5 Times They Delivered (& 5 Times They Were Big Disappointments)

In recent months, Retribution has run wild over WWE as a band of masked wrestlers, sabotaging shows, and attacking featured Superstars mid-match. There has been a great deal of speculation about which wrestlers are working under the hoods and how this storyline will play out.

Will the Retribution storyline ultimately deliver — particularly when the audience does find out, once and for all, who the members of the faction are, and if they are who fans thought they should be? Fans will have to wait and see, but in the meantime, we can look back to other wrestling angles that involved mystery wrestlers, including cases when the reveals amazed fans, as well as those occasions when they fell flat.

10 Delivered: Hulk Hogan As The Third Man, WCW Bash At The Beach 1996

There may be no greater angle in wrestling history involving mystery wrestlers than the early stages of the New World Order in WCW. Intrigue mounted heading into Bash at the Beach, where Scott Hall and Kevin Nash would partner with a third man for a main event six-man tag team match.

While some pundits had predicted Hulk Hogan as the third man, it was far from a foregone conclusion. The moment of him dropping a leg on Randy Savage took a hot angle, and positively set it on fire.

9 Disappointed: Ric Flair As The Black Scorpion, WCW Starrcade 1990

1990 saw Sting get harassed by The Black Scorpion — a masked villain who intimidated by way of performing magic tricks. A few different performers played The Black Scorpion and accounts vary as to whom the masked man was ultimately supposed to be.

In the end, though, The Black Scorpion was masked to reveal Ric Flair. While Flair can’t be called a disappointment in terms of his wrestling abilities, he was all too familiar to WCW fans as a main eventer and as one of Sting's rivals. So, rather than getting a new star or a fresh import to the promotion, it really felt as though WCW was spinning its wheels when The Nature Boy appeared in this lukewarm payoff.

8 Delivered: Bayley As Sasha Banks’s Partner, WWE Battleground 2016

After losing the numbers game to Charlotte Flair and Dana Brooke, Sasha Banks promised a mystery partner to face off against them at the Battleground PPV. Banks might have brought in a returning legend, or a main roster colleague recast as an ally to The Boss.

Bayley was far from a left-field choice for this mystery spot. She had a long history as both a friend and a rival to Banks. Moreover, she was overdue for her main roster call up. Despite the limited surprise, this moment felt just right to introduce Bayley proper to main roster fans and get her started with a big win on PPV.

7 Disappointed: Devon As The First Member Of Aces & Eights, TNA Bound For Glory 2012

At Bound For Glory, masked members of Aces & Eights defeated Sting and Bully Ray. After a post-match brawl, Hulk Hogan unmasked one of the Aces & Eights wrestlers to reveal Devon.

Despite the intrigue of Devon appearing opposite Bully Ray, he was nowhere near the main event level star, shocking defection from WWE, or buzzworthy indie talent fans would have hoped for. This first reveal set the stage for the wide variance of success members of Aces & Eights would ultimately achieve.

6 Delivered: Chris Jericho Arrives At The End Of The Countdown, WWE Monday Night Raw 1999

After a series of vignettes featuring a countdown, teasing a big arrival, Chris Jericho arrived in WWE in 1999. Jericho was a key example of a star who was better off in WWE than WCW at that point, as a young talent, respected by hardcore fans for the quality of his work in the ring and on the mic. Moreover, he was the kind of talent who had demonstrated great potential in WCW but never had an opportunity to shine.

WWE demonstrated out of the gate that Jericho would have a chance, when he made his first impression by interrupting a promo from The Rock. Indeed, this is a case where the mystery and the man served each other in equal measure. Y2J was a hot new star for WWE, but he also felt like a bigger deal for how he got introduced to his new audience.

5 Disappointed: The Butcher As The Masked Man, WCW Clash Of The Champions 28, 1994

Summer into fall 1994 saw a masked man antagonize Hulk Hogan and his allies. When the mystery wrestler finally got caught and had his mask removed, the big surprise was that he was the wrestler best known as Brutus Beefcake.

Newly rebranded as The Butcher, he was positioned as a top challenger to Hogan. If only for his longtime loyalty to Hogan, The Butcher's turn stood out more than the forgettable turns that happened in WCW. Still, no one in their right mind ever thought he’d pose a meaningful threat to Hogan in the ring given his career-long status as a mid-carder and limited in-ring skills.

4 Delivered: Bully Ray As The Leader Of Aces & Eights, TNA Lockdown 2013

The Aces & Eights storyline progressed with more and more members of the heel faction revealed as the months went on. Climactically, the group helped Bully Ray win the TNA Championship, only for it to become clear that he was not only in cahoots with them all along, but actually the President of Aces & Eights.

For as good as Bully's face work had been leading up to that moment, he has always seemed most at home playing the bad guy. He transitioned to that role brilliantly, delivering arguably the best all-around work of his career and emerging as one of the best TNA Champions of the 2010s.

3 Disappointed: Mr. McMahon As The High Power, WWE Monday Night Raw 1999

The Undertaker went on a tear with The Ministry of Darkness, one of the best factions of the Attitude Era, both warring with Steve Austin and terrorizing the McMahon family. When The Phenom alluded to a Higher Power guiding him, it promised either the arrival of a new star or major turn for someone in the company. It turned out to be Mr. McMahon who had been at the steering wheel the whole time.

To be fair, McMahon was one of the few wrestling power brokers it made any sense for The Undertaker to accept as his leader. That’s where the logic ends, though, as the master plan made no sense in retrospect, besides which McMahon being revealed as a powerful leader didn’t exactly break any new ground, instead merely pressing the reset button on him as the lead heel authority figure.

2 Delivered: Daniel Bryan As The Final Member Of Team WWE, WWE SummerSlam 2010

The Nexus was hot in the summer of 2010 as the band of fresh faces geared up for a seven-on-seven main event elimination tag team match at SummerSlam. WWE’s team was down a member, and though most signs pointed toward rising star, The Miz, taking the spot, it was unclear how things would play out.

Team captain John Cena revealed Daniel Bryan as their seventh man. Not only was Bryan about the best in-ring performer available, but the moment was all the more momentous for Bryan’s earlier involvement in the Nexus angle and real-life firing. With this return, WWE pulled off a major surprise and established a new fan-favorite via an early candidate for one of the most iconic moments of Bryan's career.

1 Disappointed: Barry Windham As The Mystery Challenger, WCW Slamboree 1994

Barry Windham is an all-time great whom fans tend to overlook nowadays. When Colonel Robert Parker promised a mystery challenger for face world champion Ric Flair at Slamboree 1994, WCW could have done a lot worse than plugging Windham into that role.

The problem was that WCW had teased the height and the blond hair of the challenger in ways that heavily implied Hulk Hogan. Relative to The Hulkster and other bigger, more shocking names, Windham felt like a letdown.

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