By Sean Markisic
WrestleMania 40 is the 40th annual WrestleMania and took place this year on April 6 and 7. The biggest storyline following the show was whether or not the most popular character in WWE, Cody Rhodes, can dethrone Roman Reigns, who has been world champion since Aug. 2020.
Roman Reigns coined himself “The Tribal Chief,” claiming that he was at the top of WWE and that no one can beat him in the battle for championship. In the build up to this match, Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson, who has starred in a variety of films, returned to WWE and joined forces with Reigns in order to ensure that Rhodes had no chance to dethrone him. With Johnson as a wrestling board member for “Total Knockout”–the company that was created as branding for the merger between the UFC and WWE–Johnson has had influence in Rhodes versus Reigns. Johnson headed into this match by beating Rhodes down in the leadup with the hopes of weakening Rhodes.
Seth Rollins, who used to be partners with Reigns when he first started in WWE, was willing to stand with Rhodes. Rollins feels that Reign’s title run is starting to get to his head and that he’s full of himself.
As a result, Rollins and Rhodes challenged Johnson and Reigns to a tag team match on night one of Wrestlemania on April 6. The stipulation of the tag team match was if Johnson and Reigns won, the Rhodes versus Reigns title match on the second night would be “Bloodline Rules,” which meant that anyone would be able to interfere in the match, likely resulting poorly for Rhodes. There was a social media movement started by fans that was called “We Want Cody.” The movement was about the fans expressing their desire to see Rhodes be the one to face Reigns at Wrestlemania.
Rhodes defeated Roman Reigns on night two of WrestleMania, and after three and a half years Roman Reigns is no longer world champion. The match went well over 30 minutes, and it took everything out of Rhodes to defeat Reigns.
Rollins aimed to defend his world championship on the second night on Sunday, April 7, against Drew Mcintyre. Mcintyre has told Rollins in the past that he should not be focused on Rock and Roman because that is Rhodes’ battle to fight and not his. McIntyre believes that Rollins’ main priority should be to carry his title with honor and because he’s not doing that, McIntyre feels he needs to win the title in order to put significance back into the championship.
Another mainstage match for WrestleMania 40 included Rhea Ripley versus Becky Lynch for the Women’s World Championship. Ripley has been champ for over a year, and has defeated any challenger she’s faced. At Wrestlemania, Ripley aimed to defend the championship against Lynch, who is a seasoned veteran in the WWE.
Lynch is the biggest threat to Ripley because she’s been to the top before. In addition to this, lots of the people that have challenged Ripley up until this point were not at her level, whereas Lynch will be at the same skill level as Ripley.
WrestleMania 40 saw a ton of top level stars battling one another. Rhea Ripley defeated Becky Lynch on April 6, solidifying herself at the top of the women’s division in the company. The Rock and Roman Reigns defeated Seth Rollins and Cody Rhodes on April 6, which meant that on April 7 the match between Rhodes and Roman was not gonna be a fair fight. Rhodes valiantly prevailed against all odds, and did what no one else was able to do for a long period of time: defeat Roman Reigns.