Charlotte’s Flair For The Gold - How WWE Ruined Their Own Revolution

The Divas/Women's Evolution/Revolution (jfc, NWA:TNA/TNA/Impact/GFW/Impact was easier to brand) was founded on an idea that WWE badly needed to up their f*cking game after decades of marginalising female talent into bikini contests or p*ss breaks depending on whatever their show or sponsors needed at the time.

It was, in actuality, formed by the type of socialism Vince McMahon has shown open disdain for. It grew from a collection of workers that knew their worth elevating each other in NXT, changing the conversation, then ensuring that conversation included everybody else once it expanded.

Paige and Emma had a banger on NXT's first live Network show, raising the status of the black-and-gold brand's Women's Title. With them both called up to the main roster, Charlotte Flair and Natalya brilliantly capped off a tournament that legitimised it further. From then on, The Four Horsewomen and select others had matches beyond the dramatic heft of any women's wrestling in the company's history. Charlotte Flair and Becky Lynch cried their f*cking eyes out alongside Sasha Banks and Bayley during the TakeOver: Brooklyn Curtain Call and your writer did too. The art was being re-perfected yet again, and it was being done by hard graft and never pulling the ladder away from those below. As usual with any great pro wrestling, only by mastering the fake stuff had the performers made it feel more real than ever before.

WWE realised eventually what they had, but struggled with its progress because they couldn't simply production line manufacture it like everything else. Their "Revolution" was to live or die entirely by the quality of the work, which was why 2018's Evolution was one of the company's best ever pay-per-views despite the half-a*sed promotion of it and them dressing the building like a jumped up house show.

As a prodigious talent from the period that expedited it all, Charlotte Flair was at the centre of this root-and-branch reimagining, fabulous matches and all, and earned the attention of Vince McMahon way beyond what he could afford her peers. Her work routinely justified her spot, but compounded a perception problem that was getting so bad, WWE felt it necessary to introduce it into the booking.

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