April 3, 2016
We’re in Dallas, Texas. The attendance for this show is an alleged 101,000 people, which is a quite extraordinary number. What they witnessed is perhaps the most bizarrely booked WrestleMania of all time. The pre-show was hosted by Mauro Ranallo, Jerry Lawler andByron Saxton, which means six hours of Byron tonight. SaxtonMania! When watching NXT I’ve been putting over the tandem of Tom Philips and Corey Graves but Mauro is easily the best commentator WWE have. By a country mile. His voice is so easy to listen to, the sheer number factoids and information he fires into commentary enhances everything you watch. Then there’s Jerry Lawler telling bad jokes and constantly telling Ranallo that nothing he’s talking about matters. The King is a throwback to the territory days and I have no idea how he’s still a commentator for the biggest promotion in the world. It’s extremely odd to me. WWE United States Championship Kalisto (c) vs. Ryback When they picked this as a singles match for ‘Mania I was confused but here all became clear. They had Ryback work the match as a slightly worked up heel version of his character. He played it quite well, although there’s still no sense to his gear change and personality switch. It took him from being a solid babyface midcard guy to a fairly worthless Goldberg clone. Something he’d spent years getting away from. Having realised this error WWE went with Kalisto full bore on the pre-show. He took some great bumps and is starting to look like a legitimate singles wrestler. Having Kalisto win the Del Rio feud and then upset The Ryback at WrestleMania is good for him. The downside was the ticket checking issues that WWE suffered. So when ‘Mania’s pre-show kicked off it was in front of less than half the house. Which is a bummer for Kalisto and Ryback. Everyone else got to work in front of 100,000 people, they had maybe 40,000, tops, for this match. WWE insisted at slipping adverts into the match too, which is so grindingly annoying. We’re already watching the product. Advertise in between matches, for crying out loud. They do this on NXT too and it never ceases to irritate me. Kalisto wins with a tidy exposed turnbuckle spot and the Salida del Sol. Good enough start. Final Rating: **1/2 Brie Bella, Paige, Natalya, Alicia Fox & Eva Marie vs. Lana, Naomi, Emma, Tamina & Summer Rae Expectations were low for this, and rightly so. The addition of Eva Marie was a bit of a joke as she’s universally hated by the audience in NXT and she’s on the babyface team here. Eva’s normal issues disappear in a multi-superstar match up. She’s able to tag in, hit a few spots and tag out. She looks good doing so because she’s got the look down and a few suplexes are easy enough. She attempts no strikes and I’m happy with her work. Considering the talent involved, Paige, Natalya, Naomi and Emma covering the workrate, it was a solid ten diva tag. The Ravishing Russian Lana came across well considering her lack of experience and nobody made any horrible glaring errors. Putting this on the pre-show allowed them ten minutes to get everything done and the pacing was solid. Whoever was the agent for this match did superb work at putting it together. Given her forthcoming retirement it was the Brie Bella show and she got in a canny counter on Naomi to finish with the Yes! Lock. Nikki Bella, in a neck brace, came down to celebrate with her sister and like Nikki, it looks like Brie got good at wrestling only to up and leave. This was way better than expected. Final Rating: **3/4 Promo Time: Lita This was a special moment. They sent Lita down to the ring to unveil the new WWE Women’s Championship belt. Which means that garbage butterfly shaped thing is going into the trash where it belongs. More importantly Lita said that women’s wrestlers weren’t divas, they were superstars too. This rebranding is hugely important as WWE are finally doing something meaningful with their women. Calling them “divas” was an insult and now I can say it’s an insult from bygone times. Kudos to WWE for this. The Usos vs. The Dudley Boyz Up to this point the show had been a surprising success but then expectations for ‘Mania last year were low and the show delivered huge. I was lulled into a false sense of security. Then this weird match popped up, with the Usos hitting a million superkicks, like they’re the Young Bucks. It felt like they flat out stole the Bucks gimmick only without being entertaining. The crowd hated the Usos and when they successfully put both Dudley Boyz through table after the match there were loud boos. If you used to play EWR (Extreme Warfare Revenge), a wrestling promoter simulator, there was a way to totally bury talent. You’d have them lose clean and then get beat down after the match. That’s what happened here. Total burial for the Dudley Boyz. Personally I can only hope this leads to a Bubba singles run as he’s been chomping at the bit for one. His run in TNA was genuinely great and got people excited until he came back to WWE and got rebranded back to Bubba 2000. This was skippable, unless you’re really into superkicks. In which case I have a tag team for you! Final Rating: *3/4 Moving on from there we went into the actual show and by now the massive queues inside the stadium had subsided and the full crowd were in. Hosts at this point changed to Michael Cole, JBL and Byron Saxton. I really wish they’d let Mauro call ‘Mania. I know he’s stuck away on the pointless B-ShowSmackdown but Cole grates at me. Ladder Match WWE Intercontinental Championship Kevin Owens (c) vs. Sami Zayn vs. Dolph Ziggler vs. The Miz vs. Stardust vs. Sin Cara vs. Zack Ryder I went looking at the bookies for odds prior to the show starting and saw Ryder was suddenly a huge odds-on favourite, as if some news had leaked out of backstage and those in the know were making a killing on a rank outsider. More on that bizarre story at the end of the match. The booking leading into ‘Mania has been confusing. They’ve taken the red hot Sami Zayn and just debuted him opposite Owens assuming we all know the backstory and while the hardcore fans do, and thus pop the hell out of everything Sami does in this match, the casuals don’t. They don’t know the history because nothing has ever been shown on RAW about the relationship between the two and even the NXT history from last year. So Sami’s RAWappearances have been flat. It really makes no sense. Sami is the star in this match, without a shadow of a doubt. He attempts the hardest spots including a streak to set up what should have been him winning. A ridiculous tope through a ladder followed by the through the corner tornado DDT on old rival Owens. Speaking of Owens, he took an absolutely devastating bump near the finish, the half and half suplex onto a ladder. Just a brutal, sickening bump. The core of the match was Owens vs. Zayn and it all worked. However there were five other guys out there. There were bumps lined up for each and various spots for them to impress. Which worked to varying degrees. Stardust, wearing polka dots to honour his father Dusty Rhodes, did the spinning ladder bit with his own personalised polka dot ladder. Sin Cara toppled off the ladder before bouncing off the ropes and diving to the floor. Sin Cara did ok work in this match, although he’s now in Kalisto’s shadow. I’m pleased that despite Kalisto’s success they’re continuing to team. No need to split them up just before one guy has a title. Ziggler did ok in there. This wasn’t his match to steal and the Miz took it relatively easy, holding the match together. The finish saw Long Island Iced Z, the Broski, Zack Ryder climb the ladder and pull the belt down, thus proving the bookies correct. Honestly, I’m pleased for Zack because WWE have been booking him horribly for years but where did this come from? Logically only Owens or Zayn should have won here because that’s the money feud. How long Ryder is champion for will reflect how competent this decision was but if they were randomly picking a guy that wasn’t Owens or Zayn to win, to give them a WrestleMania moment, then Ryder was the most deserving. Here’s a factoid for you, before Ryder’s recent RAW win over Chris Jericho, when did he last win a match on RAW,Smackdown or PPV? It was July 21 2014. He beat Fandango. So a guy who’s not won a singles match on mainstream TV in nearly two years just won the IC title. I don’t begrudge Zack his moment but why? Why was he even considered a contender? It makes no sense. They’ll probably book the win like it was a fluke and he’ll lose the belt tomorrow or next week or maybe next month. This was a nice moment but it’ll have no long term significance. Good spot fest though. Lots of interesting ideas coming into play and Zayn was the MVP. Final Rating: **** Chris Jericho vs. A.J. Styles This feud has been poorly booked. It has centred around Jericho, which is not how you want to debut a hot new singles star. The booking has been so counter productive that A.J., in January the hottest thing in the company, has cooled off into the second match on this card wrestling Jericho in a fourth contest between the two already. It’s not like the first three matches were that great. This one is perhaps the most bizarre of all of their matches. Jericho gets to kick out of the Styles Clash, which is a move so devastating that it should mean absolute death. Styles hit the Bloody Sunday and the production crew missed it, instead replaying another spot. Jericho seems to have gained an overconfidence in his ability to plan matches and execute thrilling epics on PPV. This was another example of how he’s not that good at doing so anymore. In fact the longer Styles is stuck with Jericho, the less he’s worth. His value has already plummeted in just two months. The murder continues here. This should have been an absolute shoe-in for Styles to win. Nothing else makes any sense. Jericho doesn’t need a win, unless the feud continues and yet another match between the two takes place on the next PPV. If they’re not careful A.J. will be dead in the water by then, which is extraordinary failure considering the heat he had. IfVince McMahon claims to listen to the crowd then why he is not listening to the crowd? Besides, this is WrestleMania and in putting Jericho over they turn the mood in the stadium from ecstatic to wary. It was certainly a good match but the wrong guy won and this feud is a grind. It’s bizarre because when Jericho needed a big win on a big show they never gave it him and now he doesn’t need one, because he’s 45 years old, he goes over. Never underestimate this companies ability to totally misread their audience or screw over ‘outsiders’. I expect Styles will get his big ‘WrestleMania moment’ in about three years when they finally realise how talented he is. By which point it’ll be too late. Final Rating: ***1/2 The New Day vs. The League of Nations (Sheamus, Rusev & Alberto Del Rio) Apparently King Barrett isn’t welcome in the match, as he’s announced he’s leaving so deserves nothing from the company anymore (a contrast to Brie getting a heroes departure on the pre-show). I hope Wade saved his money and I wish him all the best. He’s been booked like dirt for years and although I’m not a big fan he deserved better. He’ll almost certainly get it wherever he goes next. As with all League of Nations matches this was a chore to sit though. Big E tried to kill himself for our amusement, hitting a murderous spear on all the Lads and landing on his head in the process. Of everything on the undercard this was an absolute no brainer. Just put the babyfaces over, same as the last match. The heels have nothing to offer and the group has no long term future. Just put your super-hot New Day trio over and let them do some kind of celebration. Instead Xavier gets hit with the illegal Bull Hammer and the Brogue Kick finishes him off. Final Rating: *1/2 Post Match: We get into the fun part. The League grab the microphone to claim superiority over “any three men” backstage. Out comes Shawn Michaels, Mick Foley and Steve Austin. So in exchange for New Day taking a job at the biggest show of the year we get three retired guys coming out to beat down the boring heels who just beat New Day. I can see why Vince thought this was a good idea but it didn’t work for me. Shawn looks in terrific condition and I almost wish he’d go back on his retirement and wrestle some special attraction matches. The best part of this was the New Day teaching HBK, Cactus and Stonecold how to dance. Even Austin, thirsty as ever, goes along with it for a while. Again, this was a WrestleMania moment rather than a good match. A worrying theme. Street Fight Brock Lesnar vs. Dean Ambrose Dean has gotten tremendous momentum recently and you could argue the case for the main event being a spot he should have been in this year. Roman had his chance. So they stick Dean in this match where there’s no way he can win. They could have made Ambrose here. Had him pull out all the stops and actually beat Lesnar or at least look credible in the process. Instead he gets the same treatment that everyone gets from the Beast; a tonne of suplexes. While I do love watching Brock hit people with suplexes it does nothing for Ambrose at all. At least Reigns got a lot of sympathy wrestling Lesnar at ‘Mania last year. Sympathy he won’t get tonight. I’m still confused as to why Lesnar would agree to a street fight? Surely in a straight up match Lesnar beats everyone on the card and it’s only stipulations that count against him. Not that Dean was able to utilise the stipulations and his chainsaw didn’t work. I guessFinn Balor used up all the juice on Friday! Having teased the chainsaw and not used it they broke out the barbwire bat and didn’t use it. Lesnar then won clean with the F5 onto a pile of chairs. As a match it was fun enough and I almost get why they didn’t want them to steal the show by doing crazier stuff than Shane will but the result was quite flat. The downside is enormous. This marks the third straight ‘heel’ win. I know Lesnar is technically a babyface but Ambrose is probably the most popular guy on the roster. Having him lose clean at WrestleMania doesn’t help him one bit. The same as Styles. The same as New Day. It’s almost as if they don’t want people to get over? Glass ceiling, bitches. Final Rating: *** WWE Women’s Championship Charlotte (c) vs. Sasha Banks vs. Becky Lynch First off, it’s great to type “Women’s Championship” and hearing Cole refer to these ladies as “superstars” is a big step in the right direction. Altering perception of women’s wrestling is a massive plus for the company and the single greatest achievement of WWE on this show. In creating female stars on a par with the male stars they can improve their cards massively with minimal effort. It helps that they’ve got these three talented women, all former NXT stars, to showcase on this card. Rather predictably they proceed to steal the show. Not like the IC Ladder match, which was always going to be spotty carnage, but in terms of actual wrestling and match structure. This is match of the night, easily. There are hints of nerves in the early going, certainly, and not everything they attempt works. Especially on the floor where a few dive spots didn’t quite click but then Charlotte hit a ridiculous moonsault onto Becky and Sasha and from there the match was golden. The match got me thinking about the best women’s matches on WrestleMania in the past and the only one that jumps out at me is Trish Stratus vs. Mickie James at WrestleMania 22. Perhaps the short but sweet Trish vs. Jazz vs. Victoria at the excellentWrestleMania 19. That match went 7 minutes for comparison, this year the women got 16 minutes. A huge contrast and the biggest winner of WrestleMania being five hours long. Having watched these three come through NXT and having watched WWE struggle to understand the concept of talented women wrestlers, it was a huge relief to see this not only come off at the biggest show of the year but to come off so incredibly well. The only problem the match had was the bizarre booking of Charlotte to retain. Surely at ‘Mania you want your big babyface victories to mean something. Instead the hopes and dreams of both Becky and Sasha were crushed in front of 101,000 people and Ric Flair got involved in the finish. Which is perhaps the last thing everyone wanted to see. A shame as the match itself, until the left field booking, was killer and the best of the night. Final Rating: ****1/4 Hell in a Cell The Undertaker vs. Shane McMahon The stipulations here were that if Shane won he’d take overRAW but if Taker lost he’d never compete at WrestleMania again. The whole set up for this has been completely bizarre and confusing (two words I’ve used throughout this review). Why would you want to book two completely incompatible wrestlers into a match like this? Why would you put stipulations onto the match where the crowd will want to root for Shane, because he represents the need for change, but won’t because he’s wrestling Taker? The Hell in a Cell merely exists so Shane can fall off it. Which is a stupid idea but an even dumber idea is having them wrestle, hold for hold, for twenty-five minutes before that spot. In what world can Shane McMahon, a 46 year old non-wrestler (regardless of recent training montages), go hold for hold with the Undertaker? Even if you look at Taker as old and washed up, they had him grapple with Brock Lesnar last year in main event match ups. From that logic could Shane McMahon exchange holds with Lesnar on the mat? Of course he