A professional wrestling storyline works on one aspect: the hero vs. villain feud where one wrestler is portrayed as the heroic character and the good guy who is supposed to be cheered by the fans and doing things that entertain the fans and are ethically good and the villainous character or the bad guy is supposed to do ethically wrong things and cheat to win.
However, we have seen sometimes that fans get tired of the "good guys" and "their ethically right ways" and begin booing them which leads those good guys into becoming "bad guys" or doing bad things to amuse the fans. Examples are of the anti-hero Stone Cold Steve Austin, who would often betray his allies by hitting them with a Stone Cold Stunner because he was the rattlesnake and not trustworthy. Despite his actions being ethically wrong, fans always cheered for him and then there was Eddie Guerrero, who "lied, cheated and stole". Lying, cheating and stealing is a characteristic of bad guys but this mantra helped Guerrero into becoming an overnight star and the fans chanted for him and cheered for him whenever he lied, cheated and stole.
Sometimes creative writers' perception of a character is not important but the fan reaction is a lot more important than that. Fan reaction is very important in designating storylines and alignment of a character and fan reactions have often forced creative writers to change characters and turn babyfaces into heels or heels into babyfaces.
There have been a lot of notable examples in wrestling history where a babyface wrestler was not getting very over and the character was getting very stale and being booed by the fans instead of being cheered which led to creative team turning the character into a heel where the heel turn would bring cheers instead and once the character became popular and beloved in the heel turn, the creative team turned that character into a babyface.
Shawn Michaels:
"The Heartbreak Kid" Shawn Michaels started his World Wrestling Federation career in 1988 as one half of The Rockers, along with Marty Jannetty. The fan favorite good looking young team was very popular among females but not popular enough to succeed in the wider WWF landscape which was being ruled by Hulk Hogan, Randy Savage, Ultimate Warrior and others. The Rockers even failed to win the WWF Tag Team Championship and after failing to gain success, the team broke up for good in 1992.
This was a turning point in Michaels' career where he turned heel by superkicking Jannetty on Brutus Beefcake's interview segment The Barber Shop and transformed into the narcissistic Heartbreak Kid. This egoistical transformation helped Michaels become a quick rising star in the mid-card as he became Intercontinental Champion later that year and even headlined the 1992 Survivor Series pay-per-view against Bret Hart for the WWF Championship but came up short. However, this heel turn made him very popular and Michaels would become an important part of the WWF mid-card scene. In 1994, his partnership with his bodyguard and tag team Diesel broke up, which led to Diesel quickly becoming the WWF Champion. Michaels would win the 1995 Royal Rumble and face Diesel for the title at WrestleMania XI but came up short.
It was then that Michaels accused his new bodyguard Sycho Sid of failing to help him win the title, which led to Sid attack and injure him. It was there that Michaels turned back into a fan favorite after making himself significant enough. The late 1995 revolved around Michaels as WWF began building him as a bigger star and transition him from a mid-carder into a main eventer. He won the 1996 Royal Rumble for the second consecutive time and finally won the WWF Championship at WrestleMania XII from Bret Hart in the first televised Ironman match in WWF history. The rest of Michaels' career is history.
The bottomline is that if The Rockers had not been broken up and Shawn Michaels had not transformed himself into the heel The Heartbreak Kid, maybe he would not have developed into the legend that he is today and would have not been even close to the WWF Championship scene.
The Rock:
Dwayne Johnson was the first third-generation professional wrestler heading into WWF. His father was Rocky Johnson, a former WWF Tag Team Champion and his grandfather was Peter Maivia, who had brotherly relations with the famous Anoa'i family. Johnson took his ring name to be "Rocky Maivia", a portmanteau of Rocky Johnson and Peter Maivia's names. He made his debut in November 1996 and competed in his first WWF match at the 1996 Survivor Series. Rocky Maivia was destined for greatness from the star as he became the sole survivor in his debut match and quickly upset Hunter Hearst Helmsley to win his first Intercontinental Championship, just three months later. Billed as the "Blue Chipper", the typical babyface soon became annoying to the fans and they began booing him even though Maivia displayed all the traits of the babyface character.
