WWE's 2020 Money in the Bank PPV featured a match with a competitor who's been rarely seen over the past year showing up to challenge for a top title: Bray Wyatt.
Now Wyatt's supernatural alter-ego, The Fiend, has been a mainstay of WWE's PPV events since he first attacked Seth Rollins at Clash of Champions 2019. The Fiend took on Rollins in his first official WWE match at Hell in a Cell, beat Rollins for the Universal Championship at Crown Jewel, took down Daniel Bryan in his first title defense at Survivor Series, and battered Bryan in a strap match at the Royal Rumble before dropping his title at Goldberg at Super Showdown.
But while The Fiend has made numerous appearances inside the ring at WWE's biggest events, plain old sweater-wearing Bray Wyatt hasn't stepped outside the Firefly Fun House much since The Fiend first debuted just over a year ago. Wyatt only began appearing in "in-person" promos outside the Firefly Fun House after WWE transitioned to empty-arena shows in the midst of COVID-19, and prior to Money in the Bank, Bray Wyatt had only appeared in one in-ring match in his human incarnation, a non-title bout against The Miz at Tables, Ladders, and Chairs. Of course, both Wyatt and The Fiend appeared in the much-celebrated Firefly Fun House Match at WrestleMania 36, but that match is pretty much in a category all of its own.
Similar to his match against Braun Strowman at Money in the Bank, at TLC Bray entered to his "Firefly Fun House" theme, tried to talk The Miz out of fighting him in the opening moments of the match, and appeared to enjoy the physical punishment meted out on him by his opponent.
Although he did eventually end up beating Miz, Bray didn't have as much luck against the current Universal Champion, looking much more -- well, "human" as Bray Wyatt than as his alter-ego, the unstoppable Fiend. The differing portrayals of the fallible Bray Wyatt and the unbeatable Fiend are highly reminiscent of how WWE booked another one of its talents with a supernatural alter-ego, Finn Balor.
Balor debuted his alter-ego, The Demon, during his initial run in NXT, and then carried it over to his run on WWE's main roster. While the human Balor would often experiment with face and body paint for his ring look, often inspired by his interest in comic books, every so often (typically before an important PPV match), the darkness inside him would overflow and Balor's demonic side would make its presence known. Fans quickly learned that The Demon wasn't simply a cool red, white, and black color scheme for trademark Balor's body paint, but a sign that Balor's in-ring abilities had been temporarily "leveled-up" by The Demon's supernatural powers.
While Finn Balor had a pretty respectable win-loss record, he took his fair share of losses inside the squared circle. The Demon, on the other hand, was nearly unstoppable, going 13-1 in his fourteen matches, losing only to Samoa Joe in a cage match at NXT Takeover: The End. The Demon may have gotten his biggest stamp of approval from Mr. McMahon himself, who was said to have been a big fan of The Demon even while finding Balor's human persona a bit bland.
Though Balor's Demon persona hasn't returned since his heel turn and return to NXT, it appears his "beatable human/unbeatable alter ego" gimmick has since been taken up by Bray Wyatt -- and that's a great thing for everyone involved. One of the downsides of booking The Fiend so strongly over the last year has been the way it's limited his total number of in-ring appearances. WWE has wanted to protect The Fiend and book his character like a special attraction, like The Undertaker, to build excitement every time he appears.
While that's definitely worked in terms of building fan excitement, it also means The Fiend almost never appears outside of PPVs, and that every loss he takes looms large -- and with one loss on his record already (or two, if you count the wonky No Contest finish with Seth Rollins at Hell in a Cell as a loss), The Fiend has already taken as many L's in his first year as The Demon took in five years. Booking Bray Wyatt into more matches in his human persona and reserving The Fiend for special occasions would allow WWE to get the best usage out of both characters, protect The Fiend even further, and get more work out of the ever-popular Wyatt in his "Firefly Bray" persona.
The end of Wyatt's match at Money in the Bank, in which Wyatt slumped in the corner following his defeat at Strowman's hands while pictures of The Fiend flashed on the screen, certainly made it look like Strowman will have a very different fight on his hands at Backlash. If his title rematch does indeed come against The Fiend and not Bray Wyatt (or a different challenger altogether), then it would appear that WWE has begun to book Wyatt's dueling personas just like it used to book Finn Balor's.
While WWE has been reluctant to have Bray Wyatt make too many appearances outside the Firefly Fun House so far, continuing to book Bray into more matches -- especially matches in which Bray loses to an opponent that The Fiend later takes down with ease -- would essentially give WWE the blueprint to have double the Wyatt it's getting for its PPVs now, and that's something everyone should want. It's already decided to "let in" The Fiend -- now it just has to follow through and "let in" Bray Wyatt as well.