Nikki Bella is one of the most divisive female superstars of recent times, and even that might be an understatement. She’s spent the last few years growing the Bella Empire to the point where she’s probably one of the most marketable wrestlers on the entire roster, and that extends beyond both male, female, Raw and SmackDown Live.
Unfortunately, as is the case with any professional wrestler, there are things that we’d like to change and we’re fairly confident that we aren’t alone in our desires. Nikki has done well to re-brand herself within the new era and continue to stay relevant, and she’s proven her resilience in coming back from neck surgery, but there still needs to be a few alterations.
The Fearless One has an insanely loyal fanbase so these points may ruffle a few feathers, but that’s not our intent here. We’re simply trying to analyse some of the flaws within Nikki’s game, some of which you may agree with and some you may not. She’s definitely underrated in certain departments, but in others, she needs a massive reality check. Period.
So with all that being said, here are five things that Nikki Bella needs to change in WWE.
Entrance
Nikki Bella is an icon to many around the world, which is understandable given her larger than life persona. Unfortunately, her entrance doesn’t really follow through on that, with the sexualisation of everything she does raising a few eyebrows amongst us hardcore fans. In fact, we’re surprised it hasn’t gathered more attention.
After all, we’re supposed to be moving out of an era focused on how our female superstars look and yet we’ve got people like Nikki Bella trying to sexualise everything she does on her way down to the ring.
Now that may make us sound like negative nancys, but just think about those little girls who will think it’s acceptable to follow down the same path.
Speaking of which...
Attire
What on earth were they thinking when they decided to make Bella a babyface? Honestly, she dresses so unbelievably provocatively that we can’t even begin to understand the logic. From the short top to the hot pants of sorts, we’re failing to find the logic here as everything about Nikki just screams detestable heel.
Obviously, there are other superstars on the roster like this, but not to the extent of the former Divas Champion. If she changed things up a bit or even, you know, turned into a bad girl again, then she’d be more believable because we just couldn’t bring ourselves to paint Maryse and Miz as the heels during their mixed tag feud.
It just didn’t make any sense.
Staying on this topic...
Alignment
She needs to be a heel, simple as that. Given the dynamics of all the superstars on SmackDown Live right now it would make sense, as Nikki could end up leading the Welcoming Committee from the front. With three stooges in the form of Natalya, Carmella and Tamina by her side, she could turn into an unstoppable champion once again.
Plus, it makes sense for there to be four main heels to oppose Naomi, Becky Lynch and Charlotte due to the numbers game alone. Nikki does her best work as a heel by far, and she falls into the category of “How can Vince not understand this?”
Time will tell whether or not this issue will be resolved.
You quite literally can’t see him.
Cena association
The on-screen partnership of John Cena and Nikki Bella was extremely hard to watch at times. The couple, who had been accused of having a manufactured relationship by The Miz, didn’t provide us with all too much in the ways of babyface entertainment. In fact, it actually ended up damaging the image of both competitors.
When Nikki comes back she needs to stop riding the coat tails of Cena and instead focus on her own performances, as she needs to improve as a singles star. They can always come back together for fun one-off appearances, but their extended run as an on-screen tag team needs to be over now.
Mic work
Everyone remembers the infamous feud between Brie and Nikki back in the summer of 2014, but we aren’t here to talk about that – we’re here to talk about her work on the mic in 2017.
Spoiler: it’s still quite bad. Whilst the feud with Natalya was certainly different and interesting to a degree, it once again highlighted the problems that Nikki has as a babyface.
She has such a frustrating voice at times that being a cocky heel should just come naturally to her, and for the most part, it probably does. If WWE can direct her real life persona from Total Divas into the weekly programming, then we could have a heel on our hands who’s actually booed for the right reasons – similar to The Miz, ironically.