couldn’t. It’s absolute nonsense. The match should never have featured hold and counter hold wrestling because it makes no sense at all. Shane cannot be booked that way. I can just about understand him surviving moves and desperately kicking out of stuff but the mat wrestling in this match was just awful. And that’s twenty-five of the ridiculous thirty minute run time. The last five minutes was all about Shane falling off the Hell in a Cell, which was a startling visual and a huge WrestleMania moment. Did it magically turn this into a good wrestling match? No. Then Taker beat Shane clean anyway. Thus rendering the entire storyline pointless. Why even bring Shane back as an agent of change to put him in a position where change will never happen and job him clean? None of this makes one iota of sense. Not from the moment that Shane walked back in, to Undertaker’s lack of reluctance to simply do Vince’s bidding before they retconned a ‘last ‘Mania’ stipulation in there right through to the entire structure of the match and it’s conclusion. This entire storyline has been a farce. Final Rating: * Andre the Giant Memorial Battle Royal A bunch of jobbers, as per usual, are represented plus NXT’sBaron Corbin, Kane, Big Show and surprise entrants Diamond Dallas Page, Tatanka and Shaquille O’Neal. Shaq brought out last to get the ‘big pop’ treatment, which is fine if you watch basketball or you’re really into the movie Steel but this is a pop culture reference that’s twenty years late. Plus Shaq, who’s 7’ 1” totally exposes WWE’s worked heights by towering over Show. Shaq and Show get dumped early, thus creating some actual intrigue until I started to scan around the ring for someone I actually wanted to win. Last year’s potential winner, Damien Sandow, went out second. I feel so bad for him. WWE don’t care about him in the slightest. Tyler Breeze was an afterthought. I feel even worse for him. He’s genuinely talented and is now doomed to rot on Superstars. However this is the one match where they actually made someone, they actually went and pulled the trigger on a push. It was literally the only time they did it all night. This is a show where they could have made a bunch of guys by having them impress in front of a massive crowd and the guy they actually push is Baron Corbin, which is completely bizarre to me as he’s a mediocre guy in NXT who has barely learned anything in the time he’s been there. He has improved, a lot, in the past six months but not to this level. Plus nobody in the audience care about him because they’ve been given no reason to. Obviously the match wasn’t up to much because it’s a battle royal and essentially there as a piss break for anyone that was bursting before Uncle Paul’s super long main event. Final Rating: * Promo Time: The Rock Before we hit the main event The Rock comes out here to talk for a bit. Although the Rock’s recent appearances have been funny, some of the backstage stuff borderline hilarious, here it’s flat. He announces the attendance; 101,763, beating the oldWrestleMania III record. Perhaps just to shut up everyone who keeps harping on about Summerslam ’92 having a bigger crowd. Rock seems apprehensive and keeps repeating himself. For one of the most confident men on the planet it’s an odd performance. He’s interrupted by Bray Wyatt, Braun Strowman and Erick Rowan. Bray’s entrance is great but this is another man WWE have completely dropped the ball with. Since his ‘Mania match with John Cena his momentum has stuttered, stumbled and his group have been booked as losers. Rock makes fun of him, which elicits a few chuckles as he calls Rowan inbred. We get an impromptu match. The Rock vs. Erick Rowan Rowan is literally the biggest jobber in the company. People his size are usually treated better by Vince. Remember when they tried to turn him into a babyface with Ziggler and Ryback? Rock beats him in six seconds, which is a new record. The previous holder being Kane vs. Chavo Guerrero Jr. at WrestleMania 24. Erick Rowan, ladies and gentlemen, record breaker! The Wyatt’s continued to attack so out came John Cena for the save. Bray and his goons have been dead for months so this wasn’t a disaster for them but rather confirms WWE have no idea what to do with Bray. Segment was overlong and tiresome to boot. Final Rating: N/R WWE World Heavyweight Championship Triple H (c) vs. Roman Reigns The show has been killed at this point and the crowd despise Roman so there’s no coming back. Everything since the women’s match has been awful. Triple H has a very defined, very deliberate sense of what he believes a wrestling match should be and it was fine in the territories in the 1970s but nowadays he desperately needs someone to play off. With Roman only having four spots (Superman Punch, Spear, Drive By, Samoan Drop) it creates this impossible scenario for the match. It could not live up to being in this position on the card and it was always going to be a disaster. Not only was it a bad match but it’s a really, really boring one. A twenty-seven minute grind of a contest. The highlight for me was the work of Stephanie McMahon. She did terrific work in introducing Hunter, had the best slutty costume I’ve ever seen her wear and her presence at ringside was far superior to Hunter and Roman’s presence in the ring. She played into the biggest spot in the match too, getting accidentally speared by Reigns after barging into the ring because she’s a McMahon, damn it. You put yourself in the line of fire and you have to expect to take a bullet. The crowd’s shocked reaction to the bump was the best part of the entire match by some distance. The rest of the match the crowd chanted for people they’d rather see in this spot, which included Shinsuke Nakamura and Bayley. Nice for them to get that reception but it speaks volumes about a dull main event. Hunter has this obsession with working long main events and shooting for epic but Reigns needed a quick, decisive win. Hunter getting squashed would have meant far more. Regardless of the previous 27 minutes the finish saw Roman booed out of the building and WWE’s record attendance go home unhappy. Final Rating: *3/4 Summary: Oh good lord, where do I even start? The booking on this show was so counterproductive, so utterly helpless that it felt like Vince telling the fans “I’m always right, damn it” and booking what he thought was right. The result is a show with one feel-good moment, a totally unexpected Zack Ryder IC title win that will mean nothing in the long term, and two good matches. What did WWE achieve with this show? They killed the Shane McMahon angle. They killed the Sasha Banks angle. They continued the Roman Reigns push regardless of what the actual fans want. They killed Ambrose. They killed Styles. The nostalgia push guys didn’t make any sense. From a booking point of view this show couldn’t have been any worse. A monkey could have randomly booked finishes and come up with a better WrestleMania. Last year WrestleMania 31 was bad on paper but it delivered on the night because it was entertaining. This show was the opposite of that. Just because a few matches delivered doesn’t give WWE any right to book some of the crap that followed it. I know some people will think I’m being hypercritical but NXT on Friday was by far the better show. That brand knows how to build matches, knows how to build stars and knows how to book finishes. WWE’s main roster can’t hype matches (nothing on this show had a good build), can’t make stars even when the talent is handed to them on a platter and cannot book finishes to save their life. This show was a big chance to wow a lot of people and make worthwhile changes and the status quo was maintained throughout (women’s championship name change aside). Vince is sat in the back with earplugs in shouting “everything is fine”. He’s the captain of the Titanic who smashes into the iceberg and keeps on sailing. TV ratings pouring out of the boat from below the wrestling waterline, drifting to other entertainment mediums or seeking solace in the independent scene, which is producing an unreal amount of talent at the moment and putting on shows a lot better than this. On the bright side, this was probably a better show than CZW or Kaiju Big Battel so at least WrestleMania 32didn’t have the ignominy of being the worst show on WrestleMania weekend. That would have been odd. Verdict: 67
0 Comments
March 12, 2016
Formally entitled “March to WrestleMania” this Network special sits in between Fastlane and ‘Mania itself. Perhaps intended to create a bit of mischief by putting Triple H’s WWE Championship on the line, after general fan apathy toward the intended WrestleMania headline bout this year (Hunter vs.Roman Reigns). We’re in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Hosts are Michael Cole, JBLand Byron Saxton. The New Day (Big E & Kofi Kingston) (c) vs. The League of Nations (Sheamus & King Barrett) The New Day’s entrance is starting to get the sing-a-long treatment. It might have taken a while but they’re heading toward New Age Outlaws levels of popularity. New Day run some hilarious in-ring stuff, including unveiling a real genuine box of “BootyO’s” cereal (available from WWE’s online shop) and Big E pretending, convincingly, to be a child. It’s all so ridiculous but it doesn’t matter. Even the match doesn’t get in the way of it all with Xavier Woods shilling the cereal while a unicorn stampede crushes Barrett. Sheamus seems less angry than he should be with Kofi, considering Kingston has been openly mocking him in a series of video skits produced by the New Day to amuse themselves of late. Xavier turns this into a numbers game situation, which is the League’s fault for not bringing their other two guys and Big E finishes Wade with the Big Ending. Poor Wade Barrett is looking more and more like a jobber as every loss mounts up. I honestly don’t remember him winning since King of the Ring. I checked and his last televised singles win was in October on SmackDown. Five months ago. Final Rating: *** Video Control takes us backstage where Paul Heyman re-names Toronto as “Suplex City”. Heyman’s summation of how the match will go; “suplexed, F-5ed, conquered” is exactly how it should be booked. We go from there to Chris Jericho’s creepy t-shirt burning promo from SmackDown. A tremendous visual of Jericho murmuring “AJ Styles” through the flames is better than anything this feud/team has done so far. Chris Jericho vs. Jack Swagger Jericho cuts a bizarre anti-Canada promo pre-match, in an attempt to ensure he’s not cheered. “I am the greatest icon in the history of this country” says Jericho. “We want Bret” responds the crowd. “Canada stinks and Toronto is the anus” continues Jericho. Cole even references a match from 2010 when Swagger won the world title from Jericho. Are they not being produced tonight? Six years and a match that wasn’t “iconic” doesn’t get referenced. It was the biggest moment of Swagger’s career and he does tend to try hard when given chances. That “we, the people” shtick is still over. Probably because of Cesaro. Cole starts reeling off Jericho’s career history, going back to Smoky Mountain and they’re definitely not being produced. The match is ok but it feels like a TV match. A throwaway contest from SmackDown perhaps. The crowd eventually forgets Jericho’s promo and starts to cheer for him, seeing as they’ve got no investment in Swagger who’s barely been on TV for the past year (short feud with Alberto Del Rio in December aside). Jericho survives the Patriot Lock and wins with the Walls of Jericho. The teases for Swagger winning were almost getting me hooked but Jericho winning was no surprise. What was surprising was JBL’s insistence at chanting, by himself, “you’ve still got it” for a painfully long time after the match. Final Rating: **1/2 NXT Tag Team Championship The Revival (c) vs. Enzo Amore & Colin Cassady Interesting to see this make it onto a network special but if rumours are to be believed Enzo and Cass will soon be plying their trade on the main roster. This could be a test of how over they are with a larger crowd. It doesn’t quite have the same impact as in Florida where every single person knows the spiel and does it along with Enzo but it’s a big reaction and crowd chant “NXT”. The crowd do manage to sing-a-long with S-A-W-F-T, which is pleasing and chances are Enzo and Cass will be getting the call soon. Cass is definitely a Vince McMahon kinda guy. He’s seven feet tall and you can’t teach that. The crowd sleeps on the match a bit but chances are Enzo and Cass won’t get long matches to begin with in the bigs. The tagging stuff gets over, especially Cass launching Amore over the top. The champs take over with the kind of generic heat they’re good at. Dash & Dawson’s ‘wrestlers’ gimmick feels like it dropped out of the 1980s, which is probably bad news for them in this company but they’re a solid throwback. The champs take out Cass with a 3-D on the floor and the crowd start to really get into the match. Enzo gets a few near falls before getting planted with the Shatter Machine. This was an excellent tag match with the Revival avoiding formula for a good chunk of the contest and the challengers doing outstanding work as hot faces. Match of the night. Final Rating: ***3/4 WWE Divas Championship Charlotte (c) vs. Natalya Nattie baited Charlotte into putting the belt on the line by saying that her uncle, Bret Hart, called the Flair’s cowards. Natalya dedicates the match to Bret and is wearing a Bret and Owen t-shirt, just to totally suck up to the crowd. When Charlotte won her NXT women’s title she beat Natalya*. It’s a match that Natalya is still talking about (check out her and Charlotte on Table for 3 with Tamina). They do some keen chaining on the mat, switching from one submission to the next. It’s a strong technical match that’s easy on the eyes. What isn’t easy on the eyes is Ric Flair at ringside, occasionally breaking into weird ticks like he’s being controlled by an 8-year old hitting the taunt button on a video game. The work isn’t as crisp as it could be but the mat game is solid. They have a decent little striking contest too, which shows Charlotte’s all-round game has improved since she hit the title scene. The match even gets into exciting territory when Nattie kicks out of Natural Selection, the move that beat her when Charlotte won the NXT women’s title. The crowd lose their minds as Natalya gets some near falls. Especially the Sharpshooter. That genuinely feels like a finish. Natalya gets distracted by Flair though and rolled up. Charlotte getting her feet on the ropes like a good heel. Charlotte may not have been ready for this spot but she’s grown into it rapidly. Building the women’s division around her has been a smart move. Final Rating: ***1/4 *from NXT’s first Takeover show in May 2014. Second top on a solid card, where the dark match was Sasha Banks vs. Bayley, they went all out for nearly 17 minutes and had a **** match. Bray Wyatt vs. Brock Lesnar There was a time when WWE were leaning toward this being one of their big matches at WrestleMania. Unfortunately they’ve pretty much killed Bray’s gimmick by having him lose all his big matches for far too long and his group, the Wyatt Family, have been beaten too many times also. Wyatt brings Luke Harperwith him while Lesnar brings Paul Heyman. Lesnar doesn’t care if it’s two on one because that’s just another victim for Suplex City. The match ends up as Lesnar vs. Harper, which is better than Lesnar vs. Wyatt would have been. Harper gets an extended spell of offence before Brock shrugs him off and heads to Suplex City. F-5 ends it and Harper is pinned. Wyatt never even got into the ring. At least Bray got minor protection here but came across as a coward for not wanting to fight Brock himself. Final Rating: ** Sami Zayn vs. Stardust Nice to see Sami on the main roster as he’s over huge here, although that could be because we’re in his native Canada. Quite why he’s stuck in with Stardust is anyone’s guess. Maybe one of Vince’s challenges; try having a good match with this barm-pot. Sami doesn’t take long to completely outshine Stardust. Cole continues his unproduced rampage by referencing El Generico. He doesn’t say it but an El Generico reference is interesting in of itself. Now I have this visual of Cole sitting at home watching PWG tapes like a smart mark. Wishing he could be as funny as Excalibur and Chuck Taylor. Stardust is awful here, hooking a waistlock and having a chat about the rest of the match. The Stardust character has jumped the shark and shouldn’t be in there with useful talent like Sami. When Zayn is able to get a sequence of moves together the match is far better. Sami wins with the Helluva Kick. This was nothing much, other than a Sami Zayn showcase and it didn’t do a great job of that despite getting over 12 minutes. Stardust is played out. Filler. Final Rating: *3/4 WWE World Heavyweight Championship Triple H (c) vs. Dean Ambrose The storyline here is that Ambrose wants to destroy the existing WrestleMania card just because it’d be fun. Chaos, anarchy, good times. JBL references Terry Funk and the NWA title. It’s been an intriguing night for commentators asides. Cole points out this is Hunter’s first singles match since WrestleMania XXXIwhen he faced Sting. These two don’t click very well with Dean’s unorthodox nature meaning he works over the nose. It is one of Triple H’s most prominent features. As the match progresses it gets steadily worse as the lack of chemistry becomes ever more apparent. Hunter is more than a little rusty and Ambrose is not technically gifted enough to cover for that. One thing is clear, this should definitely be Hunter’s last world title. He simply cannot operate at this level now. Dean gets a decent run going once they’ve settled down and his high-octane strike sequences pay off. Ambrose even brings the grappling smarts and works the knee, specifically aiming for the Figure Four and then Sharpshooter submission victory. Dirty Deeds is a definite three count pin and the referee changes his mind because Ambrose’s leg is under the rope. Very awkward set up for that spot. The stunned reaction of the crowd when Ambrose got the pinfall was amazing. A pity it was immediately waved off. They do some antics with the announce table before Hunter wins clean with the Pedigree. The one moment where this match shone was when they had Dean win the match clean and then wave it off. The first half of this match was really clunky. Final Rating: *** Summary: The Network exclusive shows are proving to be a mixed bag. The main roster guys don’t seem to take them all that seriously but when NXT talent is called upon to flesh out the cards they’re producing the best work on the shows. I didn’t enjoy the main event as much as a lot of other reviewers but then I thought Triple H’s match with Sting was horrible too and people seemed to enjoy that. Ambrose brought some nice ideas to his big title match but ultimately the two main eventers simply didn’t gel together. Match of the night goes to Revival vs. Enzo & Cass, followed by the women’s match. Those are both worth your time. Verdict: 71 February 21, 2016
