The Rock reflects on his recent run in WWE as The Final Boss.
The return of The Rock and his heel turn came as a great surprise for the WWE Universe. The Final Boss character has played a key role in selling out every arena WWE has visited in the past two and a half months.
Recently, during the Post-Show Press Conference of WrestleMania 40 Night One, The Rock opened up about his return to WWE and what the initial plans were for him.
“One of the many benefits of this world of professional wrestling, I believe, is you have the opportunity to not only hear the fans but more importantly than hearing the fans is listening to the fans,” he said. “Because, to me, there is a distinct difference between hearing and listening.
“And then the other part, perhaps the most important part, is then take action. So, with the pivot that you talk about, it was an opportunity in front of us. So when I came back, the goal was to come back, and it was going to be The Rock and Roman Reigns. That was the idea.
“This was back in… I think I made an appearance on SmackDown when we were in Colorado, third quarter of last year. And the idea was to start setting the table of a Rock and Roman WrestleMania main event, WrestleMania 40.
“So as we continued to stand everything up on its feet. We realized that we had an opportunity to listen to the fans. One or two things could have happened. We could have either trucked to it. Which there were a few opinions in the room.”
The Rock wanted to give the fans what they wanted
The Great One also shared the significance of not only hearing the fans but listening to them as well.
“Of course, we have titled them the Cody Crybabies, which is fun banding, but the truth is they matter. The fans matter. And their voice matters,” The Rock said. “And we had this opportunity to really listen to them. Again, so one or two things could have happened. We could have either trucked to it or listened. And in this case, it became crystal clear to me after Birmingham, Alabama, where we had that moment in the ring.
“If you guys may remember, we came in, Cody, in essence, passed the opportunity on to me. Roman and I had that face-off. And it was just a few days after that, I was in Hawaii, and I remember waking up and going, ‘I think I have what this pivot should be. And that is not only listen to the fans, let’s give them what they want. What they’ve invested in, for the past couple of years now.’ Which is this idea of Cody Rhodes completing his story.”
Turning heel was the exciting factor for The Rock
The People’s Champion revealed that he wanted to inject his TKO Board of Directors position into the storyline as well.
“But then the B side to that, the exciting part for me, number one, was to deliver something for the fans, but also now let’s make a change, and let’s go Rock 10.0. And what that looks like, and what Final Boss looks like,” The Rock continued. “And let’s take the agreement, the deal of the appointment of the board as a Director. The ownership of the name The Rock, and all that goes along with it.
“Let’s utilize that and leverage that in a real way and that real influence of power and inject it into the storyline as The Final Boss. So, bottom line is, I couldn’t be happier with not only the pivot but more importantly everybody buying in to that. Because it’s a big shift, and you gotta buy in to it. And everybody did, and here we are.”
READ MORE: The Rock Acquires Over 96,000 Shares Of TKO Stock
Would you like to see the Final Boss character return?
If you use any of these quotes, please credit the WrestleMania Press Conference with a link to this article for the transcription.
