So, is the Daniel Bryan storyline...

[KaiserGlider]

Now that we know Bryan will likely win the title after he beats HHH, have your thoughts on the way WWE have handled this entire storyline changed?

[PorkChop]

100% them realising they'd fucked up and are making amends for it.

[Georgerv]

No, they were backed into a corner by their dumbass decisions from the past few months, and fans forced them to change their plans.

This is a victory for the fans over WWE, not the other way around

[DB3]

They change plans so much it obvious a save our ass situation. Honestly if Punk never leaves than it would be Punk-HHH and Bryan vs Orton vs Batista. The fans spoke the WWE reacted simple as that. Bryan is only fighting HHH because Punk left and so Bryan has to do double duty again. I love watching Bryan work, but damn if that dude does not retire at 35 after all the matches he has had.

[Everlong]

It's pretty clear that this is the WWE saving their asses. At least they're doing the right thing rather than steadfastly sticking by a main event that NOBODY wants to see. Could have been set up much better, but this was the best way to resolve the situation with this little time left.

[Racing Guy]

I think it's just to keep the fans from crapping all over the WWEWHC match.

[motionmann]

Whether it was planned or not, none of you would believe it if it was planned. If you've watched the WWE for the last 6 months you knew they were going to make the real payoff be at Mania. The classic baby face overcoming every single odd.

However, if D Bry beats HHH then loses in the main event, then I'm going to laugh my ass off. Hard. Not because I want him to lose(Because i believe he deserves to walk out champ), but because the explosion on the internet is going to be so damn entertaining.

[CMPUNKFAN]

Whether it was planned or not, none of you would believe it if it was planned. If you've watched the WWE for the last 6 months you knew they were going to make the real payoff be at Mania. The classic baby face overcoming every single odd.

However, if D Bry beats HHH then loses in the main event, then I'm going to laugh my ass off. Hard. Not because I want him to lose(Because i believe he deserves to walk out champ), but because the explosion on the internet is going to be so damn entertaining.

The funny thing is, that could actually happen and wouldn't surprise me at all.

[The Legend]

At the very worst it's a mix of the two and realistically it's much more of a genius slow burn. The WWE has made it clear for 9 months they were planning on a huge Daniel Bryan title run at some point. If they were ever going to just drop him down the card they would have done that already like they did with Ryback.

I find it ironic that when it's a face that people don't like they are like, it comes too easy to him it's best when a face has to overcome a mountain of adversity and have setbacks along the way. Bryan comes along and it's like, "Noooooo, he's our favorite, We want it NOOOOOOOOOOOOOWWWWWWWWWWWW!!!! WAH!"

Can I say that Bryan getting a title shot this way was their plan all along, not absolutely, but no one can say that it wasn't their plan all along either. What has to be said is the way the WWE has crafted this story has turned Bryan into a megastar that all of their fans are behind, that is a genius storyline because in this day and age the entire WWE Universe never agrees about a guy 100%

[Messiah]

It's hard to say considering it was going to be Punk, not Bryan, facing Triple H in first place and Batista was supposed to be face, not heel. So I think it is fair to say Bryan wasn't initially penciled in as being in the main event of WrestleMania.

[Daz]

I think it's somewhere in between honestly. I think it's pretty clear that Bryan overcoming Triple H and regaining the title was the eventual end game, but I don't think they wanted to do it at Mania. Punk leaving and the WWE fans pretty much demanding Bryan be in the Mania Main Event via the Batista backlash has pretty much forced their hand. In any event, you have to at least give them a small amount of credit for listening to the fans instead of digging in their heels and being stubborn. Maybe they can learn and change after all...

[Everlong]

If it was a slow burn, it was anything but genius. Rule #1 of any type of television show: don't intentionally piss off your fans. You can build heat, but they've pretty much spat in the face of the fans at every turn over the course of the last few months.

We've seen them purposefully bury guys that the fans love before, which is why it's much more likely that this is them waking the fuck up and covering their asses.

[AkydefGoldberg]

Yeah this is definitely them saving their asses after the fans didn't embrace Batista so over-whelmingly. If latter was getting the crowd support he had in 2005 when he turned face then no way they would have changed it because Orton is a decent heel and 'Tista and him would have made a decent main event but the fans pissed on Batista badly.

But it's late and not ideal but they've done the right thing although partially sad we won't see Batista/Orton and the crowd pissing on it but hopefully we'll see Bryan as the victor at the end for an awesome WM30 Yes Movement Moment.

[Ali]

If it was a slow burn, it was anything but genius. Rule #1 of any type of television show: don't intentionally piss off your fans. You can build heat, but they've pretty much spat in the face of the fans at every turn over the course of the last few months.

We've seen them purposefully bury guys that the fans love before, which is why it's much more likely that this is them waking the fuck up and covering their asses.

This.

