Roman Reigns

Roman Reigns is a Samoan-American professional wrestler from the WWE promotion.

Roman debuted on the main roster at the 2012 Survivor Series PPV as a member of The Shield alongside Dean Ambrose and Seth Rollins.

While a part of the group, Reigns was a WWE Tag Team Champion (with Rollins), tied the WWE record for most eliminations in a Survivor Series elimination match with four in 2013, and set the record for most eliminations in a Royal Rumble match with 12 at the 2014 match. After the dissolution of The Shield in June 2014, Reigns became a singles competitor, winning the 2015 Royal Rumble, the 2014 Superstar of the Year Slammy Award, and becoming a three time WWE Champion, a one-time United States Champion, a one-time Intercontinental Champion, and a Grand Slam Champion. He is also the fifth Universal Champion, winning the Universal Title from Brock Lesnar at SummerSlam 2018 after an indirect distraction from Braun Strowman.

On the October 22, 2018 episode of Monday Night RAW, Reigns relinquished the Universal Championship after announcing that he would be taking time away from WWE to battle leukemia. On the February 25, 2019 episode of Monday Night Raw, four months after that announcement, he revealed that his leukemia was in remission and he was returning to wrestling once more.

Personality
After The Shield turned face (and eventually disbanded), he continued displaying similar tactics to the ones The Shield used as heels, just now against different targets: Even when Reigns didn't talk often as a member of the Shield, he already showed then that he has a deep, booming voice.
 * He pretty much  tried to murder Seth Rollins  with a cinderblock after Rollins curbstomped Ambrose through one, and tried to do the same to Reigns. After fighting Rollins and Kane off, Reigns picked up one of the cinderblocks and circled around Rollins so he would see it coming before hurling it at Rollins' head. Rollins got out of the way, obviously, but  damn.
 * He tried more or less to play the straight hero for a while... then  TLC 2015  happened, which was one screw-over too many, and he sort of lost it at that point. In a 24-hour period, he laid waste to (almost) the entire League of Nations ( twice ), put Triple H in a hospital, and punched out Vince McMahon himself.
 * Then comes  Great Balls of Fire, where Roman outright tries to  murder  Braun Strowman via vehicular homicide by crashing an ambulance with Strowman inside after losing to Strowman in an ambulance match.
 * After Dean Ambrose suffered a legitimate injury during a match that put Roman and his Shield brothers against Sheamus, Cesaro, and Samoa Joe, Joe took credit for putting Dean out of commission and expressed great pride in having done so. The following week on  Raw, Roman - at the time defending his Intercontinental Title - responded to this by beating Joe so brutally, he got himself disqualified from the match. After which an undeterred Roman continued flattening Joe into goop.

He was  very  protective of them and did not hesitate to  wreck  anyone who tried to get at them. He also makes a point of going to check on them to make sure they're not hurt. When they're not in a match, Reigns acts like a affectionate big brother: clapping them on the shoulders, bantering with them, bodily dragging them away from enemies they aren't ready to face, etc.

Abilities
He's by far the largest and most muscular man of The Shield. As a singles star, it looks like his finishing sequence is developing into: leaping clothesline into the corner, uppercut, running single-leg dropkick from the floor, Superman punch, spear. For the most part, the spear gets interrupted in some fashion.

He eventually began to avert this trope. Say what you will, but he heard the complaints that his moveset wasn't broad enough and he has been expanding it massively ever since.

Trivia

 * The reason why Reigns' suspension was such a shock to the fanbase is because he was supposed to succeed John Cena as face of the company. Obviously, you can't be the face of the company with a black mark like that on your record, especially when the guy you're replacing has been a model employee for over ten years. Many speculate that this is why Reigns started eating so many clean pins since his return — the company is starting to gradually de-push him and back other performers instead. It also had a side effect of validating the company's Wellness Policy.
 * The return of his leukemia had significantly altered both short-term and long-term plans WWE had for not only him, but also for a significant portion of the roster, including his Shield teammates Dean Ambrose and Seth Rollins. The company basically had to treat the situation as if he had retired, as there was no way they could determine a time frame for his return (or if he would even be able to).
 * The Shield could have not been The Shield and he could have not been in it. Before it was a trio, it was supposed to be a full on power stable and before that stable even had a name, CM Punk, Seth Rollins, Dean Ambrose and  Chris Hero  were the planned members. Obviously things ended up very differently. (Worth noting that Roman himself disputes CM Punk's claim here)
 * Reigns' suspension for violating the Wellness Policy no doubt resulted in a lot of plans being changed, as the company had to get the belt off him soon. That being said, it was fairly obvious they didn't want to put the belt on Rollins (the most convenient choice), as that meant the championship had to go back to a heel after a long string of heel champions and a face that was so hated he might as well have been a heel. Luckily, Reigns' next title defense was at  Money in the Bank . So they had Rollins beat Reigns semi-clean for the title and then had Dean Ambrose cash in to become champion, to the delight of the vast majority of the WWE fanbase. Specifically, reports claim that the initial plan for Reigns' title reign would be that his feud with Rollins would lead to a double turn with Reigns becoming the heel and Rollins the babyface, and that Reigns' title run would surpass CM Punk's modern record of 434 days.