It’s Time for WWE to Bring Back ‘Total Divas’
· Vice
WWE stepped into the competition television space with Tough Enough in the early 2000s and it was a huge success for them. But in the 2010s, Keeping Up with the Kardashians was one of the biggest shows on television. In an effort to keep up with the times, they gave the world Total Divas. The show followed a group of the women around their daily lives and backstage at WWE, showcasing their off-screen dynamics and how they prepared for their matches. Total Divas was canceled in 2019 but it’s not hard to see and feel the renewed interest in the women’s division and WWE aren’t capitalizing on it as much as they could.
Total Divas was truly ahead of its time, and it was a massive success for WWE. Seeing how beloved the women are was forcing WWE to give girls like The Bella Twins, Paige, Natalya, and Summer Rae more time on television in response.
In the years since its cancelation people have discovered the show for the first time. Many people do rewatches on social media; there’s others creating TikTok edits that gain hundreds of thousands of views. The women of WWE have gone on record numerous times stating that it’s one of the most talked about things when meeting fans.
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The fact that Total Divas still has this big of an impact all these years later speaks to how iconic the legacy is. What other show could’ve given us a villainous John Cena back then? Exactly.
Total Divas Impact can’t be ignored
There are always arguments online about the impact Total Divas had on wrestling in the 2010s. Did it really add anything positive? “Women enjoying WWE because of a reality television show is a mistake!” I do think it’s misogynistic to say that women can’t enjoy popular culture that’s dominated by men. Gatekeeping wrestling is weird. But that’s a conversation for another day.
What I will say is that, without Total Divas, I likely would have never would have reconnected with wrestling which was a foundation of my youth. The Butterfly Effect is insane; without the show, I never would’ve watched WWE’s product and seen broadcaster Renee Paquette interviewing talent backstage. Without her I never would have ventured into covering sports (especially wrestling) for a living. Whether anyone liked it or not, there was a moment when they were the hottest thing on television. They even rivaled Keeping Up With the Kardashians in popularity, which is not an easy feat.
The WWE Women have tried to bring total divas back
Many of the women who made the show popular have tried to levy with WWE to bring it back. The Bella Twins in particular—who received their own spin-off, Total Bellas—think it’s the perfect way to showcase just how much the women have evolved.
“We’ve had conversations about it for years, about bringing it back. We’ve always pushed hard for that because it really helped the women, not only showcase what they can do in and out of the ring, but it gave our voices such a big platform,” Nikki Bella said on The Battleground Podcast.
“I feel like now, with what the women are doing, it’s a perfect time for it to be back, and to showcase what these women are doing, how they’re delivering, and I want to know what some of them are doing inside and outside of the ring,” added Brie. “If they were to call, we are back right now, so it might be a yes.”
Natalya, who grew a beloved fanbase from her antics on the show, is also not against spearheading a new version. However, she’d want to work behind-the-scenes too this time.
“Of course, my other big dream is to bring Total Divas back. I think a lot of people really — I mean, I get asked about Total Divas more than anything,” Natalya told The Battleground Podcast. “I would love to do a Total Divas reboot, I would love to spearhead that. I would love to not only be a part of it but also work behind the scenes with it. I think in a world that’s eating up content more than ever, people really love that deep dive into the women of WWE.”
What a revived version could look like
WWE moved to Netflix at the beginning of 2025, making it more accessible than ever for people to watch the product. The women have always had a lot of eyes on them, but even more so now on a streaming service available in hundreds of millions of homes. Total Divas ran from 2013 until 2019. At the time of its premiere, the first episode had over 1.3 million viewers watching live and 600,000 on the replay, nearing 2 million total viewers. Considering pro wrestling in the 2010s was nowhere near as big as it was in The Attitude Era, that’s a huge deal.
Even now, women make up a huge part of WWE’s fanbase. Some of the biggest wrestlers in the company are women—Rhea Ripley, Charlotte Flair, Becky Lynch, Bianca Belair, Liv Morgan (who was on the original). These are all women that fans would love to see more of behind-the-scenes. Their matches make up a big portion of PLE cards, and oftentimes they’re the ones who steal the show. Obviously WWE: Unreal exists now, but that pales in comparison to how revolutionary Total Divas was.
The post It’s Time for WWE to Bring Back ‘Total Divas’ appeared first on VICE.