As we head into a WrestleMania, the whole energy and production of weekly WWE TV starts to feel bigger, but there’s also a situation where pieces of a puzzle have to be put together and it becomes a little transparent. There’s going to be a 3-Way for the Tag Titles, a multi-women match for the SmackDown Women’s Title, Roman vs. Undertaker, Goldberg vs. Brock, because there has to be.
While suspension of disbelief is the ideal way to watch professional wrestling, sometimes it’s easier to accept that this really is just a produced television show and a WWE show is really just contracted performers doing contractually obligated wrestler things. Cesaro does a cute entrance with Sheamus, Sami Zayn saves a guy he was feuding with a few weeks ago, Enzo Amore does promos before every match – all because it’s part of the show and they’re supposed to.
The wrestling world pulling back the curtain so much for the last long while, ala Breaking Ground and podcasts and Triple H media calls, combined with a lot of lazy writing and character motivation, has made this even more glaring. But that can be interesting in its’ own way – who makes the most of a crap situation, or who’s been getting shafted and is probably frustrated – that’s the actual character motivation, vs. having coffee spilled on them or some shit. It’s what worked for Bryan, and it might some day work for Zayn or Bayley or Sasha or a hundred other folks.
It’s why SmackDown feels fresh though, because despite it being a work and still having some silly WWE tropes, the characters on the show are usually provided reasons for doing what they are doing – The Miz has been frustrated for a decade, AJ Styles wants to main event WrestleMania, and Baron Corbin wants to be famous.
It’s why something like NXT, meanwhile, is a dying brand. This is the show you go on before RAW and SmackDown, so you are contractually obligated to PROVE YOURSELF. MAKE A NAME. BREAK SOME GROUND. But when seen through the lens of this, combined with the lazy writing and the lack of character motivation and all that shit, it gets stale, it gets weird. I don’t even know who I’m rooting for anymore.
Like, what was the hook this week, Billie Kay? Hm? Am I supposed to be IMPRESSED by you acting knocked out? Was your performance GOOD? Will you make it to the MAAAIN ROSTER?
Grow up.
RAW (3/6/17)
ROSEMONT RAW! Or as the MARKS know it, Chicago RAW.
RAW’s at the Allstate Arena are always blessed with a rowdy crowd, not just folks ready to chant CM Punk but folks ready to pop for stuff and react to things. So it was pretty interesting to see them load up the first hour of this show in front of a super hot crowd and then slowly kill their will to enjoy a live professional wrestling event over the next 2 hours.
The early stuff was alright though. Jericho opening the show followed by Owens being a unequivocal dick was a great double punch of playing to a crowd ready to chant for Punk and potentially react negatively to Universal Champion Bill Goldberg – how dare they turn on Jericho, how dare they boo the man who squashed this guy who’s being such an ass to his former best friend? OK interview segment, pretty straightforward but solid, and highlighted by Owens saying to Jericho “You were never my best friend” getting a reaction like Dr. Death just dropped Kenta Kobashi on his head in the Budokan.
Bringing out Samoa Joe to attack Jericho and then Zayn making the save led to Owens vs. Zayn, which is as good a choice as any to give a show a hot start. I liked this, because KO straight-up kicked Sami Zayn’s ass and that is a very good thing to do after Owens just lost the title and Zayn sells a beating better than anybody. You don’t want to keep doing this to Sami Zayn, but it worked in this instance.
Neville vs. Rich Swann is as good a choice as any to continue your show’s hot start. Match had some really good stuff and a WILD finish but man was this sucker cut up by commercials. First minute felt like it was on fast forward, Swann’s somersault plancha was beautiful, and god DAMN did this thing get hot after the second commercial leading to a nice decisive tap-out finish. Neville’s working like he’s prime KENTA at this point.
The post-match with Austin Aries and Neville was one of those classic wrestling things where the right angle is done in front of the right crowd. This whole Aries thing has been just wild – I don’t think anybody could have predicted his trajectory from when he came in to NXT. Guy is super over via COMMENTARY, is getting chants every week, and Chicago was READY for this return to the ring / quasi-babyface turn angle – not only going crazy for Aries but booing the hell out of Neville and his bullshit accent. Aries was tremendous here – milking of the reactions, slowly taking off his sunglasses to reveal the healed eye, his timing on the shot of the microphone – for a fleeting moment Austin Aries was Jerry Lawler and it was incredible. That is the angle every wrestler wants – I don’t know how this all happened but I approve.
