WWE MATTEL Elite Collection - Series #102 - Sami Zayn (HKN95)

Product Information

Maybe Zayn simply isn’t capable of doing his signature moves anymore. It happens. Time catches up with every wrestler, and all we can do is enjoy their work while we have them. I cherish every moonsault Kevin Owens does on his battered knees, because one of them will someday be the last. I saw what might have been Tetsuya Naito’s very last Stardust Press with my own eyes, there in the Tokyo Dome with 40,000 fans screaming with joy, and I’m content with that. If we never see another Blue Thunderbomb because Sami Zayn’s shoulders can’t handle the strain, then that’s reality and must be borne.

The Barricade Moonsault. This is a move that Zayn added to his regular arsenal after he moved from NXT to the main roster in 2016, a move that would be hard to do elsewhere thanks to the extra-large padded barricades that WWE uses. When his opponent attempts to whip him into the barricade, Zayn instead pulls victory from the jaws of defeat and leaps atop the barricade, transforming his momentum into a moonsault that takes out his foe. The Topé con Giro. A wild headlong dive over the ropes and out of the ring at the opponent, with a flip thrown in for good measure. A move of passion, intensity, and desperation. Like the suicide dive tornado DDT, Zayn usually pauses for a while before delivering it, to let anticipation build and the audience’s excitement grow to a fever pitch.

Sami Zayn Game Appearances

It’s one of his most graceful moves; a twisting, dancing pivot: the way his legs curve through the move, the way he shifts balance with such explosive suddenness. For a split second at the apex of the move, he leans out toward the audience, who can see and respond to the expression on his face.

His last topé is against Kevin Owens again, because there’s no one in WWE, and few people in all of wrestling, who’ve been taking Zayn’s moves as long as he has. With their history—in WWE as well as out of it—Zayn will always get just a little bit more babyface shine when they meet up as heels, so it makes sense that the last iterations of some of his most spectacular moves would happen against Owens.Once there was a brilliant wrestler with a moveset honed over decades to perfectly evoke joy, express hope, and create connection with the audience. But when he fell into despair, he gradually lost his faith in his own moves. His joy no longer strengthened him, his hope no longer lifted him, his caring no longer sustained him. As he sank further into bitterness, he gave up more and more of what made him himself, until he was just a shadow of what he used to be. Eventually, he gave up wrestling and tried to content himself with being the voice for others’ success. When his desire for glory finally outweighed his fears, he found himself ill-equipped to be champion without constant help. Despair has stripped him of everything he ever cared about. But here’s the thing: Remember that his friendship with Owens is based in part on his acceptance of Owens’ assertion that all of his style and all of his brilliance has gotten him absolutely nothing that matters—no cold, hard proof of superiority—in WWE. Zayn still has the braggadocio. It’s the solid, stable confidence underneath it that’s been eroded by his friend and by years of struggle. Without confidence in yourself, how can you go flying over the ropes into the void? The character doesn’t have that anymore to buoy him. So he stops doing it. Zayn does the suicide dive tornado DDT for the last time against his friend and ally Kevin Owens, when they’re forced to fight each other in February 2018, as tensions build toward WrestleMania. The audience reacts as it always does: you can hear startled giggles of glee and shrieks of delight as Zayn leaps away from them. They cheer involuntarily. None of which can mean anything to Sami Zayn’s character anymore. It’s not just that he’s a heel and heels aren’t supposed to elate the crowd, it’s that his character doesn’t care about their reaction anymore. Their happiness gives him no energy, so there’s no real reason to do it as opposed to any other safer, easier move. Why bother?