A Chosen Destiny by Drew McIntyre

BOOK TITLE: A Chosen Destiny

AUTHOR: Drew McIntyre (ghostwritten by Sarah Edworthy)

YEAR: 2021

GENRE: Nonfiction

SUBGENRE: Wrestling Memoir

GRADE: B

If you’ve watched WWE from the late 2000’s to the 2020’s, you’ve seen the Scottish Psychopath Drew McIntyre on your screen, whether he was an arrogant heel, a brawling monster, or the WWE Champion during the pandemic era. If you want to hear his turbulent story about how he got to that pinnacle and all the obstacles between him and glory, you’ve cracked open the right book. I need to warn you, though, that this book reads like a lot of pro-wrestlers’ memoirs: a childhood dream turned reality with an overabundance of show-don’t-tell violations. Emotional moments that deserved time to breathe barely get a few sentences to describe how Drew was feeling in that moment, which is a shame considering some of the trauma he went through. “I was angry.” “I was sad.” “I wanted to wreck everything.” Not all of the writing is like this, but most of it is. That’s to be expected from celebrity memoirs. If that kind of milk-toast style bothers you or you’re not already part of the wrestling bubble, you may want to keep this book shelved. Otherwise, enjoy the ride!

If you can excuse the bland writing style, then you might be moved by some of these legitimately heartbreaking stories he tells. Winning the WWE Championship in an empty warehouse with no fans to cheer him on is the ultimate bittersweet moment in his career. It’s not nearly as soul-crushing as losing his physically disabled, yet highly optimistic mother to cancer in the middle of his WWE career. Or how about the time when he kept showing up to work plastered because alcohol was the only thing that brought him peace? What about the time when he was fired from WWE along with nine other wrestlers like he was an expendable foot soldier? These are all moments that would destroy any reader if they were explored in depth and with a more descriptive ghostwriter. They still tug at the heartstrings. They still hit me where it hurts. But like I said in the first paragraph, these legitimately painful moments needed time to breathe and develop. Just like Drew was robbed of his Wrestlemania crowd pop, we were robbed of a face full of tears. How’s that for irony?

I wrestled with myself (no pun intended) when trying to decide between a B or a C grade for this memoir. Ultimately, I settled on a B, because Drew McIntyre has an interesting enough life to justify penning a memoir. The way he talks about his obsession with wrestling as a kid and how he brought that fandom into his everyday life? That’s the stuff dreams are made of. Completely transforming his diet and lifestyle after getting fired by WWE? That and touring relentlessly on the indie circuit was exactly what he needed to get back into the company. Getting cheered on by his family in Scotland and his wife in America? That’s what kept him going every night. And then he eventually won the WWE Championship, but that, according to him, was only the beginning of much bigger plans. His newfound work ethic was an admirable thing to see in his process of maturity. But again, it would have meant more with better writing.

A Chosen Destiny is an interesting read, but only if you already follow wrestling. Maybe that was the whole point behind the marketing techniques. Maybe it doesn’t have to be massively appealing to be successful. Should I be more forgiving of books that have a super-niche audience? I’d like to think that’s a good idea. Maybe that’s why I’m being generous with my B grade instead of dropping it to a C. It is a good book for what it is, but I would only recommend it to other wrestling fans. In that respect, the memoir did its job. Drew McIntyre, on the other hand, will hopefully never have to do a long string of jobs ever again. Wrestling fans know what that means.

WWE Royal Rumble: Dean Ambrose vs. Kevin Owens

MATCH: Dean Ambrose vs. Kevin Owens in a Last Man Standing match for Ambrose’s Intercontinental Championship
PROMOTION: World Wrestling Entertainment
EVENT: Royal Rumble
YEAR: 2016
RATING: TV-PG for violence
GRADE: Pass

Working the independent circuit in professional wrestling will put hair on your genitals. Working that many matches around the world will give you a myriad of styles that will ultimately become your move set. In Mexico, the luchadors fly around the ring like ninjas. In Japan, they hit each other hard enough to turn the human body into one big purple bruise. In Europe, they do the exact same thing, but with emphasis on technical brawling instead of honor-bound martial arts. And then when you finally make your trip to WWE NXT and ultimately their main roster, you’ll have the crowd eating out of the palm of your hand.

