It is almost a year to the day that Vince McMahon stepped down after an internal investigation concerning serious sexual harassment allegations and other investigations into paying former employees a huge lump sum of money to keep quiet about affairs and other predatory behaviour. The disgraced former WWE CEO tweeted out, ‘At 77 time for me to retire. Thankyou, WWE Universe. Then. Now. Forever as the former boss man in charge announced his official retirement following all the controversy around him.

Outside of the personal life of Vince McMahon, the next step in the corporate world of WWE is to find the next boss man in charge. Enter ‘The Game’ Triple H, who took offer as Chief Content Officer, essentially the new head booker but just with a fancy title.  Triple H’s official run in this role began within the Summertime with Summerslam being his first PPV proper showcase to show off what he could do.  

HHH Takeover

We all know what magnificent job he did in charge of the WWE NXT product, bringing to live a more polished product winning over a cult like fan base with his monthly WWE NXT Takeover events Triple H studied the industry, and even wandered outside of the WWE sports entertainment bubble to find for assistance, working with the likes of Evolve Wrestling, WXW and PROGRESS Wrestling to his vison for the future of sports entertainment. Triple H’s WWE NXT was the canvas for such productions as Bayley vs Sasha Banks at WWE NXT Takeover, Brooklyn 2015, Samoa Joe vs Shinsuke Nakamura at WWE NXT Takeover, Toronto in 2016 and The DIY vs Revival, 2 out of three falls. For a good three-year period, NXT became WWE’s honorary third brand, but could Triple H bring his vision for professional wrestling to a larger audience and succeed…. Only time will tell.

Triple H bought some of his favourites from NXT to the grander stage including Johnny Gargano, GUNTHER, LA Knight and Rhea Ripley – with having differing degrees of success, GUNTHER would go onto break records with an incredible lengthy reign with the WWE Intercontental Championship; currently the third longest reigning WWE IC champion (at time of writing) besting the likes of Sheamus, Shinsuke Nakamura, Ricochet and Matt Riddle. GUNTHER had an absolute meat chopper of a match with Sheamus and Drew McIntyre. However, for every GUNTHER there is a LA Knight YEAH!

Adored by millions, imitated by millions more, LA Knight is currently one of the most over and beloved WWE superstars in more recent times, but Triple H is being accused of fumbling the bag when it comes to LA Knight.

Triple H and company have seemingly dropped the ball with LA Knight, failing to strike when the iron was hot on several occasions, most notably at WWE Money in the Bank and more recently with the United States championship picture. The fans were discombobulated and disgruntled when LA Knight failed to secure his spot for Summerslam match against current WWE United States champion Austin Theory, voicing their concerns and displeasure through the medium of social media.      

LA Knight is celebrated for getting himself over naturally and with little assistance from the backstage politicking, getting the green light from the WWE Universe live and in person, with his witty one-word zingers and charismatic energy. Its fair to say LA Knight has that riz. YEAH! Triple H states that ‘good things come to those that wait’, but Lord knows that WWE Universe have waited patiently enough.  Although it does seem WWE are still somewhat hot on LA Knight as a top draw, time is of the essence and fans are sadly losing hope with the game plan for LA Knight.

Return to the Game

During the Global Pandemic Vince McMahon would release many of the WWE roster with the likes of Matt Cardona, Windham Rotunda, Mickie James, Aleister Black, Keith Lee amongst a massive number of others citing budgets cuts as the reason for doing so during the turbulent time in the world’s history. Whilst some of the former WWE superstars – Malakai Black, Matt Menard, Dirty Dango, Ruby Soho and Jeff Hardy would find homes and varied degrees of success in other promotions such as AEW, IMPACT Wrestling and GCW, Triple H managed to get back into contact with a few of his former favourites down in WWE NXT.

Summerslam, 2022 saw the first major return as Dakota Kai and Iyo Skye finally got their first chance at the main roster, debuting as apart of Bayley’s stable Damage Control. Bayley returned from injury to play the part of Auntie Pam to Iyo and Dakota Kai. The first big surprise of the Triple H era was warmly received however the Damage Control saga has been victim to getting a bit stale and stagnant in places but as we reach full circle to Summerslam ’23 the tension between Iyo and Bayley is gripping fans back into the story Hunter is trying to tell. Alongside Damage Control, there has been a myriad of returns within the past year.

One google search you can see the memes of the Thanos fist attached Triple H’s hand wearing the likes of Johnny Gargano, Hit Row, The Good Brothers, Braun Strowman, Karrion Kross, and of course, Bray Wyatt keeping his most prized possession like the final boss of professional wrestling, or like your little brother hogging all his favourite deluxe aggression action figures.

These returns were primarily decent with a small minority of talent getting their jobs back and very exciting at the time, however some did not meet the expectations that the boardroom were looking for. It seems Hit Row had lost their way without their main man Swerve Strickland, and it doesn’t take watching too far into an episode of WWE SmackDown for Micheal Cole to give his honest opinions of Top Dolla. Whilst I’ve popped, marked out and got all up in my feels over some of the Triple H returns often I feel that when Hunter began his journey in his new career path, he did tend to get a little bit trigger happy with his signings and then drop the ball a few months later.

