10 Huge WWE Comebacks That Led To More Huge Comebacks

1. Cody Rhodes (2016), Then Dustin Rhodes (2019)

After Cody Rhodes finally scored his release from WWE, and was able to ditch the Stardust character they had made him portray and he’d long grown tired of, he set the independent circuit on fire. He returned as ‘Cody’, without gimmicks but turning the volume up on his real self. Aligning himself with The Elite, he would help form AEW and the rest is history.

Cody reinventing himself the way he did inspired his brother Dustin Rhodes to ask for his release from WWE, so he too could ditch his well-known Goldust character that was being used as nothing more than a comedy punch line there. It was a big risk for Dustin to leave a secure job and a character he had portrayed for years with WWE, but Dustin was tired of the schedule and wanted more out of his career.

Dustin got his release and immediately aligned himself with AEW, returning to his old school ‘The Natural’ gimmick and signing up to wrestle Cody at AEW Double or Nothing:

Dustin has said on his WWE exit and his legendary match with Cody:

“With the WWE, I'd had enough. It was time for me to go. It had been such a long, storied career with the Goldust character and, do you know, I really thought that I was going to retire - and then I got pulled in and my passion got reignited when I wrestled my brother, and we had the match of the last decade, probably, if not the last two decades.”