Opinion: The AJ Styles heel turn was necessary 

On last night’s episode of WWE RAW, AJ Styles turned heel in the main event segment with Luke Gallows and Karl Anderson after Styles lost his United States Championship match against Ricochet. While Styles is fantastic as a face, this heel turn was a long time coming and was needed as now the “real” AJ Styles can shine.

First, Styles has done pretty much everything he could as a face as he was the face of SmackDown since he was drafted there in 2016. He won the WWE Championship as both a heel and a face, and while his face reign wasn’t amazing, Styles did the most with what he was given. He also made the United States Championship meaningful when he held it in the summer of 2017, so hopefully, he can do the same if he wins it again, as the US title has lost its luster in recent years.

The Styles heel turn also freshens up his character, which had grown pretty stale as of late. Now that he is a heel again, he has fresh faces to feud with. With the Wild Card rule, it’s hard to decide who he will feud with since he could show up on SmackDown as well as RAW, but even with that he can feud with guys like Ricochet, The Miz, and some other mid-card faces if he wins the US title, which is something the title desperately needs. This can also set up a Styles v. Seth Rollins rematch for the Universal Championship down the line, which would be the perfect end goal as they had an amazing match at Money in the Bank and the dynamic between the two would be much different now with Styles as the heel.

The other good thing about the Styles heel turn is that now Gallows and Anderson have something to do. Before recent weeks, the only thing that they were doing was dancing around with No Way Jose and losing matches. Styles even scolded them for it. Now that they are heels and aligned with Styles, they will have more television time and can be built back up as legitimate threats for the RAW Tag Team Championships. All in all, the Styles heels turn is not only good for him as it freshens up his character, but it also helps Gallows and Anderson as well as possibly revitalizing the US title if Styles wins it down the line.