Such are the success stories of Dean Ambrose and Kevin Owens, two badass warriors who cut their teeth for over a decade on the independent circuit. Dean Ambrose has United States and Intercontinental Championship reigns under his belt while Kevin Owens has NXT gold and an Intercontinental belt reign as well. At the Tables, Ladders, and Chairs pay-per-view in 2015, it was Dean Ambrose who won his first IC Championship from Kevin Owens. Ever since then, Owens has been in a horrible mood, bullying and brutalizing anybody in his path, Ambrose included.

There was only one way a rivalry of this much hatred could be settled: Last Man Standing rules at the Royal Rumble. There are no pin-falls, submissions, count-outs, or disqualifications. All you have to do to win this match is beat the living shit out of your opponent so badly that he cannot answer the referee’s ten-count. Heel announcer John Layfield put it best when he said the only thing limiting the competitors in this match is their own imaginations.

When you’re called The Lunatic Fringe like Dean Ambrose is, your schizophrenic visions pretty much guarantee you a colorful and violent imagination. Kevin Owens is a brawler by nature, so he’s no less dangerous with a steel chair or a wooden table. Ambrose and Owens wasted no time in putting their violent visions to good use. They started the match by slugging it out and watching each other get dizzy.

Then the action spilled to the outside and things really got chaotic. Kevin Owens was launched over the English-speaking announce table and landed in Michael Cole’s lap, thus breaking the poor guy’s glasses. Once he got power back in his headsets, Cole was actually cheering on Ambrose when he was swinging a bamboo cane at Owens.

Once the toys were out, they didn’t go to waste, no, sir. Kevin Owens power bombed Dean Ambrose through steel chairs, spear tackled him through the time keeper’s barricade, and fisherman suplexed him through a wooden table. And Ambrose was still staggering to his feet ready for a fight! The man doesn’t quit!

Then it was Ambrose’s turn to put a serious beating on his opponent. A double arm DDT on a steel chair would do the trick. So would an elbow drop through the Spanish announce table. And then there were more whacks with the bamboo stick. The steel stairs had seen crashes and burns from both men.

After enduring all of this hardcore violence, you would expect both men to be bleeding, burned out, and ready for ambulance rides. Hell, they hit each other so hard that maybe a hearse was necessary. They stood up on wobbly legs and punched each other some more. Kevin Owens gave his opponent a pop-up power bomb and Ambrose, being the loony tune he was, got up and wrapped a steel chair around Owens’ head before boxing him in the face.

A normal man would have quit under these combative circumstances. He would have nightmares for months and would have chugged enough Xanax to kill an elephant. He would have had hospital bills that most one-percent billionaires couldn’t even afford. These two warriors aren’t normal men. They get up and smash each other some more with steel chairs, bamboo canes, fists, feet, and head butts. And then they smash each other some more. And smash each other some more. At this point, the referee could count to a thousand. He could wait for a whole decade to go by and they would still thrash each other endlessly.

But it was one mistake by Kevin Owens that cost him the match. He set up two wooden tables outside the ring and stacked one on top of the other. Owens was also perched on the top turnbuckle, presumably for a moonsault. And then Dean Ambrose jolted back to life once more and shoved Owens off the turnbuckle, sending the Canadian grizzly crashing through both tables. Owens shivered several times in his laying position, but made no attempt to pull himself to his feet. At the count of ten, Dean Ambrose was declared the winner and undisputed Intercontinental Champion.

With the crowd chanting “This is awesome!” and carrying their momentum into the Royal Rumble match itself, it’s clear there were no losers in this match. Dean Ambrose is the rightful IC Champion, but Kevin Owens is a winner too in my mind. Those two beat the living shit out of each other so badly that they limped their way into the Royal Rumble match. How they weren’t even in wheelchairs was a mystery to everybody there. How Kevin Owens managed to eliminate fellow independent wrestler AJ Styles is beyond me. How Dean Ambrose was one of the final two men in that match left standing is something that would stump Nostradamus.