The constant negative reception led to a failed run for Rocky Maivia despite having an impressive Intercontinental Championship reign and his heel opponents were cheered over him. This would lead to Maivia officially turning heel by joining Nation of Domination in late 1997 under Faarooq's tutelage. It was during his time in Nation that Maivia nicknamed himself "The Rock" and developed his everlasting character by cutting interesting promos based on his exceptional talking skills and developing legendary catchphrases. He proclaimed himself The People's Champion and quickly eclipsed Faarooq in popularity as he became a two-time Intercontinental Champion. Faarooq remained the leader until early 1998 but Rock had become the most popular and most significant wrestler of the group.
His quick rise to stardom began as he kicked Faarooq out of the Nation of Domination and became the group's leader. The Attitude Era had just begun at that time and Maivia changed Nation from a militant group to a cool dude group as his nickname The Rock became his ring name and the chants of "Rocky Sucks" had turned into "Rocky!" "Rocky!". Despite being a heel, Rock quickly became popular due to his interesting catchphrases and verbal skills. His feud with D-Generation X further elevated his status and after losing the Intercontinental Championship to Triple H at the 1998 SummerSlam, Rock slowly began transitioning into a main eventer. He officially turned babyface and even became the number one contender for the WWF Championship. Nation dissolved at that point as his teammates turned on him but Rock had become a bigger star with bigger things on his way.
With his status as the number one contender and the WWF Championship being vacated in late 1998, it was the road to set up Rock as the perfect top babyface. Vince McMahon did everything in his power to prevent Rock from winning the title. At the 1998 Survivor Series, Rock entered the Deadly Games tournament and made it to the final, where he met McMahon's favorite Mankind. McMahon double crossed Mankind and screwed him when Rock had applied the Sharpshooter on Mankind by ringing the bell and awarding the title to Rock even though Mankind had never submitted. This marked Rock's first WWF Championship reign and led to the formation of McMahon's new stable The Corporation with Rock as its centerpiece.
Now being billed as "Corporate Champion" and renaming his "People's Elbow" finisher to be "Corporate Elbow", Rock would engage in a historic rivalry with Mankind throughout the fall 1998 and early 1999 that helped elevate Rock's career and make him a perfect main eventer to usurp the position of the number two guy in the WWF as the "number one guy" was still Stone Cold Steve Austin. Rock dropped the WWF title to Austin at WrestleMania XV in 1999 and failed in a subsequent rematch at Backlash 1999, after which he accused Vince's son Shane McMahon of costing him the title, as Shane had been the guest referee during Rock and Austin's rematch at Backlash. This led to McMahon and Corporation attacking Rock and officially turning the popular Rock into a babyface.
It was during this time that Rock evolved himself into a top babyface as his fan following increased. Stone Cold Steve Austin maintained his top position throughout 1999 while Rock continued to remain the number two guy and formed a popular tag team with Mankind called Rock 'n' Sock Connection and the two amassed three WWF Tag Team Championship reigns. A turning point took place in Rock's career at the 1999 Survivor Series when Austin got injured and was run down by a mysterious assailant. Austin's absence helped Rock to transform him into the number one guy and the number one babyface of the company as he went on to win the 2000 Royal Rumble match and dominated the main event scene throughout the year 2000, which would definitely be Rock's year where he established himself as the top star of the company and eventually helped him transform into becoming one of the biggest stars of Hollywood and perhaps the most well-known professional wrestler on the planet today.
The bottomline is that if Rocky Maivia had not joined The Nation of Domination and become the cocky heel The Rock and had not been a part of Vince McMahon's The Corporation, things would not have been good for Rock as they have been.
