Lil Yachty & Trick Williams fool Sami Zayn during WWE SmackDown Gingerbread Man funeral
The Gingerbread Man has risen from the dead.
Throughout Friday’s SmackDown in Jacksonville, various wrestlers paid tribute to the Gingerbread Man, which drew the ire of Sami Zayn throughout the night. In the final segment of the show, Williams was paying tribute to the fallen cookie with a moment of silence when Zayn interrupted the proceedings. He went on to complain about the costs of the funeral and panned the performance of the choir that had sung just minutes prior. Zayn promised to win back the United States title from Williams at Backlash on Saturday then started to make his exit, but it instead turned into a cheap shot and an attack, leaving Williams reeling in the corner.
Zayn posed with the United States title when suddenly, the Gingerbread Man rose from his casket and took off his head, revealing himself to be Lil Yachty who was taken out a few weeks ago by Zayn. He grabbed a candy cane kendo stick and struck Zayn multiple times, giving Williams the opportunity to recover and lay out Zayn with the trick knee. The final moments of SmackDown had Williams and Yachty standing tall.
The sudden rise and fall of the Gingerbread Man
Although it had been initially introduced as a joke aimed at Sami Zayn, the Gingerbread Man storyline took a dramatic turn on last week’s show after Zayn destroyed the costume. Williams ran out for the save, then grew concerned and threw up the X sign, treating the situation seriously. Joe Tessitore made the grim announcement later in the show that the cookie had passed on.
It was reported on Thursday that the heavy use of the Gingerbread Man character last week got “notable pushback” from some within WWE’s creative, with a source telling Wrestlevotes Radio they felt the angle was “hokey and archaic.”
Bryan Rose is an editor from California that has been covering professional wrestling for well over a decade. He officially joined F4WOnline as an editor in 2017.