Narm/Professional Wrestling

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"There is only room for woman at the top of the WWE...ME the Celtic Warrior Sheamus!"

You can't write the sort of Narm that happens in Professional Wrestling. Okay, you can, but nobody really tries to do it intentionally. Unless you're Vince Russo.

General

  • Any bit that gets put into the Botchamania series becomes narm material by default.
  • Sid Vicious was supposed to be a towering menace, but during his offtime, he's more interested in playing softball than pro wrestling. Also, he challenged Brian Pillman to a shootfight once, and after getting his ass kicked by Pillman he left, deciding to come back and try again with a weapon this time! The weapon he found and decided to use was a squeegee (yes, a squeegee). When he walked back into the bar brandishing the squeegee and challenging Pillman again, he was reportedly laughed out of the place. Don't forget that on a live WWF PPV, Sid asked for a retake when he screwed up his promo, and Jim Ross told him that they're live. And then there's the persistent rumor that he actually crapped his trunks during his Wrestlemania 13 match with The Undertaker. Given the fact that The 'Taker had to hoist Sid's rear end towards his own face several times during the climax of that match to execute the Tombstone Piledriver, this brings new meaning to the scowl Taker has on his face throughout the match. And every waking moment since.

Sid Vicious: Nash, you know and I know that you are only half the man that I am... and I have half the brain that you do!


Ring of Honor

  • ROH isn't immune to the narm despite being one of the most prestigious independent promotions in the northeastern United States; there was the time that Larry Sweeney knocked out Allison Danger, then demanded that his obese lackey Bobby Dempsey (who basically was a Face to the crowd) hump her; when Bobby hesitated, Larry Sweeney eventually knocked him on top of Allison Danger, and then started pushing him into her. Problem was, the fans were chanting at Dempsey to "man up."
    • Unfortunately, women very rarely are treated with respect by the fans during ROH events. Doesn't matter if they're faces, tweeners or heels. The sheer number of "You got herpes!" chants shouted by the crowd is rather disturbing.
      • While we're on the subject, the Delirious-Daizee Haze-Rhett Titus love triangle was narm from start to finish. It was normal for fans to chant "YOU GOT COCKBLOCKED!" at the universally loved Delirious whenever Rhett Titus stopped him from asking Daizee Haze out. Not to mention, when Titus bragged about having sex with Haze, he started getting face pops despite being the heel. Haze, thanks to her rejection of the lizard man, and this episode, was the opposite. It didn't help matters that Delirious joined the Age of the Fall at the aptly titled "Age of Insanity." Ultimately, the payoff to this was highly predictable, as Titus revealed that not only did he not sleep with Daizee, but he was a virgin.
        • Of course, ROH "narration" (read: the Newswire) did admit that the "confession" was under duress. This Troper remembers though that it was impossible for the fans to take Rhett Titus seriously as a heel or to really treat him as one. The gimmick was FUNNY! Plus, he was acting so enthusiastically and "sincerely" that it was treated as Narm Charm.


TNA

  • TNA No Surrender 2008 featured an MMA-style match between AJ Styles and Frank Trigg. Mike Tenay and Don West, bless their hearts, were trying to sell the match as important and dramatic, but their efforts were shot to hell by the cameras getting closeups on upset fans chanting "We want wrestling!" and "Fire Russo!".
    • Doesn't help that the finish of that was a no contest due to accidental groin hit.
  • TNA's AJ Styles trying to emulate his mentor Ric Flair. With his complete lack of Flair's trademark charisma, there's just no way you can take him seriously. Especially when he starts throwing out Flair's catchphrases...
    • Blame Ric Flair (well... his pre-TNA self) being simply one of a kind; it's essentially reviving WCW's "Lil' Naitch," except wasting one of the young TNA 'legends' instead of a ref.
  • The 9-16-10 episode of Impact was host to perhaps Abyss' most ludicrous moment of narm to date, in which he abducted someone, presumably TNA backstage personnel, and proceeded to bring them to a torture chamber for the purpose of conducting various non-PG activities. In a scene more akin to something you'd expect to see in a Saw flick rather than professional wrestling, Abyss branded the date 10-10-10 onto the exposed abdomen of his captive. That this was filmed by a cameraman, who did nothing to intervene, and furthermore, shown on TV, to announcers who had little to no reaction whatsoever, not only makes suspension of disbelief impossible, but is also hilarious.
  • Samoa Joe was kidnapped by ninjas in front of a TV crew. Nobody did anything to stop this, nobody seemed to care. He cut one promo from apparent captivity, and came back within a month, the entire thing is never mentioned again.
  • From the recent "THEY are coming" storyline rehash, there's the scene of Crimson "murdering" Abyss by hitting him in the back with Janice, followed by Abyss falling over after stumbling onto the ramp, with Crimson standing behind him, grinning like a horror movie villain. Sadly, the grin, Crimson's ridiculous faux-spiky hairdo, and his odd head-tilt ruined any attempt to take the scene seriously.
  • Abyss chokeslamming AJ Styles through the ring, despite the fact that when that sort of thing normally happens it's one huge guy doing a huge power move to another huge guy. AJ is not huge, Abyss is really not that huge and the chokeslam had almost no strength behind it, making it look more like TNA just has a really shoddily constructed ring.
  • Joker Sting holding Eric Bischoff hostage with a bird. Need I say more?


