5 best heel acts of 2015 in WWE

Owens powerbombs Machine Gun KellyWorld Wrestling Entertainment (and the world) has drawn to a close another year, and looking back, the majority of the year belonged to heels. The only babyface champion we had was Roman Reigns, for the last couple of weeks.The only championship dominated by a face was the United States Championship, held by John Cena, but now that is in the hands of Alberto Del Rio. Seth Rollins won Superstar of the Year, and had one of the best pay-per-view records of the year, having lost only two of his eleven matches, one of them being by disqualification. The New Day has dominated the tag team division, and have held the Tag Team Championships for a considerable amount of time. Kevin Owens has made a huge impact on WWE already. I needn’t further explain the success of heels in the past year.Heels also have certain moments where they seem like the most hated (or even more loved) person on the planet. This article looks at the top five instances of this, in order, for 2015.

#5 Seth Rollins cashing in

A great moment

WrestleMania 31, what an event. Everything pieced together almost perfectly, and the ending perfectly captured that.

Roman Reigns and Brock Lesnar were having a brilliant match, which surprised many. It came to a point where both men simply couldn’t get up. Then what happens? The biggest heel in the company comes down and steals the win, and the WWE World Heavyweight Championship.

What makes this such a great ‘heel act’ is that we will never know who would have won that match, and that the man who was in the match for about thirty seconds was the one to walk out the victor.

However, more people rejoiced than felt hatred, so this moment isn’t quite as high as the other ones.

And the other ones are pretty good at being bad.

#4 Bray Wyatt pretends to be The Undertaker

Methodically evil

Leading into Fastlane, Bray Wyatt had a series of messages that were aired, at an anonymous figure. Speculation had it that it was for the Undertaker, as were the rumours at the time, and at Fastlane, Bray Wyatt confirmed it in the most devious way possible.

What would usually be taken up by a filler was instead a segment where The Undertaker’s music hit, and everyone in the audience thought they were in for a surprise. Indeed, the entrance was grand, complete with druids and The Undertaker seemingly being brought down to the ring in a coffin.

When the casket was opened, however, things took a turn. Instead of The Deadman, Bray Wyatt sat up, and laughed at the audience.

The scale and spectacle of this segment drew a lot of heat, and built up the WrestleMania match between the two men well. It also established Bray Wyatt as an even better heel than he already was.

#3 Kevin Owens powerbombs Machine Gun Kelly

Owens didn’t hold back

A lot of credit has to be given to Machine Gun Kelly for this, as a man who has taken a risk as great as this.

In June, Machine Gun Kelly guest starred on Raw, and performed in front of the live audience. After his performance, he was taking in the moment on the stage ramp, and then Kevin Owens came out from backstage, clapping sarcastically and seemingly laughing at the rapper.

MGK offered a handshake, but instead, got into a war of words from Owens. This prompted MGK to push Owens, and it went downhill from there.

Owens kicked him in the midsection, scooped him up, and powerbombed him off the stage. It doesn’t get much worse than that.

#2 The Wyatt Family assaults The Undertaker

This was considered utter disrespect

At Hell In A Cell, Brock Lesnar defeated The Undertaker in one of the most demanding matches that Taker has had in years. Considering this is a fifty-year-old man, that is a lot of work, and the fact that he lost, added a tonne of sympathy from the audience.

After Lesnar left the ring, The Undertaker rose to his feet to an applause, and standing ovation. While he was exiting the ring, the lights went out, and the eery shriek associated with the Wyatts buzzed. When they came back on, The Undertaker was surrounded by The Wyatt Family, who beat him to a pulp, and carried him out of the arena.

This was met with plenty of fan backlash, as many saw it as an act of disrespect towards The Undertaker, and quite a few said that he should have had a good moment to himself. I see this as a good heel moment, if it can generate real heat, so this worked.

It set up their Survivor Series match well, and made for some compelling storytelling. The last entry on this list, though, was a step ahead.

#1 Paige breaks the internet

Controversy at its finest

Leading into Survivor Series, the closing segment on the last Raw was a contract signing for the Divas’ Championship match between Charlotte and Paige.

This segment elevated this feud to a level it could never dream of getting to. It made Paige more than just a heel, it made her a monster.

Charlotte talked about how her family has wrestling in their blood, and pointed out her father and late brother.

Countering, Paige mocked her dad, and even made fun of his famous elbow drop (How could she?), but it didn’t end there. Charlotte said that she will continue to fight, just like all her family has, and Paige said, in the most heat-attracting way: “Your brother didn’t have much fight in him, did he?”.

Charlotte’s rage was metaphorical to what happened on the internet, where the majority of the wrestling community lost their minds. Twitter feeds, Facebook walls and YouTube comments were spammed with hate messages towards Paige and the WWE, and that is exactly what should have happened.

It solidied this one comment as the best thing a heel could have done, and in my opinion, cemented Paige as a character, and added an intense, personal depth to this story, which also had a show-stealing match at Survivor Series.