Being seven-foot-tall, weighing between 400 and 500 pounds, Big Show definitely stands out when you look at the WWE roster, especially because he has been referenced as the ‘second coming’ of Andre the Giant.
In WCW, he was billed as the son of Andre so he has had some extremely large shoes to fill. In various points of his career, he has had a comedic element to him which seems unfair and that WWE are using his size for that reason but he was always really good at comedy. He has multiple championship reigns, throughout WCW and WWE, and has had some extremely memorable moments which you can’t be surprised about because anything he would do would be memorable.
The only issue fans always had with Big Show was his constant face and heel turns, sometimes it got to the point where people couldn’t keep up with it. However, it does show that WWE see him as a good pair of hands to have around to put over other talent, which we all know is true.
Despite featuring on multiple Wrestlemania cards, Big Show never really had a defining ‘Wrestlemania Moment’ until Wrestlemania 28 in 2012. He was feuding with current Intercontinental Champion, Cody Rhodes who would continuously bring up Show’s failures at the previous show of shows. Rhodes would actually focus on the embarrassing moments of Show’s matches making him look more of a fool than he actually is, and also costing him matches in the run up to Wrestlemania.
Like I said in the introduction, he was there for comedic foil so Cody had a lot of ammunition to use on him. On the main card of Mania 28, Big Show would get his defining moment where he won the Intercontinental Championship from Cody after hitting him with the WMD. The title did change hands again a month later at Extreme Rules in extraordinary circumstances under the rules of a tables match, Show got dropkicked from the apron where he stepped on the table and broke it. Despite only holding the strap for a mere four weeks, he still won at Wrestlemania, got that moment and silenced Cody Rhodes.
After being ousted from the Corporation, a freshly face Show began feuding with The Big Boss Man in one of the most ridiculous and infamous feuds to date. This all came about because The Undertaker, Show’s former tag team partner, got injured. Big Boss Man crashed the funeral of Big Show’s father, outside of kayfabe, Show’s father had passed years before. The angle resulted in Big Boss Man towing the casket away from the grave with an emotional Big Show clinging on to the casket for dear life. After defeating Big Boss Man, Albert, Mideon and Viscera at Survivor Series 1999, Show looked for a fresh challenge.
That was the WWF Championship which he won after defeating The Rock and Triple H in a triple threat match on the same show. His reign was short lived as he only defended it once, against Big Boss Man at Armageddon, before he lost it back to Triple H on the first episode of RAW in 2000. Despite it being short lived it was still a huge achievement for Show to win the title after his feud with Boss Man was voted the ‘Worst Feud of the Year’ by the Wrestling Observer. Additionally, he was still in his first year of WWE only signing with the company in February 1999.
An extremely recent entry as it was only released on to Netflix yesterday but he is the first WWE superstar to have a Netflix show named after him and for him to star in it. Pretty impressive if you ask me. The Big Show Show is a comedy about Show’s life but in an even more kayfabe world where he plays himself, a retired wrestler being a stay at home dad and role model to his children. His teenage daughter moves in with him and his family and shows the character dealing with another daughter to look after, one much older than the two daughters already in the show. Due to his years of comedy in WWE, it shows to why he got this role in a comedy TV show, he has always done well is the literal and figurative centre of attention in any room he’s in.
Possibly, the best period of Show’s career in my opinion. At this point, Show had taken a couple of hiatuses and switched between heel and face but he returned in September 2012 as a heel attacking fan favourites, Brodus Clay and Tensai. He defeated Randy Orton a few days later to become number one contender for the World Heavyweight Championship, held by Sheamus. First time of asking, at Hell in a Cell, Show won the World Title from Sheamus in a career resurgence of his. He and Sheamus went to absolute war in multiple different matches spanning the course of about two months, with matches at Survivor Series and TLC. It all tied in beautifully as well, Sheamus got himself disqualified at Survivor Series after attacking Show with a chair, at TLC, Show brings out his own massive chair. After he finished up with Sheamus, or so he thought, Show moved on to Alberto Del Rio but Sheamus interfered in their title match on an episode of Smackdown.
Show then decided to bully Ricardo Rodriguez in a match which led to a Last Man Standing match on Smackdown between Show and ADR with Show dropping his title to the aristocrat after he was buried by the announce table. This reign at this time in someone’s career serves two purposes; a resurgence in the career of the more experienced competitor and for them to put over a fresh, new wrestler down the road. That is what this served to do, yes, Del Rio had won the Rumble two years prior but he was still new to the WWE and this was his first World Heavyweight Title and his transition into the face wrestler of the Latino fanbase.
One of the best storyline periods in WWE was the reign of tyranny from The Authority between 2013 and 2015. Show was picked as one of the members of Team Cena who was going against Team Authority with the ruling that if Team Cena won, Triple H and Stephanie were gone from WWE TV. Technically, Show won the match at Survivor Series 2015 after Sting debuted and cost the match for The Authority but Show did what he always did earlier in the match; turned heel. He knocked out team mate, John Cena, shook the hand of Triple H and left the match.
He, alongside Corporate Kane, were the two heavies for The Authority, usually flanking with golden boy, Randy Orton. Show did explain himself following the Survivor Series, he did give valid reasons as to why he turned heel; he’s a family man and The Authority had made his life hard in the past so he bit his tongue and joined them. The old saying goes ‘if you can’t beat them, join them’, which he did just a little too late. All he had to do was wait a half hour and The Authority were gone but each to their own. Show would go onto to have some mediocre matches in his time with The Authority but it was more that moment when he turned, shook a very confused Triple H’s hand and would leave the arena.
He is a great heel, he’s a large guy who can probably kill half the roster if he wanted to. He did serve a purpose again, like with his title run in the previous entry, he was always there to put over Roman Reigns, the man WWE were serving up to be the leader of the company.
There is no doubt in my mind Paul Wight will be in the WWE Hall of Fame real soon, despite never being the dominant World Champion people thought he could be, he has always been a constant in WWE. For the management, he’s a safe pair of hands and a very good one at that.
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