WCW

  • Scott Steiner's brother Rick is hardly immune as one Nitro featured him telling Chucky (the killer doll from Childs Play) to "Get your raggedy ass in the ring!". Yes, he challenged a puppet to wrestle him...
    • I choose to blame the whole integration of Chucky into WCW in the first place; as someone else said on TV Tropes, the worst part about that storyline wasn't this, but that before the reveal, the build-up and hype by unexplained off-screen laughter... they could have gone anywhere with it.
  • Goldberg's catch phrase in WCW was "Who's Next?", which was simple and effective. After one match, though, Gene Okerland was interviewing Goldberg.

Gene: "After that win, the question isn't 'who's next,' but 'who's left?'!"
Goldberg: "No... the question isn't 'who's left'... it's... 'WHO'S NEXT?'!"

  • Announcer Tony Schiavone was a physical manifestation of this trope.
  • The SHOCKMASTER APPROACHES!!
  • Hulk Hogan's promos for the "Yapapi Indian Strap Match" might not have been out of place in the 1980s, but they were filmed in the year 2000.
    • And given the fact that they took place in front of a patriotically raised, North-American audience, Hogan's insistence on making it sound like he was promoting an "Apple-Pie, Indian strap match" can only be wondered at. God knows what the audience made of the imagery of Ric Flair's skin 'bubbling' from the strapping he would supposedly receive. We've all seen the texture of those McDonald's pies.

"As I strap that flesh, as your flesh bubbles and burns over your body! You understand, my man, what the YAPAPI mean by the Indian strap match!"


