'WWE: Unreal' cracks open a door the wrestling world has kept closed — until now

Yahoo

4 days ago

As John Cena embraced Cody Rhodes in Toronto at the conclusion of WWE's Elimination Chamber event in March, "WWE: Unreal" director Chris Weaver knew what was coming next. Cena had just punched his ticket into the main event of his final WrestleMania appearance, and his heel turn against Rhodes was about to rock the entire landscape of professional wrestling.
Twenty years of hustle, loyalty and respect had flown out the window, and in its place was Cena standing alongside The Rock and Travis Scott in wholly unfamiliar territory.
The move was something fans had waited years to happen, and when it finally came to fruition as Cena embarked on the final run of his WWE career, the fallout was dramatic.
With the wrestling community's attention gripped by the heel turn heard around the world, speculation and reports outlining how everything came together ran rampant.
Detailed in depth for the first time as part of the "WWE: Unreal" series on Netflix, Weaver — who's also a Senior Producer at NFL Films — was tasked with pulling back the curtain on WWE's holistic build to WrestleMania 41. Featured in the five-part series is an episode entirely dedicated to Cena's heel turn. Weaver walks fans through how The Rock was brought in to be part of the show and the process for WWE to land on the monumental creative decision that would disrupt Cena's legacy.
'WWE kept a tight circle,' Weaver tells Uncrowned. 'I didn't find out about the heel turn until minutes before it was going to happen. And when I found out, my immediate reaction was, 'S***, we don't have a lot of coverage on this.''
Weaver says to help unpack the story, he interviewed WWE Executive Director Bruce Pritchard, writer Ed Koskey and Chief Creative Officer Paul Levesque. The plan from there would be to use the interviews to help drive the story, offering their own perspectives on how everything came together within the tight circle.
In an exclusive clip shared with Uncrowned before "WWE: Unreal" premieres Tuesday, Levesque details how the creative decision was relayed to WWE President Nick Khan, The Rock, Travis Scott, Rhodes and Cena, in that order.
More than a year ago, before WWE embarked on this project, the promotion unveiled 'WrestleMania XL: Behind the Curtain,' detailing the chaotic build to Rhodes finishing his story against the Bloodline and winning his first WWE title. Weaver speculates that the documentary was a good testing ground for WWE to gauge the response fans would have from getting a rare picture into what goes on behind the scenes.
The reaction was enormous, garnering 5 million views over the span of the past year ahead of the official launch of "WWE: Unreal."
'My opinion is, I think it certainly helped them get to the point where they're like, 'Alright, let's go ahead — and not just pull back the curtain, let's tear it down,' so to speak,' Weaver says.
The wheels started turning for Weaver's involvement around October 2024, when he and his team were brought to Stamford, Connecticut, to meet with WWE. By early December, plans were set in place around how Weaver's team would capture content, beginning with placing robotic cameras in the WWE writer's room.
'I think the first frame NFL Films shot was robotic cameras in the writer's room. And that was the first time I was struck by what we were about to go into, meaning how much access we were going to have,' Weaver says.
'The cameras start rolling and we see the whiteboards in the room and it's got their season laid out on it. And I was immediately struck, 'Holy cow, this is what the world's never seen before.' I knew it was going to be special. When I saw those whiteboards in the room on our cameras, I knew we were onto something.'
Weaver, who says he was not much of a wrestling fan coming into the project, was methodical with how he partnered with his team, Netflix, and the WWE in structuring the series. With nearly 25 years of experience across NFL projects that included "Hard Knocks" and "Peyton's Places," Weaver says his outlook featured fresh eyes and a fresh perspective alongside showrunner Erik Powers, who is a "tremendous WWE fan.'
Weaver says he knew 'virtually nothing going in about the roster and storylines.' Powers, on the other hand, 'had a constant finger on the pulse of WWE. He was very highly aware of how the wrestling world and the dirt sheets and just the whole culture of wrestling might view the show, what they would be interested in, what might move the needle for them,' Weaver says.
The dynamic between Weaver and Powers opened discussions and debates around their approach, identifying what was too far into the weeds and how they could balance appeasing both the wrestling world but also welcoming others from outside of the core wrestling audience.
'You can't satisfy everybody,' Weaver says. 'I would say you want the fans to enjoy it, so you don't want to dumb it down so much that they are put off by it. But at the same time, you don't want to alienate the newcomer.'
The end result is an intentional focus on not just dropping fans into a ton of writer's meetings. Rather, the series finds a perfect balance between introducing how WWE marches toward its tentpole events, while digging far enough behind the scenes to appease the diehards.
The five-episode series has an emphasis on the human side of wrestling and all the excitement, anxiety, and stress that comes with it. Fans will meet Phil Brooks, aka CM Punk, the man who's overcome with emotion in Gorilla position before fulfilling his dream of main-eventing WrestleMania. They'll hear from Ashley Fliehr, aka Charlotte Flair, and will see how she navigated a difficult build to her WrestleMania match against Tiffany Stratton.
Weaver and his team weigh personal stories with wide-reaching moments, offering a zoomed-out view of the storylines that consumed the build from the Royal Rumble 2025 through WrestleMania 41.
He compares the structure of the series to "Hard Knocks" blended with Netflix's "Quarterback," with a deep dive into the characters that make WWE thrive, while showing the behind-the-scenes moments that build to major storylines.
As fans embark on this journey, further behind the scenes in pro wrestling than many have ever ventured, Weaver is struck by how much thought and detail goes into the shows. Ultimately, what he hopes fans take away is that the series strikes an emotion with the audience and offers a new respect for the work that goes into a sports league with no offseason.
'The amount of thought that they put into this product and these weekly shows is amazing,' Weaver says.
'There's a lot that goes into this. And when you can see it, I think it gives you a whole other respect for the product and the entertainment and what it is. I hope audiences will see that, 'WWE: Unreal' audiences will see that and feel that, because I certainly did.'