While Paul Heyman ultimately became known as the Wise Man to Roman Reigns’ Tribal Chief, that was not the original vision behind their partnership.
After taking a hiatus during the pandemic era, including missing WrestleMania 36 due to concerns surrounding the COVID-19 pandemic and his own health risks, Reigns made his shocking return at SummerSlam 2020. By brutally attacking Braun Strowman and The Fiend, Reigns accomplished what many fans thought would never happen: he embraced the role of a villain.
Although nobody knew at the time just how historic his run would become, the seeds of something special were planted early. Those seeds grew further when Reigns was shown sitting alongside Paul Heyman, a legendary figure who has built a career on elevating some of the biggest stars in wrestling history
As Reigns became The Tribal Chief, he anointed Heyman to be his Wise Man. However, while speaking with Chris Van Vliet, the Hall of Famer recalled Vince McMahon being hesitant to call him The Tribal Chief:
“It’s just the little things that go into it. The first time I came up with Tribal Chief, ‘Really? You want to call him the Tribal Chief?’ [What did Vince want to call him?] Oh, The Big Dog, Roman Reigns, with his advocate, Paul Heyman, I said, ‘Well, I can’t be his advocate as Brock Lesnar’s advocate. We have to have something different to Roman Reigns, and Roman Reigns has to be different.'”
Heyman went on to compare Reigns’ transformation to what happened when The Undertaker changed his persona in The Attitude Era:
“You got to pull the trigger on this. This has to be as much of a seismic shift as The Deadman becoming the American Badass. This is a whole new character. This is a whole new persona, and he could not have played this persona earlier, because he was too young to do it. He needed to weather the storms to become The Tribal Chief. We grew up with him, almost like he was a child star, in that we saw him from his young days, fresh out of college, and he grew into this Tribal Chief.”
Vince McMahon Was Not A Fan Of Roman Reigns And Paul Heyman’s First On-Screen Shot Together
The first time fans saw the duo aligned was during a backstage segment, with the camera slowly panning over to reveal Heyman sitting beside him. While the reveal generated significant buzz, McMahon believed the visual could have been grander.
Heyman recalled that while McMahon had issues with the presentation, the company had little time to execute the segment before Payback. He explained:
“Vince thought the couch was not opulent enough for a character that was going to end up being called The Tribal Chief. I can’t disagree with him, but we were in a rush to get that done. Well, the original idea was for us both to return at SummerSlam, and then be on TV that Friday and lead into Payback that weekend that we built to in the rematch where the title went to the tribal chief Roman Reigns.”
“I thought let Roman return, give that moment to The Big Dog, and then that Friday on television, he’s not cooperative in the triple threat, he’s not cooperative with Adam Pearce, you know something’s up, but you can’t put your finger on it. Go to him sitting on the couch, and Pearce is looking over going, what the f*ck is Heyman doing there? But you don’t know that Heyman sitting there, and at the last second pull out because Roman says that’s not a prediction, that’s a spoiler, and you see Brock Lesnar’s advocate sitting with Roman Reigns after all these years, and I just hit Roman’s tagline of believe that, and off the air. So for five seconds you see us together. Did I just see that? You’re rubbing your eyes, and you can’t believe what you saw. And then that weekend get the title on Roman, and then the next Friday is our first appearance, truly together in front of the cameras as a unit, presenting our case as to why this act is a game-changing act, and will create history in WWE.”
Featured image: WWE
