Carmella talks about the current booking of WWE’s women’s division
While things are a lot better than they were even five years ago, WWE’s women’s division still suffers from an inconsistent television presentation. For every monumental benchmark the women in WWE clear, the company seems to construct two (or more) head-scratching storylines/wrestler usage that attempts to undermine that progress. The promotion’s recent booking of Carmella reflects this.
A former Money In The Bank Ladder Match winner and SmackDown Women’s Champion, Carmella received an extensive repackaging this past fall and was inserted into a storyline with Sasha Banks over the SmackDown Women’s Title upon her return. But once that program ended, Carmella saw her television time drastically decrease.
Of course, this isn’t a rare phenomenon in WWE; women who aren’t in a singles title program often end up sidelined without a meaningful story to sink their teeth into. Knowing all of this, it isn’t surprising to hear Carmella express some frustrations over the booking.
Carmella talks about her frustrations with WWE’s booking of the women’s division.
Appearing on The Bella Twins’ podcast, Carmella talked about the lack of TV time and storylines the women have gotten, particularly on the three-hour Raw broadcasts (h/t to Fightful’s Robert DeFelice for the transcription):
"“Even, myself, I would sit at home and watch Raw and it would be 10 p.m. before I would see a woman on the show,” said Carmella. “It’s like, ‘this is a three-hour show. What the hell?’ Even if I’m just a fan, which I am. Like if I didn’t work at WWE and I was just sitting at home watching, I want to see the women. That’s why I tune in. If I’m waiting until 10 p.m. to see a girl, it’s like, ‘what the hell?’ That’s not okay for little girls at home or whoever is watching waiting for the women. It just feels like oh, now, there’s only a focus on maybe two women or one women’s storyline.”"
A good example of this “one step forward, two steps back” approach occurred at WrestleMania 37, where WWE established two top stars in the women’s division in Rhea Ripley and Bianca Belair — with the latter participating in the first WrestleMania main event featuring two Black women — but also recycled the same tired “prod the Bella Twins about John Cena” trope when the newly minted Hall of Famers appeared on the second night of the show.
Next. Bayley says WWE can do more with the Women’s Tag Titles. dark
As of April 28, all but one of the women-centric storylines revolve around the singles and tag team championships, with Charlotte Flair’s storyline with a referee that she beat up on the April 19 episode of Raw serving as the outlier.
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