John Cena:
John Cena debuted as a clean-cut babyface with a "ruthless aggression". He made his WWE debut on June 27, 2002 answering Kurt Angle's open challenge. He made a mark by entering the ring and knocking Angle out with a punch. It seemed that he was destined for greatness since the beginning as he took Angle to the limit in a grueling match, although he came up short. However, Cena quickly rose in the ranks as he pulled out upset wins over Test and former Undisputed Champion "Y2J" Chris Jericho. However, the clean-cut babyface run for Cena was not being very successful and he was not becoming very popular.
Cena eventually made the right choice at the right time when he turned on his tag team partner Billy Kidman after the duo lost a match in the upcoming WWE Tag Team Championship tournament. A subsequent feud with Kidman turned Cena into a heel and he developed himself into a rapper called "The Doctor of Thuganomics". The year 2003 saw bigger things for Cena. The heel rapper who insulted fellow wrestlers and fans in promo soon earned himself a WWE Championship opportunity by winning a tournament to become the #1 contender against Brock Lesnar at the 2003 Backlash, but the rapper came up short. He had by that point beaten major stars such as Undertaker, Eddie Guerrero and Chris Benoit. His stock continued to rise and his rapping skills made him very popular among the WWE audiences and he began receiving cheers which led him to officially turn babyface in fall 2003 when he refused to join Brock Lesnar's Survivor Series team and joined Kurt Angle's Survivor Series team instead.
Cena continued his rapping character but now in a different way. His popularity can be judged by a #1 contender's 20-man battle royal on SmackDown in December 2003 where he lasted until the final two and most of the fans were chanting his name and he was the most popular person in the ring. He continued to rise in superstardom as the babyface Doctor of Thuganomics with three United States Championship reigns in 2004 and then became the runner-up of the 2005 Royal Rumble. He won a tournament to become the #1 contender for the WWE Champion and unseated JBL at WrestleMania 21 to become a world champion for the first time within just three months in the company.
The bottomline is that if the simple "ruthless aggression" John Cena had not turned heel and converted himself into the "Doctor of Thuganomics" maybe he never could have become the "face of the company", holding the position for ten years and becoming a sixteen-time world champion in WWE.
The New Day:
After years on the mid-card, Kofi Kingston and Big E were gathered together by Xavier Woods and the three formed a trio called The New Day. Spreading their power of positivity, New Day first began teaming on WWE television in November 2014. The three were supposed to be the three babyface positive guys but their positivity did not sit very well with the WWE audiences and they began booing him in early 2015. This led New Day to turn heels when they cheated to defeat Lucha Dragons to become the #1 contenders for the WWE Tag Team Championship and they used underhanded tactics to beat Tyson Kidd and Cesaro for the Tag Team Championship at the 2015 Extreme Rules.
The heel tactics continued as New Day feuded with teams like Prime Time Players, The Usos, Lucha Dragons and Dudley Boyz to stay on top and remain the dominant heel trio. However, by the fall of 2015, the heel New Day trio began receiving cheers from the crowd while their babyface opponents were being booed. As a result, New Day officially turned babyfaces in a feud with the League of Nations in early 2016 and the WWE crowd was firmly behind them as they used to enjoy their "Booty-O cereals", "their clapping and dancing".
This newfound popularity led New Day to become one of the greatest teams in WWE history and the leaders of the WWE tag team division. They became the longest reigning WWE Tag Team Champions and the longest reigning tag team champions overall in WWE history. They also helped ignite the SmackDown tag team division by putting on classic bouts with The Usos, The Bar, Bludgeon Brothers and Sanity throughout 2017 and 2018 and went on to become five-time tag team champions in WWE. In addition, Kofi Kingston's popularity skyrocketed in 2019 as he went on to beat Daniel Bryan to win the WWE Championship for the first time in his career at WrestleMania 35.
