Wrestling is a lot like comics. It’s embarrassing, difficult to get into, way too costly for what it is, you wouldn’t want to meet its fans, and it features the full spectrum of human emotions condense to punching and screaming.
It also NEVER BLOODY ENDS, with storylines piling on top of backstories, Wikipedia-choking amounts of lore for every single character that stretches back years and years.
Sometimes the backstories for these characters make sense, they start out, face some challenges that grow and change them in understandable ways, but also sometimes, oh god damn that storyline didn’t work huh, bloody hell, retcon it and move on.
Wresbsters Wrestling Dictionary defines a retcon as retroactive continuity, i.e. remember that thing that happened a certain way? Shut up no you don’t it never happened that way you can’t remember it right because you’re a baby, baby want a bottle, baby doesn’t deserve a bottle, cos baby made a poo poo.
To be clear, this isn’t about when a wrestler changes gimmick, this is about the times in wrestling where we all remember a very important thing about a character, but that thing is ignored because whoops.
I’m Adam, hailing from partsFUNknown and here are the 10 Biggest Retcons In Wrestling History.
10. Rikishi: Attempted Murderer
Ri-Quiches Lorraine is a Hall of Famer and that’s fantastic.
Before he settled on the gimmick of ‘have butt will travel’, Solofa Fatu Jr. had a bunch of gimmicks that didn’t quite work out, he was a headshrinker, make a difference Fatu who kept it real for the kids, and of course, the Sultan, oh no the sultan.
Since he became Rikishi he hasn’t looked back, and neither have we, because we’ve all collectively agreed to ignore the fact that, in official WWE lore, Rikishi is a straight-up, legit attempted murderer.
He was a happy guy who danced, then he ran down Stone Cold Steve Austin at top speed, and tried to do so several more times, then everyone thought that was weird, and then he went away for a bit, then came back as a happy guy who danced and everyone was like, yay Rikishi no problems here.
Look at that butt, Yolo, and when he was inducted into the hall of fame, his video package just kinda left the whole hit and run thing out.
9. Dominik Guerrero
Dominik Mysterio, or Dominik Guerrero – the real ones know – has a pretty huge future ahead of him.
I mean, when you’re mixing it up with Brock Lesnar, and your first official match is against Seth Freakin’ Rollins at Summer Freakin Slam, it’s fair to say WWE has high hopes for him, and if he were alive today his biological father Eddie Guerrero would be very proud.
The year was 2005, and in one of the great so-bad-it’s-good storylines WWE ever did, Eddie had a secret, and that secret was, he was actually the biological Papi to Rey’s son Dominik, pictured here during one of his rare televised appearances being shorter than Rey Mysterio.
The master of the 619 admitted, yes Dominik is Eddie’s biological son, but he was his proper father and so the two men settled it the only way the American legal system recognizes, with a custody briefcase ladder match at SummerSlam.
Wonderful bollocks, that WWE has chosen to retcon out of existence, with Dominik now retconned to being once again Rey’s biological and gigantic son.
8. That Time Vince Died
Yeah, I mean, this should be number one but I don’t want to end the list on it, and so I’m not going to.
It’s the most abrupt, zero pretense, handbrake on, immediate halt to a storyline in WWE history for a very good reason. It’s mentioned a lot but just in case this is your first rodeo, in June 2007, WWE began what was supposed to be their biggest storyline in years.
Vince stepped into a limousine, the limousine blew up and WWE announced he was presumed dead, Steph appeared on raw and acted like Vince was dead, there was going to be a funeral, Vince’s brother Rod was going to be a big onscreen character, it would run all the way to ‘Mania.
Of course, WWE scrapped the entire thing when they discovered the real-life deaths of Chris Benoit and his family. Two weeks after blowing up, Vince appeared onscreen to introduce the Benoit memorial episode of Raw, then again on ECW when the full details emerged.
Two months later Vince came back to Raw (Aug. 6) said he blew himself up to see if people cared about him, then the company echoed the image of Vince getting into limo before Coach served him with paternity papers for an illegitimate child. SIGH. Onto lighter things.
7. That Time Paul Bearer Died
Wrestling. The 2004 Great American Bash is low-key one of the worst pay-per-views WWE ever made. Here are some of the matches.
Luther Reigns vs. Charlie Haas, Kenzo Suzuki vs. Billy Gunn, Mordecai vs. Hardcore Holly, Eddie Guerrero losing the WWE Championship on a technicality and the main event, Taker vs. The Dudleys with the stipulation that if the deadman won, his longtime, I want to say, employer friend, uncle in law? Would be murdered by being drowned in cement.
Thanks, I hate it. Batman Currethers ended up winning the match and, I guess to prove that Paul wouldn’t hold him back, chose to pull the lever and drown in cement. Thanks, I hate it.
Because a televised murder is a bit, y’know, weird, on the next episode of SmackDown, WWE made Michael Cole do a serious face and say ‘err… he suffered severe injuries to the lungs’ so we might not see him again, which is, yeah, another term for drowning, but was WWE hastily retconning bearer’s status to alive, because yeah it’s… murder… SIGH.
6. The Giant Son
No not Dominick Mysterio, we’re actually briefly leaving WWE and talking about good ol’ WCW and well, it’s The Big Show.
Before he turned up in the WWE in early 99, Big Show had been a mainstay of WCW for a good few years, known as The Giant. He was called the Giant because his gimmick was that he was the son of Andre The Giant.
He had long hair, wore the same style of singlet as his “dad”, when he appeared Bobby Heenan would say things like ‘i remember those boots, I remember those trunks’ he did things like rip off Hulk Hogan’s crucifix necklace (ripping off when Andre did it before ‘Mania III) and attack him in amazingly cornball Dungeon of Doom segments, screaming things like ‘I’m the son of a giant’.