Last year’s Fastlane was a filler PPV in between Royal Rumble and WrestleMania with the sole purpose of forcing Roman Reigns down the throat of the WWE Universe. Let’s see how much Vince McMahon has learned in the past twelve months shall we? I’ll give you a clue; the answer is zero. We’re in Cleveland, Ohio. Hosts are Michael Cole, JBL and Byron Saxton. The best part of the marketing for Fastlane (aka Brmm, Brmm Racing Cars the PPV) is they’ve finally found something Eva Marie can do. Which is wave flags around while looking hot. One interesting thing of note regarding the announce teams; they’ve got a German team out there including the evergreen Carsten Schaeffer. He’s worked for WWE for a very long time. Sasha Banks & Becky Lynch vs. Naomi & Tamina Good idea: kicking the PPV off with a hot act like Sasha. Bad idea: having her feud with former Team BAD members Naomi and Tamina. I don’t understand why Team BAD couldn’t simply stay as chums with Sasha chasing the title. Instead they’ve just abandoned the whole thing to go with old NXT booking. I don’t dislike seeing aspects of NXT getting recycled on the main roster because more often than not NXT booking worked but it enforces the concept that WWE’s writers don’t have any worthwhile ideas. Naomi is the most interesting talent out there, trying new things and attempting to out-shine the Horsewomen. At one point she lifts Mike Bailey’s kick rush. The heels work heat on Becky, which she can take capably. Sasha’s hot tag would lead to a submission on Naomi only for Tamina to save. The suggestion being that Team BAD are on the same page, whereas Sasha only has a partner because she can’t beat both heels by herself. Sasha debuts a sensational satellite set up for the Banks Statement and gets the tap out from Tamina. Interesting to note Becky saving the pin by hooking the Disarmer on Naomi. The faces had to win here to set up their probable double title shot at Charlotte at WrestleMania. Final Rating: **3/4 WWE Intercontinental Championship Kevin Owens (c) vs. Dolph Ziggler They’ve probably overdone this match already but it’s always good so here we are again. It is only a filler PPV. It’ll be interesting to see where the IC title goes regarding WrestleMania. Last year it found itself in a multi-man ladder match. That wouldn’t be a terrible idea to repeat. The trouble is, we don’t really know anything about the ‘Mania card. It feels fairly unplanned at this point. Have they even nailed down who Undertaker is facing? Owens is getting a lot of heat. More so than local hero Ziggler. “Your home town likes me more than you” yells Owens at Dolph. Getting massive reactions might be the one thing to persuade the McMahon Family than Owens can be a main event for WWE. He can certainly talk. That’s the usual issue when they sign Indie darlings. This is a solid pairing because Owens is great at dishing out a beating and Ziggler is great at taking one. Everything is fine until Ziggler mounts a comeback and his comebacks have started to get incredibly dumb. The air guitar strumming elbow drop is awful. It’s getting hard to shake the feeling that Ziggler has jumped the shark and probably should have left the company last year when there were murmurs of him doing so when his contract was expiring. After both men land superkicks JBL points out we’ve got a “superkick party” referencing the Young Bucks, a team who will likely never work for WWE due to their lack of fucks given. They certainly shoot for epic here, which makes me forget how dreadful Ziggler has been at times and Owens finishes with the Pop Up Powerbomb to retain. They took a routine defence here and spruced it up a bit. Another fine showing from Owens and Ziggler didn’t grate at the nerves all the way through. I like that Owens learned from Ziggler’s first counter of the Pop Up Powerbomb and didn’t whip Dolph into the ropes on the finisher. Final Rating: ***1/2 The Wyatt Family (Luke Harper, Braun Strowman & Erik Rowan) vs. The Big Show, Kane & Ryback Show looks optimistically around for a decent pop after his excellent podcast interview with Steve Austin on WWE Network last week. I must admit I like him a lot more for his brutal honesty during that interview. The Wyatt Family have suffered from booking and talent issues. There’s no doubt they were saddled with Strowman before he was ready to be here. Rowan has had no luck whatsoever in his WWE run but he’s not done anything to prove he’s anything more than a lackey. Which makes it all the more puzzling that the Wyatt Family got split up in the first place. Luke Harper is the one guy who deserves better but when he got a singles run he couldn’t get anywhere. Not even Bray, the star of the team, can seem to get anywhere on his own. Not since last year where his interviews all started to blend together. This match is a snoozer, as you might expect. The match peaks with Ryback vs. Harper as they’re the only two guys who can actually go. “Taking out walkers like Ric Grimes would” quips JBL bringing his weekly pop culture reference from the Walking Dead and comparing the Wyatt Family to zombies. Which is about true when Ryback pins Harper clean with the Shellshock. It had to be Harper didn’t it? Well, the Wyatt’s are dead. They’ve jobbed to everyone now and if a gang can’t beat anyone there’s no point to them. It’s not like they’re entertaining anyway. Final Rating: *1/4 Video Control gives us a brief opportunity to see how well received Roman Reigns will be this evening. Here’s a clue…BOOOO! Dean Ambrose arrives to a much better reception and makes the funnies about having already booked his ticket to WrestleMania. “I got a great deal on Priceline”. The one thing the Shield “brothers” can agree on is that Brock Lesnar isn’t main eventing ‘Mania this year. The idea of Lesnar vs. Triple H again upsets me so I would probably agree with that. WWE Divas Championship Charlotte (c) vs. Brie Bella WWE are milking Daniel Bryan’s retirement for all its worth, which is a Brie title shot, which she’s not winning. Charlotte’s “goat-faced vegan babies” line is the kind of killer heel mic work she’s been lacking. I’m glad she’s discovered her inner heel. Brie has her husband’s kick pads on from WrestleMania XXX, which is a nice touch but they don’t really fit in with her gear. Also she doesn’t wrestle anything like Daniel Bryan. The only real highlight of the match is Byron Saxton taking JBL to school for trampling all over his analogy about family life. Also Charlotte’s face when Brie does the Flair strut (badly). She looks so annoyed. She looks even more annoyed when Brie busts her open hardway on the bridge of the nose. Otherwise the match is a grind with occasional nods of the head to Nikki Bella and Daniel Bryan because Brie doesn’t have a move set of her own. The match has too many hesitations and awkward pauses where they can’t get on the same page. Charlotte vs. Nikki was a much better match as Nikki was keen to demonstrate her superiority and bossed the contest. Brie’s submissions are surprisingly great though including hooking a half crab to go with an armlock (Konnan’s old Tequila Sunrise finish). Charlotte powers out and hooks the Figure Eight for the submission. This was clunky but the mat countering was better than expected. Final Rating: ** AJ Styles vs. Chris Jericho It still feels weird that AJ is in WWE. I’m a little surprised they had Jericho get a equalising win over Styles to turn this into a rubber match, even if it was hidden away on SmackDown but at least it gives this match a little extra something. The RAW match was really good, although I may have overrated it slightly due to marking out for AJ being in a WWE ring. This match is very technically strong, especially using the last match as a contrast. Jericho doesn’t quite have the pace to push AJ and you’ll certainly see more from Styles when he gets to wrestle someone who can push him when it comes to speed. It’s almost as if the Jericho feud has been a way to gently break AJ into WWE in-ring style. The commentary is pretty amazing during this as JBL references everyone from Giant Baba to Toshiaki Kawada in putting over Styles’ importance to a Japanese promotion and Byron even references Jericho’s debut in 1999 having parallels with AJ’s at the Rumble. AJ decides this would be a good time to debut the quebrada inverted DDT and naturally it’s botched but the resultant improvised neckbreaker manages to pop the announcers so it’s not a total loss. They have some interesting ideas, playing off the moves used in the first two matches. Like Styles doing the springboard elbow and Jericho springboarding to dropkick him off the top (albeit with the set up being super safe to the point of telegraphing it). They screw up another spot off the top with Jericho falling and managing to land a perfectly serviceable powerbomb before switching to the Walls of Jericho, which is what he’d intended to do. Sometimes pre-planning is your worst enemy. The weird part is that AJ Styles is supposed to be all nervous and it’s Jericho, the cagey veteran, who’s making the silly mistakes. His trash talk is awful too. “You’re stupid. A stupid man. You know that?” AJ plants him with the Styles Clash and Jericho kicks out? What? I don’t get that at all. Calf Killer finishes immediately afterwards so there was no point in having anyone kick out of the Styles Clash at this point. Bizarre. The RAW match was marginally better as Jericho made less mistakes in that. Good match though, especially from Styles. Now he needs an opponent he can genuinely show off with. Neville would be good. Final Rating: ***1/4 Video Control shows us clips from Alberto Del Rio vs. Kalisto, which got bumped to the pre-show. Del Rio got disqualified for fall one. Then pinned Kalisto to level it up but got pinned by a cheeky Kalisto roll up for the loss. Kalisto is now definitely the US champion, having seen off Del Rio twice. Cutting Edge Peep Show Edge and Christian are in town to sell their Network show, which debuts after the PPV; The Edge and Christian Show That Totally Reeks of Awesomeness. “If I can be serious for a minute” says Edge, mimicking Lance Storm, who he then references. Their guests this evening are The New Day. They make some comically disrespectful references to age so Edge brings up history and talks about The New Day’s early months where they were not impressive. “I’ve never seen so much chocolate act so vanilla”. Christian then brings up Kofi Kingston’s fake Jamaican accent and Edge claims they are E&C copycats. “If we had a threesome with Beyonce, you’d be our love child”. The interplay here is wonderful as everyone is so good at their characters. E&C provoke New Day into talking trash about the League of Nations, which results in the arrival of Sheamus and company. The heels take over the ring so New Day and E&C take the party up the ramp where Edge starts throwing dollar bills at a dancing Kofi and much fun is had by all. I laughed a lot during this. I’m actually looking forward to the Edge & Christian show. They’re funny guys. Having scoped opinion on the show after writing this it seems I’m alone in my appreciation for this, which is weird because normally I hate drop-in promo segments and prefer grappling on PPV’s. “You changed, man” screams a voice in the back of my head. It’s Eddie Murphy in the strip club in Beverly HillsCop. I love that movie. R-Truth vs. Curtis Axel The Social Outcasts talk about the Road to WrestleMania and debate what kind of car they would be. Bo wants to be a Volvo due to their safety ratings. This match just screams filler and reminds me how weak this PPV line up was on paper. They couldn’t find four guys to work against the ‘Casts? Goldust shows up to help Truth and demonstrate just how worthless the Social Outcasts really are. Axel uses the distraction to roll up Truth for the pin. I’m not sure what this was supposed to achieve but I know that I ain’t gonna fall for no banana in my tail-pipe. Final Rating: ½* WWE Championship #1 Contenders Match Brock Lesnar vs. Dean Ambrose vs. Roman Reigns As Roman makes his way to the ring through the crowd my mind starts racing. I wonder how many people Roman has fist bumped? It must be well into the thousands. He could be on for a spot in the Guinness Book of World Records. Brock starts taking bitches to Suplex City from the opening bell. Dean looks particularly out of his element and everything Ambrose attempts results in him being suplexed. The crowd doesn’t much care for Roman but they express this more through support for Lesnar. Brock pretty much has Reigns beaten clean with the F5 inside five minutes, which is slightly longer than ‘Mania last year. The crowd get to play count-along with Brock as he throws Ambrose all over the ring (I love that when he hits his tenth suplex everyone is doing the Tye Dillenger gimmick. He’ll go far). Lesnar has Dean beaten until Roman hits a Spear to prevent the F5. This is the point where the fans really turn on Reigns, hating his comebacks. The Shield boys team up to table Lesnar, thus effectively eliminating the Beast. It’s Dean who turns on Roman first, spending a while gazing up at the WrestleMania sign afterwards to demonstrate why. Neither man can get a pin so they’re forced to team up again when Lesnar recovers. This sees Lesnar powerbombed through another announce table and then buried under the remains of it. This time Roman turns on Dean, remembering what happened last time. Dirty Deeds gets a near fall but Lesnar returns again and this time the ‘brothers’ don’t see it coming and he stackerplexes them. It’s really weird because I immediately stop rooting for Lesnar when he hooks a kimura because I don’t want to see Lesnar vs. Triple H again. Ambrose suddenly has this moment of clarity where he realises he can use a chair, wears out Lesnar and Roman hits him with a Spear to win. Of course he does. One year on and Vince has learned nothing whatsoever. ‘You’ll like who I tell you to like’ is such a dated mentality but that’s Vince. He won’t be told he’s wrong. Final Rating: ***1/4 Post Match: WWE World Heavyweight Champion Triple H strolls down to get a look at the man he’s facing at WrestleMania. I still have no idea why the Authority, who hate Roman, would even bother allowing him the chance to get into the WrestleMania main event. It doesn’t make any sense. At least have something like a re-match clause for losing the belt in the Rumble or something. Summary: The show was okay. A few of the matches worked fine but it felt like the same old, same old with the exception of AJ Styles and even he managed to get booked into a match he’s already had twice since joining the company. WWE Japan’s Twitter actually blew up my feed more than Fastlane as they released video footage of Shinsuke Nakamura visiting the Performance Center for the first time. I found myself marking out like crazy. It’s really happening. This PPV? It really wasn’t happening. I fear for the state of this years WrestleMania to the point where I’m glad I didn’t follow through on my origin plan to get tickets. Verdict: 60 April 1 2016
