Hiya!

Rhea Ripley is back! Yes, the Mami of The Judgement Day made her triumphant return to WWE‘s RAW and chased off Liv Morgan, the current RAW Women’s Champion and the person who put her on the shelf in the first place. She also came face to face with her supposed boyfriend, “Dirty” Dominik Mysterio, due to this closeness with Liv Morgan. The instant her music hit and Rhea Ripley marched towards the ring, you could hear the fans erupt with cheers to welcome her back.

I did, however, find this a little bit weird as, before she was injured, wasn’t Rhea Ripley supposed to be one of the baddies in the WWE and RAW? After all, she is part of the one of the biggest heel stables, The Judgement Day. The same group who indoctrinated “Dirty” Dominik Mysterio in the first place? In fact, it was Rhea Ripley herself who used her feminine wiles to lure Rey Mysterio’s son into joining The Judgement Day! So, why are fans cheering one of the bad guys?

Well, honestly speaking, it’s because the good guy/bad guy dynamic, or the babyface/heel labels in wrestling parlance, feels dated today. This isn’t just a WWE thing. It’s something throughout the wrestling industry. The days of the true babyface and the true heel is slowing becoming too old-school for today’s wrestling fan.

Don’t get me wrong. There are always going to be room for a pure babyface and a pure heel in the WWE and wrestling in general. That’s never going to change. There’s always going to be a place for the heroic good guy like Cody Rhodes and the super bad guy like Solo Sikoa. We kind of need them to show us where the lines are drawn. What I’m saying is the black and white dynamic just feels rather passe and doesn’t feel as interesting today.

This isn’t really a new development if you really think about it. From what I know, there have always been those closeted wrestling fans who would secretly cheer for the bad guys because they didn’t care for the good guys. I personally experienced this when watching old school WWF wrestling with guys like “Ravishing” Rick Rude, the “Million Dollar Man” Ted DiBiase and “The Heartbreak Kid” Shawn Michaels when he threw his former Rockers tag team partner Marty Jannetty threw the Barber Shop window.

Yes, they were the heels but you just know there were fans even then who wanted to cheer them on but were afraid to do so because of the stigma of rooting for the bad guys. It just wasn’t done back then. It would be like rooting against the home team and you would be a traitor!

However, things slowly changed, especially during the days just before the Attitude Era. This was before my time but, from what I’ve researched, this was a time where edginess became the “in” thing. Heroes were more morally dubious and the WWE/WWF followed suit. They weren’t all that willing at the start, however.

A good example of this would be “Stone Cold” Steve Austin winning the 1996 King of the Ring tournament, defeating the newly “born-again” do-gooder Jake “The Snake” Roberts. You would have assumed the more moralistic version of Roberts was the “good guy” in the story and he was. He was also supposed to be the underdog as he was injured during the tournament. However, I don’t think fans liked his new preacher-esque gimmick. It was, well, too preachy! So, when Steve Austin simply destroyed Roberts by targeting the injured ribs, fans… liked it. Of course, the now infamous “Austin 3:16” speech helped close it out. Still, fans were openly cheering for Steve Austin as he berated Roberts by saying he was a piece of trash. He was the heel yet fans loved him!

The biggest reason why the idea of a pure babyface and a pure heel in the world of professional wrestling feels a little too old today is because fans don’t like being told who to cheer for and who to boo. If you really think about it, a professional wrestler’s job is to be an entertainer. It isn’t to be this moral fixture of goodness or evil. You can integrate that as part of your character but, if you’re not entertaining, then why would the fans like you? The WWE has had a huge problem with this as they will try to push their chosen ones on the fans and overtly hint this is the person who you’re supposed to like. It doesn’t work that way anymore!

While there are multiple examples of this, such as the WWE shoving Roman Reigns in our face as the new “suffering succotash” of a superhero babyface instead of Daniel “Yes!” Bryan, my favorite example of how tone deaf the WWE because is with trying to turn Becky Lynch heel in the 2018 SummerSlam show. The WWE, for some unfathomable reason, wanted to push Charlotte as this heroic champion. So, they did! She got inserted into the SummerSlam match Becky Lynch earned to face off against then Smackdown Women’s Champion Carmella. Now, Becky Lynch was on a winning streak and earned the title shot after beating Carmella in a non-title match. Charlotte was then added, making it a triple threat match because, annoyingly, Charlotte also beat Carmella in a non-title match.

Anyway, the finish of the match saw Becky Lynch locking in her Dis-Arm-Her finisher on Carmella. Charlotte swooped in and hit her Natural Selection finisher on Lynch and pinning her to win the Smackdown Women’s Champion. Fans were livid as they were cheering Becky Lynch’s name when the two friends supposedly hugged. So, when fans clocked Charlotte, who basically stole her victory, fans were extremely happy! In their eyes, Charlotte, the supposed “babyface” in the story, was the heel and Becky Lynch was justified in getting upset as her alleged friend for backstabbing her!

Despite the WWE trying to scramble and have Becky Lynch come out and give a speech regarding how the fans didn’t support her in the past, the fans didn’t buy it. She was a hero to them for standing up for herself. This was essentially Becky Lynch’s “Stone Cold” Steve Austim moment and led to the rise of “The Man” persona in the future. While she was supposed to be the heel in the storyline, fans didn’t see the logic in it.

Of course, I did say the concept of what a babyface and what a heel is isn’t dead and buried. I still say a really true good guy and a truly hated bad guy is still possible. However, they’re never going to be as interesting as the good guy with a bad streak or the bad guy who you can empathize with. It’s the same thing with movies, TV shows and cartoons. Life isn’t black and white and a lot of us like our stories to be held in that same regard.

Byee!

Do you think we will be fully behind a pure good guy or really hate a pure bad guy in the world of professional wrestling in the future? Let me know in the comments section below!