Seth Rollins is all about EMBRACING THE VISION, and it turns out his latest WWE character comes from a real place.
Rollins was this week’s guest on Out Of Character with Ryan Satin and he talked about how he’s not too sure if “Seth Rollins” is a huge part of who he really is, but thinks there’s a little bit of him in all of his incarnations over the years.
“I’ve been the Seth Rollins character in some incarnation for the better part of nine years almost. And the arc of the character has been pretty wild, I assume there are still parts of me in every bit of the character from The Shield to whatever I’m doing now with the hair and the suits,” Rollins said, “but I don’t know how much of it is entirely me, or an idea I have of myself, people’s perception of me. I just don’t know anymore. It just kinda goes and the motion is unstoppable at this point.”
When asked if he pushes for reinvention in his work, Rollins said it’s more or less an organic thing that happens at the end of his respective runs, but he’s pretty much been free to figure out which way he needs to lean into things.
“Sometimes they just give me a ball and don’t tell me which way to run and I’ve got to kinda figure out what that’s going to look like. That’s sorta what happened at the end of the ‘Burn It Down’ iteration of the character going to The Messiah version. I didn’t know how that was going to look, and you can see if you look at some parts of my career that it’s kinda like these little few month windows of trying to figure out what it is that I’m going to do,” Rollins explained, “and that was a big one, the most recent one.”
“So obviously, it’s just about trying to cultivate this personality that’s different, but not too far from what people are familiar with. And that can be difficult sometimes too, because the best wrestling is when it’s real to life, close to life, and for me, you can’t go too far outside the box when it comes to my character. I’m not The Undertaker, I’m not Bray Wyatt,” Rolls noted, “so it’s been an interesting ride, to say the least. When I look back on it all, it’ll be pretty cool.”
On my COOL GUY PRIVATE JET TO TAMPA! Can’t wait for ANOTHER HUUGE SMACKDOWN tomorrow night feat. YOURS TRULY & crew! It’s gonna be SO GOOD! pic.twitter.com/HhxhGM7Taj
— Seth “Freakin’” Rollins (@WWERollins) March 25, 2021
Rollins was asked if he still tries to root his character in reality, and he agreed, saying it’s intentional because it’s the kind of wrestling he’s always been a fan of. Speaking in terms of how “informed” people are today, he says if you’re not going to like a wrestler as a fan, it has to be believable and there has to be some truth to what he’s saying on TV or else people drop the veil and think he’s ‘just playing a character’.
“There’s got to be some element that people think is real, whether that’s we do that on social media or something else to try and tie it all in, because our real lives and characters are so tied together, it’s a wild time to be in the industry. But yeah, to answer the question,” Rollins said, “I definitely feel like there’s gotta be a little touch of reality in there to hook people.”
When asked about his social media return, Rollins first explained that he deleted Twitter from his phone because it created a negative environment for him personally, but explained what finally brought him back.
“I hate social media. [laughs] I really dislike it, and I had deleted the Twitter app from my phone for the better part of a few months because it was, to me, it created a real toxic environment in my own head. And as I was becoming a new father, I needed to not waste my time on that. It was actually my fiancee / wife who [said], ‘You should think about it. I know you hate it and you don’t like being on the apps, but you should think about it.’ I was like ‘ahhh….’ and I looked around and no one was really doing it, so I said to hell with it and I’ll give it a shot and see what happens. The response has been pretty good so far.”
Satin noted that there’s some humor to the fact that Becky Lynch was the one that pushed him back onto social media since her huge push began because of it, and Rollins joked that Twitter didn’t make people like him as a babyface, so he’d try to get some heat with it. Rollins went on to say that it’s a weird app and a weird way to live, but Lynch told him to not take what’s said on the app personally and he needs to approach it with a different perspective. He noted that it’s still hard to not take some of it personally, but towing that line of being reality-based helps.
“Yeah, we can have a lot of fun and type in all caps, but if you think it really bothers me and it grinds my gears, it’s going to give you more of what you’re looking for, I guess. Bless me for catering to them, I hate it, but here I am.”
Check out the full interview below:
