7 Ups And 9 Downs From Last Night's WWE Raw (Feb 1)
UPS
7. Shedding Her Security Blanket?
This gets a thumbs-up only if its leading somewhere. Otherwise, it was just a silly directionless angle. Monday night, Charlotte looked like she was well in control of her match against Brie Bella, about to slap on the Figure Eight for the win. However, her father Ric Flair was up on the apron (he actually had been up there for a couple moments trying to distract the ref when Charlotte was in trouble). The Divas Champion acknowledged him and paid a little too much attention to him, allowing Brie to roll Charlotte up mid-Figure Eight for the pin. Charlotte glared at her dad and mouthed some unkind words about him costing her the match. If that means that this is the beginning of Charlotte pushing her father away, it could be a great development. When she began her heel turn, Charlotte needed Flair to help steer things from the outside, and its worked well. But at some point, shes going to have to stand on her own, and being the only woman with a male manager is going to start looking odd. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P1Ttw6QGV5s Maybe Charlotte loses another match like this and blows up at her dad, dismissing him and making herself an even bigger villainess for badmouthing the Nature Boy. But if this was just a way to give Brie a meaningless rollup victory
Scott is a former journalist and longtime wrestling fan who was smart enough to abandon WCW during the Monday Night Wars the same time as the Radicalz. He fondly remembers watching WrestleMania III, IV, V and VI and Saturday Night's Main Event, came back to wrestling during the Attitude Era, and has been a consumer of sports entertainment since then. He's written for WhatCulture for more than a decade, establishing the Ups and Downs articles for WWE Raw and WWE PPVs/PLEs and composing pieces on a variety of topics.
