My quick rating – 6.8/10. In a time when women’s pro wrestling was outlawed across much of the U.S., Queen of the Ring follows Millie Burke, a small-town single mother who risks it all to break barriers in America’s most masculine sport. Emily Bett Rickards plays Millie with a ferocity that’s a far cry from her Arrowverse days, and her performance anchors this lively biopic about ambition, struggle, and the cost of fighting your way to the top.
For wrestling fans, the casting alone feels like a dream card. Francesca Eastwood embodies Mae Young with the power you’d expect, James E. Cornette shows up as the NWA commissioner, and Toni Rossall—better known as Toni Storm from WWE, Stardom, and AEW—plays Clara with a natural swagger. Even Kailey Farmer, who recently appeared in AEW, slides neatly into the role of Millie’s nemesis June. It’s one of those films where you can tell the producers knew their audience.
The relationship between Millie and her manager-turned-husband Billy Wolf (Josh Lucas) provides plenty of drama, echoing the business itself: cooperative when it suits, toxic when it doesn’t. Through them, we see the sport’s growth from Midwest barnstorming to East Coast flash, from friendly “works” to unpredictable “shoots.” A sly jab lands when Vince McMahon Sr. quips that “promoters writing themselves into storylines is a terrible idea.” Knowing what Vince Jr. would later do, that’s a smirk-inducing Easter egg.
The behind-the-scenes politicking feels spot-on, though you still get the sense the movie only scratches the surface of how hard it really was for these women to “get over” in a male-dominated business. Back then, women were lucky to have one championship to fight over. Compare that to today’s AEW, where you practically need a spreadsheet to track the belts—Women’s World, TBS, ROH, tag straps, and whatever Tony Khan dreams up next. Millie fought for survival; today it sometimes feels like Oprah’s handing out titles: “You get a belt, you get a belt, everybody gets a belt!”
Adam Demos struts through as Gorgeous George with perfect flamboyance, while Farmer’s June gives Millie the heel she needs. All roads lead to the inevitable 1954 showdown teased in the opening, and while the match delivers spectacle, the real drama is Millie’s arc—winning three world titles, making and losing a fortune, and fighting personal battles that mirror her professional ones.
If there’s a flaw, it’s that the pacing and editing wobble just enough to distract. Some of the roughness feels intentional, like the movie is mimicking the chaos of the business, but it can also come across as sloppy. Thankfully, the energy and sense of fun carry it through, something a lot of modern wrestling storytelling could learn from.
At its best, Queen of the Ring is a rousing, mostly faithful chronicle of women smashing barriers before “women’s revolution” was a marketing slogan. Rickards proves herself a breakout star, Francesca Eastwood adds a pedigree Clint would approve, and wrestling history gets a spotlight it rarely receives. It may not capture every bruise and betrayal, but it lands hard enough to leave a mark.