It is incredibly hard to believe that this was some sort of grand master plan on WWE's part. There were two things that went spectacularly wrong for them. One, the fans COMPLETELY s*it on Batista's Rumble win. Really, if he didn't win that match, he'd be a face. It's that simple. Two, CM Punk walked out.

These two factors pretty much sealed it. WWE's in a corner. Daniel Bryan is about the only Main Event-Level person who is universally beloved at this point. You can't put John Cena in there, because fans will just s*it on him, too, even though he's used to it. You can't put Dolph Ziggler or Roman Reigns in there, because even though they're way over with the same fanbase Bryan is over with, there are some outliers and they don't have the build up.

Bryan is their only chance to salvage this cock-up. Maybe they had a plan for Bryan moving forward, maybe 2014 WAS going to be the Year of the Goat, just not at Mania, maybe they were going to do great things with Bryan anyway. But this is WrestleMania. This is supposed to be the flagship of your INDUSTRY, let alone your company. And every single thing that WWE was planning has backfired unbelievably. You can't have 100,000 people completely sabotaging what is supposed to be your biggest show ever, and you bet your ass that's what was gonna happen to Orton-Batista. So they've been forced to move their plans for Daniel Bryan up, all because everything went wrong for them.

[Hanley!]

At the very worst it's a mix of the two and realistically it's much more of a genius slow burn. The WWE has made it clear for 9 months they were planning on a huge Daniel Bryan title run at some point. If they were ever going to just drop him down the card they would have done that already like they did with Ryback.

I find it ironic that when it's a face that people don't like they are like, it comes too easy to him it's best when a face has to overcome a mountain of adversity and have setbacks along the way. Bryan comes along and it's like, "Noooooo, he's our favorite, We want it NOOOOOOOOOOOOOWWWWWWWWWWWW!!!! WAH!"

Can I say that Bryan getting a title shot this way was their plan all along, not absolutely, but no one can say that it wasn't their plan all along either. What has to be said is the way the WWE has crafted this story has turned Bryan into a megastar that all of their fans are behind, that is a genius storyline because in this day and age the entire WWE Universe never agrees about a guy 100%

Obviously it's them saving their asses. Pretty much every step of the way, they've sign-posted that Bryan wasn't going to be in the main event at Wrestlemania. He's taken a route to the main event that basically nobody before him ever has.

Your "We want it NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOWWWWWWWWWWWWW!!! WAH!" comment is completely untrue by the way. You've been on the forum since Summerslam so you know that this wasn't anyone's reaction. Immediately people started fantasy booking Bryan's climb towards the championship at Wrestlemania. There were so many ways to stretch it out - there was Triple H, Kane & the Shield to deal with and they could have even brought in others if need be. It would have been easy to save his championship match for Wrestlemania.

And that's what everyone wanted - not for Bryan to win it straight away, but for him to have to work for it the old fashioned way and win it at the show where it would mean the most.

So by your logic, we got what we wanted in the end, right? Sure. But that's obviously not what they had planned. As I said, nobody in Wrestlemania history enjoyed the kind of year that Bryan has right before headlining the show. Consider the following:

1) Bryan was in a drawn out feud with Randy Orton for the championship a few months ago. If they wanted Bryan to win the title at Wrestlemania, why would they have wasted this match back then? That was the definition of a feud that was designed to kill time leading up to the Rumble and build up Orton/the Authority.

2) The Wyatt feud was really badly done. Bryan turned heel, turned back 2 weeks later and then they had a match at the Royal Rumble. The face lost clean and it hasn't come up since. When does this ever happen in WWE? Again it looks like the heel turn was something they were half serious about but decided against it. No way does it look like a feud that was booked well in advance. It was too sloppy.

3) Speaking of the Wyatt feud, not only was Bryan not in the Rumble match, he lost clean in the opening match of the Royal Rumble and didn't appear later in the show. Has that ever happened to a wrestler 2 months before a Wrestlemania main event?

4) As others have mentioned, the Batista stuff clearly was not supposed to turn out this way and Punk was never supposed to leave. The landscape has changed dramatically as of late, and not in a direction that WWE wanted or expected. Batista was supposed to be the babyface at Wrestlemania - that much is clear from how they booked him upon his return. That doesn't tie in particularly well with the narrative of Bryan finally winning the big one.

But the thing that makes it most obvious that this wasn't planned is that none of this was really working in their favour until last night. Fans were openly crapping on their wrestlers and their product - that wasn't what they wanted the casual fans tuning in for Wrestlemania season to see. Fans were booing babyfaces, which wasn't good for their long term booking plans. The Royal Rumble got serious amounts of bad press. I saw comments about how bad it was on videos and articles from sites that had nothing to do with wrestling.

And what did they get out of jerking Bryan and the fans around in the end? Fans are now happy to see Bryan in the Wrestlemania main event ... which is what they were already hoping for a year ago. So really they've gained nothing.

