The WWE divas have been put in a number of tough positions in the last year but it’s hard to think of someone that’s had it worse than the daughter of Ric Flair, Charlotte. While she reigns as Divas Champion, the booking of her as such as been nothing of baffling and it all started when she won the championship in the first place.
Going into Night of Champions, the WWE were trying to promote all the divas on the main roster at the same time in the team scenario. This type of booking caused the women’s individual characters to be completed neglected. Since they were trying to push them all at once, they never had the opportunity to elevate Charlotte as an individual until after Summerslam when she was going after the championship. The only problem with is that she wasn’t a developed enough character yet to even be considered as a number one contender for the top women’s title in your company. If your character isn’t developed enough and you’re going after the title, it’s going to be bad news.
Since all the heat was on Nikki Bella during the entire program, Charlotte’s role was to essential be the “anyone-but-her” girl. WWE fans were begging for anyone but Nikki to be champion and that hurt Charlotte’s character because she should not be seen in that way. The crowd weren’t for Charlotte, they were just rooting against Nikki. How could anyone possibly care about Charlotte after she won the title then?
WWE’s solution was to break up Team PCB and have Charlotte be face champion going up against the rebellious heel Paige. Think about this for a minute. Charlotte’s obviously not been on the main roster as long as Paige and during Charlotte’s time on the roster, her character development has been poor. Paige, on the other hand, is seen as one of the coolest women on the roster whether she’s face or a heel. So the idea that Charlotte is supposed to be the face going up against Paige was just never going to work.
To WWE’s credit, they tried everything they could to try and get Charlotte liked. They had her father come out week after week to help get her over. They had her cut “passionate” speeches about her father and about the divas revolution. They tried to portray her as the underdog against the heel Nikki Bella. They tried all of this and nothing came of it. People still cared a hell of a lot more about Paige than Charlotte. People care more about Sasha Banks than Charlotte. Why was all this not working? Simple. Charlotte wasn’t ready.
She was not ready to be promoted up the roster for a number of reasons. What has become evident since she’s started on the main roster is that her wrestling ability still needs working on. Her two matches with Paige at Survivor Series and RAW were both messes and she’s not really been that impressive on RAW either. Her microphone skills are still not up to par which is crucial in making a star. Her skills weren’t up to par and they were still having her talk every week and even had her close RAW last week by having her and Paige engage in a huge back-and-forth which made things worse.
Let’s talk about last week’s segment as of course, WWE tried pulling out the angle that they thought would make Charlotte as likeable hero to rally behind. They tried to garner sympathy for Charlotte by having Paige speaking ill of her deceased brother Reid. The contract signing was bad up until that point but that line and what followed was confirmation that there’s no hope for Charlotte right now. They’re fired every shot they had in their arsenal but it’s still not working. The best idea for WWE would have been to take the belt off Charlotte, re-think things and go back to the drawing board. At least with Paige as champion, you’ve got someone that has already been an established Divas Champion before. What did they do? They had Charlotte beat Paige clean in the middle at Survivor Series.
And to top it all off, on RAW they had a rematch which ended with a double count out initiated by Paige! Before anyone gets on me by the way, Paige WAS beaten clean by Charlotte at Survivor Series. Paige mentioned on RAW that Charlotte’s arms were under the bottom rope. My response to that is if Paige knew that Charlotte’s arms were under the bottom rope, why did she say anything at the time? She could see as clear as day that Charlotte’s arms was under the bottom rope so why didn’t she shout at the referee to inform him about Charlotte? If anything, Paige cost herself the Divas title.
My point is, you already had Charlotte beat Paige by making her tap out on pay-per-view. Why do we need to see this match again? You already had the feud wrap up at Survivor Series. If you’re going to have Charlotte be your champion, at least have her be challenged by someone else like Sasha Banks? Someone that the WWE universe have been actively requesting to see! Becky Lynch? Naomi? Natalya? Brie Bella? Hell, even Alicia Fox! What does Charlotte gain from facing Paige again?
I think this week’s edition of RAW in general was just a huge failure for the divas division. Paige and Charlotte went onto wrestle for fifteen minutes on RAW in a messy match that we’d just seen 24 hours ago. Becky Lynch and Sasha Banks wrestled for a grand total of four minutes which is quite insulting because of what these two in particular are capable of doing if they’re given enough time. Have you seen them on NXT wrestle against each other?
On top of all of this is Charlotte as the Divas Champion. I don’t want this to sound like I’ve got anything against Charlotte but the fact is her championship reign has been such a failure and if WWE don’t have her drop the belt or get away from Paige in a storyline which has not worked, there’s no hope. At Survivor Series, Charlotte was booed against the heel Paige that had just spoke ill about her brother that died. If that doesn’t confirm it, I don’t know what does. There’s no hope. Actually there is. They could still salvage this divas division and their champion could be someone that does it… like a boss.
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