We’re in Dallas, Texas for the first of a multitude of WrestleMania weekend goodness. Not only are WWE running WrestleMania, the Hall of Fame, Axxess and this NXT show but EVOLVE are running two shows, ROH are running two shows, there are two supershows, CZW, SHIMMER, Queens of Combat and several other shows on top of that. If you’re in Dallas you have a metric tonne of wrestling to watch this weekend. Hosts are Tom Philips and Corey Graves. NXT Tag Team Championship The Revival (c) vs. American Alpha American Alpha have been on a tear, beating just about everyone in NXT. Revival just got t-shirts. “No Flips, Just Fists”. These two teams are potentially the future of tag teaming, in the same way that Charlotte, Sasha and Becky were the future of the women’s division last year. Look where they are now. The crowd erupt for American Alpha and both of them look like huge stars. People are definitely getting Revival too but they’re working heels and mostly getting heat, which is good for them. It’s not easy to draw heat. American Alpha work around the normal straightforward formula instead opting to find counters to everything and pop off suplexes. Until Gable takes heat because Gable always takes heat. Formula is there for a reason and both teams are good at it. Gable’s hope spots are both retro and innovative. Unfortunately the match is a wee bit sloppy, with the champs botching a double team. Sloppiness aside the match is the definition of a hot opener. Jordan’s ‘cleaning house’ spots are on fire. The timing of the challengers is near perfect. The near falls in this match all get me jumping. Every single one feels like the finish because everything is a struggle. Nothing is nonchalant. American Alpha hit the blind tag for the double team finish and win the straps. They deserve them. Wonderful match. Sensational heat, amazing timing and only one major botch stopped it being top level tag teaming. Final Rating: **** Ringside: Jim Ross. Kota Ibushi. Kota was in Dallas for WWN Live’s supershow on Sunday but showing him on camera means he’s in the Global Cruiserweight Series people. Massive news. They showed Kana and she was signed right afterwards. Ibushi is there with WWE’s go-to Japanese guy Sho Funaki so you know it’s legit. Baron Corbin vs. Austin Aries This is Aries’ first match in NXT so Tom Philips has to reference ROH, although not by name, talking about Aries beating Samoa Joe. Corbin spends this match channelling his Indie heel nature by arguing with the fans. You’re in the big leagues now Baron, keep it professional! The match plods along until a suicide dive from Aries and Deep Six on the floor as a counter jolts it back into life. Aries flips out of End of Days though and pins a shocked Corbin out of nowhere. Ok showing from Aries on his debut, good counter at the finish. This was in trouble because it had to follow that insane opener. Final Rating: **1/4 Sami Zayn vs. Shinsuke Nakamura Nakamura gets new music, which is a bit underwhelming, but Nakamura himself is greeted with loud chants. Nakamura is the biggest acquisition from Japan in WWE’s history. He’s already massively over and he’s not done anything yet. I’m thrilled WWE realise the name means something and have let him keep it. Seeing his mannerisms and weird ticks in an NXT ring is just bizarre. Sami copes with the atmosphere, which could overwhelm many, and mimics Nakamura’s taunts, matching him for speed and technical skill. Nakamura’s structuring is that of an experienced grappler and everything that worked in Japan works for the big ‘Mania weekend crowd. I almost feel bad for Sami because the crowd go cold for his offence because they’re too excited for Nakamura that they can’t temper that for anyone else. Meanwhile Nakamura just drops into NXT like he’s wrestled there his entire life, which is how he’s adapted to everywhere he’s been. He’s just a natural. The match exists as an event with the crowd rolling on the Nakamura Hype Train. Every Nakamura knee gets a reaction, which is perhaps what he needed for his career. The knees had lost their effect somewhat in New Japan. He hit so many. Nakamura gets his nose busted on a series of elbow strikes as they throw lumber and the crowd chants “YES”. Strongstyle has arrived in WWE! Nakamura gets a receipt with kicks to the face and head. “King of Strongstyle” chant from the Dallas crowd! Nakamura busts out the amazing flying armbar that he used on Kazuchika Okada. He’s showing off all his tricks right off the bat. Sami will not lie down and keeps coming back. It’s so brutally stiff at times. Maybe the stiffest match you’ll ever see in a WWE ring. “Fight Forever” chants the crowd. The spots they work toward are incredible. Sami goes for the through the ropes corner DDT and Nakamura flat out kicks him in the head. Nakamura hits Boma Ye twice, renamed Kinshasa (after the location of the Ali-Foreman Rumble in the Jungle where the Boma Ye chants originated), for the pin. Good grief this match was incredible. Nakamura doesn’t do little offbeat matches. He does big event matches. The hot crowd helped matters but the work was tight. Match of the Year, so far. Nakamura’s arrival was as stunning as hoped for. Final Rating: ***** NXT Women’s Championship Bayley (c) vs. Asuka Asuka debuts a ridiculously creepy new mask with green tears. This should have been a death spot, following that last match, but the crowd are hyped for it because these two have been tearing it up in NXT. It is a legitimate dream match. The trouble they have is that Asuka’s offence is brutal and I don’t want Bayley to get beaten up because I love her. She’s too good as a babyface to the point where I don’t want her to get hurt at all. The last person I felt that way about was Eddie Guerrero. They establish Bayley as the aggressor, which is an interesting tactic, and have her chase moves that beat other people like the choke she put Nia Jax away with. But Asuka is too good to get caught by that and counters out. Asuka has been able to blow by everyone else in the women’s division but Bayley is her first real challenge. They sell how close the two are in terms of ability extremely well. Asuka looks to step it up with jabs only for Bayley to have a sick leglock lined up as a counter. It’s Bayley’s plan; take out the legs, take out the kicks. The competition of Bayley’s planning and fast countering against Asuka’s striking and submissions is the core of the match. While Bayley seems to have the better plan, Asuka is the stronger competitor and Bayley is fighting from the bottom. Which is perfect for her because she’s a great underdog. Bayley gets trapped in the Asukalock, cannot escape and Asuka wins via referee stoppage. I’m glad Bayley didn’t tap because her personality as a role model is all about positivity. She can walk away from this with head held high. Both these wrestlers did great work. It never quite had the feeling of Bayley vs. Sasha but it was still awesome. This had it tough following Nakamura. They probably should have switched those two around. Final Rating: **** Ringside: Bobby Roode! Jesus. So he’s left TNA then! NXT Championship Finn Balor (c) vs. Samoa Joe Balor comes out with a chainsaw, for some reason. “Texas Chainsaw Massacre” suggests @JoseLothario on Twitter. Bit of a tenuous link (although certainly what they were going for), especially with the Dean Ambrose/Terry Funk chainsaw angle from RAW a few weeks ago. Balor knows he needs to start fast and hard and busts Joe hardway under the eye in the opening sequence. This leads to Samoan Violence, including Balor getting thrown over the rail in careless fashion. It’s the brutal monster Joe that hasn’t really been evident in NXT so far. But here he ramps that up to eleven, blood everywhere, flying elbow first dives. Unfortunately doctors come out to check Joe’s eye because there’s so much blood. It’s wrestling! Shit happens. Joe’s intensity on seeing his own blood and letting that aggression out on Balor is seriously great. The referee continually stopping Joe to get the cut checked kills the momentum of the match unfortunately. A cut is not a big issue, compared to other head injuries. It looks worse than it is. The doctors get unreal heat from the bloodthirsty hardcore crowd. “Let Joe bleed” is an actual chant. Obviously the blood becomes somewhat overwhelming and if they let it go it could create a great storyline but instead they almost force Joe to work around it. This is a company that is obsessed with micromanaging. Just let those happy accidents make magic happen. They still have a strong match and Balor kicking out of the Musclebuster feels like an actual shocking occurrence. Coup de Grace sets up Bloody Sunday but Joe counters into the Coquina Clutch. Balor pulls out the old Bret Hart-Roddy Piper WrestleMania VIII finish by kicking off the buckles for the pin. Joe stubbornly refusing to let go. This could have stolen the show if they’d not kept stopping to check Joe. Joe’s offence in the early going was supremely fiery. Still a legitimately great match, the fourth of five matches on the card. Final Rating: ****1/4 Summary: One of the best wrestling shows of the year, easily. One of the best wrestling shows of all time, perhaps. NXT never disappoints but this was an incredible show. Four of the five matches were blow-away good. Mania weekend has started with an absolute bang. Verdict: 100 We’re in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Traditionally a hot crowd. Although not one that’ll do as it’s told. Not that any WWE TV crowd seems to want to behave anymore. It’s only the house shows, where naïve children make up the majority not the minority in attendance, where babyfaces are correctly cheered and nefarious evil-doers jeered. Hosts are Michael Cole, JBL and Byron Saxton.
Promo Time: Stephanie McMahon Nothing says kicking off a hot RAW in WrestleMania season than yet another promo from a McMahon and Steph has kept the terrible half-dance in her entrance. She drones on for a bit until Roman Reigns interrupts her. I personally wouldn’t have put Roman in front of Philly because you know he’s going to get booed. The Emasculator goes to cut Roman down but gets nowhere and Reigns even blocks her slap. That’s how you know Roman is getting the world’s biggest push. He gets to stand up to Stephanie. What a sad indictment of WWE booking that is. A.J. Styles vs. Kevin Owens This is a rematch from SmackDown where Chris Jericho distracted Styles to allow Owens to win. Jericho’s creepy “A.J. Styles” chant is the best thing about that piece of business. Both guys get good reactions, as you’d expect from the fighting city of Philadelphia. These two have been working the house circuit and getting a decent match together. It’s emphasised in certain spots like Owens backdropping Styles into the rail or Owens swatting the Pele Kick aside. They’ve had ideas and they’re putting them together. Styles hits the Ushikoroshi and it seems Michael Cole is far less familiar with that move than Mauro Ranallo, who flat out called the move, and referenced Hirooki Goto, on SmackDown. Mauro did watch New Japan on AXS when he commentated on it but I guess Cole doesn’t watch SmackDown or he’d know what he was watching. Or perhaps he’s just scared to attempt the word and get it wrong. English is hard. The match is impressive as both men seem to avoid their usual move set in favour of switching things up. When they start striking it out, it’s like watching something from New Japan and it pops the hell out of the announce team. Gee, do you think maybe there are better wrestlers outside of WWE than the ones they currently have? I’m not saying that from my basement by the way Baron Corbin. The match is a real hum-dinger. Two guys keen to prove they belong on this roster, and then some. Like on SmackDown Jericho comes out here and distracts Styles to allow Owens to win with a roll up. The same finish as SmackDown? That’s just lazy. Match was great, booking was awful. Typical WWE nonsense. The quality in the wrestling makes me wish one of, or preferably both of, these two were main eventing ‘Mania. Final Rating: ***3/4 Post Match: Owens shills #KOMania, his cute little version of WrestleMania. He wonders out loud who he might face at the big show and is interrupted by Dolph Ziggler, who pops me by referencing “Botchamania”. Maffew will be pleased. “Is that one of your crappy jokes from your stand up?” ponders Kevin, again popping me. They’re interrupted by The Miz who points out that Ziggler has done nothing. Miz’s claim to get a shot is based on his ‘Mania main event years ago (it was 2011, WrestleMania XXVII). They’re joined by Sami Zayn. Owens looking suitably enraged at his arrival. That’s the money singles match so Owens suggests they should have a triple threat match to face KO at ‘Mania. If that means they’ve abandoned the idea of a four/five-way match that’s fine. I think the injury to Neville may have altered plans for a big multi-man match. Video Control takes us to Dean Ambrose who’s chatting about crazy with Terry Funk. “Crazy as a fox in a hen house with a chicken feather sticking out of his ass”. Terry puts Ambrose over and gives him the Chainsaw Charlie chainsaw so he can use it at WrestleMania. The way they’re building Ambrose up for ‘Mania is actually pretty cool. He’ll be carrying some baggage by bringing the trademarks of Mick Foley and Terry Funk but in a good way. Promo Time: League of Nations Sheamus is unimpressed with the New Day and shows clips of the Lads giving the tag champs a thrashing last week. Thankfully this dour promo is interrupted by the New Day. Somehow the drabness of the League of Nations drags the New Day down. The League is just a massive lead weight on every segment they appear in. Kofi’s burn on Alberto Del Rio, reminding him of his previous successes before pointing out he’s now stuck in the League of Nations, is pretty funny. They end up brawling and because of the League’s terminal uselessness even that fizzles out. Big E. vs. Rusev I feel really bad for Rusev because he’s stuck in the League of Nations, which is a dead end. Everyone else in there deserves it but Rusev is just being punished for some unwritten indiscretion Lana has committed and for making fun of that fact on Twitter. While Big E can be made more entertaining by New Day being at ringside, Xavier’s trombone in particular, the League of Nations are a positive detriment. Rusev is far worse for being in their group. Xavier’s nutty ringside stuff includes hitting Del Rio with the Shining Wizard, which made me laugh. The match is an unbearable drag though. It lasts for way too long, achieves nothing and goes nowhere. Big E wipes out Sheamus and clean pins Rusev with the Big Ending. The League of Nations ship is sinking fast. It’s an unmitigated disaster. Final Rating: ¾* Promo Time: The Big Show He’s out here to shill the Andre the Giant Memorial battle royal. At some point Show flipped babyface without me even noticing. But then Show turns more often than I eat hot meals. Show puts over Andre and puts his hat into the ring for winning another Memorial battle royal this year. He’s interrupted, because everyone is interrupted in this company, by the Social Outcasts. Show just laughs at them but at least they’re entertaining, which puts them higher up the totem pole than the League of Nations in my book. Show calls them “hashtagging trolls” and then fends all four of them off with minimal effort. When the numbers game takes over Kane joins in. Bo makes me laugh by apologising after the rest of the ‘Casts are beaten down. Show is equally amusing by giving Kane a big hug. “Kane’s the man” he yells before eating a chokeslam. Oh good lord, I hope it doesn’t come down to another Show vs. Kane feud. Video Control gives us the latest Hall of Fame inductee Stan Hansen! What are the chances of him accidentally punching someone’s eye out at the ceremony? Don’t bet against it! That’s a solid entry. Very happy for Stan. He deserves it. Fandango vs. Chris Jericho Fandango still works here? I honestly thought he’d left. Fandango famously beat Jericho in his first WWE match at WrestleMania 29. “He never beat me at WrestleMania” screams Jericho. “You are a stupid man, you idiot” continues Jericho. At what point did Jericho become this ridiculous parody of himself? The crowd is dead unfortunately. Nobody cares about Fandango because WWE have booked him as a nobody for years on Main Event and Superstars. Jericho should win clean with the Walls of Jericho only for Styles to distract. Fandango is such a jobber he still can’t win, walking into the Codebreaker instead. Jericho then hides behind a cable basher, dragging the poor bastard onto camera where he clearly doesn’t belong. A.J. challenges Jericho to a match at WrestleMania. Final Rating: ¼* Video Control gives us clips of Shane McMahon in training for his ‘Mania match. He looks great but everything he’s doing won’t work against a bigger man like the Undertaker. Lots of talking heads talk about how great Shane is. Corporate shill Chris Jericho suggests it could be “the biggest main event in the history of the company”. Some people will say anything if you pay them enough. This is why I could never work there. If they had me as a talking head I wouldn’t be able to muster any enthusiasm for this match. I’m more interested in what will happen with the Shane storyline afterwards. I want to fast forward to that. Intercontinental Championship #1 Contender’s Match Stardust vs. Sin Cara vs. Zack Ryder Owens does a sensational job of making each man sound like Miz, Zayn and Ziggler. The latter being “a man who dresses and acts like he’s teenager when he’s at least thirty”. Woo, woo, woo! Unfortunately the downside to Owens’ comedy is this likely leads to another multi-man hodgepodge for the IC belt. Owens on commentary tries to replicate John Cena’s ‘giving opportunity’ US title run mentality from last year. “Praise me, praise me” he ends up pleading with Byron. Naturally the match is a joke, despite all three guys trying really hard. Miz, Zayn and Ziggler turn up to argue the point of all this and the ref throws it out. The result is not just a four-way schmoz but a seven-way schmoz. Final Rating: ½* Video Control gives us clips from the opening segment because why use a three hour show to build up your roster when you can just build up one guy who everyone hates. The last match was indicative of WWE’s booking of these endless