Cody Rhodes Reveals Stardust Past Had Him ‘On Guard’ When Returning to WWE

Cody Rhodes made his return to WWE in stellar fashion, returning to face Seth Rollins at WrestleMania 38. You can’t be on a bigger stage than WrestleMania, and fans understandably lost their minds when his return became a reality. He’s been one of WWE’s biggest superstars ever since, but Rhodes did have some apprehension about how he would be received when returning to the company. ComicBook.com’s Matt Aguilar had the chance to speak with Rhodes about this year’s WrestleMania, WWE SuperCard, WWE 2K23, and more, but Rhodes also revealed that his past as Stardust had him “on guard” and “ready to fight” when he came back.

Rhodes said that part of the reason he wasn’t in WWE 2K22 was that he is quite protective of things and wants anything associated with the American Nightmare to be as good as it can be. He also joked about being petty about things like his 2K rating, but then he talked about how he was on guard of his time as Stardust having an effect on how people perceived him when returning to WWE.

“I am super petty about all this stuff just because I’m always, again, I mentioned an eternal pessimist, but I’m also always on my guard. I came back here and some of these people were working here when I was Stardust and I know from the cannon of it all, you look at it in Stardust was kind of a big old loser. So you’re already ready to fight. ‘Oh, I hope they know this is a different me now.’ And most of this crew is more than aware of that in terms of they’ve seen everything that’s happened in our entire industry. And yeah, I’m very hands-on with it all, which is why it might have taken longer, Rhodes said.

Rhodes has gotten to the point where he can reference Stardust in promos and in the ring and it holds no bearing on who he is today. There’s even a Stardust taunt in WWE 2K23, so it seems that everyone knows exactly who today’s American Nightmare truly is.

Regarding not being in WWE 2K22, Rhodes said “I’m very, very hands-on. I’d even go as far as saying I won’t put the heat on 2K for me not being in the game initially and then waiting till the modern iteration of it to happen. The reason being I’m very particular about the American Nightmare, the whole concept of it. It’s something I built while I was away and, until you know people are going to fully immerse themselves in it, they’re familiar with it, they respect it, and they only want to kind of further give it the signal boost that somebody like 2K can do.”

“It just takes time, and I was one of the reasons why it took so much time,” Rhodes said. “So if anybody had any problems, it was more me than it was 2K in a sense that I want to make sure it’s done correctly. I’m also super petty about, I want to know what’s my number.”

Rhodes can be seen every Monday night on WWE Raw, and you can talk all things wrestling with me on Twitter @MattAguilarCB!