WWE

  • An episode of WWE Raw gave us a dramatic moment turned into a Narm by crowd participation. Randy Orton had just systematically destroyed John Cena's father as Cena watched, helplessly, handcuffed to the ring ropes. Cena finally manages to free himself (by unbuckling the turnbuckle, one of the most unique ways out of this situation this editor had seen) and chases off Orton, and Orton and Cena have a tense, dramatic staredown, Orton smiling like the cat that ate the canary, Cena staring daggers at Orton... and the crowd loudly chanting "You can't wrestle!" at Cena.
    • A hilarious moment of audience narm was brought by a Providence, Rhode Island crowd at Backlash 2009. After Triple H was given an RKO by Randy Orton followed by a punt kick, he was shown as unable to get up and was taken out on a stretcher all the while the crowd sang "na na na na, na na na na, hey hey hey, good bye."
    • WWE audiences in general love their role in creating Narms. After Vince McMahon was allegedly killed in a car bomb, the tapings of the next two shows started with a moment of silence from the wrestlers and a ten-bell salute from ringside. Which would've been fine if the show hadn't been in Philadelphia, a.k.a. Smark Central, the most notoriously cynical fanbase in all of sports, real or staged.
      • Speaking of the limo-bomb, how about Paul London's ridiculously cheesy grin during the hallway segment?
      • But then again, the Northeastern United States - particularly, from Philadelphia, PA to New York City - is home of the most hardcore fans/smarks in the entire professional wrestling world. It would be more of a shock if these crowds didn't create Narms.
          • One might want to include Eastern Canada as well with hotspots being Toronto and Montreal for narmtastic crowds
        • That may also have something to do with an early ECW revival show that was held in the Hammerstein Ballroom (one of the original ECW's old haunts), in which the main event of The Big Show vs. Batista was met with chants of, "Where's my refund?" and, "Change the channel!"
      • The whodunit storyline would have followed suit the next week, but a certain Rabid Wolverine decided to kill himself as well as his wife and youngest kid to bring everything to a screeching halt. Vince later handwaved his own "death" as staged a few months later and went back to Kick the Dog. ...Or leprechaun, as the case might be.
  • Razor Ramon is somebody important, man.
    • Somethin' happen to his gold? Somethin' gonna happen to you, man. (YMMV, but I find that hilarious).
  • The Wrestlemania XX encounter between Stone Cold Steve Austin and the New York City Crowd vs. Brock Lesnar and Goldberg was the greatest Squash Match in the history of professional wrestling.
    • The best part was that Lesnar and Goldberg likely thought they could get away with phoning the match in, as they were both leaving the company the following week. Boy were they wrong! You really had to see it on PPV or in person for the full impact, as the crowd was edited in the DVD version.
    • At least if you watch it with the English audio track. The chants are retained on the Spanish audio track.
  • There was a match in 2002 featuring the WWE version of the New World Order (which naturally, they did "right"). It was special because it was the big return of core member Kevin Nash to action after taking several months out due to injury. Approximately one minute after he is tagged in, he got seriously injured again from simply walking across the ring. At the end of the match, nWo member Shawn Michaels cut a promo about how the nWo was unstoppable and was going to destroy WWE... all while poor Kevin was lying in a painful, powerless heap right behind him. Next week, Vince McMahon appeared and handwaved the group out of existence.
    • But the really fun bit was the video that circulated among Smart Marks for weeks afterwards, which showed that pivotal moment repeatedly. In slow motion. Set to "Chariots of Fire".
      • In all fairness to Kev, you can see him grasping his leg as he enters the ring so chances were it was already in bad shape before the tear... though why with a bad leg you would go for a big boot as your first offense is beyond this troper.
        • In fact, he looks to be in pain from the moment he stepped over the top rope(raising the leg tugs on that muscle). This is then exacerbated by the torquing he did after the Big Boot. After which, he mis-stepped a little, and all 300+ pounds went crushing down on the muscle. Narm, if only because Shawn's speech included: "Triple H! What you see here is your future!" (It was in the past that he tore his left quad in 2001, but in the future that he tore his right one in 2007). Credit to the rest for breaking the match into a brawl to cover.
    • On a related note, at the 2005 Royal Rumble, Vince McMahon tore both quads stepping into the ring after both Batista and John Cena were simultaneously eliminated.
  • Hulk Hogan vs. Shawn Michaels. You just have to feel sorry for HBK on this one. Hogan played a creative control equivalent of a royal flush, meaning he was to win their match. The only thing Michaels could do was ridiculously oversell every bit of offense Hogan put up. The hilarity is unbound.
  • This promo by Finnish wrestler Ludvig Borga.
  • Take your pick with Bobby Lashley—his supposedly badass character being routinely described as "soft spoken" to the point of it being in his entrance video? All the various amusing nicknames smarks have given him? The infamous "I say your name is Finlay, and you're a baathturd" promo? Or the "No!", or the "old enough to be my dad's uncle" comment? Good God, Lashley is Narm.
    • Much of Lashley's Narm stems from one source—his high-pitched, lisping speech. Nothing deflates a massively-muscled, built-like-a-Sherman-tank, military-alumnus Scary Black Man like having him open his mouth and sound like the most stereotypical Flamboyant Gay ever.