Becky Lynch:
One of the most recent major pushes in WWE has been of "The Irish Lass Kicker" Becky Lynch. After spending years in WWE's developmental territory NXT, Lynch made her main roster debut in 2015 as a clean-cut fan favorite. The babyface Lynch became the first-ever SmackDown Women's Champion in 2016 but once she lost the belt to Alexa Bliss, Lynch lost her momentum and got lost in the mid-card scene. She failed to reclaim the glory as the top women's star on SmackDown but continued to be a popular star.
After spending two years on the mid-card, the Irish Lass Kicker finally began rising to superstardom in 2018 when she became the #1 contender for the SmackDown Women's Championship against Carmella. She faced Carmella and the returning Charlotte Flair in a triple threat match at the 2018 SummerSlam, where Flair pinned Lynch to win the title. After the match, Lynch shocked the fans by turning on Flair by attacking her and turning heel for the first time in her WWE career. Lynch berated the fans and continued to display villainous tactics but the fans screwed the heel turn as they continued to cheer for her and boo for the babyface Charlotte. The rivalry came to a head at the first-ever women's pay-per-view Evolution, where Lynch defeated Flair in the first-ever Last Woman Standing match.
The subsequent feud with Charlotte Flair cemented Lynch's legacy as one of the top female superstars on the roster and also began a new cocky attitude for her instead of the previous clean-cut babyface as "The Man". Lynch continued to rise in popularity throughout the remainder of 2018 and headed into 2019 with a rivalry against the undefeated Raw Women's Champion Ronda Rousey. Lynch officially turned babyface after the creative team realized that she had become the most popular star on the WWE roster. Her popularity would lead to a new revolution in WWE as for the first time in WWE history, women headlined WrestleMania at WrestleMania 35, where Lynch would take on Raw Women's Champion Ronda Rousey and the SmackDown Women's Champion Charlotte Flair, where Lynch established herself as "The Man" by pinning Rousey to win both titles and becoming the first woman on the roster to defeat Rousey.
The bottomline is that Becky Lynch, who was not supposed to be near the top of the card and was used in the pre-show Women's Battle Royal at WrestleMania 34, turned heel on her friend Charlotte Flair and evolved herself as The Man in 2018, which led her to become the most popular superstar on the roster and she finally cemented her status as the top female star of WWE at WrestleMania 35.
However, we have seen sometimes that fans get tired of the "good guys" and "their ethically right ways" and begin booing them which leads those good guys into becoming "bad guys" or doing bad things to amuse the fans. Examples are of the anti-hero Stone Cold Steve Austin, who would often betray his allies by hitting them with a Stone Cold Stunner because he was the rattlesnake and not trustworthy. Despite his actions being ethically wrong, fans always cheered for him and then there was Eddie Guerrero, who "lied, cheated and stole". Lying, cheating and stealing is a characteristic of bad guys but this mantra helped Guerrero into becoming an overnight star and the fans chanted for him and cheered for him whenever he lied, cheated and stole.
Sometimes creative writers' perception of a character is not important but the fan reaction is a lot more important than that. Fan reaction is very important in designating storylines and alignment of a character and fan reactions have often forced creative writers to change characters and turn babyfaces into heels or heels into babyfaces.
There have been a lot of notable examples in wrestling history where a babyface wrestler was not getting very over and the character was getting very stale and being booed by the fans instead of being cheered which led to creative team turning the character into a heel where the heel turn would bring cheers instead and once the character became popular and beloved in the heel turn, the creative team turned that character into a babyface.
Shawn Michaels:
"The Heartbreak Kid" Shawn Michaels started his World Wrestling Federation career in 1988 as one half of The Rockers, along with Marty Jannetty. The fan favorite good looking young team was very popular among females but not popular enough to succeed in the wider WWF landscape which was being ruled by Hulk Hogan, Randy Savage, Ultimate Warrior and others. The Rockers even failed to win the WWF Tag Team Championship and after failing to gain success, the team broke up for good in 1992.
