FOX’s Tactics for Censoring The Rock’s Promos Revealed

The Rock’s current heel persona expertly merges his Hollywood charm with the attitude he showcased in the late 90s, captivating fans with his dynamic character. His recent revival of The Rock concert on SmackDown was a standout moment, with The Rock unapologetically disregarding networks’ concerns about his use of profanity. Interestingly, Fox had already received the script detailing The Rock’s remarks in advance.

During the March 15 episode of Friday Night SmackDown, Hollywood Rock made a triumphant return to the ring, thrilling the audience with his iconic theme music and expressing appreciation for Memphis, Tennessee.

The Rock has been himself in each and every promo and that has led to some censorship here and there. Even then, The Great One made it clear he couldn’t care less about upsetting Networks with his language.

While speaking on Wrestling Observer Radio, the arrangement with TV networks like FOX involves providing them with the script in advance so they can prepare for censoring, allowing for precise bleeping during The Rock’s scripted promos. While The Rock’s promos are entirely scripted, they have a level of freedom in their content that other wrestlers might not enjoy.

Meltzer added that FOX is aware of what The Rock will say and when, allowing for strategic censoring of any objectionable content. This ensures that while The Rock may have leeway to say almost anything, the network can still control the broadcasted content to align with their standards.

”So the deal with the TV what they had to do was, FOX gets the script ahead of time, so they know when to bleep. The Rock promo is completely scripted, but if it was anyone else, they would not be allowed to say it. With The Rock, it’s like he can say whatever he wants, but we know what he’s gonna say and when he’s gonna say it, so anything that they wanna bleep out, they will bleep out. And they know when to bleep it out because they know ahead of time, so that’s kind of the gist of the promo and why certain things were bleeped out.”

We have also provided a clarification on The Rock’s segment running longer than expected last week on SmackDown. Nonetheless, fans are just happy to see The Rock being himself in his promos and that’s all that matters.

Do you feel The Rock should not be censored on WWE television at all? Let us know in the comments section below!

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