      • Lashley soon realized this and went into MMA, where he doesn't have to talk and can actually kick ass.
        • And then he went to TNA, where he's had promo time every week and only one actual match.
        • And in MMA, he (or his management) instead gets a reputation for dodging anyone who would be an actual challenge/threat and isn't the champion (i.e. Alistair Overeem, Strikeforce heavyweight champion) or Fedor Emelianenko.
  • The Great Khali once won the World Heavyweight Championship. That itself is not Narm, though. The following night on SmackDown, there was a big celebration in the ring for him, with many native Indian folk dancing, singing and celebrating with the big man. And there were a good number of shots of his face, in which he looked legitimately happy. This still isn't the Narm, though. The Narm came when Dave Batista stormed out to the ring, scared away all the dancers and attacked Khali. Nothing says heroic face like trashing another guy's victory celebration. Batista's a jerk!
    • The thing is... the Great Khali's a Face in India to the point that in the WWE Smackdown broadcasts in India, he's the Face while his opponents are the Heels. Sounds to me like "preemptive editing."
    • In the same vein, the segment where the Great Khali brings Big Show out and gives him various "peace offerings," including a goat, and basically doesn't do a single heelish thing despite being the heel. Big Show, conversely, abruptly ends the segment by punching Khali in the face and walking off.
      • Perfectly consistent with the above, making him the gigantic homeland Face and Batista and Big Show (and I figure any of Khali's enemies) to be the arrogant, big and rude (whathaveyou) American bullies. If anything, it sounds like Khali's face turn on RAW was supposed to finally synchronize the two versions of him.
  • Vince McMahon gets the lighting rig dropped on him and the show ends with saying "Paul," and "I can't feel my legs."
    • Some fans see the angle as a Take That towards a TNA stage worker who was killed in a stage accident after the 2008 Slammiversary PPV two weeks earlier, but the similarities between the two events are merely coincidental.
    • And six months later, he returns with much fanfare (and nary a scratch)... only to be "put back out of action" by a kick from Randy Orton. Which wouldn't be Narm if it weren't for daughter Stephanie's hilariously high-pitched screechy wails...
      • This is also 'helped' by the fact that while it was supposed to be an evil, unthinkable move and played up as such, the audience was going fucking wild for Orton the whole segment.
      • Beat up Vince McMahon and the crowd will cheer? That's crazy!
      • Actually we can apply the term Narm to pretty much every time Randy Orton gives somebody a head kick.
      • Orton's taken a liking to punting members of CM Punk's Nexus in the same way. Every time, Punk walks out and starts trying to negotiate with Orton. "Randall. You don't want to do that. Randall. Do not punt Husky Harris in the head. Do not do it, Randall. You will regret it. There will be consequences." The most hilarious was probably "Randall Keith Orton, do not do it." Orton then does it anyway, and contrary to what Punk said, he doesn't face consequences.
      • CM Punk has since been referring to Orton as "Randall Keith Orton" anytime he mentions him. Usually, it comes off as awkwardly forced into the sentence or just sounds like Punk is about to give Randall a time-out so he can think about what he's done.
  • Both the 1988 and 1989 editions of The Main Event featured awful melodramatic acting by Hulk Hogan. For example, Hogan graciously ends his first WWF title reign, here.
  • During one WWE PPV, The Undertaker's entrance was specifically arranged so it would look like he was floating down the entranceway towards the ring. The only problem with this was that the cameras filming the entranceway were angled completely wrong, causing one hell of a Special Effects Failure by revealing that he was standing on what looked like a pulley-board. Needless to say, WWE never did that again.
  • Ricky Steamboat, while an incredible worker and a ring legend, still participated in this WWF promo in the 80's. But what can you say, it was the WWF in the 80's.
    • Not to mention, as dumb as it looks in retrospect, it fit the character.
  • WWE babyface Dave Batista is pretty much a Narm Fuel Station Attendant. From the "That's my title, and come Sunday, I'm taking it back" line that became hilarious through repetition (and Batista's constant failure to back up the threat) to his infamous "Basketballs don't hold grudges" comeback, the big man is a great source of unintentional hilarity.
    • As of mid-March 2010 turning heel cured him of the Narm...
      • Or so we thought. The last time Batista was on Raw, he was confined to a wheelchair, screaming for someone in the back to "GIMME MAH DAYUMN SPOTLIGHT!!!" It's safe to say that, Face or Heel, Batista cannot resist being Narmy.
  • The 9/18/09 episode of SmackDown! contained a moment of Narm so perfectly emblematic of the trope that it's hard to believe it wasn't actually intentional. In response to general manager Teddy Long's nefarious actions in cheating The Undertaker out of the world title at the Breaking Point PPV prior to the episode, the Undertaker impersonated a limo driver and abducted Teddy Long in a jaw-droppingly stupid scene. See it here. From the Undertaker's hilarious one liner, to T-Lo's ridiculously exaggerated expression of surprise, to the incredibly cheesy special effects that kick in as Teddy struggles to free himself, I dare you not to laugh.
  • There's also the infamous 'Heidenrape' incident, in which Heidenreich kidnapped Michael Cole and took him backstage. We later see Heidenreich pushing Cole up against a door, talking to him in a low raspy voice and reading him a poem whilst keeping him in what we can assume was a hammerlock, although since we only see them from the chest up it looks much worse.
