This was a very fun night at the wrestling matches that ended with a really disappointing match. I enjoyed the show, especially the first half, which felt like a great Budokan show… while the second half felt like a decent WWE house show, for better or worse.
There were a lot of good matches here. One of the great paradoxes of today’s wrestling, though, is that despite years of demanding them, WWE has provided tons of good matches, but at the cost of interesting characters and stories. A bunch of “Good Matches” isn’t enough – the people want good wrestling, but they also want to give a shit about what’s going on to. I enjoyed myself here, especially the first half of the show… but I’m not completely drawn into what they’re moving forward with. I mean I’ll still watch, but I don’t know if everyone will.
Really, a pay-per-view card almost every 2 weeks now is way too much to instill any type of creativity, even if each brand only has one once a month. If you’re not happy with just a bunch of good wrestling matches, then I doubt you’ll enjoy the next few years of WWE outside of a few week runs of TV. This was a strong card with a lot of impressive wrestling, but almost all the matches probably should have felt like a bigger deal. If we’re having a ‘big card’ every 2 weeks, I don’t know if that’s possible.
I did like the unpredictability of almost every match. There was a lot of drama on some of these finishes for me as I consistently wasn’t sure who would win.
I wish WWE did more shtick in the early parts of their matches. I don’t know if these guys are allowed to. There should be more guys getting the better of each other, looking like goofs, milking a reaction after a hiptoss or an shoulder tackle, etc. versus just kind of trading moves before one guy goes on offense for a bit. Some of the matches here had some good early work, but some felt like they were just killing time before a strong finish.
Also wasn’t a big fan of the video packages only covering the immediate build-up to each match in the last few weeks. The Women’s Title match, Jericho/Zayn, Sheamus/Cesaro, Rollins/Owens… all could’ve had some more juice to them by talking about each competitor’s journey to this moment, not just why this match exists right now.
0. Alicia Fox vs. Nia Jax
Nia Jax vs. Alicia Fox just was not good. It was a slightly longer-than-normal Jax squash, and there wasn’t much to it – a couple decent Foxy bumps, a decent finishing move. Would’ve preferred a Summer Rae match. *
1. WWE RAW Tag Team Title: The New Day (Big E & Kofi Kingston) [c] w/ Xavier Woods vs. Luke Gallows & Karl Anderson
The New Day vs. Gallows/Anderson tag title opener was awesome. It was super short (under 7 minutes), but they packed in so much that it felt like a long epic match. After a couple decent standard tag matches, these guys just went at it. Loved the intense brawling to start it out. Gallows and Anderson finally looked like total monsters here. The finish came together really well too, and had me totally enveloped as it could have really gone either way. Nice well-timed saves off the Magic Killer and Big Ending. And Woods getting revenge after getting laid out early was great. So good. ***3/4
2. WWE Cruiserweight Title: TJ Perkins [c] vs. Brian Kendrick
The TJ Perkins backstage interview was kind of bad, but I loved the shot of him about to go up the stairs. The Perkins video game entrance is amazing. Part of me feels like he should be a “chosen one” heel cruiserweight aligned with the Authority, but as the music hit and the Tron played I felt like I was seeing something special – TJ Perkins is a video game character again, but more Sonic the Hedgehog than Tingle from Zelda. I thought TJP/Kendrick was a great match, a great use of technical wrestling and holds to go along with the high-flying. There was a bunch of fun stuff here… the Kendrick apron spot, basically all of TJP’s offense… along with a couple scary near-misses that I thought they recovered like total pros. Dueling chants in a cruiserweight match already is pretty great – WWE can say all they want about angry adult dudes ruining their shows (and sometimes they do), but they will have to rely on them for a bit to make the cruisers feel like they are a bigger deal. Kendrick’s reaction on the Sliced Bread kickout was great, and Kendrick countering TJP’s counter of a Captain’s Hook into another Captain’s Hook was SO sweet. Liked the post-match. It was a solid CWC match, and a ton of fun at that. ***1/4
3. Best of 7 Series – Match #7: Cesaro vs. Sheamus