This was a turning point in Michaels' career where he turned heel by superkicking Jannetty on Brutus Beefcake's interview segment The Barber Shop and transformed into the narcissistic Heartbreak Kid. This egoistical transformation helped Michaels become a quick rising star in the mid-card as he became Intercontinental Champion later that year and even headlined the 1992 Survivor Series pay-per-view against Bret Hart for the WWF Championship but came up short. However, this heel turn made him very popular and Michaels would become an important part of the WWF mid-card scene. In 1994, his partnership with his bodyguard and tag team Diesel broke up, which led to Diesel quickly becoming the WWF Champion. Michaels would win the 1995 Royal Rumble and face Diesel for the title at WrestleMania XI but came up short.
It was then that Michaels accused his new bodyguard Sycho Sid of failing to help him win the title, which led to Sid attack and injure him. It was there that Michaels turned back into a fan favorite after making himself significant enough. The late 1995 revolved around Michaels as WWF began building him as a bigger star and transition him from a mid-carder into a main eventer. He won the 1996 Royal Rumble for the second consecutive time and finally won the WWF Championship at WrestleMania XII from Bret Hart in the first televised Ironman match in WWF history. The rest of Michaels' career is history.
The bottomline is that if The Rockers had not been broken up and Shawn Michaels had not transformed himself into the heel The Heartbreak Kid, maybe he would not have developed into the legend that he is today and would have not been even close to the WWF Championship scene.
The Rock:
Dwayne Johnson was the first third-generation professional wrestler heading into WWF. His father was Rocky Johnson, a former WWF Tag Team Champion and his grandfather was Peter Maivia, who had brotherly relations with the famous Anoa'i family. Johnson took his ring name to be "Rocky Maivia", a portmanteau of Rocky Johnson and Peter Maivia's names. He made his debut in November 1996 and competed in his first WWF match at the 1996 Survivor Series. Rocky Maivia was destined for greatness from the star as he became the sole survivor in his debut match and quickly upset Hunter Hearst Helmsley to win his first Intercontinental Championship, just three months later. Billed as the "Blue Chipper", the typical babyface soon became annoying to the fans and they began booing him even though Maivia displayed all the traits of the babyface character.
The constant negative reception led to a failed run for Rocky Maivia despite having an impressive Intercontinental Championship reign and his heel opponents were cheered over him. This would lead to Maivia officially turning heel by joining Nation of Domination in late 1997 under Faarooq's tutelage. It was during his time in Nation that Maivia nicknamed himself "The Rock" and developed his everlasting character by cutting interesting promos based on his exceptional talking skills and developing legendary catchphrases. He proclaimed himself The People's Champion and quickly eclipsed Faarooq in popularity as he became a two-time Intercontinental Champion. Faarooq remained the leader until early 1998 but Rock had become the most popular and most significant wrestler of the group.
His quick rise to stardom began as he kicked Faarooq out of the Nation of Domination and became the group's leader. The Attitude Era had just begun at that time and Maivia changed Nation from a militant group to a cool dude group as his nickname The Rock became his ring name and the chants of "Rocky Sucks" had turned into "Rocky!" "Rocky!". Despite being a heel, Rock quickly became popular due to his interesting catchphrases and verbal skills. His feud with D-Generation X further elevated his status and after losing the Intercontinental Championship to Triple H at the 1998 SummerSlam, Rock slowly began transitioning into a main eventer. He officially turned babyface and even became the number one contender for the WWF Championship. Nation dissolved at that point as his teammates turned on him but Rock had become a bigger star with bigger things on his way.
With his status as the number one contender and the WWF Championship being vacated in late 1998, it was the road to set up Rock as the perfect top babyface. Vince McMahon did everything in his power to prevent Rock from winning the title. At the 1998 Survivor Series, Rock entered the Deadly Games tournament and made it to the final, where he met McMahon's favorite Mankind. McMahon double crossed Mankind and screwed him when Rock had applied the Sharpshooter on Mankind by ringing the bell and awarding the title to Rock even though Mankind had never submitted. This marked Rock's first WWF Championship reign and led to the formation of McMahon's new stable The Corporation with Rock as its centerpiece.
