9 Ups & 11 Downs For WWE In 2025
1. The Return Of Brock Lesnar
There was something immensely depressing about Brock Lesnar's WWE return at SummerSlam, and the company doubled down on the doomy feeling with his match and feud with John Cena.
Vince McMahon first resigned in disgrace in 2022 and then was gone for good from 2024, but WWE has always been a named party in the sex trafficking lawsuit against the former Chairman, and Lesnar himself was eventually revealed as a named wrestler too. The company could neither acknowledge nor ignore the reality of the situation, but they did have the option not to steer into the flames further by bringing the former Universal Champion back, at least until the proceedings were over. There's a strong argument that he wasn't worth bringing back at all, and that's ignoring all moral and ethical stances (because WWE certainly do).
The bleak cloud that hung over his comeback extended to a woeful and awkward television showdown with Ron Killings and an abysmal retrograde match with Cena at the roundly-criticised WrestlePalooza PLE. All of this built to his inclusion in the ultra-cheesy WrestleMania 42 promotion, which itself had a crushing inevitability about it.
The Brock Lesnar character used to bring dread as a feature, but it's long since become little more than a boring bug.