10 Things WWE Wants You To Forget About AJ Lee
5. The Total Divas Rant
In August 2013, two years' after her partner, CM Punk, had dropped his pipe bomb on Monday Night Raw, WWE tried to recreate the magic with AJ spouting off on the Total Divas cast. It was designed as a means of further portraying AJ as the antithesis to the supposedly superficial reality show crowd, and it was scathing.
As transcribed by cagematch.net:-
Do you wanna know what I see when I look in that ring? Honestly? A bunch of cheap, interchangable, expandable, useless women. Women who have turned to reality television 'cause they just weren't gifted enough to be actresses and they just weren't talented enought to be champion. I have done more in one year than all of you have done in your entire collective careers.
I have saved your divas division, I have shattered glass ceilings, I have broken down doors. Why? So a bunch of ungrateful, stiff, plastic mannequinns can walk on through without even as much as a thank you? You guys can't even walk backstage and shake my hand and looking me in the eye because you know that I worked my entire life to get here.
I gave my life to this and you were just handed fiftteen minutes of fame. I didn't get here because I was cute or because I came from some famous wrestling family or because I sucked...up to the right people. I got here because I am good. I earned this championship and you know what? No matter how many red carpets you guys wanna walk in your four thousand dollar ridiculous heels you will never be able to lace up my Chuck Taylors.
Her talk of "shattering glass ceilings" resonated, but sadly, the promo did more bad than good. It formed the basis of a feud that concluded with an AJ-led group of women falling to the entire Total Divas cast at Survivor Series, but the Bellas and co. were rocked by what they'd perceived as an unwarranted shoot from AJ. You won't see it replayed on any episodes of Raw or SmackDown for that very reason.