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The third season of WWE Unreal dropped on Netflix today and came with the shocking reveal that Bron Breakker was originally planned to win the 2026 Royal Rumble this January, before plans changed.
WWE Unreal is a documentary produced by WWE and Netflix, giving fans a backstage look at the creative process and how the show comes together. This includes exclusive peeks into the creative meetings where future plans for the company are discussed, and there are few bigger dates on the WWE calendar than the Royal Rumble.
This match is many fans’ favourite event of the year, and the wrestler who wins the Royal Rumble is crowned as a new star in the industry, with a world championship match at WrestleMania secure. However, it turns out that 2026’s Royal Rumble was originally supposed to have a different winner.
While WWE’s biggest megastar, Roman Reigns, ended up winning the Royal Rumble for the second time in 2026, a creative meeting in WWE Unreal shows that up-and-comer Bron Breakker was the originally planned winner of the match, but the booking team changed their mind.
To quote Triple H from the show: “The risk from Bron Breakker is, […] can he actually do it? Will fans accept it? So you have to really be sure.” As well as concerns that they might be “shoving him down fans’ throats”. This has happened before, when Roman Reigns won the 2015 Royal Rumble and was resoundingly rejected by fans.
However, this comes in the wake of WWE fans crying out for fresh, young talent to be pushed to the top of the card, with Bron Breakker being one of the prime candidates that fans think should be given a big push. This is doubly frustrating when Bron’s actual role at the 2026 Royal Rumble saw him eliminated almost immediately after being attacked by a masked man who was later revealed to be Seth Rollins.
While the plan was for this to lead to Bron vs Seth at WrestleMania earlier this year, Bron suffered a hernia in March that stopped him from wrestling at the show, and since then, he has fallen down the pecking order, currently holding the Tag Team Championships with Austin Theory as a member of The Vision. Whether he’ll recover his position any time soon remains to be seen.
