Now that it’s all over, was John Cena’s final year a success or a failure?
Never say never in professional wrestling. Retirement is not a word to be taken seriously between the ropes, but in John Cena’s case, it’s been repeated since the year began – 2025. *really* was it.
Saturday’s long-awaited conclusion indicated nothing different. We haven’t seen a retirement tour quite like Cena’s past 12 months before, but the man earned and deserved a send-off of this degree. Unfortunately, now that we have the full picture from WWE, the way it was shaped wound up rougher around the edges than many hoped.
What Didn’t Work
As the ultimate company man, Cena has made plenty of excuses and given countless non-answers as to how he’s felt about the handling of the final year of his in-ring career. Whether it was Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson or WWE’s fault for why things went off the rails after Elimination Chamber in March, that’ll likely forever be up for debate. What we do know is there was a grave mishandling of arguably the biggest heel turn WWE has ever executed, which Cena has since admitted was done purely for the moment.
Not much more explanation is needed regarding why the run afterward felt as flat and empty as it did.
It’s still easy to make the case that the heel turn was the greatest scene from Cena’s final year, though if you only look at it in a vacuum. Hindsight — and the knowledge of how the story swiftly stumbled over its own feet — absolutely destroys its value. The fact that it’s an afterthought all these months later tells you everything you need to know.
Even the path to Cena’s turn was questionable. It started with February’s Royal Rumble, and Cena’s teased victory only for him to lose to Jey Uso — a controversial booking choice in its own right. After that, Cena simply declared his entry in the Elimination Chamber match. No story. Nothing. Despite losing, he was just in it out of the blue, seeking a final chance to try and become a 17-time world champion.
There were some promising moments to start Cena’s heel run, at least in terms of the selection of feuds he was given, but the recurring problem of how many PLEs WWE runs in the modern era came into play once more. Cena had plenty of easy history to dig into with his oldest rivals like Randy Orton and CM Punk, but the rapid — and random — nature of their reunions made little sense and stopped each one from reaching its full potential. In most cases, Cena’s matches as a heel also followed the same formula: Overbooking and ref bumps galore.
If anything, this farewell tour unfortunately reinforced the old, tired take that Cena never put young talent over properly. The only up-and-coming names to really benefit from the past year were Dominik Mysterio — and even then, the value of the Intercontinental Champion’s win was diminished by yet another *moment* with Liv Morgan’s return and interference — and Logan Paul. With the latter, despite their singles match being decent, builds around *anything else* mentioned could’ve been a better use of Cena’s limited time.
Ultimately there was just little cohesion to any of this retirement tour, and everything could’ve intertwined better.
What Did Work
The best moments of Cena’s 2025 undoubtedly came after his last world title reign ended.
Bell-to-bell, the Cody Rhodes rematch at SummerSlam was easily Cena’s best of the year. Then you had the AJ Styles match at Crown Jewel, which delivered on all fronts, paying homage to each legend’s iconic careers in more ways than anyone anticipated — almost entirely out of fan service and at Cena’s request.
Circling back to Punk, Cena’s pipebomb callback was admittedly a personal favorite highlight of mine, and one that can stand alongside the aforementioned matches as the run’s peak.
It all led to Gunther as Cena’s final opponent, who won his way through a tournament featuring only two young, rising hopefuls. In Cena’s own words, he wanted to go out by giving someone the same opportunity he was granted when he approached Kurt Angle in 2003 to launch WWE’s “Ruthless Agression Era.” This was far from that, as the 38-year-old Gunther has been one of the best in the world for years, having already held a WWE world title and broken the record for the promotion’s longest Intercontinental title reign. Nonetheless, Saturday’s final match did exactly what it was meant to do.
As expected, a finale with a technician of Gunther’s caliber was as safe, surefire, guaranteed-quality of a match as one could’ve asked for. It hit all the right notes and ultimately ended with the legend accepting that his time was up, and the crowd showering the heel Gunther — and WWE — with boos (and some particularly spicy chants). Without the moments bookending the match itself, there wasn’t a ton this weekend that added to Cena’s overall run. He was up against one of the best, so of course he was going to lose. It’s more about how he did, and the reminder that even superheroes can be humanized.
What Remains Forever Baffling
Sadly, some of 2025’s worst overall wrestling bookings came at the expense of “Big Match John.” The R-Truth saga was another that fizzled into obscurity, wasting a great opportunity that dropped in the palm of WWE’s hand. Worst of all, though, was Brock Lesnar’s squash of Cena to start Wrestlepalooza and WWE’s partnership with ESPN.
Since Lesnar is continuing to stick around into 2026, Cena defended the decision ahead of his final match, claiming Lesnar could use the elevation as he gets back into the fold — the ultimate company-man answer about a fellow legend who needed zero build. In truth, the entire saga was completely and utterly pointless, other than to, of course, pop another *moment* and draw eyeballs, all while wasting everyone’s time.
Final Verdict
To put a bow on Cena’s final year, we have to hand out his final Crown grade. It’s an interesting one to dissect, as 2025’s ambitious retirement tour certainly left its mark, for better or worse. The highs were high, however the longevity of WWE’s storytelling lacked sustainability, and the lows were *quite* low.
In a way, Cena once again reverted to his “Prototype” days, booking out such an experimental concept over the course of a year. And with it, he once again made history — just not as much as he should have.
👑 Cena’s farewell run Crown grade: C- 👑