loveless

“You know what you are, Bayley? You are nothing but a coward.”

Sasha Banks, The Legit Boss

The Legit Boss is a complex character. She’s arrogant, cocky, aggressive and will take you out if you get in her way. Whilst most heels in the division play the cowardly, high-school bully who has to cheat to get the win, Sasha doesn’t play that way. She’s confident in her abilities and she knows how good she is. She will do whatever it takes to win, even if it means putting her own body on the line. She can be mean and ruthless if she needs to be and what matters most to her is being at the top. Sasha thrives as a heel. That’s when she’s in her element. She’s narcissistic and a bit of an egomaniac. It’s all about her and she she has to be in the spotlight. Nothing else matters but that.

“The Greatest To Never Be Great”

We saw The Legit Boss in NXT but this character has been held back on the Main Roster. Sasha’s demeanour changed during her rivalry with Charlotte in 2016. She wanted to be the hero, the good guy. She wanted the respect of the fans. But she lost at every turn. She could never defend the title successfully. She got another chance when she beat Alexa in 2017, but lost the title again on her first defence. She’s been in almost all the “first-ever” matches, but she always came up short. Something has changed. Her confidence was knocked and she had nothing. But at least she wasn’t alone, she had Bayley.

“If You’ve Got A Back, Sasha Banks Has A Knife”

So a year passes by and Sasha sees the opportunity to win the first ever women’s Royal Rumble. This is her chance to be a big deal again. She betrays Bayley but still gets eliminated. That was The Boss making a breakthrough. The Boss also comes out in the Elimination Chamber, when she betrays Bayley again. There’s a part of Sasha that thinks Bayley is holding her back. Bayley is in the way of Sasha’s success. But the smile she has on her face every time she turns on Bayley - that look of satisfaction - it isn’t just about betraying Bayley, it’s about being The Boss again. The thrill of being the bad guy, she misses it.

Another Chance

Her and Bayley are eventually able to resolve their issues and they’re good again. She realises that she doesn’t need to take out Bayley because that’s the only person who truly has her back. So things are good again.

Then Sasha gets the opportunity to face Ronda Rousey. This is Sasha’s chance to get the gold. She misses being champion. She knows that the tag titles are in the future but this is the present. So The Boss starts to break through again. Sasha is very vicious from the beginning. Telling Ronda she’s a nobody and she’s going to teach her how to lose with class. The viscousness plays out in the match as well. Countering Ronda at every turn and going for some brutal submissions, Sasha is desperate to win this match. She even uses her arm-band to lock in the Bank Statement. She has a lot to prove. She needs to remind everyone how good she is. This is her chance to become a 5x women’s champion. But she loses. Defeated and disgraced, she walks away…with a smile on her face. Maybe it’s because she knows she could still get a chance at the tag titles with Bayley. Maybe she has a plan. Or maybe she once again got a taste of what it felt like to truly be The Boss.

Enough is Enough

Sasha and Bayley win the inaugural tag team titles at Elimination Chamber and all is good. She finally has the gold again. This is her chance to be a successful champion and have a long title reign. But they lose the belts at Wrestlemania. This was Sasha’s chance to finally get that big win but they come up short. She’s had enough. Sasha Banks disappears for four months.

MIA

While all this was happening, Becky Lynch is having the greatest run of her career. Winning the Royal Rumble, winning at mania, defeating ‘The Baddest Woman on The Planet’, she’s the face of the company. But Becky is bored. Bored because she has to face Charlotte for the 100th time. Bored because she has to face Lacey over and over again. So she teases Sasha on social media. And calls her out whenever she gets the chance. She knows she needs a good challenger. She knows Sasha is one of the best in the game. She has history with Sasha. In NXT, Sasha told Becky she made her. Now Becky is champion and needs a worthy adversary. But Sasha is MIA. Becky figures, if she keeps poking the bear, she’ll get a response sooner or later. But Sasha never responds.

“New blue hair, same true colours”

Sasha returns they day after Summerslam. She interrupts Natalya’s tribute to her father. On her way to the ring, she stops to hug two little girls, even gives them her rings. She hugs Natalya and tells her her father would be proud of her- then sucker punches her. She takes off her purple wig and reveals a new look. She has blue hair now. With a smile on her face, she brutally attacks an already injured Natalya before Becky comes out. Sasha focuses on Becky and decimates her with a chair. What everyone wants to know is why? Why has Sasha been gone? Why did she attack Natalya and Becky?

“She remembered who she was and the game changed.”

Sasha Banks took time away to reflect on her career. She needed to remember who she truly was. For months, she’s been posting lyrics and quotes about butterflies, growth and her evolution. Sasha has always been The Boss, albeit toned down for the past couple of years. But she’s realised that being nice and safe, hasn’t gotten her anywhere. She’s done things the right way for too long. Even her partnership with Bayley didn’t get her back to the top of the mountain. She’s been holding back. She’s been fighting this feeling for a long time now. An internal battle. Being the hero, the one little girls can look up to, or being true to herself? Being The Boss she really is.

She came back with a vengeance. The night she returned, she came to make a statement. Sasha has always had a flair for the dramatic and that’s why she wore the wig and even pretended to be nice before she struck Natalya. She was giving everyone a false sense of security. She knew she’d been missed. But she wanted to make it clear that she was not the same person anymore. It wasn’t even about Natalya. Nattie just happened to be there. It could have been anyone else, but Natalya was an easy target. She was already injured and Sasha just wanted to hurt someone. As for Becky, she just got in the way. Of course Sasha had seen everything Becky had said about her. Sasha has seen everything every one has been saying and but she never responded. She doesn’t care, after all. People-pleasing never got her anywhere. She knows they’re all beneath her.

Sasha is back to take and destroy. She’s playing with Becky for now. She hasn’t responded for months so why respond now? She’s cold and calculating. She’s smart. She is sending a message: you’re not worth my time. At least not right now. She’s using Nattie as a plot device. She’s showing how ruthless she can be. She doesn’t care what anyone thinks. She doesn’t need the fans, they turned on her ages ago. They saw her as the girl who couldn’t get the job done. They saw her as “the greatest to never be great.” Bayley isn’t there anymore. She has no one to hold her back. She has nothing to lose and everything to gain. She got a taste of that when she faced Ronda. The freedom to be The Legit Boss. It’s been bubbling for years. She knows what she needs to do get the gold and keep it this time. The way she did in NXT.