    • Cole's facial expressions during this scene don't make this any... uh... "straighter"?
  • On an early 2010 RAW, CM Punk asked audience member Jared Fogle (yes, THAT Jared Fogle of Subway commercials fame) if he wanted to join the Straight Edge Society. When he refused, CM Punk decided he would force Jared to accept Punk as his savior. The Narm comes when Punk uttered the following line, one that many thought would never be uttered anywhere, much less on a WWE television show, "Luke, Serena, go get me Jared (Beat) from Subway."
  • Vince McMahon bragging in early 2010 about how he screwed over Bret Hart, and how Bret apparently brought it upon himself. Especially (unintentionally) hilarious is hearing Vince scream, "YOU DESERVE TO BE SCREWED!" to Bret, as he backpedals like a Looney Tunes character, hiding behind almost a dozen hilariously inept security guards. It came very close to crossing the line into "Cartoonish Supervillainy" territory.
  • The entirety of The Big Show vs Big Bossman feud, but especially the scene at The Big Show's dad's funeral. Bossman drives by the funeral in The Bluesmobile shouting insults against Show's dad through a megaphone. Then he hooks the casket up to his car and drives away with it, with Big Show hanging onto the casket and riding it like a sled.
  • The Undertaker vs. Kane feud from 1997/1998 shouldn't be overlooked just because it was a part of the Attitude Era. On the final Raw before Wrestlemania 14, The Undertaker delivered a long, heartfelt promo to his parents' gravestones which was immediately followed by an even longer promo where Paul Bearer rambled about The Undertaker whilst Kane set television sets and eventually crew members on fire using his power over lightning bolts, whilst Jim Ross, Kevin Kelly, and Michael Cole played the whole thing completely, hilariously straight.
  • The January 11th 2010 episode of Raw featured The Miz and MVP cutting a pretty damn fine promo that could qualify as a Crowning Moment of Awesome...except for one line where MVP draws a comparison between WWE and the circus and he thinks Miz is a monkey flinging poo. And then The Miz responds with a sarcastic "poo" as though he actually took that line seriously. The restrictions of PG television definitely were showing here.
  • On the July 6th 2009 episode of ECW Tommy Dreamer called Abraham Washington a "lego head" as a comeback to a barrage of fat jokes. Bear in mind this came from a badass who wrestled in countless hardcore streetfight matches and in barbed wire years earlier.
  • One moment saw Eve Torres making a run in on Maryse in the ring. Only problem was she couldn't get through the ropes on the first attempt.
  • Pretty much any time Maryse tries to be intimidating or come across as a believable heel. She tries to cover up for her lazy Five Moves of Doom wrestling with hair flipping and hand gestures with the occasional promo in French. It doesn't work.
  • The Ultimate Warrior. That is all HOAK HOGAN!!
    • "I came here for one reason - to attack and keep comin', not to ask but just to give, not to want but just to send-the send the power of the Warrior down everybody's throat in the WWF 'till they become sick of it- well, you're gonna get sick of it, 'cause this freak of nature is just beginning to swell, and when I get big enough, brother, there ain't gonna be any room for anybody else 'cept me and all the Warriors, floatin' through the VEINS, and the POWER of the WARRIORRRRRR..."
  • How about Jack Swagger bursting into the room of Rey Mysterio Jr and away dragging him away with an ankle lock, Rey was screaming out in pain and Jack had this manic grin on his face, this was still within the range of decent until Jack Swagger dragged him backwards through a curtain, you just got this image of a creepy pedophile dragging away someone who "looks like a freaking twelve year old" who's trying to crawl away from his abuser, hey, who said Narm had to be light and fluffy laughs.
  • Ahmed Johnson. Especially the promos cut for the Warzone video game for the PlayStation. Wonton and beef stew indeed.
  • Val Venis' debut included a feud with Kaientai and Yamaguchi. The narm comes from Yamaguchi's obsession with revenge (Val supposedly slept with his wife) and a backstage skit where the Kaientai stable ties up a nude Val Venis and Yamaquchi-san apparently cuts his penis off with a sword. Then the WWF waited until next week to say that he missed.
  • The 9-27-10 edition of RAW had Edge interview the anonymous RAW General Manager on the Cutting Edge. The GM had only previously communicated through a laptop operated by Michael Cole. For the interview, the RAW GM was being run through a voice changer. While the segment was narmy enough already just because Edge was interviewing a laptop (Lampshaded by Edge himself when he said that RAW had come from Austin stunning McMahon to Edge arguing with a computer), the voice distorter made the GM sound exactly like GLaDOS. The segment would even end with Edge destroying the laptop, making people wonder if the computer would starting singing Still Alive after RAW went off the air.
  • The infamous "Pillman's Got A Gun!" Moment: Stone Cold Steve Austin, feuding with his onetime ally Brian Pillman, breaks into Pillman's house (observed by cameras). Meanwhile, Pillman, his wife and his friends, and announcer Kevin Kelly are all lying in wait for Austin, who beats up all of Pillman's cronies. Pillman then produces a Glock and claims he will "blast his sorry ass straight to hell" as Kevin Kelly screams "Pillman's got a gun!" At this point the cameras "cut out" until we rejoin the action with Austin unsurprisingly not dead. Pillman drops an F-Bomb on live TV as Austin gets pulled away. The vignette was so widely panned that the WWF and Pillman publicly apologized. Basically everyone involved realized how preposterous it was to have a scripted fighting show where guns could be involved.