WE GET IT GEEZ. For context, Andre had only been dead for two years at this point so yeah… nngghhh, not great.
WCW kept him as the giant, kept him in Andre’s singlet, had hogan bodyslam him at Halloween Havoc 1995 but slowly phased out mentions of Andre, because you know, ick, but according to interviews, Paul Wight still to this day has people telling him how much they loved his dad. Mrrrrrrrr.
5. Edge Comma Christian
And speaking of family connections just sort of going away, anyone remember when Edge and Christian were brothers?
You should, it was the entire point of their 2001 feud, Edge and Christian were brothers and Grandma Edna preferred Edge. And who wouldn’t, TNA fans that’s who.
In 2009, after Christian returned from being the instant classic over in Dixie Carter’s promotion, suddenly he and Edge were no longer siblings but childhood friends, ‘as close as most brothers’ they would say.
On the April 30 episode of SmackDown 2010, on Edge’s last episode on SmackDown thanks to the Draft, Edge and Christian laid out their history saying to the fans with Christian saying “you remember the history of Edge and Christian ‘we sure do” said the fans, “we met in the 6th grade” “sorry, what” said the fans because I think we remember your history more than you.
What about Grandma Edna Christian, you can’t just ERASE Grandma Edna, this is why she preferred Edge!
4. Triple H and Steph Are Married And Divorced And Married
Ah, Triple H and Stephanie, a tale as old as time, a song as old as wine. Boy meets girl, boy hates girls, boy interrupts girl’s wedding to show footage of him actually already marrying girl while she was passed out…
…boy fights girl’s dad, girl betrays dad, girl and boy are happy for a bit, then girl suspects boy doesn’t love her anymore so lies about a pregnancy, boy finds out and wrecks their vow renewal ceremony, boy divorces girl years later…
…boy and girl actually get married in real life, it becomes an unacknowledged secret for years until another boy, a snake boy, attacks girls father, then the girl and then boy comes out to defend his sort of secret wife’s honor…
…but also everyone knew they were married but they never officially talk about and then they become this famous married couple in the industry even though in official WWE canon they’re still divorced or something I honestly don’t know. Beauty and the beast.
3. Kofi Kingston Is No Longer Jamaican Me Crazy
Fun fact, Kingston is the capital city of Jamaica. That’s why Kofi Kingston was called Kofi Kingston, like if a British person appeared he’d be Larry London, or if he was French he’d be Pierre Paris, because WWE is a baby show for babies.
Okay actually to be fair to WWE for once, Kofi Kingston was the name that Kofi used on the indie circuit before joining WWE, like the whole Jamaican angle was his idea, to differentiate himself from guys like the Ghanian Prince Nana in Ring of Honor, so yes, fair enough there.
Does still make it super weird though when WWE heavily pushed him as Jamaican in backstage promos for like, a year before suddenly dropping it.
On September 21, 2009, he was billed as Jamaican, his next appearance on Raw two weeks later, he’s billed as being from Ghana, no accent, no Jamaican themed headband, but he still kept his Jamaican theme (in fairness it rules) and crucially the name Kofi Kingston.
Weird that, suddenly Larry london was from Paris now with nary another mention of when he was an actual Jamaican outside of a famous promo a few weeks later, which saw Triple H bring it up like a cheeky boy.
He asked him, hey… aren’t you supposed to be Jamaican, and god how I wished Kofi had responded, hey… aren’t you supposed to be French?
2. Kane’s Big Normal Face
Oh man, this one’s some bulllllls**t. Ever since his big red debut at Bad Blood in 1997, Kane’s disfigurement has been a bit, shall we say, all over the f**king place.
First of all he couldn’t talk, then he talk with the existence of a voice box, then he could talk because [checks notes] X-pac taught him how with the power of friendship and sucking it, then his full body scarring was revealed to not be full body when he started wearing his sexy see-through singlet.
But despite all of this there was always one thing that was true, one constant, and that was Kane had a hideous burned face under that mask. There was a fire, set by The Undertaker lest we forget, and then left Kane with a permanent facial disfigurement, this is 100% true, and was until June 23, 2003, when he unmasked on Raw to reveal… nothing.
Sort of black smudges, like he was a Victorian f**king chimneysweep, and frasier crane hair. ‘Is that a human’ shouted JR, ‘yes JR yes it is’.
I mean what were they gonna do, have Glenn Jacobs wrestled in prosthetics forever? So his facial disfigurement was retconned as air quotes ‘mental scarring’ and Kane was allowed to go through life with a normal face. Good for him.
1. Hornswoggle, In Every Fucking Respect
Audible sigh. Over the years, Hornswoggle really has been a mythical creature, in that he’s whatever you need him to be in the moment, and his backstories are as inconsistent as snowflake patterns.
Throughout his career, Hornswoggle has been the following things, mute until he wasn’t, Vince McMahon’s son until he wasn’t, Finlay’s son until he wasn’t, an actual leprechaun until he wasn’t, anonymous Raw GM until he wasn’t, living under the ring until he wasn’t, a member of DX until he wasn’t, a little cow until he wasn’t, he is all things to all men, he who can be in all places at once, he is the shortening of the way, the one true kwisatz haderach.
Hope you all have seen Dune, because i’m not explaining those references.
Until his release in 2016, Hornswoggle spent his WWE life as the ultimate human prop, who technically had one single unbroken continuity in WWE, one unedited backstory, but one that was constantly rewritten depending on when Vince thought it would be funny to have a little person onscreen…wrestling!
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