A couple weeks ago on Monday Night RAW, the world was shocked when Shane McMahon made his return to WWE after seven years completely out of the wrestling spotlight. He immediately rained on his sister’s parade and delivered a blow to his father’s ego. This led to Vince McMahon and his son agreeing upon an ultimatum: If Shane defeats The Undertaker at this year’s WrestleMania inside Hell in a Cell, the boss’s son gets control of RAW. If he loses, he’s written out of the will, loses his inheritance — something like that. They weren’t very clear on the night the match was made, but that appears to be the gist of it.

That’s the stipulation, but knowing Vince McMahon is to know that there is something more to this. Triple H and Stephanie McMahon kicked the old man to the curb a few years ago, fully betraying his trust. When Vinny Mac returned out of the blue, he was very gung-ho about how well Triple H and Stephanie had done in his absence. He was more supportive than you’d expect a man thrown out of his own company and accused of being senile would be.

The Undertaker isn’t on Vince’s side and doesn’t care one way or the other about Shane. To him, it’s just another victim he gets to run through at WrestleMania because heaven forbid we let Undertaker be a person and have thoughts deeper than “kill thing in front of me”. He said a few words and made that point very clear. He doesn’t care about anything at all, it seems.

Vince is using that to his advantage. Undertaker doesn’t care, and likely isn’t thinking about the possibility that Vince will be up to his old tricks. There’s no such thing as a McMahon rivalry without one of them changing their perceived loyalties at least once. Wouldn’t you say that the timing was pretty suspect? Triple H and Stephanie are in control now more than ever and Vince is feeling threatened. He’s also still upset about what they did to him a number of years back when he was booted from his job as the head authority figure.

Shane never fell out of the good graces of Vince. He was a contingency plan. Dear old dad let his son leave in order to avoid the power play that the duo now known as The Authority were clearly beginning to put into effect. He needed to keep Shane out from in front of the firing squad, and that’s what he did. Now it’s time for father and son to reunite and for Vince to allow his only son to take his rightful place in charge.

He told his daughter this past week on RAW that he knew what he was doing. He assured her of it, in fact. And he was vague. He was vague because anything more specific would be tipping his cap that he has a plan in mind to help Shane defeat The Undertaker.

There is indeed an attempt at a coup, but it’s not Shane trying to usurp his father, sister and brother-in-law. It’s Vince and his son getting ready to oust the ungrateful false heirs to the throne who forced themselves into the position they are in.