  • The 11-15-10 episode of Raw had a promo of John Cena's decision as the special guest referee in the Randy Orton vs. Wade Barrett title match. To gather the effect perfectly, the AM Raw was better to watch. The promo was cut directly from a Piper's Pit that ended with John Cena basically no-selling an RKO, and then FUing both Orton and Barret. The promo itself was shots from Cena's career. However a more recent shot showed Cena hunched depressed in the corner of the ring and almost looked to be crying. One could simply picture Barret standing behind him screaming "Cry, Cena! CRY!!" It then ends with a shot of Cena leaving the building. It's mostly ridiculous because it may be the first ever title match to be more about the referee than either of the two competitors.
  • At the June 2010 Viewer's Choice Raw, the group of NXT season 1 rookies who later became The Nexus literally destroyed John Cena and the entire ring after they came out during the main event between Cena and CM Punk. This moment is widely regarded as a Crowning Moment of Awesome, but there was some Narm in the little kid shouting "MR. KING! MR. KING!" at Jerry "The King" Lawler after he had the announce table thrown onto him.
  • The pregnancy angle between Kane and Lita led to the delivery room moment when Kane found out that Lita had miscarried. The angle was already not that impressive but getting to see Kane degenerate into a screaming pile of rage did give the angle a comedic spin.
    • It also didn't help that Lita was sitting on the hospital bed with a look of, what can best be described as, stoic indifference instead of a mother who lost her child.
      • I always figured she was in shock.
  • After Wrestlemania 22, Vince decided to get back at Shawn Michaels by booking him and Shane McMahon against Michaels and "God" at the next PPV (Backlash 2006). You see, Michaels had been a born-again Christian for several years and Vince decided to go after that in their feud. It was kinda stupid and tasteless to some, but one moment was very Narmtastic. A vignette during the feud had Vince and Shane visiting a church and doing a bunch of sacrilegious things. One moment, though, had Vince taking a palmful of holy water then saying to Shane "Who am I?". He then sipped the water, looked up and spat it in the air like Triple H does with his water bottle during his entrance. Even the harshest critics of the angle though that was entertaining even though it was intended as an act of sacrilege.
  • During an Inferno Match between Undertaker and Kane at the 2/22/99 episode of RAW, Vince McMahon, who was on commentary for the match received a black container from Paul Bearer. He opens the container and inside was... a teddy bear. His reactions afterwards, including repeatedly saying "Why", falling on his knees crying and a Big No after Taker set the bear on fire, even as kids, got a big laugh out of some people.
  • The video games also have the potential for some potent narm, such as in one game, adding Jerry Lawler's entrance music to Val Venis' Titantron.
  • While The Miz promo at Wrestlemania 27 is pretty damn awesome, chronicling his days on The Real World then rising to the top of the WWE, his entrance was not. It showed him busting through an AWESOME sign made of what seems to be styrofoam. The thing looked like a prop from Pee Wees Playhouse.
  • The last Raw before Wrestlemania 27, a huge promo with Triple H, The Undertaker, and Shawn Michaels in the same damn ring at the same time. It's a pretty tense moment (sure Shawn came down acting like a big kid, but that's one of the reasons why he's beloved), but then Hunter gave a weird "you got soft" monologue to Shawn, which he sort of accepted, although didn't like. Then Taker basically told him that he ended Shawn's career and humbled him. After a failed kick and a broken up fight, it cuts to a show of Shawn's face... and it looks like he was about to cry from their comments, and then left, apparently indicating that he went backstage so nobody could see him do that.
    • Speaking of that promo, as Shawn was leaving the arena, you could overhear a fan yelling to Michaels, "C'mon Shawn! One more match! One more match, Shawn." The way that fan was yelling causing quite the Mood Whiplash.
  • The opening music to the Tough Enough revival, which sounds less than suited to a pro wrestling show.
  • WWE Over The Limit 2011's promo which feels more like a commercial for Viagra more than a PPV.
  • After Cody Rhodes moved to SmackDown! he adopts the "Dashing" gimmick. Following a few months being Laughably Evil, he Took a Level in Badass. He attacks foes with his face mask in No Holds Barred Beatdowns. So what's the narm? Well, when he talks about the ugliness he sees he puts paper bags on people. Symbolically he's covering the "sinful" appearance of others by doing this. In reality, the idea of Cody Rhodes gaining vengeance by placing a paper bag on his foe's head is truly humorous.
    • Everyone's extreme enthusiasm to wear the bags and seeing people on the front few rows sitting jauntily with them over their heads doesn't help with Cody's intimidation either.
    • The commentators refer to it as the "ultimate humiliation".
      • Perhaps the narmiest thing about Cody's otherwise brilliant persona is that the commentators cannot seem to decide whether Cody is delusional about his facial injuries or if he has actually been rendered ugly. You would think the transparent protective mask would aid in such a judgment call.
    • The narm continues: following the attack on Randy Orton on the 10/10/11 Raw he taunts, "Would you like a receipt with that paper bag?"
      • Everything Cody Rhodes says makes him sound like he's sedated. He's supposed to sound crazy, but he sounds more like a talking goat in an earthquake.

