WWE European Tour House Show Hijacking Ends In WrestleMania Booking Trainwreck

This segment on Monday Night RAW in London was supposed to be a WrestleMania main event-level confrontation between John Cena and Cody Rhodes, but what it really became was an exercise in WWE's self-congratulatory revisionist history, wrapped in a thinly veiled burial of everything outside its own bubble.

Cena, ever the company man, took the opportunity not just to challenge Cody Rhodes but to take an underhanded shot at the entire existence of AEW without actually saying it. His entire premise boiled down to this: Cody left because he wasn’t good enough, he ran off to play wrestler elsewhere, and now he’s back, trying to pretend he belongs. This was WWE at its most transparent—pretending that Rhodes’ entire journey outside the company was a failure, despite the fact that AEW exists *because* of what Cody accomplished. Cena’s promo wasn’t about competition; it was about burying it. The message was clear: *Nothing outside WWE matters.*

And then there’s The Rock. WWE clearly wanted The Rock to be the one delivering this speech, hammering home the idea that Rhodes was a fraud who got handed everything. But since The Rock wasn’t in London, Cena was sent out to do the job instead, spinning the narrative that Cody’s success wasn’t earned, but stolen. They still wanted to run with the “selling your soul” angle, except this time, it was turned back on Rhodes rather than The Rock himself, as if WWE *wasn't* the one trying to force Cody out of the WrestleMania main event just a few weeks ago. The hypocrisy was staggering.

Cena’s whole spiel about “burying mediocrity” was laughable considering the last decade of WWE programming has been built on stale, safe choices, while the “mediocrity” he’s referring to just main-evented one of the biggest WrestleManias ever and led a company that forced WWE to actually try again. The real irony? Cena’s entire argument about Rhodes being inauthentic could just as easily be applied to his own manufactured superhero persona that WWE built brick by brick. Rhodes might have a neck tattoo that screams desperation, but at least it wasn’t focus-grouped in Stamford.

Then, there’s the final moment—the Cross Rhodes to Cena. A desperate attempt to let Cody stand tall, but let’s be real: Cena had already done the damage. His words weren’t meant to build intrigue; they were meant to diminish Rhodes, to diminish his accomplishments, and to frame him as an imposter in the house that Cena built. The sad part? Cena probably believes every word of it.

Instead of feeling like a battle of two titans on equal footing, this segment felt like WWE putting its thumb on the scale to remind everyone who really matters. This wasn’t a WrestleMania build. This was WWE patting itself on the back while taking shots at anything it doesn’t control.

Jimmy Uso’s Crimson Mask—A Forced Gunther Push
If you needed more proof of WWE’s chaotic booking philosophy, look no further than Jimmy Uso’s bloody beatdown, which was WWE’s lazy way of injecting last-minute fire into Gunther vs. Jey Uso. Gunther is already one of the most dominant champions WWE has built in years, so why does he need this forced brutality to gain heat? This wasn’t long-term storytelling—it was WWE hitting the panic button, realizing they hadn’t actually built Gunther vs. Jey as a legitimate feud and scrambling to manufacture drama at the last second.

Rhea Ripley Resets to 2023 Mode
Speaking of lazy storytelling, Rhea Ripley’s return and immediate attack on Bianca Belair was as uninspired as it gets. WWE’s creative team has had over a year to establish fresh rivalries for Ripley, yet here we are, circling back to the same tired “Rhea vs. Bianca” setup like nothing else exists in the women’s division. It’s the kind of booking that screams, We don’t know what else to do, so here’s something familiar. Instead of elevating the division, it just highlights how little thought WWE has put into