YMMV / Fergal Devitt

• Awesome Ego: His reignited dark Prince persona on NXT has breathed life into his character that had been missing for years. March 2020 saw him start claiming he's been the "best wrestler in the world" since 2014.
• Badass Decay: After returning from injury in 2017, Bálor went from The Ace of NXT to mid-card in the main roster, despite winning the Universal Championship within a month of his debut. Since then, Bálor had multiple meaningless feuds that he rarely win and rarely received any championship opportunities. He also almost never brings out his Demon King persona, his Ace in the Hole, even during important PPV matches such as against Brock Lesnar at Royal Rumble 2019 for the Universal Championship.
  • To add insult to injury, the last times he did break out the Demon, he lost to Roman Reigns at Extreme Rules 2021 and Edge at WrestleMania 39 inside Hell in a Cell. The Roman loss was one of the worst finishes in recent memory, involving hokey red lights, Finn seizing on the ground for no reason, and losing because of a randomly-snapping top rope that let Roman spear him. The Edge loss, while not as bad in terms of a wrestling finish, arguably did more damage to The Demon's aura, as Edge had come out for the match channeling his Brood roots; meaning the first time The Demon came head-to-head with another wrestler's darker alter ego and fought on equal grounds, The Demon lost.
• Base-Breaking Character: Fans are pretty divided regarding Finn Bálor. Either he's amazing and needs no improvement, or he has no real character, gets by on the body paint and elaborate entrances, and borders on being plain dull.
• Broken Base:
  • A more lighthearted example. Should he have Two-Sweeted The Club in that scene at SummerSlam and given fans that pure "Look how far we've come" nostalgic moment, or was walking away a good move for his face momentum that fell right into the teasing he usually does online anyway? For that matter, is the teasing he does about the brothers good for hype or is it gratuitous trolling?
  • On a more serious note, his push to the moon following his move to the main roster, ending with his Universal Championship win. Journalists and fans in favor of it say it was appropriate as a bold move to ring in the New Era, and being consistently named as one of the best wrestlers in the world for years, he no doubt deserved it. Critics, however, say that his push was too quick and undeserved, especially since he had been called up from NXT the very night he won the number one contendership and did not have any time to build a rapport with the casual fans who didn't have much of a clue who he was, and they don't appreciate the later buildup segments, which they accused were completely dominated by Seth Rollins, who despite that was always being beaten down by him. It doesn't help that unlike several other recent NXT callups that got title pushes,^note American Alpha became the top tag team on SmackDown by default as all of the other teams had been booked as Jobbers before the brand split, and Bayley only challenged for the Women's Championship because Sasha Banks was injured and Paige was suspended, and her road to a title challenge was far more drawn out there were many talents on the Raw roster that fans felt had paid their dues and deserved a title run as well.
  • Another lighthearted example. Should WWE have given the Demon appearance away on the go-home Raw? The Raw before Summerslam 2016, Finn came out in the full Demon get-up to the ring to have a face-off with Seth. Was this a good idea to showcase the character WWE built up on the way to the PPV or should the first main roster appearance of the Demon have been saved for the PPV to make it that much more effective?
  • The "Bálor for Everyone" deal he introduced during his entrance at WrestleMania 34. Was the pro-LGBTQ gesture truly the best thing that could've been done for his first WrestleMania entrance, or should he have reintroduced the Demon King to emphasize the importance of the match? Furthermore, reports speculating that Stephanie McMahon has wanted him to be an LGBT character for some time seem to conflict with Finn's insistence in interviews that he personally felt the need for said community to be represented, leading to the question of whether this is the best move for Finn as a character at all, if it's more thinly-veiled scavenging for PR brownie points, or even if the representation idea itself should be carried by someone else who actually openly fits it and can have their sexuality acknowledged without it defining their gimmick. For future perspective, Sonya Deville began wearing rainbow-colored handkerchiefs about a year and a half later, and when Finn stopped wearing the rainbow-colored Bálor Club gear due to the combination of a Saudi Arabia appearance and getting a new merchandise logo soon after, some in the LGBT circles of fandom criticized him for being a "performative" ally—despite the fact he wore an Equality shirt off-air during that same tour. In Saudi Arabia.
• Draco in Leather Pants/Rooting for the Empire: Got some of this as leader of Bullet Club due to being Mr. Fanservice and the club generally running on Evil Is Cool. Ended up contributing to Bullet Club's expansion of this trope even after leaving and working as a face on NXT due to his rise up the developmental ranks coinciding with their explosion in popularity stateside, not to mention the fact that he kept his ties close with them. He and AJ Styles are most likely the two men responsible for the group being Unintentionally Sympathetic for a year and a half in addition to the Rule of Cool they run on.
• Estrogen Brigade: Finn drives women wild almost as much as he makes men question their sexuality. It's no surprise his "hoot" name is the "Pussy-Slayer Hoot".