Goldberg/Brock deal was fun and Goldberg taking his first real bump in a decade did feel pretty wild. The entire Internet has offered a ton of commentary on this being the big title match; I’m like 70/30 in thinking it’s a perfectly acceptable decision vs. it’s kind of gross. I like almost all the WWE’s full-time roster, but nobody really gets pushed enough to credibly be headlining a Mania. I’d love to see them try and there’s a few possibilities, but at the end of the day this was a hot segment and we’ll see what they do with it at Mania.
The thing that impressed me early on about Enzo Amore was how unique every single promo was, how much effort he seemed to put into one-liners and how they got legitimate “that was impressive” pops. But Enzo Amore is a human man and at some point you run out of stuff to say… now we get the classics at the big shows, while on TV we get… local references. Oh well. Enzo & Cass vs. Gallows & Anderson was a perfectly fine formula tag – outside of Enzo’s garbage tornado DDT on Gallows – before the coffee-infused finish with Sheamus & Cesaro because there are only a few tag teams on RAW and by default they have to be very angry with each other. Nice Brouge kick on Enzo.
Love Tozawa squashes, loved Tozawa getting all fired up ready to fight when Kendrick’s music hit. New Day did a promo again. Then they squashed The Shining Stars again. They should just bring Breezango or the Vaudevillains over for New Day to beat up, what else are they doing?
And then the Women’s Title promo happened and this was just god fucking awful. And I try to limit my cursing, but by golly this fired me up!! I mean WHAT? Stephanie McMahon? Mick Foley? What are you doing here? Why are you arguing? Why is this happening? Charlotte? Sasha? BAYLEY? WHAT HAVE THEY DONE WITH BAYLEY? What happened to such a good thing? This is like the simplest story to tell and they’re making it all convoluted with #1 contender matches and bullshit because there’s only a few ladies on the roster so these gals that should be absolute SUPERSTARS have to wrestle each other every week and fuck. Sasha vs. Bayley was terrible, not an easy position but it was just not good. Crowd was dead, stayed dead, pace was slow, never picked up, no energy, no intensity, and then poor Bayley tapped out. There’s wrestling fan complaining because that’s what wrestling fans on the Internet do and then there’s wrestling fan complaining because something is just complete trash, because they are seeing something in real-time that will pay some terrible dividends in the future. Charlotte, Sasha and Bayley have become less the Four Horsewomen and more the New Jersey Triad.
And then they tease us with an Emma vignette. These fuckers.
Samoa Joe vs. Chris Jericho was a fine sprint, or at least as sprinty as a 2017 Joe and Jericho match can be. It was a Dream Match from another era and here just an effective enough TV match. It actually got me to thinking what era of these two I’d want to see lock up and they don’t really match up. Prime Joe for me is 2004-2005, a point where Jericho had really kind of regressed and was about to take a break, while Jericho was at his best in 2001 and 2008-2009, and at those times Joe was either finding himself in UPW and ZERO-ONE or starting to slum it up in the Nashville territory.
Show closed strong though, as the Undertaker had his WrestleMania angle. Braun Strowman called out Roman Reigns and Mark Callaway decided to be a dick and say HIT MY MUSIC INSTEAD. The BOOOOO’s for Braun backing off from Taker were impressive, love the professional wrestling. Hope they don’t cool Braun off as he heads into what I assume is the Andre Battle Royal. And then Roman and Taker had a face-off. LOL @ the staredown of the Mania sign to ROMAN SUCKS chants. This could be money. Could be.
SMACKDOWN (3/7/17)
One thing that stood out to me this week is that the promo work on this show is just 100x better than anywhere else in WWE – great one-liners, actual motivations, less pressure. Miz running down Cena, Mojo spitting hot fire at Dolph, Ambrose ready to fight, Alexa being such a turd, Styles being a superstar – so much good stuff on Tuesday night.
The Cena/Nikki vs. Carmella/Ellworth tag was a couple signature spots with some decent stooging by Ellsworth – wish they would’ve milked it a bit more but it did what it had to do. Follow-up was the real story, with The Miz just KILLING it on the mic and tearing Cena and Nikki’s relationship apart – we shoot on Tuesday nights. Miz working this as being sick of Cena’s presentation as the company man when HE, THE MIZ, works SO hard … how Cena is fake and it’s making him snap, is AMAZING. And he still comes across as Dennis Reynolds or something, he’s making funny points and coming off as a creep – what a perfect modern day professional wrestling heel.