The idea that WWE planned any of this ahead of time is a really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really hard sell.

[Tom]

At the very worst it's a mix of the two and realistically it's much more of a genius slow burn. The WWE has made it clear for 9 months they were planning on a huge Daniel Bryan title run at some point. If they were ever going to just drop him down the card they would have done that already like they did with Ryback.

I find it ironic that when it's a face that people don't like they are like, it comes too easy to him it's best when a face has to overcome a mountain of adversity and have setbacks along the way. Bryan comes along and it's like, "Noooooo, he's our favorite, We want it NOOOOOOOOOOOOOWWWWWWWWWWWW!!!! WAH!"

Can I say that Bryan getting a title shot this way was their plan all along, not absolutely, but no one can say that it wasn't their plan all along either. What has to be said is the way the WWE has crafted this story has turned Bryan into a megastar that all of their fans are behind, that is a genius storyline because in this day and age the entire WWE Universe never agrees about a guy 100%

Obviously it's them saving their asses. Pretty much every step of the way, they've sign-posted that Bryan wasn't going to be in the main event at Wrestlemania. He's taken a route to the main event that basically nobody before him ever has.

Your "We want it NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOWWWWWWWWWWWWW!!! WAH!" comment is completely untrue by the way. You've been on the forum since Summerslam so you know that this wasn't anyone's reaction. Immediately people started fantasy booking Bryan's climb towards the championship at Wrestlemania. There were so many ways to stretch it out - there was Triple H, Kane & the Shield to deal with and they could have even brought in others if need be. It would have been easy to save his championship match for Wrestlemania.

And that's what everyone wanted - not for Bryan to win it straight away, but for him to have to work for it the old fashioned way and win it at the show where it would mean the most.

So by your logic, we got what we wanted in the end, right? Sure. But that's obviously not what they had planned. As I said, nobody in Wrestlemania history enjoyed the kind of year that Bryan has right before headlining the show. Consider the following:

1) Bryan was in a drawn out feud with Randy Orton for the championship a few months ago. If they wanted Bryan to win the title at Wrestlemania, why would they have wasted this match back then? That was the definition of a feud that was designed to kill time leading up to the Rumble and build up Orton/the Authority.

2) The Wyatt feud was really badly done. Bryan turned heel, turned back 2 weeks later and then they had a match at the Royal Rumble. The face lost clean and it hasn't come up since. When does this ever happen in WWE? Again it looks like the heel turn was something they were half serious about but decided against it. No way does it look like a feud that was booked well in advance. It was too sloppy.

3) Speaking of the Wyatt feud, not only was Bryan not in the Rumble match, he lost clean in the opening match of the Royal Rumble and didn't appear later in the show. Has that ever happened to a wrestler 2 months before a Wrestlemania main event?

4) As others have mentioned, the Batista stuff clearly was not supposed to turn out this way and Punk was never supposed to leave. The landscape has changed dramatically as of late, and not in a direction that WWE wanted or expected. Batista was supposed to be the babyface at Wrestlemania - that much is clear from how they booked him upon his return. That doesn't tie in particularly well with the narrative of Bryan finally winning the big one.

But the thing that makes it most obvious that this wasn't planned is that none of this was really working in their favour until last night. Fans were openly crapping on their wrestlers and their product - that wasn't what they wanted the casual fans tuning in for Wrestlemania season to see. Fans were booing babyfaces, which wasn't good for their long term booking plans. The Royal Rumble got serious amounts of bad press. I saw comments about how bad it was on videos and articles from sites that had nothing to do with wrestling.

And what did they get out of jerking Bryan and the fans around in the end? Fans are now happy to see Bryan in the Wrestlemania main event ... which is what they were already hoping for a year ago. So really they've gained nothing.

The idea that WWE planned any of this ahead of time is a really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really hard sell.

Great post! To add to Hanley's point about articles being posted online by news websites and such, the BBC even reported on Daniel Bryan failing to be included in the Royal Rumble. I have never heard of the BBC ever reporting anything in relation to a professional wresting storyline.

WWE, without a doubt, made the right choice in doing this last night. Although it was the obvious route to take, it does something that they should have done from the beginning and give the fans exactly what they want. It certainly makes me look forward to Mania a whole lot more!

[Messiah]

2) The Wyatt feud was really badly done. Bryan turned heel, turned back 2 weeks later and then they had a match at the Royal Rumble. The face lost clean and it hasn't come up since. When does this ever happen in WWE? Again it looks like the heel turn was something they were half serious about but decided against it. No way does it look like a feud that was booked well in advance. It was too sloppy.

I agree with everything else you said and I cannot comment on the entire feud because I wasn't watching the WWE much but they definitely weren't actually legitimately seeking to turn Bryan heel. It was clear the night it happened it wasn't going to last long and even more clear the week after in the tag team match they lost. Bryan was always going to return to being face.

Otherwise, everything else you said was spot on.