At WWE WrestleMania 35, Ronda Rousey will presumably defend the Raw Women’s Championship in a Triple Threat against Becky Lynch and Charlotte Flair, and, to help build to the story, she’s playing the role of the “Wrestling Is Fake” skeptic we’ve all learned to roll our eyes at.
Since joining WWE after the first ever Women’s Royal Rumble match in 2018, Ronda Rousey has shown that she’s a natural inside the ring. Her promos, however, have garnered far less praise from the WWE Universe, with her promo against Nikki Bella prior to their match at Evolution being among the lowlights.
Recently, Rousey has come under more fire – and a barrage of mostly hilarious and harmless memes – from wrestling fans for a recent promo in which she dropped a few curse words and started ranting about how “fake” wrestling is. This promo insulted many wrestling fans, who believe Rousey crossed a line by blatantly dissing the sport in this manner.
The video can be viewed below, and, yes, I’m giving a CAUTION for language.
Weirdly enough, I wasn’t mad at this. Because about a month ago, I was worried about Rousey “accidentally” dissing pro wrestling in promos when she would tell Becky Lynch or Charlotte Flair that they can’t hold a candle to how bad-ass she is.
But that was a stupid assertion on my part, since I assumed that this wasn’t by design.
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Rousey is the “Wrestling Is Fake” skeptic we’ve ALL met in our own lives and on social media. You know, the people who remind us that pro wrestling is fake every time we wear a baby blue Charlotte shirt or catch up on last night’s SmackDown highlights during breaks at work. She’s that annoying person who can somehow enjoy action movies, yet has to remind everyone else that The Undertaker isn’t actually a dead man.
Though her promo above was incredibly strong for both its language and subject matter, this blatant breaking of kayfabe isn’t harmful. Sure, it’s not in great taste for many fans, who will roll their eyes at this – as we roll our eyes at anyone who goes “bUt iT’s FakE” – but I’m a sucker for crazy ideas.
Look, Rousey vs. Becky vs. Charlotte at WrestleMania 35 is more than just a match that pits three of WWE’s biggest stars, best wrestlers, and most hated rivals together in the same ring for one of the most prized titles in all of professional wrestling.
No, it’s a battle of ideologies. Colleague Laura Mauro wrote about the Wrestle Kingdom 13 main event between Hiroshi Tanahashi and Kenny Omega, describing it as a battle for the future of NJPW, given the diametrically opposed wrestling styles and views on wrestling that Tanahashi and Omega have.
The same can be said for this Triple Threat match. Becky and Charlotte are a part of WWE’s Four Horsewomen and have been tearing down arenas and shattering glass ceilings as two of the promotion’s biggest stars over the past few years. They are the perfect examples of what it means to be a professional wrestler: They are committed to their characters, they wrestle night-in and night-out, and they share a connection with the WWE Universe that many superstars can only dream of.
Meanwhile, Rousey is the outsider. She’s the former MMA star with mainstream appeal who has appeared in big movies and made all the rounds on talk shows. Rousey’s “Armbar” has won her championships in MMA, and she KNOWS she’s a legitimate bad-ass. Hell, that’s why she calls herself the “Baddest Woman on the Planet”.
But Charlotte and Becky have more simple nicknames, and they are nicknames that the fans have organically taken to: The Queen and The Man, respectively. They symbolize what each of these characters means in just one word. Charlotte is wrestling royalty, and she knows it, backing up her words with every jaw-dropping move inside the ring. Meanwhile, Becky shattered glass ceilings and stereotypes as an underdog babyface character, working her way to the top to be “The Man” of WWE.
Rousey can’t compete with the years of pro wrestling cred that Becky and Charlotte have built up to earn a place in the first women’s main event at WrestleMania, but, in kayfabe, she sees herself as being responsible for them being in the main event. She’s the bad-ass who sells tickets in this “fake” sport, taking arms and names on a path of destruction with the title around her waist.
Outside of kayfabe, she’s loved professional wrestling for all of her life. When she says that she doesn’t “need” pro wrestling, it’s not a statement of arrogance: she’s saying that she loves being a part of this sport and is doing this for more than money, in spite of what some fans have said.
What’s more interesting in the build up to a WrestleMania main event? A benevolent MMA “outsider” as champion who plays nice and respects wrestlers the crowd is clearly more interested in cheering? Or an “outsider” who disrespects pro wrestling and shows no love for a fanbase that has never loved her (and some of those reasons, such as her past comments about trans women in combat sports and the Sandy Hook tragedy, are valid) getting her comeuppance at the hands of WWE’s move beloved superstar in Becky Lynch?
At WrestleMania, in kayfabe, Rousey is in for a rude awakening of how bad-ass pro wrestlers are, but, in reality, the woman who grew up idolizing Roddy Piper is playing a role in a wonderful story about the transcendent power of pro wrestling as an artform in the modern day. Except, she’s one of the supporting characters, because the true hero is the women she’s traded barbs with for the past several months, Becky Lynch.
On Apr. 7, Rousey is about to see just how much of a bad-ass The Man and The Queen, who are pro wrestling through and through, truly are.