shows. We’ve never been given a reason to care one jot about Sin Cara. Who is he? He’s just a dude in a mask. As for Ryder, he’s been buried for years. Why don’t these guys ever get the chance to elevate themselves? Promos, skits, matches with established talent, sit down interviews, video features. Lord knows RAW is long enough to fit all that in. Kevin Owens heads over to Steph to complain about the last segment. “Your husband thinks very highly of me”. Owens is just killing it tonight. Steph, returning to her Emasculator ways, books Kevin in a seven-way ladder match at ‘Mania that will be a car crash. I was hoping for that Owens-Zayn match but Sami does have Shinsuke Nakamura ‘Mania weekend already. Steph goes to leave and as Triple H picks her up Roman appears from the other side of a roller shutter in a cool visual. Crowd boos him relentlessly. The beatings will continue until morale improves. Natalya vs. Charlotte This is non-title and we’ve got both Becky Lynch and Sasha Banks at ringside to watch. The more I think about that triple threat match at ‘Mania, the more I think it could be a showstealer. Although it may struggle to outshine NXT’s women’s title match pitting Asuka against champion Bayley. Unlike the previous two big Natalya vs. Charlotte matches (one in NXT, one on PPV), this one doesn’t mean anything. Charlotte struggles so much against Natalya that I worry they’re planning on shoe-horning Nattie into ‘Mania. You can tell this match isn’t an important one though as Charlotte puts Natalya away with Natural Selection, her secondary finisher. Final Rating: ** Bubba Ray Dudley vs. R-Truth The Bubba singles matches give me hope that WWE realise Bubba is a good singles heel wrestler, and a former TNA world champion. Bubba squashes Truth, shouting “that’s what’s up” before the pin. The Dudley Boyz continue the beating. Goldust saves but gets beaten down so the Usos make the real save. They’re facing the Dudley Boyz at WrestleMania. Final Rating: SQUASH (N/R) Promo Time: Vince McMahon He’s out here to hype Taker vs. Shane and declares that if Shane wins “you’ve probably seen the last of me”. The crowd responds with a resounding “Yes” chant. Vince adds another wrinkle into the ‘Mania match calling Undertaker “my bitch” and putting Taker’s career on the line in his match with Shane. This was to the point. If all McMahon promos were this brisk I’d have no issue with them. Dean Ambrose vs. Braun Strowman They’ve been protecting Braun by not having him wrestle. Especially in singles where he’ll be completely exposed so this is a strange choice of main event. Braun looks every bit the lumbering rookie they’ve been trying to protect. His timing is not good. He’s not dangerous because he’s not attempting anything difficult but he’s just too green. WWE opt for the distraction tactic, with the TV audience, by putting Paul Heyman on commentary. Braun keeps using a nerve hold and the crowd chant “this is boring”. There’s a great shot of Heyman listening to the abuse. It’s not Strowman’s fault, he’s not ready for this spot and WWE should know that. Dean ends up getting disqualified for using a chair but drops Braun with Dirty Deeds because of it. Therefore telling us a story of how ‘Mania could go down. This sucked but then Braun Strowman was in it. Final Rating: ¼* THE RAW RECAP: Most Entertaining: Kevin Owens. Great match, entertaining ring introductions and fantastic commentary. Least Entertaining: The League of Nations Match of the Night: Kevin Owens vs. A.J. Styles Quote of the Night: “It’s not Kevin Owens fault that AJ Styles has the attention span of a gnat and turns around when someone walks into an arena” – JBL sums up the way all WWE babyfaces are booked. Summary: Any show where the crowd mercilessly chant “this is boring” at the main event can’t really be considered a success. WrestleMania season has been a bust this year with very little to look forward to at the big show. I’ve probably said this before but my hopes for ‘Mania weekend rest on another show from Dallas that weekend. A little soiree thrown by NXT. Their specials routinely out-do the main roster and their line up for Takeover Dallas is immaculate. You’ll forgive me for being more hyped up for that show over the seven hours of WrestleMania coverage come April 3. Verdict: 33 We’re in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Hosts are Michael Cole, JBL and Byron Saxton. WrestleMania is rapidly approaching and with the company having made it over the speed-bump that was the Roadblock Network Special the ‘Mania card is coming together. Here’s how it looks so far:
Triple H vs. Roman Reigns Brock Lesnar vs. Dean Ambrose The Undertaker vs. Shane McMahon Charlotte vs. Becky Lynch vs. Sasha Banks IC title defence Andre the Giant Memorial Battle Royal Not the most enticing of line-ups but then last years ‘Mania looked pretty awful on paper and still delivered. The biggest issue they face is there’s no major singles match where I actively care who wins. Perhaps I’m pulling for Shane to win his match, just so RAW can get an overhaul. Although the lead-in to ‘Mania is usually quite exciting as it becomes a little more unpredictable. We’ll see if that holds true tonight. WWE Tag Team Championship The New Day (c) vs. The League of Nations (Alberto Del Rio & Rusev) The New Day have been roasting the League of Nations on Twitter with stuff that’s more entertaining than anything on TV of late. New Day had a numbers advantage at Roadblock because WWE ran a house show the same night and both Del Rio and Rusev were on it. Main event for that show? Kevin Owens vs. AJ Styles. I’ve seen that match, it was solid. Seeing as the Freebirds are going into the Hall of Fame, Cole is actually allowed to reference the Freebirds Rule. WWE makes itself sound odd for not referencing stuff like this all the time. Only when it suits them. Xavier Woods actually wrestles here, which leaves Kofi standing at ringside holding Francesca II. It’s perhaps not the best use of Xavier. Or Kofi. After all Xavier drops into the heat segment like Kingston would but now there’s no one to blow the trombone. Does Kofi play a musical instrument? Drums or a banjo or something? Del Rio does some impressive work in getting Big E out of the way, blocking the spear through the ropes and dropping double knees on the apron. Meanwhile Kofi sees off both Sheamus and King Barrett on the floor, thus rendering the numbers game useless, before distracting Rusev so Xavier can roll him up. The League gets a four on three beatdown after the match but they’ve already lost to New Day twice. Perhaps some seven-man shenanigans at WrestleMania are in order. The beating goes on for ages, uncomfortably so, but at least it shows the League are pissed off about all the mockery they’ve faced in recent weeks. Final Rating: **3/4 Promo Time: Dean Ambrose The pop this man gets is shockingly loud. The announce team replay the controversial finish and, despite the set up for it being really clunky, Dean did indeed have his foot under the bottom rope on the pin. They seem really pleased that it worked. Ambrose can barely get a promo started before Brock Lesnar shows up. The logic of Paul Heyman here is that he won’t let Lesnar kill Ambrose tonight because it might effect buyrates for WrestleMania. However Brock wants a scrap and Dean came prepared. He’s got a crowbar. The ‘Mania match is a street fight. I don’t know why Lesnar, who is unbeatable in a regular match, would even want to have a no holds barred match. Or why Heyman would allow Dean this window of opportunity. Ryback vs. Sin Cara Sin Cara has badass new gear. It’s all black. Unlike Ryback switching gear, it’s a refreshing new look. Although it doesn’t really fit in with the Lucha Dragons smiley, happy outlook. Ryback in this new heel role is only entertaining if he’s squashing people. This is an extended squash. It’s tedious. They shouldn’t give the match as long as they do, nor should Sin Cara get any offence, which he does. Ryback hits a couple of Shellshocks while staring at Kalisto. He’s clearly wanting that US title that’s over Kalisto’s shoulder. That’s shaping up to be a singles match but there’s no way that should make the ‘Mania card, which is what Ryback asks for. Final Rating: ½* Promo Time: Stephanie McMahon I thought we’d dodged this bullet when the show opened with a match but here comes the long-winded McMahon family promo. Steph can’t even walk to the ring without irritating me. She tries to do a little dance to her music and it’s so half-hearted it makes no sense to even attempt it. As it happens she’s only out here to introduce… Promo Time: Triple H “Hope is not a strategy” says the champ trying to compare the people to Ambrose, which works, and Roman Reigns, which draws boos. Hunter draws some genuine heat by explaining how life works and why everyone in the crowd is a complete failure at life. It’s unerringly accurate, which makes it quite painful to listen to. When faced with the comparison, Hunter has definitely done life better than me. He looks better, he’s achieved more and the son of a bitch is even perfectly happy in his private life. “The Authority always wins” says Hunter and that brings out Dolph Ziggler. “Speaking of failures” Steph says as he hits the ring, cutting his nuts off immediately. Dolph thinks he’s got nothing left to lose. But he’s talking to his employer. There’s his job, his livelihood. Does he not see that? Not the sharpest knife in the drawer. Steph books Ziggler in a match tonight, which if he wins he’ll get any spot he wants at WrestleMania. The match is with Triple H. Steph can’t of asked her husband if he was cool with that beforehand. The worst part of this segment was Steph lifting the Daniel Bryan “yes” taunt. That’s not yours. This was going fine until Ziggler hit the ring. The Hunter stuff about hope was very strong. Nobody cares about Ziggler. If you wanted to push Ziggler you should have done it two years ago when he was hot. Sami Zayn vs. The Miz Has Sami been snuck onto the main roster? He keeps appearing on main roster shows. Kevin Owens joins commentary to point out “Sami Zayn doesn’t belong in the same ring as me”. Sami is eager to thrill and inserts a moonsault off the rail. I feel bad for Miz. He seems to be positioned as the guy who takes spots off new guys who are trying to get themselves over. Owens is terrific on commentary, shutting down Byron for reminding Kevin of Sami eliminating him from the Rumble match. “Do you want to be eliminated from this commentary table?” The finish of this is seriously clunky with Owens getting into it with Miz, over Owens abandoning Miz on SmackDown in a tag, and Zayn wins with the Helluva Kick. Final Rating: *3/4 Video Control takes us backstage where the League of Nations offer the New Day a match at WrestleMania four on three. Brie Bella & Alicia Fox vs. Team BAD Before we get underway Lana appears. Are they angling for Brie vs. Lana at WrestleMania? It feels like they’re trying to get something out of Brie before she leaves. Lana’s distraction allows Team BAD to get the double team and pin Brie. The only good thing about this match was Lana’s skirt, which was on point. Final Rating: ¼* Video Control takes us backstage where Paige, the forgotten woman, gets interview time. Lana comes in for a bit of fiery European arguing. They’d be better off as a team but another team, Team BAD, show up to have Lana’s back. Elsewhere Charlotte chats about ‘Mania. She points out Sasha puked before her first NXT match. “She’s a scared little girl”. Ric Flair puts over Sasha and Becky but that Charlotte is better. They don’t need to build that triple threat up more than showing clips from the NXT matches. I don’t see why they can’t use that background to sell it. The Usos vs. The Social Outcasts (Adam Rose & Bo Dallas) To add to the confusion The Dudley Boyz are out here to do commentary. It’s a really short match where the ‘Casts get superkicked a lot. It’s a Superkick Party! Superfly Splash finishes for the Samoan brothers. Final Rating: N/R Video Control takes us backstage where Mick Foley shows up to give Dean Ambrose some advice regarding street fights. Foley has a gift for the street fight, a passing of the torch. Ambrose has himself a barbwire bat for ‘Mania. While I don’t really see Ambrose as the logical replacement for Foley, he’s more like an unhinged Austin, it’s nice to have a logical reason for that bat to make a ‘Mania appearance. Triple H vs. Dolph Ziggler There’s no consequence for Dolph if he loses this match but if he wins he gets to pick his spot at WrestleMania. WWE Championship match aside, naturally. Ziggler has become so worthless since his hot streak ended in early 2015 that they might as well have turned him heel tonight and had him join the Authority. It’s not like they have a dog in the fight right now, apart from Hunter himself and he’s only got a finite number of matches left. As was evidenced by the clunker with Ambrose at Roadblock and the pacing of this contest. To call it methodical would be polite. Hunter has this obsession with length. Longer is better. It’s more worthwhile if it’s longer. So he can’t have an entertaining ten minute match with Ziggler. It has to be longer. Dolph can’t structure a long match either, relying heavily on taking heat in every single match. So while it makes sense here, against the champion and a larger opponent, he does it in every match. Hunter shows a suitable amount of ass, giving Dolph big near falls where his desperation last gasp kick outs pop the crowd. It makes you wonder why the company couldn’t do anything with Ziggler over the past year and a half. Eventually Dolph loses because that’s the least interesting of the two options available to them. A third option would have been Ziggler selling his soul. But no, Ziggler looks good and loses, which is a story they’ve been telling for a very, very long time. Good match eventually though. Final Rating: *** Post-Match: Roman Reigns shows up, on the entrance ramp, instead of through the crowd. The reaction is decidedly mixed with definite boos ringing out whenever Roman stops off to breathe in his violent successes. Roman continues the beating into the backstage area where Hunter bleeds from the back of his head. Some babyfaces eventually pull Roman aside to stop the beating. This segment didn’t work. Video Control gives us the latest inductee into the Hall of Fame; Jacqueline Moore. Another Texan as they’re trying to pile in the Texas based competitors for a Texas based show. Elsewhere Goldust and R-Truth talk about penguins and stuff. They’ve flipped this story around and turned Truth into the weirdo. Why can’t they get their heads around the concept that they’re both odd and shouldn’t be teaming at all? Chris Jericho vs. Neville Jericho cuts an inferior version of Hunter’s promo from earlier. Cole reminds us that Neville and Jericho worked a match on the Beast in the East show. It was really solid, the best Jericho match in a long time. This one is a lot shorter with Neville getting injured and Jericho getting disqualified for shoving the ref. Jericho runs his mouth some more so AJ Styles comes out here to shut him up with the Phenomenal Forearm, which is what they’re calling AJ’s springboard elbow smash. Final Rating: N/R Promo Time: Vince McMahon, Shane McMahon and the Undertaker Seeing as we opened with a match our main event is a promo. Vince once again says something odd by claiming that Shane will be “impotent” after ‘Mania. At least no one will be raped…of their dignity. Vince grovels to Undertaker to prevent getting choked again. The question here is why would Undertaker do as he was told in this situation. Shane shows up and botches his promo. “You’re going to go to hit me and I’m going to miss….you’re going to miss”. Crowd laughs. Shane was never that great on the microphone in the first place but he’s clearly out of practice in front of a live crowd. Shane addresses Taker’s motivation for the match, claiming he’s Vince’s bitch. That gets him a beating but no questions are answered. Shane’s comeback on Taker is embarrassing. This segment achieved absolutely nothing. They’re not doing a good job of selling this match up. THE RAW RECAP: Most Entertaining: Kevin Owens Least Entertaining: Shane McMahon. Welcome back, Shane-O! Quote of the Night: “Go ahead Paul E, let the beast off his leash, I dare you” – Dean Ambrose. “I’m looking at Brock, he’s doing his bouncy thing. He’s all bouncy and ready”. Match of the Night: Triple H vs. Dolph Ziggler Summary: An okay show, unless you were trying to assemble a WrestleMania card. At the moment the PPV of PPV’s is looking like a car crash. The card has very little quality about it and the big matches are bouts people aren’t invested in. I don’t want to see the Undertaker wrestler Shane McMahon, ever. Maybe something like Ambrose vs. Lesnar could be a sleeper hit and the women’s three-way should be good but the builds on those are falling into the shadow of the top two matches, which are horribly built up so far. This probably doesn’t end well. Verdict: 44 Tonight’s RAW comes live from Chicago, Illinois, one of the better towns/cities for wrestling crowds, along with New York and Philadelphia. Expect lots of “CM Punk” chanting to express distaste with the product. With Roman Reigns being kept off TV until after Roadblock and Brock Lesnar not scheduled to appear, the main focus of the show will mostly center round Dean Ambrose vs. Triple H and the latest McMahon family saga. Hosts are Michael Cole, Byron Saxton, and JBL.