"Cuhuhut the heeadd offa vipurr and the venum goes wihith ihihit."

  • Pretty much everything R-Truth says or does since his heel turn. That weird "shitting his pants" expression he always has or beating John Morrison to the point of Overly Long Gag.
    • He then insulted The Miz, Rey Mysterio Jr, and Alberto Del Rio by calling them Kermit, Bottlenose, and Liverlips respectively. He then referred to John Cena as "lily white."
    • "When a angry black man is talking you do not interrupt him."
    • "STOP THE PRESSUH! CALL THE POLI-CIA! THERE HE GO, RIGHT THUR! HE'S A THEIF, YO! THAT AIN'T RIGHT, YA'LL!"
    • "USED TA!? USED TA IS A ROOSTA FROM BREWSTA!"
    • "YOU GON GET GOT!" Which he's unfortunately said at least twice.
    • Also during his recent rampage against John Cena merchandise, he stormed away from the table of shirts and other things and comes across a concession stand. He then violently attacked...a pyramid of empty soda cups featuring John Cena on them. He then turned and saw a poster with a giant soda cup on it, groaned angrily and stomped away.
    • On the June 13, 2011, R-Truth referred to the Titantron as "the Triton."
  • Eve dancing to R-Truth's raps. No...just...no. Stick to wrestling. CM Punk was right when he, on commentary, said that it looked like she was having an epileptic fit.
    • No doubt hurt by the fact that due to the PG rating, that kind of limited what she could do in terms of movement, dance in general tending to be suggestive (For the record, she can dance, she choreographed a lot of the routines for her college dance squad.) She does tend to repeat the same few steps over and over.
  • In a recent promo between CM Punk and Orton, they mess up. Orton throws out a classic gem with "You'll be sleeping... unconscious."
  • Michael Cole, presumably taking the TV-PG rating into account, draws a great deal of dramatic impact when saying to Alex Riley:

