Let's talk wrasslin'

Honestly most pub food here is pretty good. Wetherspoons is one of the cheapest options, so that always raises the risk that you're going to get a below par meal. If you're paying a decent price then you almost always get good food - in pubs around here, anyway.
 
A close friend of mine was in the UK last year and he sent me a lot of pictures of food because it's something we both love and have been discussing since we were kids. Anyway, everything he sent looked incredibly good. A lot of bridies, bangers and mash, pies, puddings. Dude had a full English almost every day he was there.
 
WWE goes to one of the last big 'what ifs?' still viable and turns Cena heel. Have to say I didn't expect that on his retirement run. Interesting to see where they go with this.
 
Yeah, I was watching live and we went from Cody telling the Rock to go fuck himself, uncensored, to Cena turning heel to Michael Cole asking why Cena would "stoop to this shit?!" Things have definitely changed a bit. My initial thought was "ok, now I can get behind this match" because initially the thought of a babyface vs. babyface match and it's build leading to Mania sounded like an absolute snoozefest. At least with this we get to (hopefully) see corporate sellout Cena for a while, which is a nice change of pace.

I imagine he will revert back to a babyface before the year is up to go out that way. But then again, maybe not? I wouldn't have thought they'd turn him heel at this point so who the hell knows where this is going. I read earlier that he flew out to Africa to resume filming his new movie immediately after the event, which isn't a great start. I hope he's part of the build, otherwise this will fall a bit flat. I think most people had hoped he was going to devote more time to WWE for his last year and sort of take a break from Hollywood.
 
It definitely helps the build to Cena Vs Cody at Mania for Cena to be heel. Should have happened a long time ago, and I think if Vince hadn't been in charge it would have, but oh well. Cena has made it clear in interviews that he's wanted to go heel for some time (I think he wanted to be a full on heel in the Rock feud) so it's cool that he gets to do that now, albeit very strange timing.

I've seen comparisons to Hogan in '96 but I don't really see it. Hogan was a full timer still at the top of the business when he turned heel, and still had a few years left as an active full time (ish) worker. Cena hasn't been full time in, what, a decade nearly? Even in 2016 he was in and out. The heel turn for Cena is cool but as you noted, even now he isn't full time as even on his retirement tour he's still mixing his Hollywood commitments with wrestling.

So yeah, for me a cool moment but a bit late for it to be majorly impactful in any meaningful way beyond the WM build. Although, at least turning heel now actually does make Cena a heel. If he'd turned during the height of LOLCENAWINS he'd probably have ended up being cheered instead.
 
Yeah, this wasn't even close to Hogan in '96 imo. When Hogan turned, there was complete disbelief and shock. The crowd literally covered the ring in garbage. The crowd in Toronto cheered when Cena turned. It's not even comparable to me. I don't mean to diminish Cena's turn but it's coming very late in his career and it's riding the line between being somewhat interesting and jumping the shark. That may be me being somewhat cynical, but for reasons mentioned, this has the potential to sort of fall flat depending on where this goes. There's 6-7 weeks until Mania and if Cena is going to be filming a movie, it's really going to hurt this. In fact, if Cena isn't going to be there during the build, I would almost say they could've done the turn at Mania: Cena loses to Cody and snaps. That would've been a shocking end to the show. But again, I obviously have no idea where they're going here, so I guess it's time to sit back and see what they do.
 
I think you can maybe get away with Cena not being at Raw tonight. It's not ideal, but you can build the show around people acting shocked at what happened - focus promos, backstage vignettes, etc on people trying to process what happened. Kinda similar to how WCW had various wrestlers discussing Hogan's heel turn on the July 8 Nitro (although Hogan was at that show, from memory he came out at the end for a promo). Let the indignation, shock, disappointment, etc really build to the next show.

However, if Cena is away for multiple weeks then it severely dilutes the whole thing. We aren't even that far away from WM so every week without Cena being there is a week wasted. If they wanted to turn Cena heel then it should be an all-in commitment from both sides. If that isn't possible, then just don't do it.

If you think about Hogan's heel turn - he was a face in WCW for roughly 2 years, from mid-1994 to mid-1996. The writing was on the wall, fans had turned on him (although not as viciously as they did with Cena) and so he did the logical thing and turned heel. Cena turned face around 2004/2005ish, and much like Hogan got turned on by fans quite quickly, but it took them 20 years to do a heel turn, despite constant and overwhelming rejection of his face role (up until very recently, anyway).

Imagine WCW kept going, but they also didn't turn Hogan heel at BotB '96. Imagine them waiting until 2015 before turning Hogan heel, during his final retirement year no less. Putting aside age differences and such (you have to de-age Hogan a bit for this scenario to work), that sounds absolutely ridiculous. To have pushed good guy Hulk Hogan for 20 years despite the fans not wanting it - and having him repeatedly win world titles and dominate during a significant portion of that time. Then finally turn him heel when his career is essentially over, having resisted the opportunity to turn him heel countless times in the past. It sounds like total insanity. That's basically what WWE have done with Cena. It's obviously Vince's fault this happened and Cena probably would have remained a face until the bitter end if Vince was still there, but man, it's just so stupid when you really think about it.