Promo Time: Shane McMahon I’ll let you in on a little secret: unlike most of my HoW colleagues, I actually used to get a kick out of Shane O’Mac matches. He’s definitely one of my biggest guilty pleasures of the attitude era. His return a couple of weeks back was also one of few genuine surprise returns in wrestling since the internet became a thing. I still don’t think that he’s the ideal opponent for The Undertaker, especially as it is rumoured to be his final WrestleMania appearance. I’d have thought Sting (if fit), John Cena (if fit), Seth Rollins (if fit), Bray Wyatt (if not jobbed out to him last year), or even Kevin Owens would have made more suitable potential final challengers for the dead man, while Shane’s return should surely suggest a match against Triple H. In fact, I still genuinely do not believe that Shane vs. ‘Taker will go ahead as booked, and will only do so once the bell has rung and somebody throws a punch. Shane’s here to address his father’s speech from last week. He declares Vince to be out of touch with just about everyone, which is true, and promises to put an end to all the backstage BS and counterproductive booking. He sounds like the voice of the internet. The highlight is him calling his dad an “egomaniacal, miserable, old bastard.” Taker’s gong hits, which gets a mini pop, but it’s just Vinnie Mac, which draws an “asshole” and the first “CM Punk” chants of the night. Vince smashes an old photo of him and Shane to fully symbolise the severance of their familial bonds, then sets four of the worst looking ‘security’ guards to physically remove Shane from the ring. I’m begging for the Mean Street Posse to show up. Shane doesn’t need them, though, and sees off all four guards with consummate ease, which begs the question, what type of security firms are WWE employing? They got their asses handed to them by a forty-six-year-old businessman. Kevin Owens vs. Neville I’m expecting Owens to lose tonight for two reasons: one, he’s the Intercontinental Champion, and that’s what they do nowadays; two, he needs an opponent for Roadblock and/or ‘Mania. A third reason to suspect a loss for the champ is that he’s dominant throughout, bringing the aggression right from the bell and managing to avoid the aerial assault before launching the jumping Geordie into the steps conveniently in time for the commercial. Owens seems to have counters for all of Neville’s moves up until he gets clocked with an enziguri and a shooting star press from the top rope to the floor, the latter prompting Chi-town to chant, “holy shit.” Owens misses a moonsault of his own, then just barely kicks out of a second-rope Red Arrow. Contrary to all my predictions, the champ does actually win a television match with a tights-assisted roll up. He continues the beating after the bell, but Sami Zayn comes out for the save. I didn’t expect to see him until the night after WrestleMania, though I’m now sure that he’ll be involved in the Intercontinental Championship picture, perhaps in another multi-man format. It’s all good. Final Rating: ***1/4 Backstage, Dolph Ziggler is getting ticked off by Steph over some tweet he allegedly sent out about the Authority earlier and subsequently deleted. Apparently, he referenced his Survivor Series win over Team Authority in 2014. That’s two years ago, mate. You’re a glorified jobber now. Steph will recreate those conditions for him later when he takes on three members of the League of Nations in an elimination match. Brie Bella vs. Summer Rae Some awful clip airs from the recent episode of Total Divas, where Brie has bought a scooter or something and her sister disapproves. I prefer the one where John Cena unhooks the wrong chandelier and it smashes. That might be an episode of Only Fools and Horses now that I think about it. Lana provides the distraction for the Summer Rae roll up victory. Dressed in a denim ensemble with leather jacket makes her look more like Dolph Ziggler’s girlfriend again. After the match, Lana plants Brie with an X-Factor. Apparently, it’s Brie’s finisher, too. That’s news to me. Final Rating: ¼* Promo Time: Dean Ambrose Ambrose essentially runs through his latest SmackDown! promo again, only this time presumably to a wider audience. The general gist is that he’s going to screw up the WrestleMania booking by defeating Triple H for the World Heavyweight Championship. “I’m hijacking the WWE Championship and I’m hijacking WrestleMania whether anyone likes it or not,” he claims. I really hope that prophecy is fulfilled. He digresses by pondering over future promotional appearances at baseball games and charity events before being interrupted by Triple H, who intends to bring him back to reality. Hunter points out that Roadblock is just a marketing slogan, whereas Ambrose is really a speed bump or a pot hole. All roads lead back to Roman, here, so I guess that the ‘Mania booking will remain the same after Saturday. Dean tries to goad the champ into the ring, so Hunter books him in a match with Bray Wyatt in the main event. 3 vs. 1 Elimination Match Dolph Ziggler vs. League of Nations (Sheamus, Rusev & King Barrett) When I heard the three-on-one stipulation earlier, I naturally assumed that Barrett would be the one missing out. However, he’s in there to job first, which is exactly what happens via a superkick after Dolph takes his customary beating for a while. Rusev has to make the save to prevent Sheamus from suffering the same fate second later. Michael Cole shows new levels of ineptitude when calling the wrong superstar’s name, which he does a lot, stating, “Ziggler knocked down by Ziggler.” What a first-class buffoon. Ziggler falls to the Brogue Kick because Sheamus always seems to win. I thought that Ziggler would at least have put Rusev out first, but no, it seems pinning Barrett is the best that he’s getting tonight. Expect him to be competing in the Andre the Giant Memorial Battle Royal on the WrestleMania pre-show. And not winning. Final Rating: ** Video Control gives us an in-depth look at Shane McMahon’s wrestling “career.” It revolves around the myriad stunts he pulled off during the Attitude Era, which is why I think I always enjoyed watching him. He wasn’t very good at “wrestling,” for sure, but it always fascinated me how he was willing to risk his health for the sake of a match that he didn’t really need to compete in in the first place. The video is backed up by a selection of talking heads, namely Seth Rollins, Dean Ambrose, JBL, and Big Show. I quite enjoyed the video, but unfortunately it just serves to remind everyone how much Shane has physically aged since he went away. Becky Lynch & Sasha Banks vs. Naomi & Tamina A rematch from Fastlane, though only one of these teams will feature on the main card of the next pay per view. The crowd are hot for Sasha, and just how good she is becomes evident when she’s in there against Tamina, who still seems to be struggling with the fundamentals. The Bank Statement finishes Naomi off in short order. Charlotte, at ringside with her dad (where else and with who else?) attacks Becky and Sasha after the bell. I can’t see her retaining the Diva’s Championship at ‘Mania. Personally, I’d like Becky to get a run with it before putting Sasha over. Final Rating: *1/2 Backstage, R Truth brings a peace offering for Goldust in the shape of a pizza. A crusty Goldust claims to be lactose intolerant, which is just a set up so they can use the phrase “exploding butt” a few times in a misguided attempt at comedy. Mark Henry pounces on the unguarded deep pan. He’s never moved that fast in all of his twenty years with the company. WWE Tag Team Championship The New Day (Kofi Kingston & Big E) vs. Y2AJ In the pre-match promo, Big E brings up New Day’s matching ass-cheek tattoos of a pink and blue unicorn, only it seems that Xavier and Kofi didn’t get one after all. Chris Jericho and AJ Styles are sporting matching Y2AJ tees. Styles and Jericho have the going of this early on, with AJ’s offence looking sharper than just about anyone on the entire roster. WWE really need to move him away from the ageing Jericho soon and utilize him to the fullest effect. His 450o springboard splash is as smooth as it gets and would have the titles in the bag but for Big E pulling Kofi out of the ring. Jericho jobs clean to the Big Ending to round off a great TV match, though I suspect that New Day will eventually complete their ill-advised face turn and defend their titles against the League of Nations at ‘Mania. After the match, Jericho attacks AJ for no good reason, which goes contrary to everything WWE need to be doing with him. So much for those t-shirts. He’s had his matches with and against Jericho now. Can he face Kevin Owens next, please? Final Rating: ***1/4 Renee Young gets a quick word with Jericho backstage. Jealousy, it seems, was the reason for his post-match assault. Kalisto vs Tyler Breeze Tyler is sporting some designer stubble and his hair is less kempt that usual. It’s also unusual for him to have such a size advantage over an opponent. These two seem to have good chemistry with each other and put on the beginnings of a match that is like a throwback to the old SmackDown! cruiserweight heydays. Sadly, instead of getting an unexpected undercard classic, Breeze jobs to the Salida Del Sol inside of a couple of minutes. There was potential for so much more with this one. Final Rating: *1/2 Video Control run a highlights package for the latest Hall of Fame inductee, The Big Boss Man. Boss Man was a decent big guy and quite popular in his initial run with the company during the Rock N’ Wrestling era. He also had a great entrance song. Backstage, JoJo tries to get a word with Kalisto, but they are interrupted by Ryback, who is rumoured to be in line for a United States Championship opportunity in the near future. Though obvious to most, the Big Guy wonders why he isn’t in the WrestleMania main event or even booked on the card yet. He tells the little lucha that he is best off looking out for himself and not carrying on with The Lucha Dragons. Expect Sin Cara to be jobbing to Ryback within one week. Ryback vs. Curtis Axel Before the match, Axel and his Social Outcast cohorts cut a really irritating promo that finishes with them doing some sort of Tatanka-esque chanting ritual. Axel is a jobber, so he obviously loses, but there is far too much clubberin’ and generic scrapping before the match reaches its inevitable conclusion. Final Rating: ½* Backstage, Steph confronts Vince and is clearly concerned that Shane might, just might, beat ‘Taker at WrestleMania. Vince tells her that it is all in hand, but it’s clear that he is also concerned. Dean Ambrose vs. Bray Wyatt This feud got played out last year, and to be honest they never really gelled together. I suppose Bray needs something to do in the absence of Brock Lesnar tonight, though a nonsensical promo usually suffices. Somebody like Wyatt, in storyline terms, is actually an ideal opponent for Ambrose ahead of Roadblock, as it provides more opportunity for the Lunatic Fringe to take another beating, though the rest of the Wyatts, who usually intercede at every chance, are conspicuous by their absence tonight. Without his droogies, Bray has to put the effort into a one-on-one match and it is to the benefit of the contest, though he still retains some of the usual shtick that comes with his character. They actually have a decent match, easily bordering on their best to date, and that’s without all the electrocutions, ambulances, and broken rocking chairs. What I also like is that though they are not currently feuding, they clearly still have residual hatred for each other, which is how it should be. Too many times, wrestlers engage in bitter blood feuds spanning months, only to end up on-screen mates months later when it suits the booking. In the end, the other Wyatts do show up, ruining what was turning out to be a decent main event. Triple H makes his way to ringside to nod his approval for the Wyatts, though there is a temporary stare down between the champion and the Wyatt patriarch, which the crowd bite for. Wyatt gives the title belt a little touch before leaving the ring (a bit like in the Bayley-Asuka booking on NXT – does Bray want a shot, too?). Triple H clears the announce desk in preparation to finish what he started last week, but he ends up the recipient of Dirty Deeds, which almost certainly means that Ambrose will not win the title at Roadblock now. Final Rating: **1/2 THE RAW RECAP: Most Entertaining: Dean Ambrose Least Entertaining: Most of them. Quote of the Night: “My greatest creation will put to rest my greatest failure,” Vince to Shane Match of the Night: The Tag Team Championship match just edges Owens vs. Neville. Verdict: There’s no doubt about it, there were some good matches on tonight’s RAW. Two matches clocked just over three stars and Ambrose vs. Wyatt was likely heading the same way before the inevitable DQ finish. However, the gaping hole in roster depth is evident in abundance tonight, and it certainly is affecting the WrestleMania booking (though WWE have hardly helped themselves in that department). With many big names missing off tonight’s show, focus was primarily on Triple H vs. Dean Ambrose, one of whom did not wrestle, and Shane McMahon vs. Undertaker, neither wrestled and one wasn’t even on the show. Roadblock should clear up the championship picture, but if WWE manage to screw it up, they can always throw out another Network special: Caution: Last Minute Booking Changes at Work. Verdict: 47 We’re in Nashville, Tennessee. Hosts are Michael Cole, JBL and Byron Saxton. We’re 39 days removed from WrestleMania. One would suspect the hype would kick into a higher gear tonight. If not now, when do we expect this big push to actually assemble a passable card?