Impressed with how quickly Baron Corbin has assimilated himself into WWE politically, now working hand-in-hand with Kevin Dunn and ensuring that all his promos on Dean Ambrose are done via Titan Tron. Do they still call it the Titan Tron? What do they call it? Oh, BARON CORBIN ACCOSTED A SECURITY GUARD AND THREW HIM AT DEAN AMBROSE. I mean the forklift spot was a little weak but the Ambrose/Corbin backstage brawl was tremendous professional wrestling.
Solid Women’s Title segment highlighted by Alexa Bliss continuing to absolutely rock the microphone. I swear, SmackDown women’s segments are booked as a shoot on RAW’s trash women’s segments – the Road Dogg Jesse James is telling whoever’s scripting RAW that THIS is how you present a women’s division. It was pretty straightforward but everyone came out with a motivation and looked like a star. The tag – Becky/Natalya vs. Alexa/Mickie – was a solid match. Becky and Mickie seem to genuinely enjoy working with each other, any time they got in there it was a highlight for me. Most of the match was a Becky beatdown and then Natalya turned on Becky and then Mickie attacked Alexa, because we’ve got a Mania card to get to.
“I took a B show and made it into THE show!” Great promo by the WWE’s own AJ Styles. Styles vs. Randy Orton was good solid work, with both guys selling well and AJ being AJ with an extra little something on every single thing he does. Had some real cool stuff too… Orton looking like a beast hitting the Exploder, AJ’s springboard fake-out on the RKO, and finally the 450 leading into the pop-up RKO finish. BUT! It just never seemed to get into any second gear until the last couple minutes or so. As the first match between AJ Styles and Randy Orton that’s fine, but as a match to qualify for Mania it disappointed me. As expected it got pretty buck wild for that last couple minutes, but most of it felt like they were either holding back or something just wasn’t clicking.
Also WHERE WERE THE USOS???
TALKING SMACK (3/7/17)
This was a must-watch edition of Talking Smack because The Miz was on it.
Show was really good top-to-bottom actually. First few minutes had Daniel Bryan just shitting on Renee hosting RAW Talk – “Don’t be on shows that are bad.” Alexa Bliss had herself an interview. Then they aired the footage of AJ Styles confronting Shane McMahon backstage which was awesome. I absolutely flip out for Gorilla Position segments, that’s when you know things are getting REEEEAL. After this aired, Bryan said that tensions can be high after SmackDown and wrestlers get fired up – and then I highly enjoyed him taking the time to explain why wrestlers would then be cool with him on Talking Smack: with 205 Live being an hour, they’ve cooled off by the time Talking Smack starts.
And then The Miz and his lovely wife Maryse. I love how purely UNCOMFORTABLE it gets when those two show up on Talking Smack. And FUCK was this a good promo, The Miz is the best promo in the world. Just shitting on Cena… saying he demanded to not be drafted #1 because he didn’t want to be there all year, mentioning Nikki’s relationship with Dolph. Again he’s saying some wild and at-times funny stuff, which is great, but the pure confidence and disdain and just shocked disgust he oozes as he talks puts it all over the top. And doing this not in front of Cena’s face just comes off as so weasly. Miz on a tear is the best thing in wrestling. I wanna see him shoot on RAW next.
Then Miz and Bryan make news, because of course – Miz says he can’t wrestle, and Bryan just flips: “I can’t, or they won’t let me. We’ll see in a year and a half and see what happens.” THE EMOTIONS COME OUT ON TUESDAY NIGHTS. Somebody important wasn’t happy about that, as Bryan shut up until closing the show with “I wish I could say more.” This is either the greatest work of all-time or a very strange work environment – going to lean the latter, but wondering about the former is what this great sport is all about.
205 LIVE (3/7/17)
205 Live felt pretty cold – would’ve liked it better if the Aries match was better. The Aries in-ring interview with himself to open was pretty great, this has really been such a fantastic main roster introduction for Aries. The match with Tony Nese to end the show was… solid. Just a solid match. Nothing more, nothing less.
