with [[Wrestling/BryanDanielson DANIEL BRYAN]]. And upon his return in 2019 he became one again, with his segments getting millions of views; more than any other in RAW during the time they came out. Heck, he's even cheered like a {{Face}} when he took out Rollins for the Universal Title at ''Crown Jewel''.
25	* FanNickname:
26	** Wyatt's BadassDecay during his "Eater of Worlds" gimmick, bringing him down to near-{{jobber}} status, resulted in him attracting the derogatory nickname of "the Eater of Pins".
27	** When he returned with his "Firefly Fun House" gimmick, fans called the show "[[Series/MisterRogersNeighborhood Mr. Wyatt's Neighborhood]]" or "WebVideo/DontHugMeImScared: WWE Edition".
28	* FountainOfMemes: Just like BROKEN Wrestling/MattHardy, the Firefly Fun House made Bray a meme machine.
29	* GrowingTheBeard: [[{{Pun}} So to speak....]] Wyatt definitely came a long way from being "that fat dude from the Nexus."
30	* HarsherInHindsight:
31	** Wrestling/MickFoley was once quoted several years ago as calling Bray a darker, meaner, more athletic version of himself by way of a compliment. In 2019 Bray would return after a long absence, and down Foley with a more brutal version of Foley's own Mandible Claw. The Fiend proceeded to employ it as a finisher, but much, ''much'' more brutally than perhaps even early-era Mankind ever did. Wrestling/SethRollins even spit up blood once after having The Fiend's version put on him. ''Yikes.''
32	** At the height of The Fiend's first Universal Championship run, wrestling news site The Sportster ran [[https://www.thesportster.com/wrestling/bray-wyatt-dream-matches-never-happen/ an article]] listing 10 potential dream matches for The Fiend that would almost certainly never be able to happen. In most of the cases (Wrestling/HulkHogan, Wrestling/RicFlair, Wrestling/{{Sting}}), it was because the opponent in question was long retired and in no shape to perform- but the #1 spot was occupied by Wrestling/{{Goldberg}}, on the basis of [[WhoWouldBeStupidEnough it just being a really, really bad idea]]. Well, we all know how ''that'' turned out: Goldberg {{squash\|Match}}ed The Fiend in a very poor match at ''Super [=ShowDown=]'' 2020 in Saudi Arabia, and yes, it ''was'' a catastrophically bad idea. Even worse, the article was published three weeks before the event, and ''actually namedrops said event as a possible place for the match''.
33	--->''Goldberg is still an active wrestler, who performs occasionally in WWE. As a matter of fact, the former Universal Champion could take part in Super [=ShowDown=], which is set to take place in UsefulNotes/SaudiArabia. It is feasible for Goldberg and The Fiend to collide, but [[TemptingFate WWE is unlikely to let this match happen, as it might affect the credibly of either of the two Superstars]].''
34	** Look at almost ''every'' major moment on Bray's [[Awesome/BrayWyatt Awesome page]]- his getting over with Wrestling/TheWyattFamily, his WWE Championship win at ''Wrestling/EliminationChamber 2017,'' (''especially'' the bit about him supposedly having Wrestling/RandyOrton cowed and under his control), his creation of the Fiend character and his Universal Championship win. ''Every one'' of those moments was completely undermined by WWE's almost ''maliciously'' awful booking of him when it came time to deliver in big matches, something which suggests that they've never ''really'' had faith in him at any point. Wrestling/TheWyattFamily was buried by constant defeats, Randy Orton would backstab Bray, make him look like a fool, and take the WWE Championship off him at ''[=WrestleMania=] 33'', the Fiend would be appallingly misbooked by being hotshotted into the Universal Title picture (leading to the [[Website/WrestleCrap Gooker-winning]] ''Wrestling/HellInACell 2019'' match) and Wrestling/{{Goldberg}} would squash him in a very poor match at ''Super [=ShowDown=]'' in Saudi Arabia for the Universal Title. The entire character of the goofy Firefly Funhouse Bray and The Fiend has been effectively taken from him so they could give it to Wrestling/AlexaBliss instead. Even the one masterpiece his fans believed he would be able to have as his legacy forever, the Firefly Funhouse match where he defeated and completely deconstructed Wrestling/JohnCena in a way that nobody ever had before, was effectively rendered null when Cena returned to WWE in 2021 to feud with Wrestling/RomanReigns without even the most token acknowledgment of what he'd gone through in his last appearance due to Bray's release taking place in the interim, effectively rendering the match CanonDiscontinuity. Nearly every single thing Bray has ever worked hard to accomplish, WWE has stripped away from him with the gleeful recklessness of a bratty kid kicking over a sandcastle.
