5 Impact Wrestling Character Changes That Made Wrestlers More Popular (& 5 Who Lost Fan Support)

The great talent to work for Impact Wrestling was the strongest aspect of their history through ups and downs. TNA was criticized for dropping the ball with their decisions, but there were plenty of great names on the roster. However, every talent to switch characters and try to revamp their careers had mixed results.

The hope for every wrestler is that such a change will lead to more success and general fan interest to boost their careers. Impact witnessed both sides playing out. Some names became bigger than ever with great results. Others showed why “LOL TNA” became a meme for the company’s constant mistakes. Each of the following names were either more popular or lost fan interest with character changes in Impact Wrestling.

10 More Popular: Sting

Sting took one of the biggest risks of his career when introducing a new character based on The Joker. There was an originally a polarizing response to Joker Sting since it was an intentionally cartoonish portrayal to show where his mind was during the war with Hulk Hogan.

Time showed that more fans loved this new gimmick as being a fun twist than hated it. Sting even talks about this being among the favorite times of his career and loving the United Kingdom tours when the fans treated him like a hero. Impact recently uploaded a full video of every Joker Sting moment to show how it’s viewed today.

9 Lost Interest: AJ Styles

The first big creative decision by Hulk Hogan and Eric Bischoff gaining power in TNA saw them completely changing AJ Styles’ character as the TNA World Champion. Styles turned heel when Ric Flair arrived to become his new mentor.

However, it just hurt AJ to become a cheap rip off of Flair’s gimmick wearing his robes and having models walk him to the ring. TNA failed Styles with this character making him look like a joke. AJ had to wait until a face turn ditching Flair to gain back some momentum.

8 More Popular: Bully Ray

TNA tried to do something that failed badly in WWE when Team 3D aka the Dudley Boyz broke up. The idea made more sense this time around when Bubba Ray Dudley turned heel and played the new heel persona of Bully Ray.

D-Von remained face to feud with his longtime partner, but Bully broke out as a new major heel in the company. Fans paid more attention to Bully as a singles star to help him get pushed all the way into the TNA World Championship feud for major success at the highest TNA level.

7 Lost Interest: Lance Hoyt

The early years of TNA saw Lance Hoyt (now known as Lance Archer) as a beloved fan favorite in the Impact Zone. Fans even made Hoytmania t-shirts parodying Hulkamania and chanted his name loudly during every entrance as if he was already an established star. TNA did nothing of note with this and barely spotlighted Hoyt in a major way.

A character change to the comedy side saw Hoyt teaming up with Jimmy Rave and Christy Hemme in the Rock n Rave Infection. TNA made them play an intentionally bad music group playing off the success of Guitar Hero and Rock Band video games to weaker interest.

6 More Popular: Jay Lethal

Jay Lethal always had good matches and showed potential for TNA as a young X-Division star. However, there was no real character or gimmick in his career until Kevin Nash got involved. Lethal did his Randy Savage impersonation backstage and Nash pitched trying it on television.

Fans were taken back at how stellar Lethal’s impression was for TNA to make it a full-time gimmick. The Black Machismo moniker became Lethal’s identity and helped him move into the top X-Division babyface role. Lethal broke out in TNA during this bold change working out for the best.

5 Lost Interest: Black Reign

Dustin Rhodes has been one of the most versatile wrestlers of our lifetime after various changes over the course of three decades plus. WWE pushing Dustin as Goldust is likely how most fans remember him strongest.

TNA tried to add an alter ego on the darker side when Rhodes resurfaced as Black Reign. A dark wig, weird face paint and a pet rat just confused the audience more than anything else. Dustin was also in rough shape at the time to make this a low point in his legendary career.

4 More Popular: Abyss

Abyss was a generally successful character as a TNA homegrown star, but he was placed into many terrible angles. TNA realized a bigger change was needed to build back some momentum when coming up with the Joseph Park angle.

The unmasked Abyss appeared under the new name and claimed he was looking for his brother Chris Park aka Abyss. It turned into a running joke that everyone knew they were the same person except for him. Park became quite entertaining and a strong part of the product.

3 Lost Interest: Monty Brown

Monty Brown remains arguably the biggest “what if” TNA story of a great talent that never got a fair chance. TNA fans loved Brown as the former NFL player got over relatively quickly in the early years and appeared to be an easy main event name down the line.

Unfortunately, TNA signing babyfaces Christian Cage and Sting led to Brown having to turn heel to remain in the main event picture. Brown’s heel character was a huge downgrade when he turned into Jeff Jarrett’s sidekick.

2 More Popular: Matt Hardy

Matt Hardy deserves a lot of credit for taking bold risks with character changes multiple times at different stages. The most successful instance of this was when Impact Wrestling allowed Matt to portray his Broken character and basically create his own cinematic universe.

Impact received major wrestling attention for the first time in years for Broken Matt having the cinematic Final Deletion match against Jeff Hardy. The fans loved the Broken character so much that Matt had to turn face and Jeff became his own Broken persona as Brother Nero.

1 Lost Interest: Samoa Joe

TNA never truly committed to Samoa Joe’s greatness as they always stopped short of making him “the guy” or tried to fix something that wasn’t broken. Joe was still among the most popular TNA names when he had the controversial and confusing abduction angle of ninjas taking him away in a van.

There was no real explanation when Joe returned and started to show a more ruthless side. Fans just groaned when Joe had weird face paint and carried around a knife. TNA made matters worse with this character culminating in a heel turn to join the Main Event Mafia and end any chances of more singles main event success.