Promo Time: Triple H Hunter addresses the concept of Authority and how everyone has to answer to it but while everyone hates it they can’t challenge it because they’re scared. Is this a message to the locker room? Hunter points out that no one should challenge authority or face the beating that Roman Reigns took last week. This brings out the one guy who doesn’t care about authority in the slightest (and possibly should have had Roman’s spot) Dean Ambrose. “Last week was very busy” points out Ambrose, having wanted to chat to Hunter on RAW a week ago. “Do you like Shane O Mac or not?” quizzes Dean* before moving on to asking Hunter who he actually wanted to win the main event at Fastlane. It’s slightly unhinged and shoot-ish. Hunter shuts Ambrose down by calling him a “non factor”. Ambrose is terrific here, with his slow delivery and kooky persona. His response to Hunter calling him insane is wonderful. “Why does everyone keep saying that?” muses Dean. Ambrose gets tired of being abused and challenges Hunter to a title match. Hunter instead books Ambrose against Alberto Del Rio because why gives the fans what they want when WWE can give them something that nobody wants. This was going well until Hunter bailed on the eventual match that people were clamouring for. More on that later. *Allegedly Hunter isn’t too keen on Shane due to his brother-in-law leaving the business back in 2010. Rumours persist of bad blood within the McMahon household. Something that they’re probably keen to keep going as tension and conflict is good for business. Even if the reality of the matter is they’re probably fine. Ambrose’s questioning in this segment opens up the concept to the general public and given Stephanie’s open animosity toward Shane there’s definitely room for a storyline after WrestleMania. WWE Divas Championship #1 Contenders Match Becky Lynch vs. Sasha Banks I assumed this was heading for a ‘Mania three-way given the history between these two and Charlotte, going back to NXT and their first night on WWE’s main roster. These two are two of the most talented women to ever grace WWE’s rings, especially given the majority of their training has taken place in house**. They do a lot of extremely good mat grappling, countering holds back and forth. Sasha looks a lot calmer and more focused with Becky rushing into a few spots. On the mat they’re both excellent though. The finish is interesting as Sasha plants Becky with a sunset flip superbomb and they land clean in a double pin. The result is a draw, the exact same finish run on NXT between Samoa Joe and Sami Zayn last week. The crowd don’t hate it and chant “triple threat”, which is exactly what I thought was happening beforehand. Whoever is going to WrestleMania it should be a good match. I’m intrigued to see who wins that. Perhaps more so than anything else on the ‘Mania card. Final Rating: **3/4 **This is perhaps unfair on Becky, who’d spent a decade training and competing around the world prior to signing for NXT in 2013. Although there’s no doubt her all-round game has improved drastically since being recruited by WWE. By comparison Sasha has spent four years in WWE’s developmental system out of her six years in the business. Dolph Ziggler vs. The Miz For those who don’t have the Network the opening episode of Ride Along featured these two driving together. It made me hate them both just that little bit more. Practically every time Ziggler opens his mouth outside of the kayfabed world of WWE it makes me hate him. He has proven to be a complete doofus at every turn. It’s a shame because he’s a solid wrestler, who really wants to be Shawn Michaels and he never will be. This is energetic but short lived and Miz wins with a roll up. I persist that Ziggler should have left WWE last year and given the Indies a go. Especially with WWE hiring top talent from the Indies. There’s a vacuum now. Final Rating: ¾* Promo Time: Stephanie McMahon The crowd are not pleased at having to sit through Steph’s acceptance speech (for the Vincent J. McMahon Legacy of Excellence Award), which she didn’t get the chance to deliver last week. Steph throws a hissy fit when the crowd chant for “Shane O Mac” as she’s been here running the business while Shane’s been off gallivanting around Asia (sadly Steph doesn’t use the word “gallivanting” but it seems appropriate). Steph gets into a gender based argument about her daughters and Shane’s sons. Oh God, this is going to go on forever isn’t it? This is a frankly ridiculous interview as Steph gets even more worked up. “Bow down to your Queen…ME!” It’s so over the top. At least she doesn’t emasculate anyone in the process. The Lucha Dragons vs. Sheamus & Rusev The League of Nations are trying hard to make their group work, even though there’s no purpose for their existence anymore, and I appreciate their efforts. However I don’t feel any attachment to them and they don’t have a great babyface to battle against. It seems they’re going to work with the New Day, which means a face turn for the tag champions. While New Day is being rapidly cheered that doesn’t necessarily mean they should be turned face. Much like John Cena and Roman Reigns getting booed doesn’t mean they should be turned heel by WWE logic. So why does it apply to the New Day? Kalisto has certainly gotten over in the past few months so it’s pleasing to see he’s been able to maintain a tag team with Sin Cara. Just because someone is successful in singles doesn’t mean you need to split their team up. However the numbers game is too much for the Lucha Dragons and Rusev gets the pin. Del Rio still can’t let Kalisto go and double stomps him. He beat you, dude. It’s over. Final Rating: *1/4 Video Control takes us to Renee Young and Natalya, who try and sell me sandwiches. There’s enough damn advertising on this show as it is without this crap. [DUD] Ryback vs. Adam Rose Rose is joined by his brothers in the Social Outcasts. The crowd bite on his old gimmick and do the Rosebuds chant. It merely serves to remind me of when one of these two men were actually of interest. Heel Ryback has to be one the most boring, useless members of the active roster. Ryback beats the piss out of Adam Rose and finishes with the Shellshock. At least Ryback looked vicious during this, treating Rose like the jobber he is. The bit where his attack was interrupted by the ref and Ryback used his other hand to hit hammer-fists was inspired and saves the Big Guy from being ‘least entertaining’. Final Rating: SQUASH (N/R) The New Day vs. Chris Jericho & AJ Styles The New Day keep finding new ways to entertain. In this case Big E swimming across the ring while Kofi Kingston prances around outside him, skipping gleefully along with the music. Meanwhile Xavier Woods blasts away on Francesca II. With AJ, I was hoping to see a number of fresh new match up’s. Instead he’s been saddled with Jericho out of the gate. Y2J is desperate to prove he’s still relevant, which had led to cringeworthy promos and sloppy in-ring work. “Y2AJ has really taken off on Twitter” rambles Cole, disregarding the majority of the Twitter talk being of what an awful team name that is. To be fair to AJ Styles, more often than not, all hot new WWE acts tend to get lumbered with a pointless midcard feud in their early months. Just to make sure WWE’s road schedule won’t drive them insane. There’s nothing worse than investing in a new character and having them implode and disappear. West Ham fans can relate. Where is Marco Boogers nowadays?*** The New Day debut a new, incredibly irritating, card trick where Xavier pulls out a deck and asks Kofi to pick a card. “What did you get?” “I got his number!” yells Kingston. AJ is totally professional throughout this, selling and bumping like a champ, showing he’s not effected by nonsense and politics. Styles creaming Big E with his springboard elbow smash is one of the in-ring highlights. Jericho clumsily blocking the Trouble in Paradise and getting the Walls of Jericho to win is not. “Y2AJ is a thing” claims Jericho before asking for a title shot. Final Rating: ** ***Boogers was the subject of a legendary Sun story where they claimed “Barmy Boogers” was living in a caravan after getting sent off in only his second West Ham appearance. The reality of the situation is that Boogers, with an injured knee, had simply gone home to recuperate and the Sun picked up the story after mishearing a press agent say “Boogers had gone home by car again” as “Boogers has gone to his caravan”. The Sun: because why let facts get in the way of a good story. Mishearing a phrase in such a way is called a Mondegreen. Don’t say you never learn anything while watching RAW. Promo Time: Vince McMahon This would be the third McMahon family member to come out here and cut a promo tonight. Vince’s vision of the future of WWE, under Shane McMahon, involves Steph and Hunter quitting and Vince being put in “mothballs”. Hey, sounds ok so far. What’s the catch? “Only fools believe in miracles” states McMahon, dropping truth bombs all over Nashville. Vince perhaps errs by calling the Undertaker “my instrument of destruction” before introducing the Dead Man. Has he not learned from past instances where he’s called Taker to do his bidding? Anyway, the Undertaker is here tonight to sell his WrestleMania match up. “The blood of your son is going to be on your hands, not mine” states Taker, matter-of-factly, before walking to the back as slowly as he came out here. Ok, so Taker is ok with killing Shane? Vince promises to write to Shane out of his will. How much you get out of this depends on how into these characters you are. I’m not. I didn’t care for this. Jey Uso vs. Bubba Ray Dudley ‘We’re not a nostalgia act’ was the claim of the Dudley Boyz this week. Which is odd because they come out here wearing the same crap they were sporting sixteen years ago. D-Von smashes a table into Jimmy’s face, showing a level of hypocrisy in an attempt to make the heel turn stick. They’ve giving the fans what they want after telling the fans they wouldn’t do so and that makes them heels? I don’t get it. Anyway, Bubbabomb finishes Jey off. Final Rating: ½* Video Control takes us to Goldust and R-Truth and the latter refuses to tag with the former. Can this angle just end already? It’s not working. They’re both the comedy guy. You need a funny guy and a straight guy for him to play off. Why is that so hard to understand? The classic example is Al Snow and Steve Blackman (or Bing Crosby and Bob Hope if you’re a bit older). That worked so well because Blackman wasn’t funny. At all. That’s what made him funny. Kevin Owens vs. The Big Show This feud with Show, small though it’s been so far, seems designed to test Owens’ capability of being a main event star. The idea being that if you can work with a variety of guys then you’re a potential top guy. Owens really is legitimate and can work with a variety of guys and he’s big enough that he feels competitive against guys like Show. Owens comes across as tactically astute, going for the count out win like he did on SmackDown. Show drops Owens on the ropes, in a replay of SmackDown only reversed, and Kevin gets counted out. Final Rating: * Video Control takes us backstage and Brie Bella is still hanging around. She’s interrupted by Lana to criticise her choice of men and lack of meat. “They love you because they pity you” says Lana. Brie’s retort is to call Rusev a caveman and point out Lana isn’t a wrestler. I didn’t see the point of this as Brie is wrestling someone else and Rusev vs. Daniel Bryan will never happen. Brie Bella vs. Naomi The Road to WrestleMania is normally more exciting than throwing together two random women in a match with no heat. Neither of them are likely to feature on the ‘Mania card unless there’s a big clusterfudge contest with all the divas in it. The work feels suspiciously like a video game simulation. It’s just a bunch of stuff thrown together. Brie gets to lose again, perhaps doing favours for half the card on her way out, and taps out to a weak looking submission. Lana comes out here to laugh at Brie after the loss. Presumably Brie will be teaching Lana a lesson at some point. Final Rating: ½* Video Control gives us clips of the latest WWE Hall of Fame inductees: the Fabulous Freebirds. The story was broken by Rolling Stone, continuing a weird trend of WWE giving their exclusives to other websites. I’m surprised it’s taken them this long to put the Freebirds into the HOF but this ‘Mania being in Texas may have something to do with it. Elsewhere Charlotte bad-mouths both Sasha and Becky before telling them they’ve got a re-match on SmackDown but they’re still both losers. Well, they did both get pinned tonight. Dean Ambrose vs. Alberto Del Rio WWE should cut their losses on Del Rio. He’s clearly not cared since returning, or in between WWE stints. It’s another bland disinterested performance from him in this match. He just ambles from spot to spot with Ambrose, covered in tape, driving the action with his comebacks. Del Rio’s spots are goofy as hell and at one point he entirely misses on a punch. By about a foot. Other odd stuff includes the double stomp off the rail, with Ambrose having to hold himself in place. Triple H turns up and Del Rio can’t even get the predictable distraction pin with the League of Nations piling in for the DQ instead. Final Rating: *3/4 Post-Match: Hunter gives Ambrose a verbal beating so Dean fires up at him until a Pedigree puts him down. Why are they teasing this match, knowing full well people are more into this than Hunter vs. Roman? Triple H says yes to a title match. “Hey Hunter, thanks” mumbles a half conscious Ambrose and Hunter decides to give him a Roman-sized beating for that. With Reigns MIA, nursing a broken nose from last week, there’s no one to save Dean. At least he got his title shot although with Triple H vs. Reigns at ‘Mania seemingly set in stone they wouldn’t pull a switcheroo would they? Would they? No, probably not. THE RAW RECAP: Most Entertaining: The New Day Least Entertaining: Alberto Del Rio Quote of the Night: “Shane won’t be my son anymore he’ll just be a son…of a bitch” – Vince McMahon promises to cut Shane off after WrestleMania. Match of the Night: Sasha Banks vs. Becky Lynch Summary: Frankly a dour episode of RAW with poor in-ring performances almost across the board. The promos were largely lifeless affairs and the only storyline that seems to be genuinely clicking is Hunter vs. Ambrose, which must annoy the hell out of WWE as they’ve put their eggs into the Roman Reigns basket. You’d never know it was WrestleMania season, although the fans were responding pretty strongly to some of the booking tonight. I am even more concerned about this years ‘Mania card than last year’s. Verdict: 33 February 22 2016
We’re one night removed from WWE’s February filler PPV Fastlane, where Roman Reigns once again captured the number one contendership for the WWE Championship. A query: does WWE still have a mandatory 30 day title defence period? They used to and Hunter is clearly going to exceed that. I’m sure Brock Lesnar did too during his part-time run with the belt. We’re in Detroit, Michigan. Hosts are Michael Cole, JBL and Byron Saxton. Tonight is the awarding of the Vincent J. McMahon Legacy of Excellence Award. I predict BS. Video Control takes us to earlier tonight where an arriving Dean Ambrose is mashed by a clearly upset Brock Lesnar. This culminates in a glorious powerslam on a limousine. Ambrose has been taken to a medical facility because there are no hospitals in the WWE Universe. Vincent J. McMahon Legacy of Excellence Award Ceremony Vince McMahon Jr. (mockingly called “junior” by some of the boys back in the day, Roddy Piper included) is here to announce the recipient. My mind doesn’t race into odd places and instead suspects Vince will either give it to himself as a self masturbatory segment designed to provoke some legend into fighting him at WrestleMania. Or Triple H, to give Roman the opportunity to jump the champ. Instead the award goes to Daddy’s Little Girl, Stephanie McMahon. The nepotism is strong in this one. Speaking of nepotism the shock twist in the tale is that Shane McMahon is back after a six year hiatus. His arrival is a genuine shock, one that rarely occurs in WWE land. Even AJ Styles arrival at the Royal Rumble was all over the internet and I watched AJ suggest he might be in the Rumble while at Rev Pro’s High Stakes show. Shane’s return leaves me torn over the outcome of this storyline before it’s even hit a high gear. The basics of Shane’s return are to run off Steph, point out cryptically that Vince owes him and actually be the first guy since Hunter to not be emasculated by Stephanie on WWE TV. The storyline sees Shane request the chance to run RAW, using some fine examples of how badly run WWE is including declining stock value, poor TV ratings and an injury bug that has claimed several top line talent (thus buggering up the ‘Mania card). Vince rather surprisingly agrees…if Shane can beat the Undertaker in a Hell in a Cell match at WrestleMania. To begin with my mind started to unravel at this, thinking it’d be a fantastic car crash to draw a few more eyes to ‘Mania. But then I remembered that I don’t like Shane as an in-ring performer and this booking isn’t quite what I was hoping for when Shane walked into the venue to shake things up. I was hoping more for a seismic change in the booking of WrestleMania and the RAW’s that lead up to it. Instead I get another match added to WrestleMania that I’m not bothered about. Apart from the outcome, where I now bizarrely crave a Shane victory over Undertaker at WrestleMania. My initial thought process is; “what’s wrong with me?” but that should actually be “what’s wrong with WWE?” Anyway, this was different, a total curveball and a thrilling promo to watch. The nagging concerns about McMahonamania are slightly offset by the promise of genuine change. For starters a babyface authority figure hasn’t been done in sixteen years. How hard would it be to just give the fans what they want for a change? The Lucha Dragons & Neville vs. The New Day The one thing that opening segment has done has got the crowd seriously worked up. It now feels like an important show. Plus this match should be fun as everyone involved is entertaining for various reasons. The New Day rock, as per usual, with Unicorn Stampede’s and Francesca II getting involved. This ends up being less fun than imagined due to the New Day working heat on Neville for most of the contest. Luckily they’re entertaining working on top but the match didn’t need a long heat segment when it’s not a long match. Neville knows how to have fun and both him and Kalisto hit ridiculous 450 Splashes on