Opinion: Unanswered Wrestling Mysteries Chapter 3 - What Was In The Lockbox? - Part 2

Chapter One - Who Kidnapped Samoa Joe?
Chapter Two - Who Was the Higher Power of The Nexus?
Chapter Three (Part One) - What Was In The Lockbox?

Yay, you came back! Here's some more possibilities for what Shane O'Mac had tucked away in his box that locks.

4. A Large Amount of Timeshares in Puerto Rico

It would explain a lot.

5. All the copies of The Self Destruction of The Ultimate Warrior

It would explain significantly less but you know, I can't imagine Vince wants to remind people of the time he decided to be as petty as to market his own grudge with the Squared Circle's most incomprehensible bigot in one neat DVD package of a man's downfall from Warrior-sized portions of drugs. I don't think I can explain this one any better than to just give you a panel from a Warrior comic in which... this happens.

6. Vince's Prank Suggestions for Swerved Season 2

Vince loves to get hands-on with all his projects. So when he was pitched a wrestling prank show, he squealed with delight. Two of this favourite things: big, sweaty men and pranks. Sadly his notes for season two got a little... off-kilter. He wanted to put an electric buzzer on every chair of Madison Square Garden and have them go off just as Roman Reigns entered to force them to give him a standing ovation, he wanted to hide Zack Ryder somewhere in Chessington World of Adventures and not tell him they weren't filming just to see how long he'd stay there, he really wanted to make Mamps (Man Clamps) a thing but wouldn't tell anyone what they were, one note just said 'Kill Santino?', no one yet knows if he meant for real or not, he wanted Michael Cole to walk around Central Park whispering 'Mountain Dew: Do the Dew' in people's ears then running away giggling like the Laughing Gnome, he wanted to dress up Big Show like R-Truth and vice versa. White/Black-face and all. He wanted to release Cody Rhodes, send him to the Indies and have him win all the titles in three star matches and take them back to him so he could sit on them like a wrestling Smaug. 

Along the way, he started to forget what the line between 'prank' and 'weird act of megalomania' was.

7. An explanation for Dean Ambrose & Baron Corbin's hair lines

Where are all the full manes of Smackdown Live going? Were they in the Lockbox? Did Vince want Styles to be treated as the L'Oreal soaked lion he is so he stole loads of the main event talent's hair? How did Ziggler manage to get away with his Golden Fleece? Is that why Kalisto wears a mask to cover his embarrassing lack of hair? No one knows, this is pure speculation. The fact that this storyline existed months before the Brand Split was even publicised either hints at a plot hole or that Vince is that well prepared that he is always thinking six-to-eight months ahead which is DEFINITELY TRUE.


8. Some bullshit cop-out that would have satisfied no one.

I don't know, maybe they'd have just filled it with pictures of Scott Hall or Branston Baked Beans or another Lockbox. And in that Lockbox, another Lockbox. And just keeps those Russian Nesting Lockboxes going deeper and deeper until we're so befuddled by the prop department's ability to provide smaller lockboxes that we all forget what this was about in the first place. Wasn't it something to do with Shane? Was The Undertaker there? Did we all watch about 40 minutes of submission holds just to see one moment where a Hot Dad nearly dies for our entertainment? Was it worth it?* Was The Vincent Kennedy McMahon Award for Excellence just a collective dream incepted by a dying God? Was it you Murder Clown? Did you do this you sick fuck? But that would never happen because RAW is the home of logical, progressive storytelling. No loose ends up there, eh, Triple H? We all know exactly why you turned on Seth Rollins. Sometimes, I despair for the state of modern storytelling, I truly do.

*Yes.

9. Mitch

#JusticeForMitch.

Well, that's nine possible explanations which is...erm...nine more than WWE gave you. Praise be to Jozef.

Words & Images: Jozef Raczka - (@NotJozefRaczka)

Editing: James Marston - (@IAmNotAlanDale)

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Opinion: Unanswered Wrestling Mysteries Chapter 3 - What Was In The Lockbox? - Part 1

Chapter One - Who Kidnapped Samoa Joe?
Chapter Two - Who Was the Higher Power of The Nexus?

A lot happened in the WWE in 2016: AJ Styles turned up, the brands got split again, Brock Lesnar got murdered by your Dad's ripped friend, Bill, something called a Wild Card Finals. Despite a year full of big questions and many big answers, there is one question that many people still ask to this very day: What was in that lockbox? Let's take you back to the halcyon days of the 22nd of February 2016. Vince was in the ring to announce the very first Vincent Kennedy McMahon Legacy of Excellence Award which unsurprisingly he awarded to his daughter, the stylish and unlikely to ever get demoted, Stephanie McMahon. When much to everyone's surprise (that's a rare use of that phrase without sarcasm, kids) 'Here Comes The Money' hits and out came Hot Dad Shane himself, big money Shane McMahon to run down the poor business practices of the WWE, his sister and basically leave everything in what I believe the kids would call #rekt. He then announced to Vince he would be battling for control of the company and as collateral, he reminded Vince that he had a lockbox containing a secret Vince wouldn't want to come out. So Vince put him in a match at Wrestlemania against The Undertaker in Hell in a Cell. 

