This was Thanksgiving Week which is usually cool but I got a sinus infection and that was not cool.
Hey, remember Carlito?
RAW (11/25/19)
Not sure where this came from but GOOD SHOW.
Seth Rollins embracing his natural dipshit-ness. Charlotte vs. Asuka. SQUASH MATCHES. And REY MYSTERIO!!!
Seth Rollins opening the show scolding the RAW roster acting like a whiny baby overwhelmed by the task of leadership while conveniently ignoring that he and his mean girlfriend both lost in big matches on Sunday was tremendous, a rare occasion where WWE rolls with the punches of a character change right in front of their eyes. The dude went after Charlotte Flair AND called Rey Mysterio’s kid stupid. Kevin Owens not saying one word and hitting the Stunner was a pitch perfect end to it too. Setting up a match right away to main event RAW maybe not so much.
Nothing sums up WWE’s difficulty with their wrestlers’ motivations than everyone being chided by Rollins and then going after the United States Championship, no one able to admit that Brock Lesnar owns all their asses. But hey, it RULED. They basically wrote a whole hour of TV based around the U.S. Title and the feel-good redemption of Rey Mysterio.
The 4-Way Match for a shot at the U.S. Title – Rey vs. Randy Orton vs. Drew McIntyre vs. Ricochet – was fun, if you can stomach watching Orton and Rey stumble around to setup Tower of Doom bullshit. Ricochet vs. Rey rocked, Drew and Randy slapped the shit out of each other, and you’ve just got all these pros out there just doin’ stuff. Crazy cool finish too, a quebrada by Rey on Ricochet that transitioned into not a DDT but an INSIDE CRADLE!
AJ Styles vs. Rey for the U.S. Title was tremendous and unlike anything I expected – lots of Rey selling, AJ being a jerk, and the eventual Gallows & Anderson get kicked out spot, all mixed with AJ and Rey just casually doing incredible spots here and there. Rey was working hyper-speed for the finish which was total chaos – AJ rammed his balls into the turnbuckle post like a freak, Rey did the damn Code Red, and I’m not sure if it’s any good or not but these fuckers ran the Foley/Austin finish with Orton as Austin and Rey as Foley and Dominick as DX holding up his pops. How are AJ and Rey still doing this!?
Of course, Rey becomes his own worst enemy – just as Cena took his place and WWE Title nearly a decade ago in that tournament on RAW during the Summer of Punk, Rey takes the place and title from the heir apparent Humberto Carrillo. So it goes.
Asuka vs. Charlotte Flair ruled too – big grappling, Asuka just booting away a figure-eight attempt, and a crazy frantic finish that reminded you why these two occasionally RULE. The Natural Selection got COUNTERED – what is this, WrestleMania? Mist aside, FINALLY Asuka gets that WrestleMania revenge.
Fired up Rusev kicking Bobby Lashley‘s ass was good. AOP finally wrestling and beating some Ryder & Hawkins ass was good. Matt Hardy getting a HUGE POP before being kneed by Buddy Murphy into deletion was good. Aleister Black going at Murphy was good. Rowan kicking a poor fella’s ass was good. Also, The IIconics and R-Truth might be the three genuinely funniest on-screen people in WWE so even the WWE Shop promo was good.
Andrade squashing Tozawa who just got a little shine last week was not.
Rollins vs. Owens ended the show and they had a pretty quality match with big crowd heat. We’ve seen it before and there’s all kinds of tropes but it worked here. AOP finally did something and attacked Owens, seemingly aligned with a heel Rollins but maybe not. INTRIGUE~!
NXT (11/27/19)
Outside of the fact that they started this show with a roster-wide trance club dance number, I thought it was pretty good.
Yeah, I don’t know. Not big on the team bonding, wasn’t big on the talky talk segment to open the show with all the Top Guys. Vaguely necessary to set a tone post-TakeOver, but probably shouldn’t be. Regardless, lot of good quality wrestling entertainment here.
Keith Lee & Dominik Dijakovic challenged The Undisputed Era for the NXT Tag Team Titles, a match that really feels like it should be saved for like an actual Starrcade but hey here we are opening up Wednesday Night. Undisputed Era went from O’Reilly & Fish to O’Reilly & Strong after Fish took a rough landing, and it sure was interesting to watch the picture-in-picture commercial as O’Reilly killed time and Roddy ran out in sweatpants.
It’s always a tough gig getting me or maybe anyone to buy into Dijakovic getting his leg worked over but this was fine TV wrestling from five fine wrestlers and a bit more interesting than usual thanks to the hiccup. The LAUNCH of Adam Cole into the crowd by Lee was an all-timer spot too.
Before Fish got hurt there was also an actual counter of the Keith Lee double crossbody spot, a payoff if I’ve ever seen one.
Mansoor did some cool topes against Shane Thorne, yeah? Successful guy on Saudi shows might not be a great gimmick for NXT though, no?
Candice LeRae and Dakota Kai beat the shit out of each other – Kai throwing kicks, a big powerbomb, Candice fighting back with a passion and laying everything in. They probably could’ve ended it after the Kai-ro-practor but we’re on Wednesdays now or something. Loved Kai going for the kneebrace as a weapon, practically leaped out of my seat when Rhea Ripley karate kicked the chair from her hands.
