When Daniel Bryan turned heel, he introduced a completely new persona as someone who fought for the environment and called out fans for not caring for the planet they live on. Now, though, he's back to being the leader of the Yes Movement and reveals that there's a very good reason why he hasn't been wearing WWE-licensed merchandise.
"I'm working with the WWE and its merchandise team," he says. "In that whole run, while they did make a Daniel Bryan 'Planet's Champion' T-shirt, I never wore one to the ring. One of the things I've always felt very guilty about is the amount of stuff that I've specifically sold to people, and I've never done it with the intention of, 'Oh, I want to sell all these things.' It's just part of what you do. It's like, OK, you wear your shirt to the ring, so that people see your shirt and buy it."
"Well, this was a good opportunity for me to be like, 'Oh, no, I shouldn't wear a shirt to the ring, because I'm the planet's champion.' And that's one of the things that I can criticize other people for — they're just out there for other people's money."
Bryan went on to reveal that now he's a babyface again, WWE has been pushing to make new t-shirts for him, but he wants to ensure that future releases are made out of recycled materials and that the plan right is for five plastic water bottles to be used for each of them. He's also pushing for a tree to be planted for every one that's sold and that's what's causing the delay.
Interestingly, he also revealed what led to the end of his Champion of the Planet character. "When I was doing the environmental thing, they actually told me to stop talking about the environment because they told me it was a political issue and we don't want to deal with politics. I said, 'It's not a political issue. It's a scientific issue, and the sciences pretty much prove it.'"
With any luck, we'll get to see these shirts sooner rather than later!