WWE's New Day Stable Will Be Limited as Trio of Babyfaces
By Alfred Konuwa , Featured Columnist Dec 2, 2014
During a Tag Team Turmoil match on Raw, The New Day, featuring Kofi Kingston and Big E, was the second team eliminated despite making its Raw debut.
"The New Day is yesterday," announcer John Bradshaw Layfield remarked.
Despite weeks of buildup, with aforementioned members Kingston, Big E and apparent leader Xavier Woods testifying before a gospel that a new day has arrived, the team was booked no better or worse than it was before being repackaged.
Even in its first week, JBL has every right to imply that The New Day has already come and gone. Because if the concept of this stable is three happy-go-lucky babyfaces mixing and matching one-liners better suited for Zig Ziglar, this gimmick will quickly fall on deaf ears.
The wrestling world needs another fist-pumping good guy like it needs another hour of Raw. WWE seemed to be very self-aware of how cliche this concept had become with the arrival of Bo Dallas.
Dallas was a heel because of his intentionally over-the-top babyface antics. Through Dallas, not only was WWE admitting this type of character was no longer effective as a good guy, but the company was using that very fact to make him a villain.
With the three members of The New Day making their debuts as babyfaces in such proximity with the Dallas character, the trio is set up for failure. Audiences have already been conditioned to resent these archetypes to the point where WWE is now in on the joke.
What's the ceiling for three enthusiastic WWE Superstars looking to spread positivity? Is there truly room for character development through such a basic premise?
The origins of this stable date back to Woods scolding Kingston and Big E in a promo that served as a thinly veiled commentary about race.
"We do not ask any longer. Now, we take," Woods demanded of his frustrated peers. The tone of the sudden angle instantly branded the wrestlers as heels. They were angry, despondent and only interested in advancing by force. Through that incarnation there was depth, even pathos, and a story to be told.
But the unbranded stable quickly disappeared from WWE programming for months before resurfacing under a much less militant guise. Gone were the uncomfortable undertones of three salty WWE Superstars with an agenda. Now, their message is much less complicated. In the span of three vignettes, each member of The New Day went from sympathetic figure to sermon deliverer.
In the Reality Era, the most effective characters use sympathy to either garner support or antagonize an audience.
Daniel Bryan's exclusion from the main event picture begot the Yes Movement, where fans rallied behind him all the way to an improbable WWE World Heavyweight Championship win. Upon returning to WWE, The Miz admitted that despite becoming entrenched in Hollywood, he was on a mission to seize the respect and admiration that he never received after headlining WrestleMania.
If The New Day is simply going to wash away past grievances with a feel-good gimmick, where's the hook?
Why should anybody care? And with jaded fans unimpressed by babyfaces with little to offer past an inspirational quote, can The New Day really last in the present day?
That's when it went sideways. Instead of using Cena to build up a new, red hot heel, they protected Cena again and it hurt Wyatts' momentum.
