Buddy Matthews criticizes WWE's lack of long-term story-telling
Former WWE Superstar Buddy Matthews, fka Buddy Murphy, didn't hold back while discussing the lack of long-term storytelling in Vince McMahon's promotion. He openly talked about the drawbacks of the company's approach to the extended storyline.
During a recent interview with Forbes, Buddy Matthews compared WWE storylines to action movie plots and stressed the 'dips' in the cinema's script. He argued that these stagnant low points are essential from a narrative point of view as they help connect the dots. However, constant action with no time to digest the incidents often accounts for rushed angles.
"Let's use an action movie for an example," said Matthews. "It's not explosions and bombs going off and guns getting shot the entire two-and-a-half hours. You have to have dips in it. And I feel like that was their thing is they never wanted to have dips and those slow points to let it kind of sit and let people digest. It was constantly 'move, move, move, move...'"
"I am not going with you, dad. I LOVE HIM." - Aalyah Mysterio
#SmackDown @reymysterio @WWERollins @WWE_Murphy @DomMysterio35 https://t.co/aETH7MlPew
Matthews then reflected on his booking in WWE and discussed how many incidents connected to each other in hindsight. However, he further stated that the lack of consistency took away a lot from the presentation of the said storylines.
"If I gave you a rundown of my stories and gave you the dot-points, you'd be like 'that happened? That's awesome, it sounds good.' But when there's weeks and weeks and a lot of disconnects, the story doesn't get put together how we actually viewed it. I just feel like they don't let stuff sit there and move progressively."
"It either sits in the same spot and it's on repeat, and we get over it and we get bored with the situation or there is no sitting there it's like 'we're going to do this...' and when you think it's about to get to the big explosion, it [doesn't]. It's like, in a movie reference, if we start off with a big bang at the start and the bad guy dies halfway through the movie," Matthews concluded.
Buddy Matthews' booking right before his WWE release
After a series of disheartening losses on the WWE main roster, Buddy Matthews' career started flourishing when he allied with Seth Rollins. The latter called himself the Messiah and adopted Matthews as one of his disciples. Together, the duo became extremely strong and even won the RAW Tag Team Championships.
They continued to work together on tormenting fellow WWE Superstars, including Rey Mysterio. Rollins' feud with Mysterio led to the arrival of the latter's son Dominik and daughter Aalyah Mysterio.
Buddy Murphy on #SmackDown: Hey bro. Aaliyah broke up with me after we got into an argument over how millennials wear jeans. Also she’s 19. We cool? https://t.co/dt6DeLSQqg
Aalyah also played Buddy Matthews' romantic interest on television and turned it into a key factor in his rivalry with Rollins on WWE SmackDown.
Matthews eventually defeated Rollins on the blue brand, but his storyline involving Aalyah ended soon afterward. He tried to reunite with the Messiah once again, but the creative team did not push forward with that angle.
Matthews made his last appearance on WWE SmackDown's go-home show before WrestleMania 37 when he competed in the André the Giant Memorial Battle Royal. Following that, he did not appear on television and was released in July 2021.