The fact that two men could put on an apocalyptic brawl and still be able to compete later on in the night should be a testament to how tough pro-wrestlers are. Getting clotheslined or body slammed is bad enough. Being driven through tables, smashed with a kendo stick, and slammed through steel chairs takes more guts than the stomach has room for. It was amazing Dean Ambrose and Kevin Owens didn’t have their own guts spread all over the arena that night. Yes, it’s a TV-PG rated pay-per-view, but you wouldn’t know it from how banged up and battered these ring warriors were afterwards. I’d even say this is an early contender for Match of the Year in 2016. Congratulations, you two. You just made an entire arena full of people shit their pants with excitement. Now it REALLY looks like a battlefield out there!

WWE Live From Madison Square Garden: Brock Lesnar vs. The Big Show

MATCH: Brock Lesnar vs. The Big Show
PROMOTION: World Wrestling Entertainment
EVENT: Live From Madison Square Garden
YEAR: 2015
RATING: TV-PG for violence
GRADE: Pass


On one side of the ring, you have a seven foot tall, 450 lb. giant with multiple championships and an Andre the Giant Memorial Battle Royal trophy on his resume. On the other side of the ring, you have a 6’7”, 285 lb. fighting machine with championships from the NCAA, WWE, and even the UFC to his credit. These two super heavyweights aren’t just big and burly. They’re legitimate athletes. They can steamroll any opponent put in front of them. They can put multiple people in the hospital at once. They’re fighters by nature. And even though they’re both past their primes, they keep getting bigger, stronger, meaner, nastier, and better. Only on the WWE Network will these two weapons of mass destruction be allowed to compete. What better place to hold the deadly fight than at Madison Square Garden, the world’s most famous arena and a staple of New York City?

Believe it or not, these two behemoths have survived each other’s onslaughts before. Their first recorded WWE match was in 2002 at the Survivor Series for Lesnar’s WWE Championship. 2002 was Lesnar’s rookie year and already he was dominating this turnbuckle jungle. He won the King of the Ring Tournament. He defeated The Rock to become the WWE Champion at age 25, the youngest at the time. He held multiple victories over The Undertaker. Nobody could stop this wrecking machine from hell…except for The Big Show, who with a steel chair and a little help from a treacherous Paul Heyman, pinned Brock Lesnar and won the WWE Championship.

As badly as these two men beat each other over that year, it wouldn’t compare to an episode of Smackdown in 2003, when Brock Lesnar once again had to defend his WWE Championship against The Big Show. Ass beatings were definitely in order, but the climax of the match didn’t come until Big Show was on the top rope and Lesnar had the idea of super-plexing this mega giant. Not only did Brock Lesnar have the Greek god-like strength to heave the 500 lb. man up, but when the two superstars crashed to the mat, the entire ring fell to pieces. The match was declared a draw, but that moment remained one of Smackdown’s most memorable.

Fast forward to the year 2014 when both The Big Show and Brock Lesnar had developed as brutally powerful athletes. They would meet again at that year’s Royal Rumble pay-per-view. The even itself was greeted with negativity due to Daniel Bryan’s absence from the actual Royal Rumble match, but if the fans ever needed a reason to cheer up, they got it when Brock Lesnar and Big Show’s match never got started. The reason for that being Lesnar’s vicious steel chair assault to Big Show, leaving bruises, blood, and slashes all over the giant’s body.

And now we fast forward to the year 2015 at WWE’s live event in Madison Square Garden. No more bullshit. No more draws, No more cheap shots. No more betrayal. Just straight up violence and nothing more. Though the match itself was relatively shorter than the rest of the matches on the card, it was no less brutal or deadly. It was a match that started with Lesnar attempting a double-leg takedown on Big Show and getting thrown over the top rope by Show instead.

