Heading into March's Elimination Chamber, Cody Rhodes was presented with the opportunity by Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson to sell his soul and join forces with the Final Boss. He refused, and in a moment that shocked the world, John Cena finally turned heel.
The Rock vanished after that, and while Travis Scott briefly returned at WrestleMania after being part of Cena's turn (we're still not sure why), the rapper was another non-factor when all was said and done. As for the heel run itself, it divided opinions and has been deemed a let-down.
That was more down to WWE's booking than what Cena was doing, and it came as a blessed relief when he finally returned to his usual babyface persona ahead of SummerSlam. Regardless, The Rock and Scott's absence from the storyline—the former was never mentioned again—definitely took the wind out of Cena's sails.
During a recent interview with Cody Rhodes, the 17-time WWE Champion addressed their disappearance and, despite choosing his words carefully, it's clear that there's more than a little frustration and resentment.
"'Hey, you have The Rock and Travis Scott.' Awesome, we can plan all this stuff," Cena recalled. "'Hey, you don’t have those two guys anymore.' Not once did you and I, the whole world has had the conversation of, 'What would it have been like if?'"
"The two guys in it, with their d**k in the dirt, not once had a conversation about, 'Man, what would it have been like if we had those guys?' No. It was, 'What do we do now?" he continued. "Let's walk down hypothetical street. Let’s say everyone who showed up at the Chamber is active until August."
"That robs us of John Cena, Randy Orton, that robs us of John Cena, CM Punk, John Cena, Ron Cena, John Cena, AJ Styles, John Cena, Logan Paul, me, and you for the last one," Cena noted. "So yes, the story that might have been might have had star power, and gravity, and who knows what, but what we got by just being like 'these are the pieces left.' What we got, for me personally, was beautiful."
While the Last Real Champion seemingly doesn't regret how things panned out without The Rock and Scott, it's hard not to think about what might have been. At the time, Johnson was still inserting himself into the biggest and most newsworthy WWE storylines after his Hollywood career hit a stumbling block.
Somewhere long the line, The Rock decided to take a crack at being viewed as a serious actor in Hollywood and has dropped WWE like it's hot.
You can hear more from Cena in the player below.