Cole: You are a... a bastard.

    • And then he still can't help but crack a smile during the line, as though he were a little kid on the playground who'd just learned a new swear word and wanted desperately to try it out.
    • I would think the grinning part comes from the fact that Cole was on the verge of corpsing due to unintentionally stalling on calling Riley a bastard.
    • Even more hilarious was the audience's reaction, which was a mix of ooh's and ah's, but you could tell that it was probably at least 70% sarcastic.
  • The 7/18/11 episode of Raw concluded with Triple H coming out and firing Vince McMahon. This was concluded with a tearful, and very hokie, "I love you, Pop."
    • Even worse, the crowd ran through a gamut of chanting things. They ran through chanting "Triple H," "Cena," singing goodbye to Vince, and finally "Thank You Vince." At the end it seemingly broke down into a huge mess of different chants running at once while Vince stood in the middle of the ring blubbering.
  • Natalya Neidheart, bless her heart, is a fountain of Narm. Apparently, the Neidhart family is a conservative one, because trash talk just isn't that girl's strong point. One night, while on commentary, the closest she ever came to snapping at Michael Cole (pretty much a requirement for commentary) was to tell him to "settle his teakettle." And another night, after a Face Heel Turn, she goes into a speech about vegetables. [What had happened there was that Kelly Kelly said that the fans like her and the other Divas like her (the ones that Beth Phoenix and Natalya are feuding with for being all looks and not talented), Natalya then compared the fans to candy-eating kids, and how she and Beth were going to show them they need to "eat their veggies" by showing them what "real" Divas wrestling was.] However, Beth and Nattie have made it work, and have a sense of humor about being "the two hottest veggies in the WWE."
  • Kevin Nash's return in 2011 is full of some truly narmy moments. We'll just say that his current issue with Triple H is centered over texting.
    • "I'M YOUR FRIEND!"
    • "Would you like to see the text message on my telephone?"
    • "I'M TRYING TO MAKE THE WWE COOL AGAIN!"
  • Hopefully in the right section, just from the trailer of Triple H's new movie Inside Out, it seems to have no clue what kind of movie it is. Is it a straight, but really cliched action movie? A subtle parody of an action movie? A so-so porno with none of the good stuff? Seriously.
  • Mark Henry slamming Jerry Lawler through the announce table had some serious impact...or would have if not for the fact that directly afterward, the guys in the front row behind him were cheering in demand for him to do the same to Michael Cole.
  • JR's firing by John Laurinaitis, or afterward, when Michael Cole screamed for a good minute about how awesome it was that JR was fired, even channeling Schiavone and declaring several times that it was the greatest night in the history of wrestling.
  • An early 2012 episode of Raw featured a scene straight out of a horror film, where the big red monster Kane was chasing down Zack Ryder and Eve Torres. Pretty thrilling stuff... until Ryder discovered that his getaway vehicle had a flat tire. He then spent the next fifteen minutes fixing said flat tire... and did I mention that during the night's main event, update footage of the titanic struggle was shown periodically on the big screen? This lead to comments along the lines of "He's still changing that tire? Why don't they just run for it!"
  • The same week's SmackDown featured a no-DQ match for the World Heavyweight Championship between The Big Show and Daniel Bryan (c). Right near the end of the show, Big Show is chasing Bryan around the ring, when he collides with D-Bry's girlfriend AJ Lee. Bearing in mind that AJ is all of 5' tall and maybe 95 pounds, while The Big Show is easily 2 feet taller and some 5 times her weight, she goes down in an instant. Then the smarks start chanting "She's OK" while Big Show looks like he's about to cry, and Daniel Bryan closes the show by calling Big Show a bastard.
    • The show actually ends of a close-up of Big Show's face, blubbering like a baby.
  • The 1/23/12 episode of Raw ended with a big confrontation between CM Punk and Executive Vice President of Talent Relations and Interim Raw General Manager John Laurinaitis. After a particularly tense promo, Punk manages to finally get his hands on Laurinaitis, and actually sets him up for the GTS, but Laurinaitis seems quite okay with getting KO'd to oblivion, showing no expression whatsoever in his predicament.
    • From that same edition, there's also John Cena's angry face to the camera after being forced to watch Kane basically destroy his best bud Zack Ryder.
  • The 10/24/11 episode of Raw ends with Laurinaitis giving John Cena the opportunity to pick any partner he wanted for his upcoming tag team match against The Miz and R-Truth at Survivor Series. After building it up for a few moments, Cena announces, "I choose my partner to be... THE ROCK!!" - at which point the cameras get a great close-up of the line of dribble hanging off his lip.
  • In the lead up to his match with Big Show at Wrestlemania 28, Cody Rhodes continues to show his opponent's most embarrassing Wrestlemania moments. With the loss record Show has had at the event that shouldn't be that hard, as Cody has shown footage of his losses to the likes of Akebono and Floyd Mayweather. Then he said he would show another loss except Show didn't even wrestle this time, referencing Wrestlemania 18 when Show was at WWF New York. That could have ended the segment as it would indicate that the company didn't have anything for him that year. Yet Cody provides a clip of Show at the restaurant with fans, followed by an Evil Laugh. Apparently, being at a restaurant is embarrassing. This also fuels Big Show's anger as he squashes The Miz, indicating that referencing it was Serious Business.
  • Yeah, Chris Jericho beating up CM Punk and dousing him with liquour on the 4/2/12 edition of Raw was a tense segment, but it loses its edge somewhat due to Jericho slipping on the spilled liquor and falling on his ass when attempting to kick Punk.
  • On the topic of Wrestlemania 28, the Triple H vs The Undertaker match in Hell In A Cell, while an excellent and emotional match, had its moments. One such moment was when 'Taker kicked out of a Pedigree that was chained from a Sweet Chin Music from guest referee Shawn Michaels: HBK sells it by dancing in circles like a lunatic around the ring. Another was when 'Taker sat up after that as Hunter prepared to hit him with a sledgehammer again (it was that sort of match): Hunter sells it by dropping to the canvas in fright like he got kicked in the face. A little bit later, Hunter kicks out of his first Tombstone Piledriver of the night again, that sort of match): the camera zooms in to 'Taker, hoping to get a priceless shot of his surprised face like when HBK did the same at their Wrestlemania 25 match, and instead gets a view of 'Taker with drool hanging out of his mouth.
  • The Big Show/John Laurinaitis segment from the 5/14/12 Monday Night Raw in spades. Almost to the point of being a Funny Moment. See it here in all of its glory.
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