WWE SmackDown: Analyzing Daniel Bryan’s Surprising Heel Turn

In news that will shock the world of wrestling, Daniel Bryan has defeated AJ Styles to become the WWE Champion tonight on WWE SmackDown Live.

While it’s never out of question that Daniel Bryan could take the title as a legitimate main-eventer, the means of his victory tonight were shocking. In the closing moments of tonight’s WWE SmackDown Live main event, AJ Styles went for his springboard flying forearm on Bryan, but Bryan ducked, and AJ crashed into the referee.

As AJ turned around, Bryan kicked Styles low, hit his running knee, and pinned the champion to dethrone him and hold the WWE World Championship. After he’d won, Bryan went on to unceremoniously attack Styles some more.

This heel turn for Bryan is not entirely unexpected, as Bryan’s behavior on SmackDown has been increasingly erratic since his feud with The Miz began. The turn, in and of itself, makes a lot of sense.

Bryan has been languishing since returning from forced retirement. We never got to see Bryan rise to the top as a conquering babyface like we hoped he would. Every chance at a major title, Bryan found himself on the losing end. The last time he faced off against AJ Styles, he lost clean right in the middle of the ring.

Bryan, it seems, has had enough. He didn’t work so hard to return from retirement and a career ending injury just to play second fiddle to Styles. Daniel Bryan came back to be the man.

He wanted the WWE Championship, and he decided to do whatever it took to win it. After the match, Bryan acted in a way that was reminiscent of his heel character in ROH where he would yell to referee during a rope break that he “had until five!” Bryan stomped AJ’s face repeatedly in brutal fashion, revealing a side to him we haven’t seen since those ROH days.

This was a very well executed heel turn. The angle itself was fantastic; Bryan winning the title was a wonderful surprise. The fact that we get to see Daniel Bryan vs. Brock Lesnar (admittedly a few years too late, but better late than never) is something that we can definitely look forward to.

However, I can’t say that I’m not somewhat perplexed by it. While the turn itself made sense logically (something that we can rarely say with WWE these days), I am not sure if this was the right time or place.

I am concerned that WWE has taken the best babyface they have had in over ten years and turned him heel just to get heat. WWE, as of late, has been obsessed with getting heat on heels to the point that it seems the heels are the only ones allowed to get any wins on the roster. When you look at the current list of WWE champions, how many of them are babyfaces?

WWE Universal – Brock Lesnar – Heel
WWE Intercontinental – Seth Rollins – Babyface
WWE Raw Women’s Champion – Ronda Rousey – Babyface
WWE Raw Tag Team Champions – Author’s of Pain – Heel
WWE Cruiserweight Champion – Buddy Murphy – Heel

WWE Champion – Daniel Bryan – Heel
WWE United States Champion – Shinsuke Nakamura – Heel
WWE SmackDown Women’s Champion – Becky Lynch – Heel
WWE SmackDown Tag Team Champions – The Bar – Heel

Seven out of the nine champions are heel. If you include NXT, 10 out of 13 are heels. If the NXT UK brand is included, 12 out of 16 are heels, and one is vacant. There seems to be a heavy emphasis on getting heat on heels at the moment. While the angle to have Bryan defeat AJ was excellent, I am not sure that turning him heel was the right choice.

With that being said, this shakes things up dramatically heading into Survivor Series, making the show that much more intriguing. We can, and probably will, still get Brock Lesnar vs. AJ Styles II, but for now we get to have the dream match that fans were clamoring for a few years ago between Daniel Bryan and Brock Lesnar.

This was an excellent angle that closed a pretty good episode of SmackDown. Combine this with the glimpse we got of babyface Becky Lynch, who hugged Charlotte after announcing Charlotte as her replacement, and I cannot complain about the show being dull. It featured two very memorable angles, and the main event match between AJ and Bryan was excellent. All-in-all, it was a great show.

Where they go from here shall be very interesting, but we shall see on Sunday night what happens next. This might have been the creative boost that WWE needed heading into Survivor Series as the build to the show has been rather bland.

I, for one, am far more invested now. I must applaud WWE for creating a very interesting angle and for putting the title back on Daniel Bryan. While this was likely a last minute decision, time shall tell if it was the right one.