Former WWE Writer Says Firefly Fun House 'Spiraled Out Of Control'

In the final years of his WWE career, Bray Wyatt became known as The Fiend, with part of his presentation centered around the eerie Firefly Fun House segments, inspired by children's TV host Mr. Rogers. Former WWE writer Nick Manfredini originally came up with the idea, but as revealed during an episode of "Wrestling with Freddie," many elements of the concept changed as time went on.

"It was never meant to be supernatural," Manfredini said. "Once [the segments] became successful, it was like, 'Oh, everybody's involved.' Everybody's changing things, everybody's getting their hands on it, when it was just a very small group at first. Then it became a big thing. So it kind of spiraled a little out of control at the beginning."

Manfredini shared his understanding that Vince McMahon had an entirely different take on The Fiend compared to himself and Wyatt. According to the writer, he and Wyatt saw The Fiend as a persona that Wyatt adopted, while McMahon thought it better to portray The Fiend as something Wyatt could not control.

"It wasn't the original vision," Manfredini continued. "[Wyatt] was very frustrated with stuff like that, when somebody was trying to change what he wanted to do. And I was too, I mean, I'm not gonna lie, but we're employees. We don't own this character."

After debuting this new version of the character in the spring of 2019, Wyatt continued performing as The Fiend until July 2021, when the decision was made to release him from his WWE contract. Wyatt (and The Fiend character) would return the following year, after Paul Levesque had taken over booking the company. Sadly, Wyatt (real name Windham Rotunda) eventually became too ill to continue wrestling, and he died on August 24, 2023, after suffering a heart attack.

If you use any of the quotes in this article, please credit "Wrestling with Freddie" and provide a h/t to Wrestling Inc. for the transcription.