John Cena vs Dwayne Johnson: The Real Reason It Got Personal

Short version: a decade ago, John Cena torched Dwayne Johnson for choosing Hollywood over WWE. Then The Rock came back, juiced WrestleMania 40 into a record-breaker, helped crown Cody Rhodes, and Cena ended up apologizing for... basically all of it. The long version is wilder, pettier, and honestly, pretty fascinating.

How we got here (and why it still matters)

• 2011: After seven years away, The Rock returns to host WrestleMania 27, roasts Cena and his 'You Can’t See Me' thing, and later costs Cena the WWE title in the Miz main event. On the Raw before WrestleMania, Cena gets the upper hand and blasts Rock with an Attitude Adjustment.
• 2011–2012: WWE books Rock vs. Cena for WrestleMania 28 a full year early. Things get real when Cena calls out Rock for having promo notes written on his wrist. It rattles Rock, and their on-air jabs turn sharp.
• WrestleMania 28: The 'Once in a Lifetime' match goes Rock’s way. The feud keeps going anyway.
• WrestleMania 29: Cena beats Rock for the WWE Championship. A lot of fans call it an unnecessary sequel.
• Years later: The mea culpas and context start rolling in. Cena admits he crossed lines. Rock returns in a big way and helps set up Cody Rhodes’ coronation.
• 2024–2025: Rock swings back into WWE as 'The Final Boss,' nudges Cena into a heel turn heading toward WrestleMania 41, disappears after Elimination Chamber, and fans are heated. By SummerSlam, Cena flips back to babyface and not-so-subtly blames... well, someone.

The old grievance: Cena vs. Rock, but make it personal

Cena was the one who went surprisingly hard. He framed Rock’s move to Hollywood as abandoning WWE, accusing him of cheapening 'I love this business' and not giving back. At one point he even said he just wished Rock would show up, say hi, and leave. It was blunt then, and it reads extra awkward now that Cena splits time between the ring and movie sets.

The wrist-notes incident that flipped the switch

This is the part everyone in the locker room talked about. On A&E’s WWE Rivals (Season 2, Episode 3), Cena says that about 90 seconds before his music hit, someone pointed out Rock had notes written on his wrist. In WWE promo-land, that’s basically taboo. Cena pounced on it live. Backstage, Big Show told him: 'Big set of balls on you, buddy.' Former WWE writer Brian Gewirtz later said the moment created a real disconnect between the two.

Rock tried to reassert dominance on the mic with some unfiltered energy:

"At his core, The Rock is 6'4", 260 pounds of man that will rip your throat out."

He even dropped an off-mic 'F**king punk' at Cena. Cena’s response? Smile, then twist the knife by writing Rock’s lines on his own wrist. Petty? Absolutely. Effective? Also yes.

Years later on Logan Paul’s Impaulsive, Cena called that move 'f**king stupid,' admitting Rock was likely juggling a billion things and he took advantage of it.

WrestleMania 40 proved Rock still moves the needle

For all the past talk about not giving back, Rock’s return ahead of WrestleMania 40 was not small. He pressed pause on Hollywood for a three-month story build, and the show went nuclear on Peacock: most-watched broadcast in the streamer’s history with 1.3 billion minutes viewed, per Deadline. On the night, he backed Roman Reigns and even flattened a run-in Cena who was there to support Cody Rhodes. And still, Rhodes walked out with the title.

More important long-term, Rock’s feud with Cody helped turn Rhodes into a full-on franchise player for WWE. That alone undercuts Cena’s old 'he doesn’t give back' claim.

Cena walks it back

In 2023 on the Happy Sad Confused podcast, Cena owned the hypocrisy and apologized to Rock. The key bit:

"I got selfish... My view was if you love something, be there every day. Like, what a hypocrite I am, because I still love WWE and I can’t go all the time... I was so selfish."

He also said he regrets how he handled things around WrestleMania 28. Fair.

The 2025 wobble: heel turns, no-shows, and a quick face reset

Heading into WrestleMania 41, Rock helped steer Cena into a heel run and laid groundwork for Cena vs. Cody. Then Rock went quiet after Elimination Chamber and didn’t show at WrestleMania, which didn’t help a show fans already felt was underwhelming. By SummerSlam season, Cena had seen enough of being the bad guy and pivoted back to babyface, thanking Cody Rhodes for snapping him out of it.

He summed up the course correction like this (via Yahoo Sports):

"That was just the boot in the a** that I needed... For 20 years... I have forged a reputation off of hard work, honesty, and respect. And I now realize that five months ago, I flushed it all down the toilet, chasing false glory when I bought into somebody’s crazy idea to make shocking TV... And the people that were supposed to be on my team - they left. And they left me alone, trying to pretend to be something I’m not."

WWE hyped the moment on X with: 'WE ARE SO BACK!!! Thank YOU, @JohnCena!'

Rock’s side of the 2025 story

On The Pat McAfee Show, Rock said stepping away was his call, not a ghosting act. The plan, according to him, was to elevate Cena as a heel champ and Cody as the hero, then vanish so the spotlight stayed on them.

"We’ve established this idea of Cody’s soul. We can always come back to it. I made the call, I don’t want to be involved in that. Let The Final Boss step back into the shadows. Let all the spotlight go to John, let it go to Cody."

He says he rang both Cena and Rhodes after Elimination Chamber to say his run was over for now, and that they had already sparked the biggest angle since Hulk Hogan’s 90s heel turn. Whether that makes his absence easier to swallow depends on how you felt about WrestleMania 41.

So... Cena vs. Rock one last time?

Cena says he’s retiring in mid-December. Boston’s WCVB pegs the date as December 13. That set off fan fantasy-booking of Rock crashing the farewell to set up one final match, maybe even punting the retirement to WrestleMania 42. Great theater, sure, but Cena’s recent off-camera comments suggest it’s a long shot.

To ExtraTV, he was blunt about how his body feels and what’s next: 'My back hurts. My arms hurt. My body’s hurt. Painful. I think the emotion will set in when it’s all over in December.' On Stephanie McMahon’s podcast, he added: 'A schedule like I was doing in 2013 would destroy me right now... It will ruin me and ruin my relationship... So I gotta close a chapter, that’s it.'

Where it lands

The feud that started with wrist ink and real resentment has turned into two guys who both found Hollywood, both boosted WWE in different ways, and both know when to say 'my bad.' If Rock pops back up before December, the door is cracked for a poetic final beat. If not, the legacy’s already set: they made magic, twice... okay, technically three times, even if one of those was the sequel nobody asked for.