The best thing about the Royal Rumble is counting down all thirty entrances with the fellas; the other best thing is the crowd’s reaction to whoever enters when that countdown hits 0.
So….
0. WWE Women’s Tag Team Title: Asuka & Charlotte Flair [c] vs. Nia Jax & Shayna Baszler
What to say about the bad wrestling match? Asuka’s whole thing used to be dominance and Baszler’s whole thing used to be great singles matches so here is Asuka getting beat up for a while by Nia Jax and tag team wrestler Shayna Baszler, naturally. The word on the street is Nia Jax can be reckless; as a bonus she’s now putting in Operation Warp Speed levels of effort. Joy can be found in bad wrestling, but Charlotte’s hot tag and the double Natural Selection were just bad bad. This was all BEFORE barren Ric Flair waltzed out there. Bad! DUD
1. WWE Title: Drew McIntyre [c] vs. Goldberg
This was what it needed to be, but I don’t know if it needed to be? Goldberg is definitely capable of throwing finishing moves back-and-forth for a couple. A lot of the bumps here were nasty, but kind of in a way where I was more concerned about the health of Drew’s hips than in awe of the pro wrestling action. Cole and Graves yelled stuff, faces got made, and Drew passed the test – whatever it was. ***1/4
2. SmackDown Women’s Title: Sasha Banks [c] vs. Carmella w/ Reginald
Carmella’s tope of death where she landed on her face was realistically the most interesting part of her 5 minutes of offense and trash talk, though Sasha Banks’ sell on the frog splash miss and leap into Carmella’s superkick (among other things) made sure the last few minutes closed up strong. ***
For a world with no live audience, Booker T dressed as G.I. Bro standing unfazed in the middle of a Bad Bunny performance came off as the most on-the-button WWE live music performance ever.
3. Women’s Royal Rumble
I’ve found the Royal Rumble is best viewed as a ride — jump on and embrace the excitement, anticipation, confusion, surprises, frustration, conclusion. See where it takes you and how it all ties together, even if there is only real “intent” or “logic” behind maybe half of it.
This was the first Royal Rumble to take place in the COVID-19 era so the lack of many (or any at all) reactions to build around kind of cornered ol’ WWE into relying more on characters. Occasionally.
The ride had me until around 10 people in, when it seemed like all efforts at A to B and character work got dropped in favor of just… throwing some folks out there. One might say it served to slow things down and grab me again at the end and let the Belair/Ripley/Flair showdown stand out, but that’s probably only going to work for nerds.
That first 10 was good though. Bayley at #1 with the pyro and flip-out over Michael Cole not being on commentary since she shaved his name in the back of her head. She, Naomi and Bianca Belair brought big energy to the start which was more impressive when it turned out they all lasted deep into the match.
The running bit with Billie Kay alternating between trying to find a teammate and casual commentary was fun, mostly because Billie is very good at whatever this is. It’s 2021; the Rumble’s got jokes! Victoria and Jillian Hall (and that lariat!) popped me, but once Peyton Royce entered and they didn’t completely take advantage of the IIconics reunion the match took a break.
Victoria, Ruby Riott, and Dana Brooke all bit it hard on their eliminations but even more painful was WWE’s crack production team that praises itself every other week missing Bianca Belair eliminating Bayley. Props to Bayley’s tantrum to try and capture something, but that was a miss.
The middle was an afterthought with a smile here and there: Nikki Cross hyping herself up, Naomi’s stiffest ever splits legdrop, Mickie James’ casual boot to Lacey Evans. Even WWE leaning into the big Tamina showdowns is becoming funny. Counterpoint: all the Ric Flair and 24/7 Title stuff. It’s just embarrassing.
The match got its mojo back at the end, even if Nia & Shayna casually tossing people gave me bad Rumble 2014 flashbacks. Nia taking out Shayna then Lana taking out Nia was fine, Charlotte Flair as a final 3 decoy was practically brilliant, and Bianca vs. Rhea was an absolute show. Way better Women’s Rumble than last year’s mess, and really probably the best laid out and my favorite since the original nostalgia trip in 2018. ***3/4
4. Last Man Standing – WWE Universal Title: Roman Reigns [c] w/ Paul Heyman vs. Kevin Owens
“Who’s blood is that on your face?! That’s not my blood! No, no – that’s tribal blood!” Kevin Owens brought all of Kevin Owens here to the rare Thunderdome hardcore match that felt more like a fight and less like a series of comedy bits.
Owens fell off the stands through a table, got run over by a golf cart (and took the greatest ever bump foe it), did a Swanton bomb off a forklift through a table… you know, because it’s professional wrestling. The last few minutes felt like close quarters combat and I totally fell for the near fall of Roman handcuffed to the lighting rig.
Unfortunate prop difficulties leading to human difficulties at the finish aside, this was a blast. I’d say these guys are 3 for 3 on great gimmick matches but they had one at Rumble 2017 too and I’m probably forgetting another. Great opponents who get the most out of each character, are willing to hurt themselves for each other, and you just know have the sway backstage to do some of the wildest stuff too. ***3/4
5. Men’s Royal Rumble Match
Kind of a boring ride. There were parts I liked, mainly Daniel Bryan working bunch of mini-matches in between everything, but man talk about a slowed-down middle: Dolph, Nak, Miz, Morrison, Ricochet, Elias, Riddle, Sheamus, Corbin, Priest… I’ve either seen it already or don’t want to anymore, usually through no fault of the guys themselves (besides Riddle). You betcha I lost it for the returns of Carlito and Christian, but the Hurricane and Kane appearances felt like repeats of repeats. Bad Bunny was cool but probably shouldn’t be a highlight of the match?
Edge vs. Randy Orton plus Sami Zayn was a mildly fun first 3, but then this just became a big Randy Orton Rumble. No one needed that. There was more put into his minor moments than there was into Edge and Jeff Hardy in the same ring again. Big E was a star but didn’t get enough play, and there was definitely 5 or so minutes here of King Corbin just trolling. Who needs that?
The Christian return and Edge reunion was in the back of my mind and despite no live crowd came off awesome, even if he and Edge hugged in the middle of a ROYAL RUMBLE. Bryan immediately springing on Christian with a rapid Irish whip was great, as was the Bobby vs. Big E showdown. Then came Seth. And Braun. Eh.
The modern day Rumble is almost built now around a suspicion WWE will do something really tone deaf and stupid, but labeling Daniel Bryan a “sentimental favorite” (despite a clearly directed on-screen push!) then mocking the phrase after his elimination was special. It’s not that it sucks Edge wins and he doesn’t; it’s more the lame and uninspired way they go about it. I like ol’ Adam but there’s 12 other things you can do besides him returning from his return at #1 in the Royal Rumble and going the distance at the expense of doing something cool with everybody else.
Look — at least they setup two Omos matches. **1/2
Honorable Mentions: The weak men’s Rumble closed this show with a buzzkill, but the show before it was very good. The women’s Rumble and Reigns/Owens are worth seeing and Drew/Goldberg was… yeah. It was yeah. 7/10
