Abstract
Abstract
This netnographic study examines how World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE) fans on Reddit discursively construct and negotiate the possibility of artificial intelligence‑generated or AI‑assisted storytelling. Drawing on authorship and authenticity, platform affordances, affects, ritual and fan studies, and performance studies, the study analyses fan discourse across three subreddits in response to AI‑related announcements in late 2025 and early 2026. Findings reveal three dominant themes: a “forensic gaze” through which fans attempt to detect algorithmic authorship; an affective rejection of AI content as “AI slop,” framed as a betrayal of human artistry and labour; and parodic absorption, in which irony and humour function as communal repair mechanisms for ontological anxiety. The paper advances theoretical understandings by proposing dialectical algorithmic kayfabe. It advances the theoretical framework beyond a simple rupture model. Algorithmic kayfabe is not a single break but an ongoing negotiation, a performance of uncertainty that fans have transformed into a shared game.