Last week I brought to you a rather half-hearted Redux thanks to my flu-like symptoms. It’s unfortunate illness hit at such an inappropriate time and I don’t feel like I did Kaitlyn‘s win and Eve’s departure any justice.
Both have had a similar, yet different journey in the WWE. They both won a contest to get their main roster spot and both had to work their way to the top. This past year we got to watch the evolution of Eve Torres as she made the transition from babyface to super heel diva, and it was remarkable. To a lot of people, Eve never really clicked as a face. Her wrestling was certainly on par, but her act was generic and didn’t stand out. The best thing the company ever did was give her a chance to be a heel. Eve got to show us how far she had come as a performer. Her crowning moment was kicking Zack Ryder you-know-where at WrestleMania. It basically solidified everything about Eve, and her title reign as a heel was just the icing on the cake.
As Divas Champion she was entertaining. Week after week we watched Eve escape with a number of cheap victories. Her wins were fun to watch and her posing over the defeated bodies of her opponents was probably one of my favorite gestures ever. Eve was just solid – in the ring and out of it. She was a promotional dream for the company. Beautiful, talented, intelligent – Eve basically had everything you could ever want in a Diva and a face for the company. Her presence is going to be missed in the division more than any of us can imagine.
On the other side, you have Kaitlyn. This is a woman who came out of nowhere to win NXT by her personality alone, because she definitely didn’t have the skills at the time. Kaitlyn is Kaitlyn… she truly is a different brand of Diva. She’s beautiful but she’s powerful. She’s quirky, but it isn’t over the top or fake. I picked Kaitlyn on day one of NXT to win the entire thing, and look at her now. She’s Divas Champ while AJ is sucking face her sloppy seconds.
Sorry… that was really bitter.
The point is, Kaitlyn has come a long way. She’s worked her way up from nothing to a solid performer. She’s not the best in the ring, but she will get better. She will continue to improve. The evolution of Kaitlyn is something I’m invested in. She’s reminding me a lot of Trish Stratus in the fact she’s not a veteran, but she’s got the ball. She’s going to run with it no matter what and make the best out of it. I think Kaitlyn has potential to be just as marketable as Trish, Kelly Kelly, and Eve before her, and I truly, truly hope her first reign as champ has a multitude of memorable moments.
That being said, there wasn’t a lot to cheer about tonight. Kaitlyn took on the endangered Alicia Fox in a singles match. This is the point where normally I would be a bit disgruntled over the fact Alicia didn’t get a proper entrance, but seeing her dancing on the ropes makes me kind of glad I didn’t have to see the whole thing. Is she heel or face? Is she a tweener? You really never know when it comes to Alicia, her alignment is ever changing. At least her ring gear was cute for a chance. I can’t really complain.
Alicia gets the offensive advantage early on and slams Kaitlyn’s head into the turnbuckle three consecutive times. Kaitlyn eventually regains control and we see some nice outside work, including a dive off the apron by Kaitlyn. It’s also interesting to note that Tamina is watching all of this backstage. Could she perhaps be Kaitlyn’s first true challenger?
The ladies end up back in the ring and Alicia is able to gain the upperhand again. The crowd kind of rallies behind Kaitlyn, which is nice to see. Alicia ends up missing a huge leg scissors take down, but she covers it up with a clothesline. She pins Kaitlyn but only gets a two count. The match doesn’t last much longer and Kaitlyn hits a spear for the win – an ugly, painful looking spear at that. Our new champ celebrates her victory and that’s about it for that.
I wasn’t a big fan of this match because I didn’t feel like either of them had much chemistry. It’s hard for me when it comes to Alicia these days because the ‘E aren’t giving her much of a chance. We never know if she’s heel or face, and I’m not even sure if the commentators knew. One of them made a comment about all women secretly hating one another, and Alicia certainly didn’t seem very heelish, you get what I mean? She was still smiling and still dancing, so at the end of the day who really knows? At this point, Alicia probably doesn’t even know. I reckon she was just happy to finally be back on Raw.
Kaitlyn’s spear was terrible looking at the end. Not sure what happened with it, but it just didn’t come off right. I do like the fact it seems to be her finisher now, however. It’s better than that gut buster thing or whatever she had to start off with. Plus, it’s fun seeing a diva use a spear. I used to get excited every time Edge did it, then Christian, and lets not forget when Kelly Kelly busted it out when she went to defend the World Heavyweight Championship. It’s just a shock and awe type of move, and I really like seeing it. It’s a shame there wasn’t much more excitement than the funky spear, but Kaitlyn’s reign is a week old. There’s more chances for her to shine and I can’t wait until that happens.
Speaking of shining, AJ Lee continues to dominate when it comes to onscreen appearances. She had several moments on Raw including a backstage segment where she sloppily made out with Dolph Ziggler in front of Vickie Guerrero. Probably the best part of that segment was when Vickie dropped the bomb that the only number Dolph could pick from when it came to the Rumble was one or two. Not going to lie, I giggled.
I really don’t like this storyline.
Biased, I know! That said, there will be a non-biased article about my thoughts on this and where I want to see it go coming up real soon. That’s why I’m not going to get into too many details here ;-)
That about wraps us up, however. Until next time… Cryssi out!
