Yes!: My Improbable Journey to the Main Event of
Wrestlemania is the latest New York Times Bestselling autobiography by none
other than internet fan-favourite wrestler, Daniel Bryan (aka. Bryan
Danielson). The book takes us through a
journey from his independent wrestling roots to his current run as a WWE
superstar. We follow him on his humble
journey as he lives off of peanut butter sandwiches, jet-setting across the
world to make a few bucks and finally landing himself in the WWE, the wrestling
world’s biggest stage. He shares some
stories about his family and about falling in love (with current Diva, Brie
Bella). Although the broad span of the
book covers his early career journey, each chapter opens with a short story on
the days leading up to the biggest match of his career: main eventing
Wrestlemania (28).
If you’ve followed the WWE the past few years, you’ve
undoubtedly seen the popular Bryan, or at least his famed YES chants which has
been seen across a wide variety of live sporting events. The heavily bearded Bryan is the poster boy
for the underdog so much that that particular aspect has been woven into many
of his storylines. He’s small, he’s
pale, he’s supposedly uncharismatic and yet, people love him. Perhaps more so than the Rock, Daniel Bryan
may be a true people’s champion.
I’ve only read a few wrestling biographies, that from Bret
Hart and two from Chris Jericho. The
journeys between the three wrestlers have a lot of commonalities. All three were undersized wrestlers (and
thus, not seen as true champions), all three were arguably underdogs in the
eyes of the fans, and all three are established technical wrestlers. Perhaps it speaks more to my taste in wrestlers.
I have to say though, between the wrestling biographies that
I’ve read, I feel as though Yes! was the least entertaining. Although I have no way of truly knowing, it
feels as though part of the problem may have been being filtered through WWE’s
publishing process. A lot of the emotion
that I was hoping to feel felt very muted.
A lot of details and stories I was hoping to hear about were completely
left off the book (i.e. the story of AJ Lee, his thoughts and reactions to
various wrestling deaths, etc). I can’t
help but feel that if his story was published outside of the WWE confines (like
that of Hart and Jericho), that it could have been more honest. There was so much more emotion in the biographies
of Hart and Jericho. I could really get
behind their struggles. That’s not to
say that the book is dishonest! Bryan
gives really candid thoughts on the current wrestling scene, which he calls a
parody of wrestling. And he’s
right. Go to any indie wrestling event
to watch wrestling. Go to any WWE show
to see a cartoon.
I would still recommend the book if you are a Daniel Bryan
fan, but I do feel the story pales in comparison with Hart and Jericho’s
biographies. But perhaps that’s not
saying too much, as those biographies are some of my favourite books in
general, outside of just wrestling biographies.
Til next time, later geeks!
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