Yahoo Movies John Cena's career journey from WWE Champion to Hollywood megastar
As he retires from WWE and leaves wrestling behind, let's look at how John Cena became a powerhouse in the movie world.
John Cena has been a household name for wrestling fans since the mid-2000s. In fact, his place in the WWE landscape was so firmly entrenched that a lot of viewers were quite pleased when his career path broadened outside the squared circle. He's now one of Hollywood's biggest names.
Much like Dwayne Johnson and Dave Bautista, Cena has parlayed his talent for theatrical fighting in the ring on to the big screen. Like his predecessors, he has found a home in action cinema, but Cena's gift for comedy has seen his career diversify in other ways.
This weekend, Cena made a surprise appearance at WWE's Money in the Bank event in Toronto to announce that he is bringing his decorated wrestling career to an end. Going forward, he's a full-time movie star.
How did John Cena become WWE's most famous wrestler?
In 2002, John Cena debuted in WWE. He arrived as a young upstart standing up to the bullying bad guy Kurt Angle and answering an open challenge for a match. By the end of that year, Cena had developed the character that would make him a top-tier WWE star. As the "Doctor of Thuganomics", he was an arrogant and abrasive rapper who would perform insulting freestyle raps about his opponents.
By 2005, he was world champion. He modified the WWE Championship to give it a spinner design and subsequently became a dominant character in the company. In the years to come, he won and lost the title many times, but he was always the most famous name WWE had to offer.
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The rapper gimmick disappeared over time, with Cena transformed into a moralistic superhero-type figurehead governed by the mantra of "hustle, loyalty and respect". It was similar to the "say your prayers and take your vitamins" approach of Hulk Hogan during his 1980s heyday.
Cena was on top of the wrestling business and he stayed there for many years. He became a divisive figure, with fans bored by how frequently he would be chosen to win matches. Despite always being presented as a heroic character — a "babyface" in wrestling parlance — a vocal minority of fans booed him as enthusiastically as they booed any of the bad guys.
Read more: WWE stars turned actors: The wrestlers who switched the ring for Hollywood fame (Yahoo Entertainment)
Around this time, Cena had an infamous rivalry with Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson, leading to WrestleMania matches in both 2012 and 2013. During that rivalry, Cena's character criticised The Rock for leaving the wrestling business behind in search of Hollywood riches. A few years later, that would become very relevant.
How did John Cena transition from wrestling to movies?
At the height of Cena's WWE fame in the mid-2000s, the company had established WWE Studios in an attempt to produce film projects for its biggest stars. The Marine, in which Cena played the titular military man, was one of its flagship projects and Cena went on to star in subsequent films from the studio, including 12 Rounds and Legendary.
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None of these movies pulled up any trees financially and the critical reviews were not good, but they showed that Cena could transplant his wrestling charisma into a movie. And then, in 2015, everything changed.
Cena shed his direct-to-DVD action guise and delivered a rapid-fire trilogy of memorable comedy cameos. He sent up his own persona to great effect in Trainwreck, portraying Amy Schumer's gym-obsessed loser of a boyfriend, and popped up in both Sisters and Daddy's Home.
These three appearances made a big impact on Cena's career, showing his willingness to laugh at himself and do absolutely anything for a gag. There's a straight line between these movies and Cena's naked cameo at the 2024 Oscars.
Cena's career has become increasingly blockbuster-heavy since then, whether it's taking a lead role in Bumblebee or joining the ensembles of The Suicide Squad and Fast and Furious. More and more, he's being respected as a potential Hollywood leading man, whether it's in the worlds of comedy, explosive franchises, or family-friendly animation. He's a four-quadrant star in every way.
Read more: The story of Fast and Furious so far (Yahoo Entertainment)
Indeed, his performance in Fast X is the perfect combination of Cena's on-screen ability. It allows him to be an action star — he even deploys his signature "Attitude Adjustment" wrestling move in a fight scene — but also gives him the chance to do the goofy comedy he couldn't do when he was the scowling villain in F9.
Why is John Cena retiring from wrestling?
The reason it was worth mentioning that segment with The Rock earlier is because Cena has, in true Harvey Dent fashion, lived long enough to see himself become the villain. He's now the super-famous movie star who has to leave the ring behind.
Wrestlers-turned-actors always have to maintain something of a balancing act. They're always at risk of sustaining an injury in the ring and, when you're the first name on a movie's call sheet, you can't be running that risk every week on live TV. A movie star becomes much less desirable if there's a chance they could hold up an entire shoot for six months, costing tens of millions of dollars and putting people out of work.
Read more: When is WWE coming to Netflix? (Yahoo Entertainment)
Cena is also 47 years old and would have been winding down his career even without his interests away from the ring. Wrestlers are often able to work for a long time beyond their prime, with Chris Jericho still going strong at 53 and 1990s icon Sting only retiring earlier this year a few weeks before his 65th birthday. But for Cena, the time has come.
Watch: John Cena announces his WWE retirement
This also allows Cena to go out on top. In recent years, his appearances have been rare enough to still feel special, as a stark contrast to his over-exposure at the tail end of the 2000s. It makes sense for Cena to preserve that and use 2025 as a retirement tour, going out on a high with an array of fun contests against younger stars and one more blockbuster WrestleMania match.
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If Cena wins the WWE Championship once more, he will become a 17-time champion and pass Ric Flair as officially the most decorated champ in WWE history. That would be quite the way for Cena to cement his already undeniable legacy in wrestling, right before heading back to the red carpet and to Hollywood.
Maybe one day he'll be back on the stage of the Oscars as a winner? He should probably put on some clothes this time.
