The choice to stage WrestleMania 32 at AT&T Stadium marked an ambitious moment for WWE. Though the company wasn’t exactly on fire, the company brand and the brand of their flagship PLE was significant enough that drawing a live crowd of 100,000-plus didn’t seem entirely unrealistic.
With such a large stage, top stars like Roman Reigns and Seth Rollins coming into their own as singles stars and icons like The Rock, Brock Lesnar, and Triple H in the mix, there was the potential for something magical to happen.
While WWE did draw arguably their largest single night attendance number (there’s some debate, but the consensus is WrestleMania 32 packed over 80,000 fans in the stadium), the show itself did not go down as one of the more successful iterations of the Showcase of the Immortals for a variety of reasons.
Roman Reigns Hadn’t Yet Clicked As The Top Guy
Roman Reigns challenging Triple H for the WWE Championship closed out WrestleMania 32. On paper, this match checks a lot of boxes with one of the biggest legends in the company squaring off against the top rising star with the world title on the line and months of storytelling behind them.
In practice, the Reigns vs. Helmsley angle never heated up. Reigns kayfabe injuring Triple H in late 2015 was strange creative that had the babyface acting pretty heelishly. From there, Triple H’s “surprise” return to win the 2016 Royal Rumble and, in so doing take the title off Reigns, was incredibly predictable. To his credit, The Game got in incredible shape and put on excellent matches with Dean Ambrose and Dolph Ziggler on the Road to WrestleMania. Unfortunately, those stellar outings only underscored how blah his showdown with Reigns wound up being.
In the end, Reigns simply wouldn’t get over at a high level with a wide swathe of the WWE audience until his heel turn in 2020. WrestleMania 32 highlighted all his limitations from his promos leading up to the event, to his ring work during it, to his lukewarm connection with the fans.
Seth Rollins Was Injured
Seth Rollins was second only to Roman Reigns as the most heavily pushed rising stars in WWE in 2016. The prevailing wisdom was that he’d square off with Triple H at WrestleMania 32 if he’d been healthy—delivering a version of their WrestleMania 33 angle a year early. Some others have theorized Rollins vs. Reigns or a Shield Triple Threat may have been in the offing.
Regardless of how things would’ve played out with a healthy Rollins in the mix, there’s little question in-ring ability alone, combined with fans more readily buying into him than Reigns had the potential to singlehandedly elevate a WrestleMania that suffered from a lack of standout matches.
Brock Lesnar Didn’t Gel With Dean Ambrose
Brock Lesnar is a one of a kind professional wrestler whose combination of real-life credibility, in-ring style, and steady protection in being booked as a monster made him a draw and someone who all but guaranteed a memorable match in his every WrestleMania appearance.
The Beast and Dean Ambrose did not gel, though. From Ambrose’s own account, he had ambitious ideas, but Lesnar wasn’t interested in venturing out of his more traditional format for a match. So, whether Ambrose got too nutty with his ideas for a Street Fight or Lesnar was unmotivated, the one undeniable truth is that these two performers did not gel and the resulting match underwhelmed at every turn.
Shane McMahon’s Comeback Signaled What Was To Come
One of the most buzzworthy stories going into WrestleMania 32 was the return of Shane McMahon after going missing from the WWE landscape for nearly a decade. The choice to immediately plug him into a Hell in a Cell Match with The Undertaker certainly made for an attraction as well.
Unfortunately, the performances of both Shane-O-Mac and The Dead Man proved emblematic of where they were in their careers and where they were headed. For McMahon’s part, he’d not only lost a step but unveiled a style that came across as less the dare devil he’d been in his youth than desperate to deliver a contrived spot.
The idea of The Undertaker throwing the boss’s son off the top of Hell in a Cell was very much on the mind of fans given each man’s history. In practice, the tedious match peaked at Shane-O-Mac foolishly climbing to the top of the Cell to go for a nonsensical elbow drop, only to predictably miss. In kayfabe, McMahon came across as an idiot for the attempt; in reality, it seemed clear he was starving for attention with an eye-catching spot, even if it made no sense in the context of the match. Meanwhile, the cracks also showed for The Undertaker, who no longer had what it took to singlehandedly carry a match like this.
The Rock’s Involvement Was Underwhelming
WrestleManias 27 through 29 marked a trilogy of sorts with The Rock’s return to WWE and impact on the main event, followed by consecutive years of him main eventing the show himself against John Cena. From there, WrestleMania 30 saw him cut a sweetly nostalgic opening promo with fellow icons Hulk Hogan and Steve Austin, before he delivered an electric moment at WrestleMania 31, teaming up with Ronda Rousey to clear the ring of Triple H and Stephanie McMahon.
So, even though The Rock didn’t have anything official on the docket for WrestleMania 32, there was reason for optimism he might do something cool if he showed up at AT&T Stadium. The People’s Champion did arrive, complete with an over-the-top flame thrower entrance that underwhelmed fans, followed by a generic promo.
Business looked like it would pick up when The Wyatt Family showed up to confront The Great One, but things quickly devolved into an impromptu, seconds-long squash match with The Rock pinning Erick Rowan, followed by a brawl. While the segment wasn’t the worst part of WrestleMania 32, it did signal babyface, part-time Rock had run his course.
Other Potential Big Draws Underwhelmed
There are other reasons why WrestleMania 32 had a lot of potential on paper but failed to deliver. John Cena made a surprise appearance which was perfectly fine—helping The Rock against The Wyatts—but paled in comparison to his previous WrestleMania roles. Shaquille O’Neal was a surprise entrant in the Andre the Giant Memorial Battle Royal and had a confrontation with The Big Show, but between the booking and execution, what might have been a huge celebrity appearance fell flat and became utterly forgettable.
Zack Ryder’s last-minute addition and victory in the Intercontinental Championship Ladder Match arguably stole the show, but also left fans scratching their heads because Ryder had not been in the title mix up to that point (not to mention that he promptly dropped the belt without fanfare). A League of Nations versus New Day showdown ultimately felt as though it was just there to set up a paint-by-numbers legends segment with Steve Austin, Shawn Michaels, and Mick Foley beating up the current talents. All of this added up to a WrestleMania that felt thrown together, carelessly booked, and far short of its potential.
In the end, the biggest silver lining to a severely disappointing WrestleMania may well be that it offered the emergent women’s division an opportunity to shine. Charlotte Flair vs. Becky Lynch vs. Sasha Banks emerged as a pretty clear cut match of the night—the first time the women of WWE could make such a claim in WrestleMania history. This match paved the road for women to work featured matches every year to follow, including garnering their first main event spot at WrestleMania 35.
