10 Ways WWE Has Screwed Up Its Women's Division
2. Rhea Ripley
There is no single better example of the implosion of WWE’s women’s division than the complete and utter mishandling of Rhea Ripley. (Her situation is what prompted this entire article.)
By all accounts, Ripley, 24, should be a can’t-miss, top-shelf prospect who can potentially carry the women’s division for the next decade. She tore up NXT and was poised to break through at WrestleMania 36, but she inexplicably lost her NXT Women’s Championship to Charlotte Flair and then had to rebuild herself.
When Rhea re-emerged on Raw earlier this year, the entire ordeal seemed rushed, but if WWE handled her ascension properly, she could easily overcome it. Locking her in with feuds with Asuka and Charlotte Flair out of the gate made it seem like WWE was going to handle this properly.
Oh, how wrong we were. After a somewhat lackluster WrestleMania title win, Ripley has floundered. We literally know nothing about her character, other than she and the announcers use the word “brutality” to describe her a lot. WWE hasn’t been able to figure out if she’s a heel or a face, or even a tweener. Since we know nothing about her and she hasn’t been given any compelling scripted promos to cut, there’s no reason to cheer or boo her, or even sympathize with her.
Her feud with Flair has been an abysmal failure from start to finish. It’s painful to watch Ripley drown in real-time on live TV every week as she’s sent out there with poor writing and forced to try to make this work. At this point, it would almost be better if she got “injured” and disappeared for 2-3 months and then came back with a vengeance, because this isn’t going to play well with live audiences.