the floor. Trouble in Paradise takes out Sin Cara though and the tag champs win. Final Rating: **1/4 Video Control takes us Roman Reigns, who talks WrestleMania while the crowd gleefully chant “we want Ambrose” over his promo. This is a fine example of lightning striking twice where Vince wanted to have Roman run into ‘Mania and get the big babyface win only for it to blow up in his face. Unlike with Batista, he’s not learned with Roman. The crowd could have been receptive of him if it didn’t feel like Vince had hand-picked him as the new top guy. Which is exactly what it feels like. Promo Time: Paul Heyman & Brock Lesnar It seems Brock is not best pleased about the outcome of the Fastlane main event. Him and me both. Paul points out that Lesnar took everyone to Suplex City. Heyman blames Ambrose for wrecking WrestleMania and pissing Brock Lesnar off so Brock, “the God of violent retribution”, took out Dean Ambrose. Heyman goes on to offer the spot of working Brock at WrestleMania to absolutely anyone who wants to get destroyed. This brings Dean Ambrose back out here in an ambulance he’s acquired. He crawls back to the ring. You have to admire his chutzpah. Brock simply steps on Dean’s head while walking to the back. Damn. Ambrose grabs a microphone and demands Brock at ‘Mania in a street fight. That gets him an F5 on the floor. “My client accepts your challenge” adds Heyman. Better go get a plan Dean! The Usos vs. The Ascension Because no one cares about the Ascension, the Dudley Boyz come out here to remind the Usos that the Dudleys are the most decorated tag team in the history of WWE. The crowd want tables but the Dudley Boyz don’t do that anymore. This provokes JBL to go off on another anti-internet rant about how the Dudley Boyz were hardcore before the term was “cool on the internet”, which is as ridiculous as it is wrong. The Ascension get beaten in short order. Nothing to see here. The Ascension have very little to look forward to. Final Rating: ½* Promo Time: Chris Jericho Cole talks about Jericho’s “incredible” match with AJ from last night. It was incredible alright. I can’t believe Jericho can botch that many times in a match either. Jericho talks a load of nonsense about AJ offending him by calling himself “phenomenal” when he’d never even been in WWE (which is rich coming from someone who made his name wrestling all over the world and can’t even pronounce “WWE”). Does he even hear himself talking at this point? Jericho calls his match last night “phenomenal”, which would certainly be one word for it, and calls out AJ Styles for a chat. They’re interrupted by the Social Outcasts (jobbers) to run scripted crap. This leads to Jericho and AJ becoming a team. Chris Jericho & AJ Styles vs. Social Outcasts (Heath Slater & Curtis Axel) I admire how hard the Social Outcasts are working to try and get their terrible gimmick over. It worked for New Day so you never know. It’s not clicking with me yet though. AJ wrestles circles around the “Red Dragon” or “Crimson Werewolf” or whatever Heath is calling himself this week. AJ murdering him with a springboard forearm and then taking out everyone else with a pescado allows Jericho to win with the Walls of Jericho. This was a squash but that’s what the Social Outcasts are for. Final Rating: ** Video Control takes us backstage where Steph gets bent out of shape about her award ceremony getting interrupted. Even though the award only existed since yesterday and nobody outside of the McMahon Family gives a monkeys about it. Elsewhere Roman is walking so Steph takes it out on him and books Reigns against Sheamus. Elsewhere Goldust brings R-Truth a cake to apologise for costing Truth his match last night. This naturally results in cake hitting the face of the golden one. This angle is so forced. It doesn’t have the natural chemistry of Goldust and Booker T. Plus in that angle Goldust was the weird babyface and Booker was not. In this angle Goldust and R-Truth are weird babyfaces. They’re not coming together because opposites attract, they’re not working because they’re too similar. The Wyatt Family (Bray Wyatt, Luke Harper & Erik Rowan) vs. The Big Show, Kane & Ryback It’s almost a re-match from the most worthless match on last night’s PPV card with the exception of Bray replacing Braun Strowman. The crowd chose to ignore Ryback’s resemblance to Goldberg last night but certainly don’t in Detroit. They go even further by chanting “Gillberg” at the poor bastard but if he’s going to wear knock-off Goldberg gear to go with his knock-off Goldberg act he has to expect that. Changing his gear was a mind-bogglingly bad decision. Big Show is far more over in Detroit and he responds by bringing a lot of energy. I guess more Detroit locals saw his pod with Austin. Clearly Ryback gets upset with everyone hating him and he just walks off. This allows Wyatt to floor Kane with Sister Abigail. Hey, the Wyatt Family won! It only took a heel turn from someone they were working to get the duke. Ryback left “for some crazy reason” according to JBL. Because there was literally no reason for him to do so. Final Rating: *1/4 Video Control picks up Ryback backstage who points out he has nothing to prove and is “done with tag teams”. He coins an interesting phrase; “that glass ceiling. That brass ring? Break it. Take it”. It’s odd how the crowd were responding quite well to Ryback until his change of gear. It almost felt like a calculated attempt to make people hate him again and then they turned him heel. Was it Ryback’s decision and he wanted to go heel or creative’s decision? Either way he’s lost the niche spot he had and has become a dull heel. His character is in desperate need of something new. Sasha Banks vs. Naomi This is weird but Sasha’s music makes me more excited than anyone else’s in WWE. I am a Sasha super-mark. Sasha works slightly heel on Naomi, which is odd considering Team BAD are the heels. Sasha is ultimately a better heel and knows it. It’s a decent match but the crowd sleep on it until Becky Lynch runs down to stop Tamina from interfering. Banks Statement finishes. Final Rating: ** Post-Match: Sasha and Becky are standing tall and Charlotte arrives. Charlotte does tremendous heel work, being dismissive of Brie Bella, and sowing seeds of dissent between the duo of potential challengers. Ric Flair has been reduced to the role of cheerleader for his daughter, indiscriminately WOOOing while he does it. I want that triple threat match at WrestleMania. It could be a show stealer, considering how the card is shaping up so far. Video Control lets us know that The Godfather is going into WWE’s Hall of Fame. Damn, they’ll let anyone in that thing. So far the class is him and Sting. They need to pick that one up but generally they name a big name, then a load of smaller names building up to the biggest. Roman Reigns vs. Sheamus These two have a decent understanding based on having worked together a lot over the past couple of months. It doesn’t make Sheamus any more interesting working an armbar for the entire match. Nor does it make Roman any more popular as the crowd round on his comebacks. It makes me wonder how hard Michael Cole must work on getting excited about the Superman Punch every time. Maybe he’s just a really big Roman Reigns fan but I would find it impossible to get excited about one of those. Sheamus gets himself counted out and Triple H strolls down here for a ‘Mania headlining brawl and the crowd boo Roman even more for that. Triple H absolutely mangles Roman and busts his face open hardway to try and sell their match. The crowd get a delightful “YES” chant going for Hunter hitting the Pedigree on the ring steps and then “one more time”. WrestleMania is going to be an absolute car wreck. Final Rating: ** THE RAW RECAP: Most Entertaining: AJ Styles. At the moment he’s the freshest, most exciting thing about the programming. Hopefully this will continue and he won’t become ‘just another guy’ like everybody else. I’m already leaning toward this happening. Least Entertaining: Sheamus. He plodded through tonight’s main event and felt out of place. Already disposable two months after his brief title run ended. Quote of the Night: “Your brother always has been and always will be a failure” – Triple H of Shane McMahon, via Steph. Match of the Night: The Lucha Dragons & Neville vs. The New Day. Summary: The opening segment obviously worked for a number of reasons. It was truthful, perhaps even painful for WWE fanboys to listen to, and it was a shock. When Shane left WWE six years ago it was also a shock but him suddenly reappearing the month before WrestleMania is even more startling. That segment obviously opening the show in spectacular and unexpected fashion. Then it was a slow downward cycle throughout the rest of the three hours. The New Day and Lesnar stuff was good. The AJ and Jericho piece was ok. The pointless Wyatt Family vs. big men trios match was a low point and the crowd’s disdain for WWE’s booking was incredibly prevalent in the main event. Roman Reigns is going to get booed out of Texas at ‘Mania. One can only hope they find something to go on last. If they’re hoping for Taker vs. Shane to be that match I would probably think again. Shane is 46 years old, hasn’t been in the ring for seven years and wasn’t that good to begin with. Verdict: 52 Aside from about half of the main events, NXT has been a little underwhelming this year when compared against its usual high standards. However, with the number one contender’s match between Samoa Joe and Sami Zayn plus an eight-man tag team bout to kick the show off, I’m expecting it to start getting back on track tonight. Hosts are Tom Phillips and Corey Graves. When Rich Brennan was at the announce desk, I actually felt uncomfortable at times with the way Graves bullied him. But Graves is starting to grow on me now. His partnership with Phillips works well and he is an ardent defender of the English language, or more precisely, its correct usage, so that’s alright by me.
Enzo Amore & Colin Cassady & American Alpha vs. Blake & Murphy & Dash & Dawson American Alpha are sporting new singlets with a design that makes them look like the Steiner Brothers from the early- to mid-nineties. They’re almost as awesome as the tag team wearing them. Speaking of new gear, Blake & Murphy are now rocking the Nightmare on Elm Street look. I like it, or more accurately, I like how it looks on Alexa Bliss. I think I’d be OK with her infiltrating my dreams and bludgeoning me to death; then again, I’m not sure that I could live with myself being killed. There’s too many “&” tag teams in this match. Given their new gear, perhaps Blake & Murphy should rename themselves after one of the Freddy Kruger franchise films. The Dream Warriors or The New Nightmares, something like that. The uber-brilliant Chad Gable starts the match for the face team. I really believe that he could be the next Kurt Angle if WWE allow him to be. As the smaller guy on his team, though, he ends up taking the heat, which is fine, but it does mean we get to see less of his amazing arsenal of suplexes and submissions. Dash & Dawson, a real throwback to the tag teams of the eighties, do most of the donkey work here. I’m hoping to see American Alphas dethrone them and going on to battle my other favourite tag team, The Vaudevillains; however, I suspect Enzo & Cass might be getting a run with the straps. Jason Jordan, who has really come into his own since teaming with Gable, gets the hot tags and cleans house. Jason definitely got the better of two Freddys in this exchange. Alpha look to have Dawson beat with Grand Amplitude, only for Dash to make the save. Enzo & Cass finish Dawson off instead with the Rocket Launcher. Bliss is seething with disdain after the match. Final Rating: **3/4 Backstage, Rich Brennan gets a word with Deanna Purrazzo. He wants to know how she’s feeling about going into a match with Asuka later tonight, especially after Asuka knocked her out the last time they met. She cuts a really bland promo before being interrupted by Emma and Dana Brook. My word, they are orange! They look like Rodney Trotter after Del turns up the timer on the solarium in the Tea for Three episode. Yak yak, blather blather. I can’t really understand (or care) what they are saying, as they are simply too orange. Deanna Purrazzo vs. Asuka Asuka should win this in two to four moves, like a fool’s mate in chess. However, Asuka’s last jobber match was quite disappointing. She let the female Tito Santana (or whatever the jobber’s name was) have far too much offence. This time, Asuka takes her opponent to school with kicks and submission holds. The only offence Deanna gets is pretty much what Asuka allows her. And then we get the smile, beautiful and deadly in equal measure. Purrazzo knows the game is up now. Three spinning back fists and a roundhouse kick seals it. Asuka put on a good clinic tonight, even if it wasn’t really much more than a squash match. Final Rating: **1/4 Phillips and Graves recap last week’s events in the aftermath of the Women’s Championship match. I get chills watching how Asuka serves Bayley notice of her intentions on the title. The highlights segue into a pre-recorded promo from Nia Jax and Eva Marie. Jax’s whiny voice and constant high-rising intonations negate any aura that her physical presence might have. Not everything is a question, Nia. She needs to become a silent assassin quickly or damage all future credibility. Tye Dillinger vs. Alex Riley In this world we haven’t got the time for the likes of Riley. The smug git needs to blast right out of my stratosphere. Graves comes out with a corker of a line regarding Riley’s new look. “He looks like he’s been hanging out with Leonardo Di Caprio, getting attacked by bears,” he quips. Riley is a revenant of the time when NXT was a cringe-inducing reality TV show. Even before A-Ry became a Miz clone, I was alerted to what a twat he is when he did that fake sneeze – “I think I’m allergic to you” – line with Michael Cole. When you’re inferior to Miz and Michael Cole looks upon you with contempt, it’s time to get your arse down the road a little. I’m not particularly fond of Dillinger as a talent, but I am quite glad that he beats Riley with a roll up. Hardies, A-Ry. Future endeavors for Mr. Riley, please. Final Rating: *1/4 Alex Reyes gets a word with the NXT Champion, Finn Bálor. He puts over Apollo Crews from last week and says that both Joe and Zayn are credible challengers for his title, though he intends on retaining it. Fairly bland stuff. I’d much prefer to watch him wrestle. Backstage, Baron Corbin bursts in to William Regal’s office. He still thinks that he should be included in the number one contender’s match tonight, which is a frankly ludicrous suggestion. It’s a no from Regal, so Corbin makes some vague threat involving an eye for an eye. Corbin could be of much greater use to the general manager if he would just say which of the submission holds he tapped out to a couple of weeks ago. Sami Zayn vs. Samoa Joe Let me start by getting a potentially controversial statement out of the way. Sami Zayn is a heel. That is, the character’s persona, promos, general attitude/demeanor (and his flat cap) come across as a little too cocksure of himself, a little conceited. He gives off an air of arrogance about how good he is (he is good) and believes with a little too much John Cena-style fervor that he should always be in and around the main event because he’s reached that level, and even when he acknowledges others, it’s always a little bit passive-aggressive. Obviously the rapport that he has with the NXT crowds sort of urinates all other my Sami Zayn-as-heel chips, but there it is. As an in-ring talent he is brilliant, though, regardless of whether he’s heel or face. The match starts off tentatively, with both men feeling each other out. It’s like containment strategy in chess, with neither man willing to risk a gambit. Sami gains the first slight advantage, low-bridging Joe out of the ring. Joe knows that a dive is coming, so promptly gets out of the way. At this point, we cut to a break so the Network can plug the soon-to-debut Edge & Christian Show. It looks like it reeks of awesomeness, and I will definitely be tuning in. Back to the action and Joe lays a trap for Sami, catching him in the corner with a side slam. He then proceeds to slow down the pace and keeps him in either a central position in the ring or hemmed in against the ropes. It’s smart because if he starts opening up space through Irish whips or running the ropes himself, he moves into Sami’s realm. Sami looks to have regained the advantage with the Blue Thunder Bomb, but Joe counters the Koji Clutch into a powerslam. The match then moves away from chess and into a boxing match (though Chess Boxing is actually a thing). Sami is playing the part of Rocky Balboa against Apollo Creed (or Clubber Lang or Ivan Drago) by staying in the match, despite looking punch-drunk and having taken a merciless beating, on his instincts and determination alone. A Helluva kick out of nowhere seems to have got the three count for Zayn, but the referee declares that both men’s shoulders were down – even though Joe’s right shoulder is clearly an inch or two off the ground. The ref intends to call it a draw, so Regal comes down to ringside. Once again, he dithers like Hugh Grant in any Hugh Grant film instead of making a decision, so we go off air with a stalemate. I hope this is heading to a triple-threat match at the next Takeover event before Zayn vs. Bálor at a later date. I think that would be something special to behold. Final Rating: ***1/4 THE NXT RECAP: Most Entertaining: I’ll be as indecisive as Regal and say that Samoa Joe and Sami Zayn will have to share this one. Least Entertaining: This is certain: Alex Riley. Match of the Night: Joe vs. Zayn Summary: This show was definitely more like it. The three major championship divisions of NXT all had a good showing tonight. The four teams in the opener demonstrated what a strong tag division NXT has, and that was without The Vaudevillains even making an appearance – I’m deliberately excluding the awful Hype Bros. from this conversation, by the way – while Asuka is looking a strong contender for Bayley’s Women’s Championship once all the crap has been disposed of in the run in. As for the title scene, it may seem a little inconclusive at the moment, but if it’s heading to a triple-threat match with Joe, Zayn, and Bálor, then I’m all for the booking as a means to a fantastic end. The only blot on the copybook tonight was Alex Riley. Overall, though, a definite recommendation. Verdict: 65 |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. Archives
May 2016
Categories |