Even though Shane McMahon lost his match with the Undertaker at WrestleMania 32 that would’ve given him control of WWE’s Monday Night Raw programming, he has called the shots for both of the show’s episodes since then, at least within the storyline. Triple H hasn’t been seen during that time, but it can only be assumed that he would take issue with this since he and Stephanie McMahon had controlled the show for a while.
As a result, we seemed destined for some sort of power struggle between the two brothers-in-law. There are plenty of ways to write that scenario, but because battles for power between members of the McMahon family and other members of WWE management are nothing new, most of them have been done at some point over the last 20 years.
Here are the five best.
One-on-one match
Now at first glance, this would seem like an unfair fight. Shane certainly has put in his work in the ring, but Triple H is a 14-time world champion, most recently holding the big belt earlier this year. But Shane is also coming off an impressive showing against the Undertaker, and with due respect to Triple H, he’s no Undertaker.
So the WWE creative team could believably book this as a match that either man could win and build to what would presumably be a victory for Triple H that has some suspense.
Battle with representatives
This match has been done before, in a way, with the fatal four-way WWF Championship match at WrestleMania 2000. In that match, Triple H represented Stephanie while retaining his belt against Big Show (representing Shane), The Rock (representing Vince) and Mick Foley (representing Linda).
This time around, Triple H would want to make sure he was victorious again, so he might pick someone like Seth Rollins, if healthy, or make an attempt at Brock Lesnar. Shane might go with a John Cena, Roman Reigns or a dark horse pick like Samoa Joe.
Brand split
This angle was done for a while several years back, and many have called for it to be brought back even before Shane’s return. With a deeper roster after a recent influx of talent, coupled with an injury bug that has plagued the WWE Superstars, a split workload could kill multiple birds with one stone.
Further, the struggle between Triple H and Shane could be the catalyst for this change. Shane could somehow maintain control of RAW through his father, and Triple H could take control of SmackDown and build it up as a show to rival RAW again.
No struggle at all
Of course, it’s always possible that there won’t be a power struggle at all. In years past, the WWE has not been afraid to put the entire McMahon family into an Authority-like stable that runs all the shows together. That would take quite a turn from Shane, but that’s never been out of the question.
Another possibility that would eliminate the need for a struggle would be that Vince simply stops allowing Shane to control RAW, handing the keys back to Triple H. He could even kick Shane out of the building, but it seems more likely that they’ll go with something more dramatic than that.
Bullet Club invasion
This is perhaps the most controversial angle, but it could be the most entertaining as well. Vince could hand the control of RAW over to Shane more long-term, which would obviously leave Triple H out in the cold and likely a bit upset.
As a result, he could enlist the help of Bullet Club members Karl Anderson, Doc Gallows, Finn Balor and perhaps even AJ Styles as his invading force to regain control of the company’s top show. Whether this would be more like the NWO, the WCW/ECW Invasion or other similar lines from bygone eras, the story has a lot of potential.
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