The beauty of long-term storytelling

What a difference a year makes. A cliched saying, sure, but it’s incredibly appropriate for a lot of things. The housing market, WWE as a whole for a buttload (technical term) of reasons, and, of course, the story of Bianca Belair & Becky Lynch. Becky’s surprise return at SummerSlam 2021 was a moment. The crowd went wild, the shock was palpable, and Bianca Belair, then the reigning SmackDown Women’s champ, didn’t back down from the weirdness of it all. The card said Sasha Banks was her opponent. What she got was Carmella, which is crazy in retrospect given Mella’s recent position in this story. After dispatching the former Princess of Shaolin with ease, Bianca looked prime to go home and kick up her feet for the night.

Then The Man came around and everything changed in 27 seconds.

From there, the story took a few crazy turns: Bianca and Becky both went to Raw, Becky turned heel, and they put on the best match at this year’s WrestleMania. But even then, we knew this was far from over. Especially because Big Time Becks is everything she hates other wrestlers for being. The blame for that is squarely on Bianca’s shoulders.

Pro wrestling is all about whose story we’re telling. Both women have compelling reasons for claiming ownership of this story. Becky says this is her redemption tour since losing “her championship” at Mania. Whether it was Asuka, Asuka, Carmella, or even Asuka, so many people were thorns in her big time side. Asuka interjected herself into Bianca and Becky’s rematch at Hell in a Cell and she barely qualified for the Women’s Money in the Bank match. Oh, and by the way, she lost that match too. But after another number one contender’s match on Raw, Becky finally got what she chased for months: A one-on-one match with the champ.

And what about the champ? Bianca is killing it right now. She successfully defended her title in several dope matches against Carmella even while knowing Becky loomed in the omnipresent shadows. Which is exactly what she wants. Regardless of her success this year, Bianca isn’t letting go of those 27 seconds last summer. It drove her all the way to this year’s WrestleMania and is still behind the wheel today. What better way to exorcise that nasty demon than returning to the scene of the crime? Beating Becky at WrestleMania is huge, no doubt. But eviscerating her at SummerSlam? That’s therapeutic. It won’t erase what happened last year but it will make her feel a lot better.

So whose story is it? Who walks out of Nashville with the red brand’s belt? We’l find out shortly but even money is on this being the best match of the night if not the second best.