Thursday, October 12, 2017

How The Shield Should "End" This Time

They don't have to break up again. They never have to break up again.
Photo Credit: WWE.com
Roman Reigns, Seth Rollins, and Dean Ambrose have finally gotten back together after a little more than three years doing their own thing. The Shield's official reunion shook the Bankers Life Fieldhouse to its core, and it set the stage for war with The Miz, The Bar HOSS International, and Braun Strowman. While most people are agog over the reconstruction of perhaps the most important group in WWE in this decade, it's becoming increasingly clear that it is a momentary diversion, something for Reigns at least to do while he waits for the lead-up to his final showdown with Brock Lesnar at WrestleMania. Rumors seem to corroborate that this reunion is temporary, and that the principals will go back to doing their own things before Royal Rumble season.

Of course, the peanut gallery will salivate over this to be opportunity to turn Reigns heel, as if the entirety of time between the first breakup and now wasn't an emphatic statement from WWE that Reigns is the wrestler it wants him to be regardless of certain people's perception of alignment. Because this is WWE, and because as Willow pointed out a couple of hours ago,Vince McMahon is a fundamentally broken human being, someone's going to have to turn on the group to cause it to implode. I'm sure you'll be able to wager real currency on who that person might be (hint, it'll be Ambrose), but what if I said that even if they go their separate ways that the group shouldn't break up in traditional fashion?

Wrestling storytelling has so much in common with comic books in that both theoretically present good vs. evil in struggles that never end thanks to the demand cycles and frequency of publication/show production. In comics, heroes (and villains) team up all the time. The Avengers, the Justice League, the Teen Titans, and the Defenders are just some examples of aggregate hero teams that have lasted for several decades. Sure, they've all had lineup changes, but the threads are mostly the same; these teams come together to stop existential threats to the planet and then return to their solo titles when those threats are neutralized. The Avengers don't dissolve when, say, Iron Man turns against his team to join the Sinister Six or whatever. They have narratives for when they're together as well as on their own.

Why can't wrestling stables work that way? Well, they actually have in the past, outside of WWE, but at the same time, wrestling promotions aren't scattered about over several different outlets. Superman can have his own title released in the same month, maybe even week where he's appearing in a Justice League book. Character availability in the comics is limited by the amount of money producers have to pay writers and artists, and DC and Marvel have big goddamn budgets and a ton of titles. Even the biggest wrestling companies have limitations of manpower and time in a given week.

However, all that means is the ebbs and flows of teams and their singles travails happen in real time. The Shield can join together in service of keeping one of its own from both getting beaten down by multiple people and its own legacy from being mocked. Then, afterwards, when the threat is neutralized, they can all go back to their own pursuits. For Reigns, it's chasing the Universal Championship. For Rollins and Ambrose, they can go back to defending the RAW Tag Team Championships. They remain in their own worlds until another threat arises, like the reformation of The Authority, or Carmelo Anthony, Russell Westbrook, and Paul George descending upon RAW challenging the best trio to a halfcourt three-on-three throwdown.

Because WWE is so predictable and runs such an antisocial modus operandi, viewers of RAW will probably be watching with dread to see which member off The Shield rends the group asunder this time. However, it doesn't have to be this way. The Shield doesn't have to end. It can be dormant and pick up only when needed without the need for any elaborate setup. The Shield can be WWE's Justice League if it'll allow it to be.