35	** The Raw after ''Wrestling/WrestleMania 37'' has Bray declaring that he was looking forward to a fresh start. This wound up as becoming his final appearance before his absence and release 3 months later... [[spoiler:Until his return at Extreme Rules 2022...]]
36	** At the RAW is XXX show, Wrestling/TheUndertaker gives a PassingTheTorch moment to Bray, establishing him as the new WrestlingMonster in the WWE. Bray would never get that chance to truly show himself as a true monster as he passed away seven months after his final match against Wrestling/LAKnight. Moreover, LA Knight's promo was about Bray living on "past glory", which is now all that's left of him, plus how he constantly rambles on "but never gets to the point", and now that incarnation of Bray's character is the last to enter permanent limbo and [=Vince McMahon=] isn't the one that sent him there...
37	** One of the lyrics for "Broken Out In Love/Live In Fear" goes "He won't see the sun again for years to come"...how about he'll ''never'' see the sun again...
38	* SugarWiki/HeReallyCanAct:
39	** From his work as Husky Harris or Axel Mulligan, you would '''NEVER''' be able to guess that Wyatt had that amount of mic skills and character-performing ability in him. Go back and watch Husky Harris, and then watch Bray Wyatt. They're not even the same goddamn person.
40	** His "Firefly Fun House" videos had people amazed at how Bray could balance the kind-hearted Mr. Rogers with the creepiness associated with Wyatt, capable of being happy and cheerful to serious at the drop of a hat.
41	*** The "Firefly Funhouse Match" against Wrestling/JohnCena in ''Wrestling/WrestleMania 36'' has him unleash a BreakThemByTalking routine on Cena, shaking fans to their core with all of the points he makes in a way that is utterly visceral. And the March 13, 2020 promo (taped in an empty arena due to the UsefulNotes/COVID19Pandemic) has him sound utterly chilling, like he's some sort of insane maniac one could find in real life.
42	* HilariousInHindsight: Bray's gimmick-- a backwoods cult leader from the bayou with a flair for Southern Baptist Preacher themed rhetoric and implied supernatural overtones-- is very similar to themes present in Creator/{{HBO}}'s smash hit ''Series/TrueDetective'' that debuted a few months after Bray was turned loose on the WWE.
43	* HoYay: He had quite a bit of this during his feud with[[Wrestling/JonMoxley Dean Ambrose]]. During one backstage segment, after he ambushed Ambrose and hit him with the Sister Abigail, he actually [[http://33.media.tumblr.com/b8903f64856b63162bfc34492aae8450/tumblr_nf1tyv18Cm1sub5hso2_250.gif starts petting Ambrose's head, in a rather intimate manner]].
44	* IKnewIt: Let’s just say no one was too surprised when Bray turned out to be the White Rabbit.
45	* MemeticMutation:
46	** After his return for the "Firefly Fun House" promos in May 2019, many fans joked about Bray having been spending way too much time in the [[Wrestling/MattHardy Lake of Reincarnation]] or that it's ''WebVideo/DontHugMeImScared'': WWE Edition. Since the segment regularly gets more views than anything else on RAW going by Youtube's stats and viewer reactions, there's also a ton of jokes about Bray getting injured due to having to carry the entirety of the program.
47	** His mental deconstruction of Wrestling/JohnCena at the Firefly Funhouse Match in ''Wrestling/WrestleMania 36'' has been compared to the Scarecrow segments in ''VideoGame/BatmanArkhamAsylum'' where The Scarecrow psychologically taunts Batman himself through fear toxin-induced hallucinations.
48	* MoralEventHorizon:
49	** Trying to beat down Wrestling/JerryLawler ''solely'' because he's a supporter of Wrestling/JohnCena. Lawler had done nothing wrong, and Bray attacked him ''purely'' to hurt Cena. ''Then'' having Harper and Rowan ''hold Cena's eyes open'' so he's ForcedToWatch. Cena even more or less calls it this InUniverse.
50	** Ambushing Wrestling/TheUndertaker, alongside the other three members of his family, after Taker's defeat against Wrestling/BrockLesnar at ''Wrestling/HellInACell''. The next day's RAW revealed he captured Undertaker to steal the power of his soul. When Wrestling/{{Kane}} demanded the whereabouts of his older brother, they did the same to him, dragging him backstage [[NoBodyLeftBehind with no sign of]] [[NothingIsScarier either brothers' body]] the following week. It should be noted that even ''[[Wrestling/JohnBradshawLayfield JBL]]'' [[EvenEvilHasStandards was audibly appalled and disgusted by these actions]].