Now being billed as "Corporate Champion" and renaming his "People's Elbow" finisher to be "Corporate Elbow", Rock would engage in a historic rivalry with Mankind throughout the fall 1998 and early 1999 that helped elevate Rock's career and make him a perfect main eventer to usurp the position of the number two guy in the WWF as the "number one guy" was still Stone Cold Steve Austin. Rock dropped the WWF title to Austin at WrestleMania XV in 1999 and failed in a subsequent rematch at Backlash 1999, after which he accused Vince's son Shane McMahon of costing him the title, as Shane had been the guest referee during Rock and Austin's rematch at Backlash. This led to McMahon and Corporation attacking Rock and officially turning the popular Rock into a babyface.
It was during this time that Rock evolved himself into a top babyface as his fan following increased. Stone Cold Steve Austin maintained his top position throughout 1999 while Rock continued to remain the number two guy and formed a popular tag team with Mankind called Rock 'n' Sock Connection and the two amassed three WWF Tag Team Championship reigns. A turning point took place in Rock's career at the 1999 Survivor Series when Austin got injured and was run down by a mysterious assailant. Austin's absence helped Rock to transform him into the number one guy and the number one babyface of the company as he went on to win the 2000 Royal Rumble match and dominated the main event scene throughout the year 2000, which would definitely be Rock's year where he established himself as the top star of the company and eventually helped him transform into becoming one of the biggest stars of Hollywood and perhaps the most well-known professional wrestler on the planet today.
The bottomline is that if Rocky Maivia had not joined The Nation of Domination and become the cocky heel The Rock and had not been a part of Vince McMahon's The Corporation, things would not have been good for Rock as they have been.
John Cena:
John Cena debuted as a clean-cut babyface with a "ruthless aggression". He made his WWE debut on June 27, 2002 answering Kurt Angle's open challenge. He made a mark by entering the ring and knocking Angle out with a punch. It seemed that he was destined for greatness since the beginning as he took Angle to the limit in a grueling match, although he came up short. However, Cena quickly rose in the ranks as he pulled out upset wins over Test and former Undisputed Champion "Y2J" Chris Jericho. However, the clean-cut babyface run for Cena was not being very successful and he was not becoming very popular.
Cena eventually made the right choice at the right time when he turned on his tag team partner Billy Kidman after the duo lost a match in the upcoming WWE Tag Team Championship tournament. A subsequent feud with Kidman turned Cena into a heel and he developed himself into a rapper called "The Doctor of Thuganomics". The year 2003 saw bigger things for Cena. The heel rapper who insulted fellow wrestlers and fans in promo soon earned himself a WWE Championship opportunity by winning a tournament to become the #1 contender against Brock Lesnar at the 2003 Backlash, but the rapper came up short. He had by that point beaten major stars such as Undertaker, Eddie Guerrero and Chris Benoit. His stock continued to rise and his rapping skills made him very popular among the WWE audiences and he began receiving cheers which led him to officially turn babyface in fall 2003 when he refused to join Brock Lesnar's Survivor Series team and joined Kurt Angle's Survivor Series team instead.
Cena continued his rapping character but now in a different way. His popularity can be judged by a #1 contender's 20-man battle royal on SmackDown in December 2003 where he lasted until the final two and most of the fans were chanting his name and he was the most popular person in the ring. He continued to rise in superstardom as the babyface Doctor of Thuganomics with three United States Championship reigns in 2004 and then became the runner-up of the 2005 Royal Rumble. He won a tournament to become the #1 contender for the WWE Champion and unseated JBL at WrestleMania 21 to become a world champion for the first time within just three months in the company.
The bottomline is that if the simple "ruthless aggression" John Cena had not turned heel and converted himself into the "Doctor of Thuganomics" maybe he never could have become the "face of the company", holding the position for ten years and becoming a sixteen-time world champion in WWE.
