Ember Moon Details WWE Exit, Reveals Company Wanted Her To Help The Next Generation

Ember Moon’s WWE departure in 2021 came after a period of prolonged absence for the former NXT Women’s Champion, with conflicting reports at the time suggesting why Moon was not on television.

Talking to Chris Van Vliet on Insight, Moon (now known as Athena) explained why she was pulled from television:

"Me, Hunter [Triple H], and the head writer at the time had come up with doing a heel turn with me because it was new and different. During this process, we wanted to do a losing streak. That was my thought, 'let me do the losing streak.' I see the new faces coming through and part of my job at NXT was to help new talent on TV, which I get. I love this business so much that I didn't mind. Let me do a losing streak, let me get frustrated, and let me turn. 'This is a great idea, we have ABCD, we'll do your first feud with this person.' Then the first match happened and I'm off TV for four weeks. 'Don't worry, we got this.' Then, Hunter disappeared. I was supposed to do a match with Sarray and ended up getting a rash on my arm. I had an allergic reaction to something and they thought it was something else, so they pulled me from the match. Okay, fine. 'We'll do the match next week.' Three weeks later, 'we're going to do this match,'" Athena recalled.

"That match gets pulled from TV and one of the head coaches goes, 'will you do me a favour and work 205 Live with Cora Jade. We like her, she's a sweet girl, we think this will be a fun match, you two are in the main event.' Cool, that sounds great, I'm never going to say no to having a match on TV, regardless of where it's airing. We have a fun banger of a match. They go, 'you're turning in this match, but we want to make it subtle.' They kind of turn me, but they don't, there was confusion of what would happen. Then, off TV for three weeks, I have the match with Mandy and they're like, 'We're finally pulling the trigger on this.' I get a note that week saying, 'In two weeks, we need you to dye your hair fire colour again, get the red contacts, you're going back to the old Ember Moon character. This is per Vince (McMahon). You're going to turn heel, but turn heel as your old character. We're trying to get the old music and stuff together.' Alright, great, this is great.”

Athena recalled getting prepared for this rebirth as the old Ember Moon, including a lengthy hair dyeing process:

"I show up to TV, I'm motivated, just had to wait it out. Ryan Katz and I went and filmed a demo of the vibe that I wanted. Comeback, I get the video ready, I'm ready to show everyone after TV and they're like, 'Hey, we have some bad news. Vince is pulling you off TV indefinitely.' I just sat there and was like, 'What did I do wrong?' 'You did nothing wrong.' 'I've done everything you guys have asked me, I've gone over and above.' When they put me and Shotzi in a tag team, everyone knows I'm not a tag team person, I hate tag teams, there are too many moving parts. It's not that I hate tag team wrestling, it just requires so much more to give vs. just relying on yourself, you have to rely on three other people. I feel me and Shotzi capitalised on it and we were so motivated to build that division and then we weren't able to. I showed up to TV, it's 2 AM, and I'm like, 'I've done everything you've asked me to, I've branched out,'" Athena recalled.

Athena continued, recalling how WWE wanted to pivot her into a coaching role:

"They're like, 'Not everything is lost Ember. We still want you to come and help the next generation, maybe teach a class, do some PC lives.' I'm like, 'You're taking me off TV and trying to make me a coach?' I remember laughing. 'If I've done nothing wrong, you can cancel all my flights, I'm not coming to help these people who do not care about what I do. They only care about the paycheque that hits their bank account. They're not passionate like me. I'm not going to come up here and help these people that don't care about what we do when there is no benefit for me, when I've done nothing wrong and I've given you my entire right side of my body, between my elbow surgery and Achilles surgery. I've given you this entire side, for no reward, not even a thank you. You want me to coach and take me off TV to coach?' I remember sitting there, I got teary-eyed, and I said, 'I'm not coming up here to coach or do PC shows. I was supposed to come to NXT to repackage and go back to the main roster. That was supposed to be within the year, but I'm still here. You took Shotzi away from me. I have nothing to go off of. I'm going home. Cancel all my flights, cancel all my hotels, if you have a flight there and have no creative for me, I'm not getting on the flight. I'm not doing this anymore because I'm going to snap. It's either going to be on you or on a talent. I'm going to go home. If you need me there and have something for me, even then, I need to approve the creative before I hop on the flight.' It's the first time I've ever pulled this card.”

H/T: Fightful