• Ensemble Dark Horse:
  • One of the biggest in wrestling today, and not just because of his associations, either. There's also his artistry with the demon paint entrances, his washboard abs, his in-ring ability, his stage presence…really, the only department he's lacking in is promos. Other than that (and character depth these days), he's money in everything he does. The topic of his WWE main roster debut has been widely debated and stressed over long before the start of 2016. WWE - somewhat against character, depending on who you ask - recognized this and had him drafted to RAW third overall during their draft event to mark the new Brand Extension. (Because Smackdown had the second pick, this means only one Superstar was drafted to RAW before him.) Then, the following week, proceeded to have him win a Fatal Four-Way, then pin Roman Reigns clean to face Seth Rollins at Summerslam for the newly created WWE Universal Championship. So, long story short, Bálor went from NXT to being the #1 Contender for RAW's top singles belt in a week. And to show how popular he is, Ric Flair's disparaging remarks criticizing the decision to push Bálor over Reigns based solely on size got quite a few people declaring He Panned It, Now He Sucks! towards one of the most respected professional wrestlers of all time.
  • Even winning the Universal Championship hasn't taken him out of this yet. Despite reaching the top of the premiere brand in all of wrestling at the pinnacle of one of the greatest weeks ever for the stable/association he started, he would be instantly forced to start back from square one due to an injury he suffered during the match. Then the discovery that tentative plans would've had him defend the championship against Kevin Owens and later Chris Jericho over a period of several months leading into Hell in a Cell left a taste of What Could Have Been that made people lament Bálor's injury even more.
• Epileptic Trees: Pick any potential or approaching significant milestone in the WWE career of Finn Bálor. Odds are there's a few "Imagine this…" theories going around with the end result being a Bullet Club appearance. This ratcheted up even further once the news broke on the internet that Luke Gallows would be returning to WWE and would be joined by Karl Anderson. (And let's not neglect AJ Styles, who debuted first and happens to have been Devitt's replacement in the BC after the latter left New Japan to join NXT.)
• Fan-Preferred Couple: Its not hard for fans to pair Finn with Bayley over their real life partners. They have multiple Adorkable moments since their NXT days, from performing each other entrances, to occasionally hugging each other.
• Narm:
  • Finn Bálor's entrance when he's wearing body paint? Awesome. Finn Bálor's entrance when he's just in his gear? Still pretty cool. Finn Bálor's entrance when he's wearing a hoodie? Ridiculous. Finn Bálor's entrance when he's wearing a leather jacket as part of the "Bálor Club" brand? Holy…wait, he's flashing his abs and belt instead of crawling around and it looks awesome. Carry on.
  • His entrance at Takeover: Dallas attempted to replicate the cosplay idea from Takeover: London, with Finn homaging The Texas Chain Saw Massacre (1974) instead of Jack the Ripper. Where the London entrance came off as ominous, this one was cringe-inducing, thanks in no small part to the obviously non-functional but still incredibly loud chainsaw Finn brought out as a prop.
  • His promo directed to Seth Rollins, in which he rambles about Irish mythology and it cuts to some fairytale-like pictures to illustrate it, can be really awkward when you remember you are watching a wrestling show. Then again, if you're a fan of Lucha Underground it might be right up your alley. And even the WWE itself is not exactly devoid of supernatural characters
  • In the build-up to Summerslam 2016, you could make a drinking game with the amount of times WWE have the commentators and Finn and Seth themselves say the name Demon King. Be warned, you may damage your liver with this.
• Older Than They Think: Prince Devitt was using a guitar weapon as the leader of Bullet Club before they ever brought Jeff Jarrett into the group as a "chairman". In fact, he admits that "The Real Rock-n-Rolla" gimmick he used as the leader of Bullet Club was his own spin on Jarrett's "The Real Double J".
• Serial Numbers Filed Off: The Bálor Club logo looks almost identical to the Bullet Club, and the leather jacket he wears is similar to the one he wore as their leader. WWE's early 2016 signings of NJPW talent and Bullet Club mainstays Luke Gallows, Karl Anderson, and AJ Styles lend credence to ideas of a reunion under the new name—especially with Finn's own constant teasing of the matter on social media and now at live events. Gallows, Anderson, and Styles have arrived and united on WWE's main roster, but Bálor as of early July 2016 is still on NXT and still teasing a future role in the affairs of The Club. And as of late July 2016 he's been drafted to Raw, as have Anderson and Gallows.
  • As of 2017, a minimalistic Bálor Club logo with just the letters BC (which had earlier been used on the back of Bálor Club WWE Shop T-shirts) debuted on his trunks, as well as a full text version on his titantron.
  • As of 2018, the Bálor Club is reunited on Raw, with Finn, Gallows and Anderson.

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