The first few minutes of the match consisted of Lesnar trying to heave and toss around this 500 lb. warrior to no success whatsoever. Big Show decided to end it early with not one, not two, but three choke slams and a leg-hook pin. Even after falling seven feet three times, Lesnar got his shoulder up at two and the match resumed. Big Show was pissed. He was so pissed that he wanted to end it early again, this time with a knockout punch once Lesnar got to his feet.

Big Show didn’t get a KO victory, no, no, no. He got a one-way all expenses paid trip to Suplex City and Madison Square Garden was the capitol building. Brock Lesnar went behind the massive athlete, wrapped his arms around Big Show’s waist, and gave him not one, not two, not even three, but four German suplexes. Having enough strength to throw a 500 lb. man around like that says something about how much of a slayer Lesnar really is. And then this display of brutal strength was capped off with an F5 from Lesnar to Big Show, followed by a leg-hook pin for a full three count.

You think this is over? Aren’t you forgetting the bonus material? That’s right. Big Show actually got back up to his feet and flipped of his opponent. Granted, this titan was on spaghetti legs and couldn’t clear the cobwebs out of his thick skull, but he was clearly itching for another fight. Lesnar was more than happy to oblige. He got back in the ring and delivered an overhead belly-to-belly suplex to the massive ogre before picking his battered ass back up and giving another F5 for good measure. Needless to say, Brock was fully satisfied and walked away from the arena a happy man.

Big Show, on the other hand, walked to the backstage area holding his ribs and trying to maintain his equilibrium. When ringside announcer Eden Stiles said into her microphone, “Ladies and gentlemen, let’s hear it one more time for The Big Show!”, all the seven-footer heard was a chorus of boos.

Despite the short length of this match, the multiple displays of sheer power by Brock Lesnar were awesome to watch. Having The Big Show do a job for him was the right move by WWE. And not only was it an important victory for Brock, it was a convincing one. Big Show suffered losses over his career to men much smaller than him.

But this match didn’t feel excessively scripted. This match actually felt like two big men trying to outmuscle each other. Lesnar isn’t used to being the underdog in his matches, so him being victorious in definitive fashion is a huge momentum builder for what awaits him next: a Hell in a Cell match with The Undertaker. After tossing around a man twice his size like he was medicine ball, Brock Lesnar doesn’t look like an underdog anymore, especially not against The Undertaker in a match the latter made famous.

WWE Fast Lane: Roman Reigns vs. Daniel Bryan

MATCH: Roman Reigns vs. Daniel Bryan to determine the number one contender for Brock Lesnar’s WWE World Heavyweight Championship
PROMOTION: World Wrestling Entertainment
EVENT: Fast Lane
YEAR: 2015
RATING: TV-PG for violence
GRADE: Pass


The Samoan badass known as Roman Reigns burst onto the scene in WWE in 2012 as part of a faction called The Shield, alongside independent wrestling veterans Seth Rollins and Dean Ambrose. Together, The Shield had the gimmick of a paramilitary unit who would dominate matches and attack random superstars in the name of justice, using their superior teamwork. In mid-2013, Roman Reigns and Seth Rollins would eventually win the WWE Tag Team Titles and Dean Ambrose would win the United States Championship.

The most valuable player in this faction was Roman Reigns, a Samoan giant of a man who had the most eliminations in a Survivor Series tag match and in the 2014 Royal Rumble match. In 2013, he caught the attention of the Wrestling Observer Newsletter when they voted him Most Improved and as part of the Tag Team of the Year alongside Seth Rollins. Naturally, Mr. Reigns would receive a huge push from the company into main event status.

Because of Roman’s lack of experience and perceived lack of verbal skills, many in the WWE Universe feel his push was undeserved. In 2014, the Wrestling Observer Newsletter voted him in second place for the Most Overrated award, the actual winner being Kane. But it didn’t end there. In 2015, Roman Reigns would go on to win the Royal Rumble match and earn a spot in the main event at that year’s Wrestlemania.