Lio Rush vs. Akira Tozawa for the Cruiserweight Title also ruled, with all the rope-running and kung-fu counters you could ever want done at somehow a higher level of speed than normal. Everything was extra stiff too, from Tozawa’s back crashing into Lio’s knees on a senton bomb or Lio’s Minoru Suzuki-esque elbow to Tozawa’s cheekbone. They actually delivered on a German suplex off the apron too. Psychopaths. Wonderful, wonderful psychopaths.
Xia Li ending her match with Vanessa Borne quick so she could fight Shayna Baszler and her girls was pretty sweet. It was followed by WE WANT RIPLEY chants which resulted in an actual appearance by Ripley.
The main event was Finn Balor vs. Tommaso Ciampa which was really pretty good, one of those 2019 matches that feels really cool in the moment then kind of fades away. I’m not sure why you’d run through a top rope Air Raid Crash and a title belt shot just to setup a weak Adam Cole kick and Balor DDT finish, but I mostly enjoyed the rest.
MAIN EVENT (11/27/19)
Natalya can get some slander online and sometimes I’m of the mindset she’s just this seasoned pro who’s been around WWE for a decade plus but then I see a match like this one with Sarah Logan.
No Way Jose wrestled Eric Young. That is the sentence.
NXT UK 71 (11/28/19)
Ah, the show with the 9 foot tall champ who got beat at Survivor Series in 3 minutes.
The main thing going around here is Imperium vs. Gallus with Ilja Dragunov kind of aligned with Gallus but kind of not. It’s really not much more complicated than that at this point, and it’s kind of as boring as it sounds. They wrestled in an 8-man tag main event that had a lot of fun wrestlers but I don’t know the entertainment value in this – nobody’s likable, nobody’s badass enough for it to be a battle of the badasses. It’s just a lot of chops and missed potential.
The rest of the show was more place-setting for acts I assume they just hope will suddenly catch on one day. Piper Niven spent a little too much time taking shit from Jinny, though her through-the-ropes elbow drop was sweet. Eddie Dennis is still tall and boring, and Noam Dar vs. Ashton Smith was a solid cold match.
SMACKDOWN (11/29/19)
The only thing advertised this show was a new “face” as a part of Bray Wyatt‘s Firefly Fun House and it ended up being the show-closing angle and it turns out it was just Wyatt pulling Daniel Bryan under the ring and maybe ripping his hair out. This is officially no longer scary, just dumb. Respect for all the children out there this is conceivably trying to get at, because I don’t know what else the end game is here if not to terrify small children and annoy everyone else. What else could they even be trying? Creating a dominant champion? A fearful champion? A compelling act to last years to come? Or just another stupid gimmick they run to the ground because they had too much time to fill and got complacent? Also, the new title looks dumb.
At least Roman Reigns is still here. Honestly, by far the best part of this show – he started the show all folksy talking Thanksgiving leftovers, then had a Saturday Night’s Main Event match with Robert Roode. Check this finishing sequence: Reigns sets up a Superman punch, Roode rolls out, Reigns hits Ziggler, Roode tries to take advantage but jumps into another Superman punch for a near fall, Reigns sets up a spear but Roode blocks it with a spinebuster for a near fall, Roode tries a shot with Corbin’s septer but walks into a spear for 3. INCREDIBLE.
Then Roode tried to legit kill Reigns with the septer and got speared through a barricade because wrestling.
Roman not going after The Fiend because King Corbin is a jerk is the dumbest shit. At least bring it up. At least let The Big Dog recognize the menace. Corbin isn’t even a real king! There is no power!! There is nothing being fought against!
Otherwise… damn. Not good. Drew Gulak was so happy when he threw Mustafa Ali off the top rope and then he got squashed aw. Bayley & Sasha Banks cut a tone deaf heel promo that was responded to by Lacey Evans with a tone deaf babyface promo. The New Day defended the SmackDown Tag Team Title against Nakamura & Cesaro in a match that will only be remembered for the really really bad Kinshasa at the end.
Even after all this time, the 60-seconds between Mandy Rose‘s “your face looks like a cold plate of Thanksgiving leftovers” line followed by Michael Cole saying Nikki Cross wasn’t on her game because she was being so emotional was one for the record books too. Terrible.
Oh and Sheamus is back.
205 LIVE (11/29/19)
Love Raul Mendoza but why did he have to go 15 minutes with Ariya Daivari and why did he lose WHY?
Danny Burch squashed some guy after coming out to Oney Lorcan’s music and it made me sad.
Angel Garza vs. Jack Gallagher closed the show and had so many good bits that it willed the crowd into digging it – Garza faked a high five that got a guy in the front row legit hot and his pants spot is eternally over, and Jacky just went OFF with smacks in the corner late in the match that got over. He got a little angle after losing too, tearing up the floor and whatnot. I will assume it goes NOWHERE.
WWE TV Match of the Week: AJ Styles vs. Rey Mysterio for the U.S. Title
WWE TV MVP of the Week: Rey Mysterio
RAW was a fun anomaly and NXT continues to rock. Rest was shit.
RAW: 8/10
NXT: 7/10
NXT UK: 2/10
SmackDown: 2/10
205 Live: 3/10
