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For many fans of WWE, the time Sami Zayn spent as “The Honorary Uce” in The Bloodline will go down as the true highlight of the faction's near-three-year stranglehold on the top of the RAW and SmackDown card.
A classic fish-out-of-water story, Zayn used his wit, his charm, and his exceptional comedic timing to create a character that was a fast favorite among fans, and an even bigger hit backstage, as he single-handedly went from a performer tasked with working with Logan Paul and Johnny Knoxville to an uber babyface capable of main eventing the Elimination Chamber and Night 1 of WrestleMania.
Discussing the creative opportunities Zayn added to The Bloodline with Rick Ruben on his Tetragrammaton podcast, Paul Heyman noted one storyline that The Bloodline opted against running with that would have taken inspiration from one of just two screenplays written but not directed by Quentin Tarantino.
“We're having a free-form creative expression here, so I will tell you something that I always wanted to say to Sami on television. I will never be able to say it on television because it's so inappropriate. I'm a big fan of the scenes in the movie ‘True Romance.' Like a lot of people, can't stand the entire movie. Just too long. But boy, you break it down scene by scene, and it's of the greatest movies ever made. Love Gary Oldman as Drexl in the movie. Christian Slater comes into Drexl's club and catches a beating from Drexl, and Drexl turns to his bodyguard, Marty, and he goes, ‘He must of thought it was white boy day. It ain't white boy day, is it? Marty goes, ‘No, man, it ain't white boy day,'” Heyman said via Fightful.
“I always wanted to do this thing with Sami [where I say], ‘You know what your problem is Sami? You thought it was white boy day. Take it from the one white boy on the Island of Relevancy, on the Island of Relevancy, it ain't ever white boy day.' Of course, there's no way that let me say that on television. It's not about the racial overtones to it, or the skin color of a Polynesian against the pale white Sami from Montreal, Quebec. It's about a mentality. Because Sami is as caucasian as a caucasian can be. He does not fit in on the on the Island of Relevancy. He just doesn't. I do because I'm the Wise Man. I'm the exception. I'm Tom Hagen. I'm the non Corleone in the Corleone family. I'm the adopted one.”
Now, excluding the fact that Zayn is not, in fact, caucasian, as he's the son of two Syrian Muslim refugees who relocated from Homs to Canada before he was born, the idea of playing up “The Honorary Uce's” misfit status in The Bloodline really wasn't as played upon as it might have been in the past, with the potential for an Owen Hart in the Nation of Domination-style story that was thankfully avoided. Still, it is interesting to hear about some of the storylines that didn't happen in relation to The Bloodline, with plenty more surely set to be expanded on in the years to come.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m5v327D8YhY&t=321s
Sami Zayn has long been a favorite of Paul Heyman.
Now for fans out of the know, Tetragrammaton wasn't the first time Paul Heyman decided to talk about Sami Zayn's spot in The Bloodline and how it impacted both the group and his own trajectory moving forward.
Discussing Zayn back in March after his loss to Roman Reigns at the Elimination Chamber but before his match with Kevin Owens against The Usos at WrestleMania 39, Heyman complemented “The Underdog from the Underground” for helping the storyline along by being one of the most compelling babyfaces of all time on the SI Media podcast.
“I didn’t imagine Sami Zayn becoming a massive part of this when Sami Zayn was becoming a massive part of. To his enormous credit, Sami Zayn seized the moment. We’d give him crumbs of a segment and he would just turn it into a moment that he had to connect with the audience with what I think has ended up becoming the most endearing character that we’ve presented in decades, if not ever,” Heyman said via TJR.
“As great of a talker as Sami Zayn is, and he is a magnificent talker, I think Sami resonates with the audience, just because Roman Reigns will turn to him and lean in on him about something, and Sami gets that hush puppy face, and that sad look on his face, and the camera zooms in on the sad look on Sami’s face, and everybody feels for him. He just endears himself to the audience.
“They absolutely fall in love with him and his plight and his pursuit of acceptance, which I think is a big part of this is that everyone can relate to the pursuit of acceptance, and that was the tale of Sami Zayn. He just did it so well, and did it so brilliantly, and with such authenticity, and with genuine angst on his face and pain when spoken down to, that people just felt for him, and as you know, it’s not just constrained to WWE. In any form of television, movies, Broadway plays, if you get the audience to feel for you, you know, touchdown, victory. It’s everything that a writer, director, producer, and performer seeks.”
Fast forward three months into the future, and Zayn is still one of the biggest babyfaces in WWE, with fans cheering him on to an incredible degree anytime his music hits and he takes the ring. If the goal of The Bloodline is to not only keep the Fatu/Anoa'i family on top but create new Superstars in the process, then Zayn is the poster boy of the angle's success.