Tag opener with Gallagher & Swann vs. Dar & Daivari was 205 101, mostly a heel beatdown that wasn’t very interesting with only bare bones cool shit from the good guys. Every time Alicia Fox gets flowers, a cruiserweight loses their smile.
Arik Cannon showing up on 205 Live under the “Bryan Kendrick” name was just incredible. Cannon beating Petey Williams for the IWA Mid-South Heavyweight Title at the Ted Petty Invitational in 2004 at the Lincoln Center in Highland, IN got SUUUUUCH a pop. There was also a guy who hung out at the Highland shows who wore a garbage bag over his shirt because Cannon wore a weird skin-tight black latex tanktop. Memories. Match itself was a blast for the minute it lasted… was fun seeing Cannon take all of Tozawa’s stuff, and Tozawa squashes guys with such straightforward intent – love this man.
NXT (3/8/17)
NXT needs such a damn KICK IN THE ASS. The pieces are there but the product sucks. Nakamura, Hero, and Roode have talent. Billie and Peyton are closing in on something that works. Nigel seems to be getting more comfortable with the heel commentary. The Revival, #DIY, Tye Dillinger and No Way Jose are right there. But JESUS. Just the absolute SILENCE for the SAnitY/Tye Dillinger angle. The sheer NOTHING of the Andrade Almas squash. URIEL EALY. THEY ALLOWED A GUY NAMED URIEL EALY ON A WWE TELEVISION SHOW. WHO IS RUNNING THIS???
Ember Moon vs. Billie Kay had a nice rolling elbow by Billie – otherwise, I dunno. It’s great that the Performance Center has such a massive crop of women coming in, because Asuka/Ember/Billie/Peyton as your anchors just stinks. Ember’s promise of a new phase for the women’s division at TakeOver: Orlando makes me think they realize this.
Kassius Ohno talked for a bit with a guy who gets really horny on airplanes. Then Bobby Roode talked for a bit, and between the flowers, NXT Title, and 8 x 10, the set looked not like Roode’s house but Roode’s funeral. The promo did make me think that there needs to be a character that only does promos in this tightly controlled away-from-everyone situation, just totally disconnected from reality promos from his home ala a Dictator and then only wrestles once in a while. Bobby’s onto something but he ain’t there yet.
“I’m a thief, but I don’t steal moves – I steal moments” UGGGHH FUCK YOU TJ PERKINS, you have set the cruiserweights back a decade. Nakamura vs. TJ was soooo vaguely worth watching – basically an extended squash with TJ allowed to do some neat things. They had some fun ideas – the dab-off, TJ landing on the apron doing the slingshot kick and getting kicked himself, the dueling cross armbreakers – but this felt like a Make-A-Wish match more than anything. Sorry. I am so sorry.
MAIN EVENT (3/8/17)
Curtis Axel vs. Jinder Mahal was a total dud of a match, there’s nothing sadder than directionless WWE jobbers having a completely nothing 5-minute match. At a high level the “WWE-style” is one of my favorite things, but at it’s lowest level my goodness can it be soul-crushing. Is there no greater statement on the cruiserweights than Jack Gallagher killing it at Fastlane and then not being on RAW and barely featured on 205? No mention of the title match, just move on because nothing actually matters. The tag here – Gallagher & Mustafa Ali vs. Tony Nese & Noam Dar – had a fun little sequence early with all 4 guys based around Jack’s turnbuckle headstand spot. Mustafa as per usual did some cool stuff; he’s a consistent bright spot for the 205 stuff. But match was just your ultra-basic 205 thing… safe, solid, empty. Where is Drew Gulak?
WWE TV Match of the Week: The professional wrestling was not very strong this week. Zayn vs. Owens was the best straight-up TV match because KO got to squash somebody’s ass after he got his own ass squashed the night before. AJ Styles vs. Randy Orton was the best match, basically by default, but that thing should’ve been better.
WWE TV MVP of the Week: I mean the Austin Aries angle was good, if only he had a better 205 Live match… I AM KIDDING WHO ELSE COULD IT BE BUT THE MIZ
Ehhhhh. SmackDown was good but not peak SmackDown, RAW started well but really lost steam, and 205/NXT were pretty weak. The Mania card is looking strong though, the Miz promos were awesome, the Austin Aries angle was amazing, and there was some solid professional wrestling all around.
RAW: 5/10
SmackDown: 7/10
205 Live: 4/10
NXT: 4/10
