Long before confronting "The Final Boss" at WrestleMania 40 to help Cody Rhodes topple Roman Reigns and finish his story, John Cena's beef with The Rock was firmly established, both on- and off-screen. With real life feelings as the backbone, including legit shots fired by Cena, who questioned not just "The Rock," but Dwayne Johnson himself, in terms of his love for the wrestling business, the pair went full throttle toward their "Once In a Lifetime" main event at WrestleMania 38, only to run things back a year later, in two of the most successful WrestleMania finales of that era.
Cena's claims from that era may seem ironic now, seeing as how "The Never Seen 17" pretty much followed The Rock's blueprint, leveraging momentum created from his WWE career to launch an uber-successful career in Hollywood. But at the time, those were the accusationsthat "The Brahma Bull" left WWE in the lurch to become nothing more than a part-time superstar. Tensions rose once The Rock returned to a WWE ring for the first time in nearly eight years in 2011, first successfully pairing with Cena at Survivor Series against The Awesome Truth, before the one-on-one rivalry took shape.
With a series of "shoots" in both directions, including Cena's infamous calling out of The Rock having promo notes scribbled on his arm (which clearly got under the same skin at which The Rock now consistently showcases goosebumps during his latest run of intermittent appearances), things allegedly nearly came to a physical head backstage and one point. These days, however, as evidenced both on-screen with Cena's ill-fated heel turn and "Final Boss" allegiance, as well as behind the scenes, with whatever beef now seemingly squashed, it seems to be all about business and, though Cena's career soon coming to a close rules out any further physicality with his longtime rival, it all seems to have worked out for both parties in the long run.
