John Cena’s Heel Turn Is Being Hurt By WWE’s Refusal To Give Answers


For two decades, many wrestling fans have been begging for John Cena to turn heel. His babyface run quickly got repetitive and dull, and although we booed him, it was out of frustration with his character, not because we hated the man. Cena had the charisma and the mic skills to be a phenomenal bad guy. At Elimination Chamber it finally happened, with Cena turning on WWE Champion Cody Rhodes and aligning himself with The Rock. It took weeks for Cena to explain himself, but he finally did last week on Raw, blaming the treatment of the fans for his actions. He did the same thing again this week, and has not mentioned The Final Boss at all. The wish for John Cena to become a heel is here, but is this as deep as WWE is going to go?

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John Cena Blamed The Fans Bullying Him For His Heel Turn

The Rock Was Never Mentioned In Cena’s Promo

John Cena WWE RAW Promo In Belgium

  • It seemed to make perfect sense why John Cena would turn heel and align himself with The Rock.
  • Cena breaks Ric Flair’s world title record if he beats Cody Rhodes at WrestleMania 41.
  • All Cena did during his first Raw promo was complain about the fans.

When John Cena turned heel, it didn’t feel forced, as if this was some desperate move to give fans what they wanted as soon as possible before the GOAT retired. Instead, without a word being said, it made sense. The Rock had first come to Cody Rhodes, asking for his soul, promising that he could give him everything, but the American Nightmare turned him down because there’s nothing the Final Boss can give him. That’s not the same case for John Cena. He’s in his last year in wrestling, and until his Elimination Chamber win, he was on a losing streak. Now in his late 40s, he’s not the same wrestler he used to be. If he was desperate enough to become the champion one last time and break Ric Flair’s record, we could see how he would be driven to accept help from his former nemesis to make it happen.

Instead, what we got from Cena on the March 17 episode of Raw was something different. Cena blamed the fans for what he did to Cody. For two decades they had bullied him, booing him and calling him names, making so many bad “You can’t see me” jokes, and demanding he give them everything, only for it to never be enough. There was a lot of real-life truth to those words, but his time on the mic was also a bit of a letdown. That’s it? How many times have we seen a wrestler turn heel then blame the fans for it? And he never even mentioned The Rock. Still, it was a decent first promo, with plenty of time left to build the story.

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The Final Boss Was Still Not Brought Up

The Rock, Travis Scott, and John Cena at Elimination Chamber

  • John Cena brought up how his mocking of a child went viral.
  • Cena said he is going to ruin wrestling.
  • He vowed to win the WWE Championship, then retire and take it with him.

John Cena came out to start the March 24 Raw as well, and was again greeted by sustained boos and foul chants from the crowd. What would Cena say this time? As it turns out, he pretty much just gave a recap of what he said the week before, proclaiming how he was right about the fans, and how every expletive they shouted at him only proved his point. He even brought up how his mockery of a child last Monday going viral validated his reasons.

The only change this time was that Cena said he was going to win the WWE Championship, beat Ric Flair’s record, then retire and take the belt home with him. He vowed to ruin wrestling, but outside of those additions, Cena said nothing new. And yet again, The Final Boss was never mentioned even one time.

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John Cena’s Heel Turn Motivation Is Weak

Cody Rhodes Has Yet To Attack His Challenger

Cody Rhodes & John Cena WWE RAW March 2025

  • John Cena once wanted to be as bad as possible if he ever turned heel.
  • There needs to be more to Cena’s motivation than whining about the fans.
  • Will WWE step it up and have The Rock return once Raw returns to the U.S.?

John Cena said years ago that if he ever turned heel he wanted to go all in and be scorched earth, as vile as possible. That’s exactly what we got at Elimination Chamber, but on the last two Raws he’s just like any other whiny heel you’ve heard from a thousand times. After all this wait, is this the best WWE could think of? It doesn’t make sense why Cena, after two decades, would finally decide to turn on the fans when they were showering him with love. It feels weak and quickly put together, as if it was all decided at the last minute, which, according to a report from Fightful Select, it was. WWE first went to Cody Rhodes about turning heel and joining The Rock, but when he said no, they turned to John Cena, who accepted.

The main event for WrestleMania 41 is feeling surprisingly tame so far. Is WWE holding off on taking things up a notch because they are in the middle of this three-week European tour? Are they waiting to turn it up when they get back to the U.S. and hopefully The Rock appears? To make matters worse, Cody Rhodes has come out the last two weeks and given a simple retort about beating Cena, as if this was any old PLE coming up. Shouldn’t he be filled with rage about what Cena did to the point that he’d attack him the moment he saw him? Can you imagine “Stone Cold” Steve Austin simply coming to the ring after being beat up to do nothing more than pick up a microphone?

WWE has one of the biggest dream matches of all-time waiting for them at WrestleMania 41. The main event will have the most over red-white-and-blue babyface they’ve had since Hulk Hogan going against an icon turned heel. It needs to be about more than John Cena being a crybaby because fans used to be mean to him. It needs to be about his desperation in the face of diminished skills and the end of his career. At some point it needs to be about The Rock too. This is John Cena’s last run in WWE. At the end of 2025, fans can’t be left again going “What if” when it comes to him.



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