Who Are All These People in Wrestlemania and Why the Heck Are They Fighting?

Brock Lesnar is an enormous and genuinely intimidating man. He was a successful UFC fighter for a while, but a serious illness ate half his guts so he decided to retire from mixed martial arts and take things easy by slamming 300 pound men through tables. When he gets really pumped up he does this victory/rage roar that sounds like a little baby bird just bumped its knee on a tiny coffee table. He's the best.

Roman Reigns is a romance book cover. He has been prematurely pushed to the top of the roster, past several deserving fan-favorite wrestler men. He obediently delivers WWE chairman Vince McMahon's terrible lines, including (this is not made up) fifty year old cartoon references like "Sufferin' succotash".

Roman Reigns wants to win Brock Lesnar's heavyweight championship belt and use it to hold up his pants. This is because he is afraid that if he does not do so, Mr. McMahon will soon tell him to wear suspenders, a pair of 1920s schoolboy short pants, and a propeller beanie.

HHH is a man in a business suit. He walks out into the ring and spends twenty minutes saying something that could be conveyed in one minute, often repeating himself while raising his voice then pausing for dramatic dead air.

Sting really liked that movie The Crow.

As I understand it, this matchup is a fight to determine who gets to sit closest when Kid Rock performs his second seven song set of the evening.

What if, instead of working out in his prison cell, Robert DeNiro's character in Cape Fear ate a bunch of LSD burgers while perusing a fedora catalog? That's Bray Wyatt.

The Undertaker is an undead graveyard man. Or a supernatural biker. Or an MMA warlock. I forget.

These two dark wizards are going at it to determine who gets complete control of the fog machine.

John Cena likes anime and cargo shorts. This makes him the ultimate American.

Rusev is a Russian. He is critical of the United States and shakes his head when the audience chants "USA! USA!". This makes him the ultimate American.

The winner of this match will officially become the president of the United States.

Nikki and Brie are sisters, and they're bad. Or one of them is good, and the other is bad. After a months-long leadup the bad one won an event with the stipulation that the good one had to become her personal servant for a month. That story disappeared with no resolution. The next time they showed up they were both bad again. I think.

AJ Lee and Paige are an uneasy alliance, and in the absence of any real story the WWE writers have decided to continually tease WHAT IF MAYBE THEY'RE SORTA LESBIANS? Like, what if they pin each other and linger for the benefit of the audience? Or how about one distracts the other mid-match with a kiss?

The WWE hates its female talent even more than it hates its male talent so I don't even know why this fight is happening. I do have a prediction, though: One of the announcers will say something revolting.

These guys are what wrestling fans call jobbers. Basically, that means they treat wrestling like a job. Every morning they clock in then turn to the camera and bemusedly state "It's a living," with a shrug.

As dedicated workmen, they all want the ladder. It's a pretty good ladder. Now they're going to fight for it. These blue collar folk ask that you do not cheer too loud during their match or hope for any of them to become overly popular or successful.

– Dennis "Corin Tucker's Stalker" Farrell (@DennisFarrell)