51	* {{Narm}}:
52	** Frightening as Bray and his domination of Wrestling/TheUndertaker and Wrestling/{{Kane}} could be, the promo in which he claimed to have sucked their souls and demonstrated it by summoning their lightning and fire all over the ring can be seen as too over-the-top. It switches Wyatt from a subtle [[MaybeMagicMaybeMundane Maybe Magic, Maybe Mad]] cult leader to something straight out from [[Wrestling/FightingOperaHUSTLE HUSTLE]].
53	** Bray's first feud with Wrestling/RandyOrton, in which Orton pretended to be Bray's follower before turning on him, was rifle with this:
54	*** Bray once ambushed Randy backstage with a horde of sheep-masked acolytes, who restrained Randy in front of Bray. This was creepy and impressive in the finest traditions of the Wrestling/MinistryOfDarkness. What was ''not'' fine was when Bray stepped forward and started brandishing what looked like ''a black-painted ping-pong paddle with a couple of red popsicle sticks stuck to it in the shape of an X'' and waved it around Randy for some kind of weird mumbo-jumbo ritual. Even worse, the next week Randy had somehow gotten hold of the prop and taken it back to the ruins of the Wyatt compound where Sister Abigail was supposedly buried, where he proceeded to jam it into the ground to symbolically "impale" her.
55	*** The subsequent match between Bray and Randy at ''[=WrestleMania=] 33'' did nothing to dispel the narm that had settled over the whole feud, as Bray displayed his new "powers" by causing maggots and centipedes to appear in the ring through the incredible mystic arts of [=PowerPoint=] projections. It looked incredibly dopey.
56	*** As if WWE was trying to constantly outdo themselves with ever more ridiculous Narm, the two then had a "House of Horrors Match" at ''Payback 2017'' which was almost immediately considered by many to be the worst (and ''dumbest'') match of the year, before the year was even half over. Website/WrestleCrap actually [[http://www.wrestlecrap.com/inductions/induction-houseofhorrors/ preemptively awarded it the Gooker award for 2017]] on the basis that they couldn't even ''imagine'' things getting dumber from here.[[note]]For what it's worth, it was ultimately unseated by Wrestling/JinderMahal's run as WWE Champion (who incidentally interfered in the match).[[/note]]
57	* NeverLiveItDown:
58	** The infamous "House of Horrors Match" he had with Orton.
59	** His Wrestling/HellInACell match against Wrestling/SethRollins at ''Hell in a Cell 2019'' and his match against Wrestling/{{Goldberg}} at ''Super [=ShowDown=] 2020'' are most remembered as the one-two punch that symbolized WWE ruining the credibility of "The Fiend" character; the former going to a no contest despite the match's stipulation stating that it can only end via pinfall or submission, and in the latter Wyatt losing to Goldberg in a SquashMatch.
60	* OlderThanTheyThink: Wyatt being a [[MalevolentMaskedMen masked character]] as The Fiend got a try beforehand in FCW (NXT's predecessor) as Windham Rotunda briefly experimented a gimmick known as "Axel Mulligan" - which was basically Husky wearing a hockey mask reminiscent of Jason Voorhees, with a handful of Bray Wyatt's in-ring mannerisms. Suffice it to say, the 2019 version is several magnitudes better developed and scarier, but some of the seeds of his current and previous gimmick were there all the way back in 2011...
61	* RootingForTheEmpire:
62	** Toward the end of his NXT run, Bray Wyatt was triggering '''deafening''' pops just by showing up. This has mostly carried over to his time on the main roster as well. To put this in perspective, the sheer awesomeness of the gimmick earned cheers even when the Family was going up against '''[[Wrestling/BryanDanielson DANIEL BRYAN.]]'''
63	** Only increased further by his feud with Wrestling/JohnCena. Cena's antics, and the general perception of their feud by many being that Wyatt's performance is the only thing standing in the way of Cena burying yet another shining young career, has now resulted in the fans eerily singing, clapping, and chanting in favor of Bray Wyatt and ''using the beat of Cena's own theme song for a "John Cena Sucks" song ala Wrestling/KurtAngle's original "You Suck" theme meme''.
64	** In his debut at ''Wrestling/SummerSlam'' 2019, the entire audience was on his side chanting "Yowie Wowie" and "Let Him In".