Finish The Story… or not!

Since the departure of Vince McMahon, the storylines and the creative side to the WWE product has improved tenfold with just the pure quality and excitement watching on weekly as the story plays outs brilliant. The Bloodline saga is the perfect example – We have been able to get emotions high and watch the crushing lows of a family drama play out for the best part of three years, and each week leaving you wanting more. The performances of the likes of Jey Uso, Paul Heyman, Sami Zayn have been nothing short of pure cinema, just ask Wrestling Twitter. A three-year title reign in the 2020’s is something you’d think would be quite dull, uninteresting and boring, but the arrogance and villainy of Roman Reigns has kept it interesting for so long, its honestly been one of the most impressive and hottest long term angles WWE has pulled off in sometime. Although, this angle ahs been shit hot for the longest time, again Triple H is fumbling when to pull the trigger on who should defeat ‘The Tribal Chief’. 

The WWE Universe had their hearts set on Sami Zayn to pin Reigns, but Triple H saw that Roman Reigns would win that match, and The Bloodline would begin to crumble as Sami reunited with Kevin Owens and then took WWE Tag Team Championship.

Then we move to WrestleMania, the stage was set…

The perfect super-hero arc for our American Nightmare Cody Rhodes. Recover from the injuries he sustained within his Hell in a Cell epic with Seth Rollins, win the Royal Rumble, defeat Roman Reigns. If only that was the case, but Solo Sikoa had other plans and Triple H pulled the rug from under us once again. Next up for the ‘Tribal Chief’, Roman Reigns, his cousin Jey Uso, however, there is just too many red herrings for me. Jey Uso was the first and only person to beat ‘The Head of The Table’ in singles competition in three years., but time will tell…

Another example of Triple H creative plans burning to brightly before they faded away: Enter Bray Wyatt. The arc of Bray Wyatt could’ve been wonderful and a near perfect professional wrestling redemption arc for one of WWE most unique performers.

Wyatt was released in 2021 after the pandemic caused WWE to resort to budget cuts, however once Triple H was in charge Windham Rotunda was back and speculation and surprises ran wild within the minds of the WWE Universe.

 The return of Bray Wyatt had us with our notepads out ready to fantasy book any and every angle WWE could be planning, then The White Rabbit hit. At first, The White Rabbit saga was by far the most creative and inspired thing we had seen in such a long time with some bizarre yet genius ideas involving QR codes, horror inspired hippy music and reminisces of Wyatt’s fiendish past with the puppets. It was going so terrifically, it even intrigued my sister, who swore of wrestling after taking a dodgy bump off a German Supplex into the trampoline from my brother. Everybody was hooked.

All the pieces were in the correct places, but once again the execution didn’t match the vision, whereas were expecting traumatic storytelling and Rob Zombie-esque physiological thriller and psychedelic horror, but what we were met with was sponsorship matches, odd cringey video packages and a story that was too convoluted and overall, it just took long to get to point week to week. It’s a true shame because I feel we were onto something, but once Uncle Howdy was introduced and the longer it went on something fell flat along the way.

Alongside the creative minds of Bray Wyatt and WWE higher ups not gelling to greatly, injury was another component of these story falling short. Bray Wyatt took time for his mental health and things just didn’t work out. First, I hope that Wyatt recovers, and then once he is well it would a grand idea to see where this mysterious nightmare fuel was supposed to go.  I would love to see Triple H and company pick it back up, but perhaps speed up the process or at least give Wyatt opponents that fit within the genre of story that Wyatt is trying to tell. Imagine Cody finally conquers Reigns only to be met by a nightmare of his own in Windham Rotunda.

The Reality Era

Often when watching a Triple H produced episode of WWE it feels as though, WWE are back in the loop with the rest of the wrestling world rather than ignoring the promotions around them. I dislike the way Triple H talks about the AEW’s and TNAs of the world, calling AEW a ‘pissant company’, but at least he acknowledges them unlike the previous head honcho. I adore hearing Michael Cole become this encyclopaedia of pro wrestling rather than him being fed stale lines.

The Rollins and Riddle stuff, it was very attitude era esque and felt unique and real as they legit let F bombs off during an interview. At the time it felt much like Edge/ Matt Hardy or Bret Hart / Shawn Micheals.

The signing of Logan Paul takes WWE further into the heights of mainstream media. Although I disagree with a lot from his past ventures, Logan Paul the wrestler is quite exquisite bringing the likes of Ricochet, The Miz and Dom Mysterio into the public.

Triple H has had an impactful journey his first year being charge, I do wish he’d get rid of that third hour of WWE RAW, however I do see the financial benefits to this method. I doubt WWE cares about some nerd’s sleeping pattern when they are raking it in when it comes to the ad revenue and sponsorship deals.

Overall, whatever this era is called, it feels in sync with the real world for the first time in years.    

The Final Verdict

Triple H has had quite the task, recovering from a heart attack, running a multi billionaire company and managing to pull it off very successfully. Obviously, I am not blind to the issues within Triple H’s WWE, however, I do, for the most part, enjoy WWE television. So for that reason, Triple H gets a 6.7/10 for his first year in charge. Here’s to next year, Paul.