After “Hollywood” Hulk Hogan and The Miz, Sasha Banks is the first woman to be featured in the WWE Evil series. Each episode offers you an interesting point of view on a wrestler, not through his career or iconic matches but through the creation and the evolution of his/her character. WWE Evil is about dissecting the heel, give a different spotlight on it. When it comes to Sasha Banks, every person interviewed agrees to say she pushed her “Boss” character to such extremes she’ll do whatever it takes, to whoever she wants, whenever she wants to win.
Like John Cena, the narrator, says, “if you really want to know what evil lurks around you, take a closer look inside the hearts of your heroes.” Sasha Banks is the vengeance of Mercedes Kaestner-Varnado, the only coloured person in her town of Iowa, with no friends, no social life, no hope. A fan of bad guys in movies with ” a big chip on her shoulder.” One day, WWE popped up on her screen and she found a reason to dream of something else, to escape her life. She instantly connected with Eddie Guerrero and his “Latino Heat” because he was, at that time, one of the very few coloured people in WWE and, as she says, “I saw myself in him.”
Her chance came from her cousin, WWE Hall of Famer, and legendary rapper Snoop Dogg, who brought her to WWE shows and let her think her only dream, wrestling for WWE, was possible. Her first character Mercedes K.V. was not a character, it was the girl next door coming to the ring. Banks then transformed herself into somebody else. The Boss is a strange mix of movies’ bad guys, Floyd Mayweather, Kanye West, Nicki Minaj, Bratz© dolls, and, of course, her cousin Snoop Dogg. Like her good friend Bayley says, “You just wanted to slap her. The look in her eyes was saying this chick is dangerous.”
Becoming a heel was liberating for Banks but not for her opponents. She was unrepentant, vicious, unapologetic. She knew she was the best, and she backed it up. She was dirtier than any other women Superstars in the whole WWE. The more she was wrestling, the more she could continue her Rampage of Terror. Like her hero, she would lie, cheat, steal, make little girls cry, re-injure an opponent. No one was off-limits. Rey Mysterio noticed how she embraced the swag and the drip Eddie had when he was coming to the ring. It was even more obvious when she made her main roster debut.
Seen as “one of the most consistently talented people, men or women, I’ve seen in WWE” by a former writer, the mean Sasha continued to collect gold the same way she was backstabbing her opponents. “Sasha Banks was everything I wanted Mercedes to be, “says Banks. But Sasha is not Mercedes. In her quest for revenge, Sasha forgot to be Mercedes. Being Sasha Banks 24/7 made her forget who she really was, to the point of requesting her release from the company she dreamt of being a part of in order to know who she was without her character.
She came to Japan, reconnected with her true self and also with her passion. And came back to WWE the same “Bad Boss” she had always been. She main-evented WrestleMania 37, showing not only women can do it but black women too. She may have lost the match but she stole the spotlight that night. Mercedes finally embraced her dark side, making Sasha Banks the darker part of herself in addition to carrying the legacy of the Latino Heat. The Boss has become unstoppable, so is Mercedes.
Sasha Banks’ story is a very powerful tale, from the lonely little girl to this all-eyes-on-her Superstar. Mercedes has become unstoppable, thanks to Sasha. It doesn’t make this episode a fairy-tale one but a true lesson on life.
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