9 Ups & 3 Downs From Last Night's WWE SmackDown (Dec 11)

8. Nobody's Ready

These recent Asuka promos? They're fine. They get her and her feud over without exposing her too badly, and interspersing English passages with angry Japanese yelling provides a nice balance. Longer scripted dialogues were part of what started her character's long-term erosion in the first place, but these little snippets are getting the point across at the moment.

'The Empress Of Tomorrow' kept it basic this week. She promised to grab the SmackDown Women's Championship and claim victory at TLC, and that 'tonight, Charlotte will not be ready for Asuka.' Cue: the imposing Japanese part. Over and out.

WWE's recent elevation of Becky Lynch and Charlotte Flair to a level above everyone else in the women's division makes such segments essential. They've done a solid job with their presentation of Asuka over the past few weeks. We'll dive into that later in the article, but this brief, old-school segment successfully built anticipation for what was already going to be a hot SmackDown main event.

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Channel Manager

Andy has been with WhatCulture for eight years and is currently WhatCulture's Wrestling Channel Manager. A writer, presenter, and editor with 10+ years of experience in online media, he has been a sponge for all wrestling knowledge since playing an old Royal Rumble 1992 VHS to ruin in his childhood. Having previously worked for Bleacher Report, Andy specialises in short and long-form writing, video presenting, voiceover acting, and editing, all characterised by expert wrestling knowledge and commentary. Andy is as much a fan of 1985 Jim Crockett Promotions as he is present-day AEW and WWE - just don't make him choose between the two.