The New Day:
After years on the mid-card, Kofi Kingston and Big E were gathered together by Xavier Woods and the three formed a trio called The New Day. Spreading their power of positivity, New Day first began teaming on WWE television in November 2014. The three were supposed to be the three babyface positive guys but their positivity did not sit very well with the WWE audiences and they began booing him in early 2015. This led New Day to turn heels when they cheated to defeat Lucha Dragons to become the #1 contenders for the WWE Tag Team Championship and they used underhanded tactics to beat Tyson Kidd and Cesaro for the Tag Team Championship at the 2015 Extreme Rules.
The heel tactics continued as New Day feuded with teams like Prime Time Players, The Usos, Lucha Dragons and Dudley Boyz to stay on top and remain the dominant heel trio. However, by the fall of 2015, the heel New Day trio began receiving cheers from the crowd while their babyface opponents were being booed. As a result, New Day officially turned babyfaces in a feud with the League of Nations in early 2016 and the WWE crowd was firmly behind them as they used to enjoy their "Booty-O cereals", "their clapping and dancing".
This newfound popularity led New Day to become one of the greatest teams in WWE history and the leaders of the WWE tag team division. They became the longest reigning WWE Tag Team Champions and the longest reigning tag team champions overall in WWE history. They also helped ignite the SmackDown tag team division by putting on classic bouts with The Usos, The Bar, Bludgeon Brothers and Sanity throughout 2017 and 2018 and went on to become five-time tag team champions in WWE. In addition, Kofi Kingston's popularity skyrocketed in 2019 as he went on to beat Daniel Bryan to win the WWE Championship for the first time in his career at WrestleMania 35.
Becky Lynch:
One of the most recent major pushes in WWE has been of "The Irish Lass Kicker" Becky Lynch. After spending years in WWE's developmental territory NXT, Lynch made her main roster debut in 2015 as a clean-cut fan favorite. The babyface Lynch became the first-ever SmackDown Women's Champion in 2016 but once she lost the belt to Alexa Bliss, Lynch lost her momentum and got lost in the mid-card scene. She failed to reclaim the glory as the top women's star on SmackDown but continued to be a popular star.
After spending two years on the mid-card, the Irish Lass Kicker finally began rising to superstardom in 2018 when she became the #1 contender for the SmackDown Women's Championship against Carmella. She faced Carmella and the returning Charlotte Flair in a triple threat match at the 2018 SummerSlam, where Flair pinned Lynch to win the title. After the match, Lynch shocked the fans by turning on Flair by attacking her and turning heel for the first time in her WWE career. Lynch berated the fans and continued to display villainous tactics but the fans screwed the heel turn as they continued to cheer for her and boo for the babyface Charlotte. The rivalry came to a head at the first-ever women's pay-per-view Evolution, where Lynch defeated Flair in the first-ever Last Woman Standing match.
The subsequent feud with Charlotte Flair cemented Lynch's legacy as one of the top female superstars on the roster and also began a new cocky attitude for her instead of the previous clean-cut babyface as "The Man". Lynch continued to rise in popularity throughout the remainder of 2018 and headed into 2019 with a rivalry against the undefeated Raw Women's Champion Ronda Rousey. Lynch officially turned babyface after the creative team realized that she had become the most popular star on the WWE roster. Her popularity would lead to a new revolution in WWE as for the first time in WWE history, women headlined WrestleMania at WrestleMania 35, where Lynch would take on Raw Women's Champion Ronda Rousey and the SmackDown Women's Champion Charlotte Flair, where Lynch established herself as "The Man" by pinning Rousey to win both titles and becoming the first woman on the roster to defeat Rousey.
The bottomline is that Becky Lynch, who was not supposed to be near the top of the card and was used in the pre-show Women's Battle Royal at WrestleMania 34, turned heel on her friend Charlotte Flair and evolved herself as The Man in 2018, which led her to become the most popular superstar on the roster and she finally cemented her status as the top female star of WWE at WrestleMania 35.
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