Cesaro vs. Sheamus was Misawa vs. Kawada without the years of story. I fucking loved it. This series has really been great, with a bunch of in-your-face, snug work that feels like a true toughman contest. This was the capper of it, like the best parts of each match rolled into one epic I Have To Win This-type match. The early stuff was great, all the good intense stuff they’ve been doing for the last five available matches. It’s insane how athletic Cesaro is for how tall he is, and him working like Rey by God Mysterio early on added some fun variety – the dive from the apron, crossbody, springboard, and of course the 619. The dive with Cesaro landing on his head was SO scary and it’s a miracle that Cesaro wasn’t seriously hurt … and then they used that and whatever they had planned got even more epic, as the match just went to another level after it. SO dramatic!! I am totally fine with the finish, even if it robbed an epic match of a true finale. THIS WAS REAL. ****1/4
4. Sami Zayn vs. Chris Jericho
Jericho vs. Zayn was a fine match that began the trend of a bunch of matches where the first half didn’t really come together. Following the Cesaro/Sheamus war sure didn’t hep, but these two just don’t mesh together well, whether it was here or their matches earlier in the year. They’re both doing what usually works with other guys, but the match lacks… IT. Love Sami, but he’s definitely lost a step since the call-up to the main roster. He’s had some great matches here and there, but he doesn’t have a lot of intensity behind anything he’s doing, and the audience not being so invested in his story doesn’t help. Still one of the best sellers going though. Tornado DDT through the ropes was scary. Finish seemed uninspired. Solid, not much more. **3/4
5. WWE RAW Women’s Title: Charlotte [c] w/ Dana Brooke vs. Sasha Banks vs. Bayley
I liked a lot of the Women’s 3-Way – thought they made good use of the 3-way stip even if Bayley was missing for long chunks of time. Lots of fun spots that were built to well. Charlotte’s moonsault on Bayley/Sasha was PERFECT. Sasha took some nasty bumps that didn’t feel unsafe like in the SummerSlam match, but more “God damn this girl goes balls out.” I actually bought Bayley winning a couple times too, which was cool. Didn’t love it, but liked it a lot. ***1/2
6. WWE U.S. Title: Rusev [c] w/ Lana vs. Roman Reigns
The first half or so of Roman Reigns/Rusev was really rough, as it was a match built around sympathizing with and rooting for Roman which just doesn’t come off right currently. The RAW match these two had felt like a high-end Bruno in MSG match – this match felt like them trying to recreate a high-end Bruno in MSG match and failing. The finish though was really great, even if the spear eventually started to feel inevitible. Lana pulling the ref away on the first one totally got me though. And I fucking LOVE Rusev – best reactions in pro wrestling right now. Though this was probably on the lower-end of this show’s matches for me, the result was the one I’m most interested in – Reigns as midcard champ can go a lot of different ways. ***1/4
7. WWE Universal Title: Kevin Owens [c] vs. Seth Rollins
Rollins/Owens, I hate to say, was a big disappointment. I watch Seth Rollins every week and I see a guy who is clearly one of the best performers in wrestling, and a guy who deserves this spot – but this marks two PPV matches in a row that looked good on paper (Balor being first) that just did not deliver. And I think it’s coming out that this one, like the Balor one, may have had an injury in it… but still. Yeesh. I don’t know. This was a victim of bad creative (Rollins as a not-quite-face, Owens as kind of a chump) and a long show with a lot of good stuff on it…. the crowd wasn’t with them and they didn’t really adapt. Owens’ shit talk was nice and there were a couple fun stretches, but it just was not very exciting and the crowd was silent for a lot of it, even if they did do the inevitable This is Awesome chant towards the end. Finish was OK but kind of lame – more a need to get to the next thing than an actually interesting thing to watch. **1/2
It was a solid show! The first half was legit excellent – I’d put Sheamus/Cesaro and the tag titles match as legit MOTY contenders. Two MOTY contenders on one show!! Plus every match was at least good and worth checking out!! Are you kidding me!? How good is the wrestling right now!?!?! But, man. Creative. Characters. Guys I care about. Finishes I was interested in. I don’t think that was here. Backlash had less high-end matches, but I gave a shit more and probably liked it better. I’ll remember Heath Slater winning the SmackDown Tag Team Title over most stuff that happened tonight. Still though, lots of good wrestling. 6/10
