John Cena spent roughly five months of his WWE farewell tour finally playing a heel in 2025, and it mostly sucked. The initial angle with Cena selling his soul to The Rock at Elimination Chamber was fantastic, but it quickly went downhill from there
In an interview on UnSKripted with Dr. Chris Featherstone, Cena’s father criticized WWE’s “poor” booking mistakes with the heel turn, pointing out that the whole thing was undermined by the absence of key people during the follow-up to the initial angle.
“Turning John Cena heel was a great idea. The shock factor was great. But I think the storyline was destroyed. And that was a very poor move, in my opinion, because it was a big gamble for everyone that was involved. And to see how it started, and then to see the characters who were involved no longer be present, well the heel turn almost became non-essential.”
In case you don’t know who he’s talking about, Cena’s dad goes on to say The Rock’s name and call out his vanishing act from WWE.
“With The Rock, I have no idea what that whole thing was about. The whole storyline was ‘I want your soul.’ That means…if you give me your everything, I will make you champion. Okay, now we have a storyline. The Rock comes out. He does his thing…and that’s the last we see of it! That was, in my opinion, that was poor! Very poor. Because now it becomes a one man show. And it’s not fair to the individual, and it’s not fair to the fans of the WWE. Because look, that story’s not finished. The story with Cody Rhodes and The Rock isn’t finished. Why? Because I’ve got to go make a movie? And I’m not being wise with The Rock. I have nothing but respect. But let’s take it and call it as we see it. Why not finish what we started? Or, if we couldn’t finish what we started, don’t start it at all.”
Overall, Cena’s dad thinks the farewell tour has been good, though he did say that rapper Travis Scott has “no business being near a wrestling ring” based on his mannerisms and terrible performance at Elimination Chamber.
If you want to hear John Cena Sr.’s full thoughts on his son’s heel turn and also why he wasn’t a fan of Cena being squashed by Brock Lesnar at Wrestlepalooza, check out the interview here.
