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WWE Legend on The Rock Having a WrestleMania Moment With His Father Rocky Johnson: “He Didn’t Really Have a Choice”

Published 02/03/2022, 3:20 PM EST

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When father-son reunite, the crowd goes wild! Well, this is what happened when The Rock and Rocky Johnson had a moment at WrestleMania 13.

Now, this was something that was created by WWE and enjoyed by the fans, but did The Johnsons enjoy it?

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During a Supercut episode on AdFreeShows, Bruce Prichard revealed that when WWE realized that this was a good way to bring back Rocky Johnson, The Rock (who was playing Rocky Maivia at the time) didn’t have a choice.

“I don’t remember, he didn’t really have a choice. It was something that we had come up with and thought it would be a nice moment for him. And, it was a WrestleMania moment. We would always bring back Legends and we would bring back Hall of Famers and it was a nice way to kind of spotlight them and we pitched it. He didn’t have a problem with it and we did it.” H/t AdFreeShows

Rocky Johnson had come out to help his son take down Bob Backlund and The Iron Sheik. The latter duo attacked Rocky Maivia after he pinned The Sultan to retain the WWE Intercontinental Championship. They cleared the ring and shared a father-son moment in the ring!

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The Rock changed character to become successful in WWE

When Dwayne Johnson made his WWE debut, he was known as Rocky Maivia. This was a combination of his father, Rock Johnson, and grandfather, High Chief Peter Maivia. While he didn’t want to take this name, Vince McMahon convinced him.

He was being marketed as WWE’s first third-generation wrestler, but it didn’t quite take off. Even though Maivia was wrestling well, securing victories, and working hard, the WWE Universe didn’t enjoy it.

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In fact, the fans would often chant “Die Rocky Die” whenever he appeared.

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In April 2008, Johnson suffered a knee injury and took a break from WWE. When he returned, his character had gone through massive changes. He was now The Rock.

via Getty

He began insulting the audience who booed him. He insulted other Superstars and even interviewers. Interestingly, the fans responded positively to the new character Dwayne Johnson had adopted.

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Of course, the rest, as they say, is history! Everything worked out really well for The Rock in WWE, and he moved to Hollywood after attaining peak success in pro-wrestling.

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Written by:

Shuvangi Sen Chaudhury

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Shuvangi is a senior WWE and AEW author at EssentiallySports. She has over 2000 published WWE articles and also has experience in content operations with Forbes. Having completed her undergraduation from Royal Holloway, University of London, Shuvangi is closely aligned to the fitness industry, having amateur skills levels in tennis and basketball while rowing at a regatta level.
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