10 Wrestling Parodies That Became Real
3. Brandi Rhodes Becomes Stephanie McMahon
If not an explicit parody, we were certainly invited to draw mocking comparisons between Brandi Rhodes and Stephanie McMahon upon the launch of AEW.
Her job title is Chief Brand Officer. She stood in front of a TV backstage at a natural angle and wondered aloud why anybody wouldn't. She threatened, at Double Or Nothing, to make the Women's division all about her by teasing an impromptu role in full gear before revealing the debut of Awesome Kong. But then, much like that song 'That Joke Isn't Funny Anymore', and the heartbreaking racist who sang it, this devolved into parody.
Brandi cut a fabulous, heartfelt promo ahead of Fight For The Fallen, in which she revealed a lifelong struggle with anxiety, before up and swerve-turning heel at show itself, arbitrarily veering across the moral spectrum just like the punchline. Later, as Dynamite otherwise established itself as excellent appointment television, Brandi dragged down its quality as the mouthpiece of the Nightmare Collective, burying to counterproductive effect the entirety of the Women's division, the worms eating which were already quite full.
The similarities became eerie, but happily, the character has since been abandoned quietly on Twitter, which is preferable to, for example, calling Mick Foley a disgrace for eight months and telling him to f*ck off.