On the latest edition of RAW, we saw a vignette for a returning WWE superstar. Yes, we got our first glimpses of Eva Marie is almost five years.
The return of the former Total Divas star had long been speculated over the course of her absence. It had even been reported in October last year that Marie had put pen to paper on a deal.
Whilst some were happy to see that she’d be back in a wrestling ring, many fans were feeling sceptical for a number of reasons.
One, her initial run with the company didn’t see her open a lot of eyes when it came to her in-ring ability. The fact that her biggest impact came via an angle in which she avoided wrestling speaks a lot about the quality of her matches.
Secondly, we are just a few weeks following the company’s second straight post-Mania cull of their roster – an exodus that included popular female stars Mickie James and the IIconics. As a result, the decision to re-debut Eva Marie at this point may be seen as a slap in the face to these athletes.
My friend and colleague at the podcast, David Campbell reacted saying that he wants Marie to be like Lou Therz in the ring if they let go of Peyton Royce and Billie Kay in favour of her.
Whilst David is obviously being facetious, I think the minimum we want is a better product from Marie between the ropes. A similar effort compared to her first run just wouldn’t be acceptable.
You can understand why WWE have brought her back given the work she has done in other media and thus the eyes she could bring on the product from other avenues, but did they really have to let Mickie go to do this?
Adding Marie to the roster as it was before WrestleMania may have actually helped to solidify the female undercard, much like I previously suggest Sonya Deville could do also.
Instead, we are left biting our nails with worry that a John Laurinaitis-led talent relations team are trying to reinvent the Divas era. Whilst I hope to be completely wrong and Eva Marie shows us that she has indeed put the graft in, I’m very nervous and not holding my breath at this particular time.
The founding father and ‘higher power’ of the ESSR army, Steven oversees the operation of the Suplex Retweet podcast series and is the show’s primary host. With a broad knowledge of the industry, Steven leads discussions on a wide range of subjects from stables to WCW.
Email: steven@eatsleepsuplexretweet.com
For some reason, he thinks John Cena’s real name is Allen Jones and is madly in love with Becky Lynch.