65	** His match against Wrestling/SethRollins at ''Wrestling/HellInACell'' 2019 had the audience firmly by his side with the fans ''noisily furious'' when it ended in a "no contest" with the belt still on Seth. And to prove that even the talent themselves would be cheering for Bray if they could, Wrestling/SeanWaltman called bullshit on the ''de facto'' disqualification finish on WWE's official watchalong, and Rollins himself later described being furious enough with that ending he wanted to ''strangle Vince [=McMahon=]'' over it.
66	* ShockingMoments:
67	** The Fiend's entrance at ''Wrestling/SummerSlam'' 2019 which had the entire audience on his side.
68	** The Firefly Funhouse match against Wrestling/JohnCena at ''Wrestling/WrestleMania 36.'' The fact that Wrestling/VinceMcMahon ''allowed'' Bray to expose and deconstruct one of the biggest stars he ever had so brutally and openly was enough to make jaws drop, along with the ending where The Fiend apparently ''wiped Cena from existence!''
69	** His return at ''Extreme Rules 2022,'' despite being fairly well-telegraphed by WWE beforehand, qualifies just for the ''staggering'' amount of love and grandeur put into it in spite of how acrimonious Bray's previous departure had been.
70	* SignatureScene: The Fiend's debut at ''Wrestling/SummerSlam'' 2019.
71	* SpiritualSuccessor:
72	** He became WWE's resident [[MaybeMagicMaybeMundane "paranormal wrestler"]] starting in TheNewTens after Wrestling/TheUndertaker and Wrestling/{{Kane}} became less and less active, culminating in TheNewTwenties with Taker's retirement and Kane being busy with his political career. Had Wyatt not passed away in 2023, it'd have been safe to assume he'd of officially become ''the'' resident supernatural wrestler of the company.
73	** Wrestling/MickFoley outright called Wyatt a Superior Successor to his Mankind gimmick. Wyatt even eventually took a page from Foley's book by showing he was also able to freely switch around his three most prominent personas. Coincidentally (and unfortunately due to Wyatt's untimely passing), Wyatt's career ended up with notable parallels to Foley's; both men ended as three-time WWE World Champions with their last World Title win happening at ''Wrestling/SummerSlam'' before shortly losing it to a long-haired [[Wrestling/TripleH dominant]] [[Wrestling/RomanReigns heel]] who was at the beginning stages of his tyranny. Both men had career-defining Wrestling/HellInACell matches. Both men are known for being in an OddFriendship TagTeam with a [[Wrestling/DwayneJohnson third]] [[Wrestling/RandyOrton generation]] megastar.
74	* UnexpectedCharacter: Suffice to say, absolutely ''nobody'' was expecting Bray to return in spring of 2019 as a children's show host character. He has a little of everything; [[Series/MisterRogersNeighborhood Mr. Rogers]], Steve from ''WesternAnimation/BluesClues'', even [[Series/PeeWeesPlayhouse Pee-wee Herman]]. And even though most fans rightly (this ''was'' Bray, after all) suspected that there was nothing but NightmareFuel incoming, '''not a single person''' imagined that Bray would eventually reveal his true gimmick to be a golden-eyed, slash-mouthed MonsterClown that looks very much like it could have been spawned by the Pentagon Dark era of Wrestling/LuchaUnderground.
75	* UnintentionallySympathetic: Seems to have fallen into this following ''Wrestling/HellInACell 2019''. For years Wyatt was saddled with inept booking and took loss after loss, until the shine was off him and he seemed to be another talented performer with all the potential in the world who had been failed by the WWE system.\
76	Then his shocking reboot into a DepravedKidsShowHost turned him into the biggest thing in wrestling overnight, he was put almost immediately into a title feud with Wrestling/SethRollins and looked like he was finally going to break out and become one of the company's top stars. Then his big match was ended by referee stoppage. In a Wrestling/HellInACell match. Because ''Seth'' was being too violent. Now some fans are actively feeling sorry for the psychotic, possibly demonic, creepy MonsterClown, because of how frequently and how badly the promotion he works for has dropped the ball with him.
77	* VillainDecay: His original "Eater of Worlds" gimmick suffered this after several underwhelming ends to feuds with [[Wrestling/BryanDanielson Daniel Bryan]], Wrestling/JohnCena, and Wrestling/ChrisJericho. While Bray was still considered one of the better in-ring talkers, his promos started to lose credibility due to him having little impact on his opponents (particularly John Cena) and having no clear goal or focus despite what it looked like since his beginning. It got to the point where WWE attempted a retool on the entire Wyatt family, having Luke and Rowan "break free," from Bray to enter into singles competition and putting Bray into a feud with [[Wrestling/JonMoxley Dean Ambrose]].

Context YMMV / BrayWyatt