We're nearly a week removed from Money in the Bank 2025, and the major talking point coming out of that Premium Live Event isn't the winners of the Money in the Bank ladder matches, Jacob Fatu finally turning on Solo Sikoa, or Becky Lynch claiming her first Intercontinental Championship.
Instead, most people are talking about R-Truth's surprise return during the climax of the John Cena and Logan Paul vs. Cody Rhodes and Jey Uso main event. Truth, who was let go by WWE on June 1, slid into the ring and clocked Cena with the WWE championship belt, handing the win to Rhodes and Uso and gaining a measure of revenge against his "childhood" idol.
After losing to Cena on the May 24 Saturday Night's Main Event and getting squashed by J.C. Mateo (the former Jeff Cobb) less than a week later on SmackDown, we thought we saw the last of Truth in a WWE ring. But after seeing how the fans and Truth's colleagues reacted to the company treating the beloved veteran like an expense on a spreadsheet, WWE brought him back, with him now working under his real name.
Sure, Triple H pretended the whole thing was a big work during the post-Money in the Bank press conference (which Truth refutes). Still, those who are at least somewhat aware of WWE's tendencies see this for what it is: A move designed to quell the backlash to its short-sighted decision. It's far from the first time the company has done such a thing.
WWE has course-corrected in the past to quell fan backlash
WWE releases Drake Maverick and brings him back, pretending that it was part of a larger storyline
This isn't even the first time WWE let someone go only to bring them back after taking too much heat for it. Fans who watched WWE during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic remember Drake Maverick (ironically, a former archrival of Truth) suffering a similar fate.
Despite bringing in record profits that year, the company still decided to make budget cuts in the form of talent releases, and Maverick was one of those casualties. During this thoughtless purge, the company forgot that it had booked Maverick to participate in a round-robin tournament for the interim Cruiserweight championship. Then, Maverick poured his heart out over the release in a video he posted on Twitter (now X), which won over anyone with a functioning conscience.
Those two factors resulted in WWE bringing Maverick back for the duration of the tournament, adding the condition that, along with winning the interim title, he would receive a new full-time contract if he won the whole thing.
Naturally, WWE booked him to go on a miracle run, as he tied with KUSHIDA at the top of his block. However, the two didn't battle in a sudden-death tiebreaker to determine who went to the finals. Instead, KUSHIDA gave Maverick the spot out of sympathy.
That act of kindness led to...Maverick losing to El Hijo del Fantasma (the future Santos Escobar) in the championship round. But again, Maverick would receive some more apparent good fortune. Despite the loss, Triple H still handed him a full-time contract. This represented the peak of Maverick's second stint with the company, as he transitioned into an "Odd Couple" team with Killian Dain before getting rereleased.
All in all, Maverick's two runs in WWE, from his time as the 205 Live general manager to his pursuit of the Cruiserweight title, were a success, and it's good that he got a second chance with the company. But while WWE painted this as a magnanimous gesture on their part, everyone else knows that it was an attempt to assuage fans who saw Maverick's release as a painful example of the promotion's greed.
Daniel Bryan and the "'Yes!' Movement"
When Bryan Danielson signed with WWE in 2009, few people thought he would become one of the biggest stars in the company's modern history. However, that ascent didn't happen without some WWE-esque blunders.
After he debuted on NXT (with The Miz, of all people, as his mentor), the man known in WWE as Daniel Bryan (as he'll be referred to for the rest of this section) endured a long losing streak while the announcers (specifically, Michael Cole) mocked him for being a vegan and not owning a TV.
His booking somewhat improved when he got to the main roster (after being fired and rehired during the Nexus angle) but WWE still viewed him through that "good performer but not a star" lens. It's even easy to forget that the "Yes!" gimmick started off as a heel taunt and only gained traction thanks to the fans rebelling against WWE for scripting Bryan to lose to Sheamus in 18 seconds.
Regardless of how Bryan got over, his talents in the ring and as a personality kept him over with audiences. This helped elevate him to main event status in 2013, but WWE still seemed hesitant to fully lean into the idea of Bryan serving as the fed's top babyface, which explains the constant "B+ Player" jabs that the on-screen authority figures constantly hit him with.
Nothing better exempified this dichotomy between the company and the fans than the 2014 Royal Rumble match. Even though the fans clamored to see Bryan win the big battle royal, Byan wasn't even a participant, paving the way for the returning Batista to win.
From there, we know what happened: the fans rejected Batista as a babyface, Bryan challenged Triple H to a match at WrestleMania XXX, Bryan also asked for the stipulation that the winner of that match gets added to Batista vs. Randy Orton, Bryan beat Triple H at the pay-per-view, and Bryan won the WWE title in the main event.
WWE would have you believe that Bryan's title quest was part of this winding story that culminated at the biggest supercard of the year. In reality, a combination of factors caused WWE to abandon its original plans and go with Bryan, chiefly the repudiation of big Dave and CM Punk's abrupt exit following the Rumble.
Had the fans not rebuked Batista as the company's designated hero, WWE would've pushed forward with his match against Orton and Bryan would've faced Sheamus (again) in hopes that dropping him in the middle of the card would give the fans their fix before the REAL stars closed the show (a mistake it tried at the 2015 Rumble).
Thankfully, the fans had other plans.
Becky Lynch becomes "The Man"...whether WWE wants it or not
Nowadays, Becky Lynch is the top heel in Raw's women's division, somewhat leaning into the recent idea that she holds down younger talent (and perceived-by-the-company utility players like Bayley), which, aside from being nonsense on its face, is ironic considering her own rise to stardom.
Much like Daniel Bryan, WWE saw Lynch as a star, but one that would always play second fiddle to the creator's pets, namely Charlotte Flair. We saw this play out in 2018. Lynch was thriving as a babyface, getting great reactions, having solid matches, and cutting good promos, but with Flair needing a big heel rival to overcome en route to her (planned) impending WrestleMania match against Ronda Rousey, WWE decided it was time for her to wear the black hat and put the second-generation star over.
There was just one problem: the fans almost universally sided with the perpetually overlooked Lynch over the constantly overexposed Flair. Even WWE's attempt to re-contextualize both as tweeners with valid points for disliking each other did little to change this.
Lynch won a great Last Woman Standing match at the inaugural Evolution PPV to close this chapter of their feud, but that didn't change WWE's plans to do Flair vs. Rousey at 'Mania. It did appear that Lynch would face the noted conspiracy theorist dabbler at Survivor Series 2018...until Nia Jax broke Lynch's nose with a botched punch.
Because of the injury, Flair replaced Lynch at Survivor Series, but booked a finish indicating a rematch was coming. When Lynch returned as white hot as ever, though, even a promotion as set in its ways as WWE couldn't ignore her immense popularity.
So, Lynch and Asuka had their rumored 'Mania match at the 2019 Royal Rumble (another match worth rewatching), Lynch then won the women's Royal Rumble match, and -- despite the nonsense booking to include Flair and trick fans into thinking Lynch was getting screwed over -- won again in the main event of WrestleMania 35.
To be a little fair to WWE, it took them less time to pivot with Lynch than it did with Bryan, but it still took an overwhelming fan response and an unforeseen incident to force its hand. Otherwise, it would've powered through with Flair vs. Rousey and continued to shoehorn Lynch as a heel everyone wanted to cheer (like during her "Big Time Becks" run a few years later).