Army Says Recruitment Partnership with The Rock Actually Made Things Worse

The Rock was really popular.

I want to really stress the word “was.”

For whatever reason, he endorsed Joe Biden in 2020, and to the surprise of no one, he got a massive backlash from action movie fans. He later apologized for doing this, but the damage was done.

At the same time, his film career was developing poorly. He had been built up as an action star and then things got out of control, and he ended up on some sitcom about himself. It was really a mess.

I’m not surprised he accepted $11 milly to shill for kids to go die for Israel, but I’m also not surprised that people were like “fuck off, Rock.”

New York Post:

This deal sank like a stone.

Legendary pro wrestler Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson’s $11 million partnership with the US Army was so disastrous that it appears to have actually hindered recruitment efforts for the military branch, according to a report.

The Army is now trying to recoup its money after claiming “The Rock” didn’t hold up his end of the deal by sharing an agreed-upon number of social media posts during the United Football League season, Military.com reported.

The Army declared the relationship as a net negative — with an evaluation projecting that it led to a loss of 38 enlistments as resources tied up in the deal could have potentially been used elsewhere with a more advantageous recruitment outcome, according to an internal review of the plan obtained by the outlet.

The military branch inked a contract with Johnson, a UFL co-owner, earlier this year that would see prominent Army branding on player uniforms and during games, while Johnson acted as a de facto spokesperson for the Army on social media.

With 396 million followers on Instagram, Johnson’s posts were valued by the Army at $1 million each. As part of the agreement, the “Moana” star would share five posts elevating the military branch throughout the UFL’s inaugural season from March through June.

But Johnson allegedly failed to hold up his side of the deal — only sharing two Army-related posts since April, the documents state.

Well, it seems like ripping off the military would be a bad idea. I’m not even sure if I believe he did that. If he did it was probably a clerical error.

Regardless, he was known as the face of the US military, and they’re going to have a problem wiping that stupid steroid face off of their brand.

They should have just hired Shane Gillis to do commercials saying:

“I’m not doing it, because I think it’s retarded, but as a paid spokesman for the military, I think you should sign up to go die in pointless foreign wars, primarily for the sake of a country I like to call ‘Chosenville,’ but many know as Israel. Real patriots don’t ask questions about what’s going on in Gaza. They just sign the papers and go die. And hey – the benefits are great. They gave me $11 million, and I asked for something to sweeten the deal, and they sent me an entire case of Fleshlights. They have the US Army logo on them and everything.

“People ask me if I would put my money where my mouth is and go die for Israel, and the answer is, of course not. But I don’t have to, because they will pay me to use my celebrity status to manipulate you into doing that. I hate to break it to you chief, but things aren’t easy out there. The jobs market is less than great, and you need money if you want pussy, and probably the best way to get that money for you is by going and fighting wars for the chosen ones. I’m pretty connected with my fanbase, and I know most of you really don’t have anything better to do. And guess what? Even if you get your legs blown off, you can still get pussy. These army motherfuckers will give you robot legs. And if you’re dead, well, in the Christian Bible I subscribe to, dying for Israel means you get 72 virgins in Heaven.”

Seriously. That’s what I would do if I was the Army. I would go full “it is ironically hilarious to die for Israel” and hire a bunch of comedian podcasters to sell it like they sold “Better Help.”