Some more things followed, Shane did the ghost punches, everyone called each other 'bitch' a lot and eventually after a solid ten-fifteen minute match trapped in a forty minute match's body, Taker won and per Vince's stipulation, the lockbox went away and Vince made Shane a Co-CEO because reasons. But here's the thing, you might have expected a Chekhov's lockbox like that to have been opened by now as we have to have hit Act Three of the story by now but no, it went away, never to be mentioned again. Till now. You see, we here at ATPW, don't like leaving a stone unturned so we've put our best minds together and come up with our explanations of what could have been in that lockbox and here they bloody well are...

1. A gritty, Nolan-esque reboot of The Gobbeldy Gooker.

What else could it be? Cast your mind back to 1990, a time when men were men and Fred Ottman was Tugboat. In the lead up to Survivor Series, the question on everybody's lips was 'what is inside that giant egg?' Not in fact the question they should have asked which was 'why is there an egg near this wrestling?' It turns out the obvious answer was Eddie Guererro's brother Hector, dressed as a turkey hatched out of the egg, calling himself The Gobbedly Gooker and proceeded to dance around the ring with 'Mean' Gene Okerlund who had to pretend Thanksgiving hadn't just died for him. The Gooker appeared intermittently over the next few months in the lead up to the Rumble but the fact that everyone seemingly hated it didn't lead to a devastating Gooker heel turn but just for him to disappear completely for about a decade. 

Now, for my theory to have worked, they would have needed to keep that lockbox out post-WrestleMania, by the commentary booth, until Survivor Series. They would have it turn up at Live events, on NXT, even turn up to and EVOLVE show, compete in a Triple Threat with Matt Riddle and Fred Yehi. Come Survivor Series, Hot Dad Shane would be getting a beat down from Braun Strowman when he'd manage to crawl over to this bizarrely human sized lockbox and unleash the gritty, Nolan-esque Gooker 2.0. As played by Shaul Guerrero. Just for legacies sake. It would be a brutal, nihilistic take on the dancing turkey with washed out colour palette and brooding, monotone voice modulation that could be put into just about any storyline and make sense. 

Now, why would Vince want this creation kept locked away? It had a Hans Zimmer-seque entrance theme that made CFO$ weep when they created it. Aiden English was finally able to get some main roster traction by playing on his real-life marriage to Guererro. Sadly, it would never be because they forgot to put air-holes in the box and the stand-ins for Shaul they had (because they couldn't risk injuring any more talent) all passed out and had to be sent to the farm with Randy Orton's multiple fake TV wives. Probably for the best as, like all Nolan creations, it had such a tragic backstory that the writing staff could never capture its depths of emotion. Sadly, all we are left with, is the thought of what could have been and the dreams of what may still.

2. The Scripts from that time Vince wanted to be the father of Stephanie's illegitimate child.

This actually nearly happened. Vincent Kennedy McMantuar actually wanted this to happen. Many people believe this was the moment that Stephanie McMahon realised that her father was more evil than the man he portrayed on television. Even when Mr. McMahon did this:

Luckily for Vince, even if he never got to have a TV Child with his REAL daughter, he did at least get to have that I Quit Match with Steph. That'll teach her to not want to have sex with Dad.

3. Vince's legitimate illegitimate son (aka not Hornswoggle)

Everyone here may remember shortly after dying in a limo crash, there were plans for a storyline about Vince's illegitimate son inheriting his company. Originally slated to be Mr. Kennedy, then revealed to be Hornswoggle (because of some real world shit that presumably we all know about and don't need to discuss again) then revealed to not be Hornswoggle (who was the son of Finlay because... haha Leprechauns) but it was never said who the real son was. Many people have hypothesised who it could be: Brad Maddox, Paul London - the Smiler upon exit, HHH (those people also wanted Vince to be Steph's child's father), Ross Kemp but there's only one person who makes sense: Husky Harris. Think about it, what if Irwin R. Schyster had two children: Bo Dallas and food presenter Mika Rotunda, Vince however had an affair with Stephanie Windham (he liked women called Stephanie) and the result was a third child named Windham who they pretended was not of Vince's lineage. 

As the years went by, he began performing under the name Husky Harris and made his way to Daddy's Own WWE and found himself thrown into the hot angle of the Nexus because Vince wanted all his children to be big names. Now, Harris wasn't quite as well-versed in Wrestling lore as Steph and Shane and quickly found he was floundering, especially within the weak sauce faction The Nexus became. He began hearing voices, a fair maiden named Abigail whispered to him. She told him to follow the buzzards. And he did. And more joined him along the way, they became a terrifying force, well for a while, till the losses started racking up. As the losses happened, so his promos became more tangential and less connected to reality but the question was asked, why would Mr.McMahon want to keep around an insane cult that wish death to his corporate machine? Because he keeps the spirit of his son, Husky Harris inside a lockbox, waiting for the day he can re-connect him to his body and vanquish the villainous spirit of Bray Wyatt once and for all. 

Obviously he didn't want to tell anyone because it's part of a grand plan, we all know that Vince plans everything years ahead right? No decisions made on the fly here.

*Check back at 6.30 GMT tomorrow for a shit load of other possibilities*

Words & Images: Jozef Raczka - (@NotJozefRaczka)

Editing: James Marston - (@IAmNotAlanDale)

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Twitter - @ATPWrestling 

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