On that fateful night, the casual dislike of Roman Reigns turned into fiery hatred. Despite being a baby face, Mr. Reigns was booed out of the building while the fans in attendance cheered for his opponent at Fast Lane, Daniel Bryan, who was eliminated early in the match despite his rapport with the fans. To quell the “controversy” surrounding the 2015 Royal Rumble pay-per-view, Triple H and Stephanie McMahon put together a match for Fast Lane between Reigns and Bryan where the winner would face Brock Lesnar for the WWE World Heavyweight Championship at Wrestlemania.

The Fast Lane pay-per-view itself was a complete failure, but it was mostly the fans’ fault since they were dead throughout the entire thing. The matches were exciting, but with the fans acting like spoiled jerks, nobody would know it. The only match that would save the pay-per-view was the main event between Roman Reigns and Daniel Bryan. Those two couldn’t just have a good match. They had to perform a necromantic ritual on the entire show. In other words, it had to be five stars, no more, no less.

And boy, did those two bring the fans back to life. Roman Reigns and Daniel Bryan not only hit each other with everything they had and refused to quit, those hits were harder than hell. Daniel Bryan put on a kick-boxing clinic with his stiff roundhouse kicks and European uppercuts. He also twisted Roman Reigns’ body into a pretzel with his various submission holds, which included arm bars, surfboards, face stretches, if there was a way to rip apart the human anatomy, Daniel Bryan could do it and turn Roman Reigns into the human Fruit Rollup. Mr. Bryan’s hardest shot, however, had to be when he threw a kick-boxing strike to Roman Reigns’ surgical scar where he previously had hernia surgery. Roman Reigns would later describe that liver shot as the most painful thing he had ever experienced. He’s a tough guy, so that’s saying a lot.

But that’s not to say Roman Reigns didn’t put on a hell of a show himself. While Daniel Bryan is good at kick-boxing and jujitsu, Roman is good at just plain punching people in the mouth. He punched and superman punched Daniel Bryan so many times that it’s amazing the latter still had all of his teeth in his mouth. He also should have had black eyes the size of watermelons and broken ribs that shattered all over his body, but he didn’t. Bryan still had the energy to deliver his patented running knee finishing move to Roman, but Roman stood back up and delivered a thunderous spear tackle for a hard-fought victory.

After the match, the two bitter rivals shook hands, but not without Daniel Bryan telling Roman Reigns, “You’d better kick Brock Lesnar’s ass!” These two warriors beat the living crap out of each other. They made everyone in that dead arena believe that the two W’s in WWE stood for World War. That’s what this match was: war without machineguns and tanks. The wrestlers were sore, they were battered, they were bruised, they were bloodied, and they’d do it all again if they could. This deadly fight could easily be a candidate for Match of the Year. That, and maybe the Wrestling Observer Newsletter will think twice before calling Roman Reigns overrated again.

Ever since that show-stealing match, the careers or Roman Reigns and Daniel Bryan took on slightly different paths. Roman did indeed challenge Brock Lesnar for the WWE Title at Wrestlemania, but couldn’t get the job done since Roman’s old tag team partner Seth Rollins cashed in his Money in the Bank contract in the middle of the match and pinned Reigns to win the title. Ever since that night, Reigns has struggled to get back in the championship picture time and time again.

Daniel Bryan’s career path would end with even more heartache than losing at Fast Lane. He competed at Wrestlemania in the seven-man ladder match for Wade Barrett’s Intercontinental Championship. Yes, it’s true Bryan won and became a Triple Crown and Grand Slam Champion, but weeks later after successfully defending the IC Title against Dolph Ziggler, Bryan had to surrender the belt due to injury. He swears he’s going to be back in action soon, but WWE management will probably be hesitant to push him like they did Roman Reigns. Before he returns to the ring, Bryan will fill the role of a judge on WWE’s reality series Tough Enough. That, and he has a DVD and book coming out, so don’t feel too bad for him.

At the end of the day, neither Daniel Bryan nor Roman Reigns can be considered overrated or less than five stars. They both deserve the spotlight despite their differences in skill set and experience. Is it any coincidence that I have action figures of both of them that I got for Christmas? Probably not. A passing grade goes to this badass wrestling clinic they put on at Fast Lane. A failing grade goes to the fans who attended that show and acted like they were bored out of their minds.