The Women's division has had its share of struggles. Becoming a top wrestler hasn’t been so easy for women. So, even the wrestling business hasn’t been an exception. In a hyper- masculine world such as this, women have had to break many walls, cross barriers and break down glass ceiling to make a mark. And it has had its revitalizations over the years. The highs and lows have gone hand in hand. The latest low lasted for a few years with less and less emphasis being put on character development, storylines or even wrestling skills.
But it looks like that phase is passing by with the arrival of new women who’ve achieved so much in NXT.
Here are the 5 worst booking decisions in the women's division:
#1 The Divas Revolution
It started off with a bang and it had to end with a whimper. Whatever it was, it had to end. Just like the catchphrase ‘best for business’, this catchphrase or rather these buzzwords had gotten too redundant. All the ‘Divas Revolution’ phase did was tell the audience that WWE has a great depth of talent but nothing creative for them to do. All they had was only three women tag teams fights every week. But we also saw some great moments, like Paige facing Sasha Banks, Paige breaking away from Charlotte and Becky Lynch and Nikki Bella truly gaining a supernova amount of heat after beating AJ Lee’s record of the longest Divas Title reigns and Charlotte finally being crowned as the new face and champion of the then ‘Divas’ division.
But the buzzwords did not live long (thankfully). We are now on to the phase where we have a new Women’s title (glorious) and the term ‘diva’ is obsolete.
#2 Wrestlemania
For years, all WWE did with Wrestlemania and women were have them either jumbled together in battle royal matches or tag matches which never really did anything with storylines or character wise. There have been a few exceptions- the triple threat match at WrestleMania 18 between Lita, Trish Stratus and Jazz, the match between Mickie James and Trish Stratus, and this years triple threat match between Charlotte, Sasha Banks and Becky Lynch.
But in between all that we’ve seen during the ‘Divas’ phase was abominable excuses for matches, one of which Santino Marella won, where he introduced a new persona by the name of Santina.
#3 Bellas Feud
This started off looking surprisingly fresh and great. Nikki Bella turned heel in a spectacular fashion during the match between Stephanie McMahon and Brie Bella at Summerslam 2014. But what followed after that night was a series of unforgettable moments, promos and just downright repulsive segments which gave just no context of this feud and no interest in the performers involved. The Bellas aren’t really the best promo workers in the company even if Nikki Bella has gone on to improve monumentally in the ring. And hence, they had a really good match but what preceded it was just not up to the mark.
#4 Breaking the women’s title
Lay-Cool may well be one of the most entertaining heel tag team the Women’s division saw but it has had its share of forgettable moments. One of them was breaking the much revered and historic Women’s title in two. They actually carried one-half of the title with each other. It looked ugly. It really did. But then it was just a phase out for the title since the Divas Title became the mainstay of the division. Hence, this title became the face of a certain period when the division was at its lowest with hardly decent matches and more emphasis on anything but character development or wrestling skills.
#5 Natalya Farting Gimmick
Natalya is a great wrestler but she has hardly ever been an interesting character. That has been one of the issues going into her feud with Charlotte, that there is hardly anything to care about her as a babyface apart from the fact that she is a Hart. Her promo delivery has been completely flat and she hasn’t really developed into a well-rounded character. But that does not mean that one could go ahead and give her an absolutely redundant gimmick as this one that happened in 2012. She would have strings of backstage segments at the end of which she’ll fart much to the disgust of the wrestler and the audience.
Not that farting is a sin but this gimmick served no purpose at all.
