WrestleMania Backlash (that’s the name) took place Sunday evening, where Roman Reigns remained the Universal Champion keeping SmackDown interesting and Bobby Lashley remained the WWE Champion in search of anything other than what RAW does every week.
By the end of the week, WWE made another round of talent cuts (including a pair of creeps) and announced that live audiences are back in two months. I’m so excited about that last one I might do the circle-each-day on a calendar gimmick.
Working Man’s Recap
Good Work: Kofi Kingston, Sheamus, Toni Storm, Hit Row, Bronson Reed, Tyler Bate, A-Kid, Bayley, Kevin Owens
World: More Talent Releases, The All Mighty Bobby Lashley, The Completely Uninteresting Drew McIntyre, Heritage Cup Rules, Where’s the Women’s Division?, Aleister Black Returns
Wrestling: Heritage Cup: A-Kid [c] vs. Tyler Bate w/ Trent Seven (NXT UK 5/20/21), Fatal 4-Way Match – WWE Intercontinental Title: Apollo Crews [c] w/ Commander Azeez vs. Big E vs. Kevin Owens vs. Sami Zayn (SmackDown 5/21/21)
Entertainment: Pete Dunne sit-down interview (NXT 5/18/21), Supernova Sessions w/ Ilja Dragunov (NXT UK 5/20/21), Bayley runs down the champions (SmackDown 5/21/21), Intercontinental Title match promos (SmackDown 5/21/21), Roman Reigns promo (SmackDown 5/21/21)
RAW (5/17/21)
Bobby Lashley and MVP kick off the show with some beautiful ladies and put out an open challenge — who’s taking on the champ tonight? The question gets brought up often over the next few hours, all the way until the end of the show when Kofi Kingston answers the call and finds out: HA! He can have his match, but it’s not even for the WWE Championship!
Kofi beat Randy Orton earlier in the show too (distraction by trombone), which was a better indicator to me Kofi may be next up for Bobby than Kofi beating Bobby in a non-title main event — which he did too (distraction by McIntyre). They are just shitposting wrestling TV!
Sheamus vs. Ricochet was pretty good, while after part 9 I think Asuka vs. Charlotte Flair may officially be boring.
Omos stared down Jaxson Ryker after AJ Styles beat Elias, because that’s the current Tag Team Title feud. Angel Garza put a rose down Drew Gulak’s mouth and John Morrison (post-zombie attack but not a zombie) lost to Damian Priest in a (non-zombie) Lumberjack Match.
All this and an evil doll — what a strange show!
NXT (5/18/21)
If I’m in charge, Cameron Grimes buys the NXT Title and sends Karrion Kross to RAW or something. Unless Grimes is broke now. Oh no.
There’s plenty going on at CWC NXT, but until somebody besides Kross and Finn Balor has actual momentum it’s just a bunch of teaser trailers for a deep bullpen of talent. There was a whole Prime Target video for Kross/Balor tonight, but I’m still not convinced the feud has actually started yet.
Interesting directions here and there: Pete Dunne‘s back to being a proper shit, Sarray kicked more ass, and heel Toni Storm is unbelievably consistent — she put young Zoey Stark in her place and introduced a sweet new DDT on the head to do it.
Jake Atlas found WWE’s fabled “newfound aggression” in the ring according to NXT’s psychotic commentators, but to beat Cameron Grimes he needed the distraction of Ted DiBiase — who appeared live.
Hit Row‘s awesome debut promo last week was followed up with a tag win for Ashante “Thee” Adonis & Top Dolla over Ariya Daivari & Tony Nese, and as someone who has seen every 205 Live one of the only things I’ve learned is that Adonis is pretty great.
Bronson Reed is the new North American Champion! The big guy beat Johnny Gargano in a Steel Cage to close the show on a high note, and speaking of notes — they absolutely hit them in this match. The NXT Steel Cage Match is just like the NXT WarGames match, too formulaic and safe to completely work but plenty of fun morsels including Gargano being a turd and some wild bumps by both guys.
MAIN EVENT (5/19/21)
Naomi/Lana vs. Mandy Rose/Dana Brooke was a solid match of teams that haven’t really clicked, then Cedric Alexander screamed “you’re not ready” a bunch Mansoor and lost.
NXT UK (5/20/21)
This week had the usual lame sketches and middling matches (I’m looking at you Wolfgang vs. Rampage Brown!), but it also had a few chuckles from Noam Dar and Sam Gradwell and a great main event.
The main event – A-Kid vs. Tyler Bate for the Heritage Cup trophy – was phenomenal, a rematch from last December when Kid retained the trophy in somewhat of an upset with a cradle two falls to one. For the first three rounds (Heritage Cup Rules), it was all hold-trading and counters — plenty of attempts at offense, but pretty much all defense.
Once the fourth round began they dropped the holds and moved to just hitting each other, a natural escalation if I’ve ever seen one. The exhaustion began to show as Bate, fresh off throwing a European uppercut at Kid’s face, exerted even more energy to suplex his way out of a guillotine choke and wasn’t able to cover before time ran out. Midway through the fifth fall, Bate hit a Tyler Driver for a massive near fall then went for the Skytwister press and missed, which Kid immediately followed up trying to put on the Omoplata which became a struggle until the bell rang.
The sixth round began with both guys holding their arms in agony and just throwing themselves at each other until Bate went for the Tyler Driver again, which Kid countered with a hurricanrana for a near fall. Kid blasted Bate with a superkick right after, like one with a running head start and everything, then went for Bate’s leg but Bate managed to reverse it and trap him in a cradle (!) for the 3-count and only fall. Bate wins the trophy after just under 18 minutes of brilliantly escalated and executed main event drama from two gifted fellows aged just 24-years-old.
SMACKDOWN (5/21/21)
It must’ve been sweeps week SmackDown because this was stacked, a well-hyped main event for the Intercontinental Title while Roman Reigns and The Usos kept telling their story which is giving SmackDown layers and shit. Plus Bayley ran down all the champions to start the show – it was amazing.
King Corbin has worn his crown so long I forgot how ridiculous it was that Shinsuke Nakamura hasn’t had a crown his entire WWE run. In addition to the crown Nakamura has picked up the guitar skills of new manager (I think?) Rick Boogs, which for this week at least added to the act.
Everybody’s shitting on poor Dominik Mysterio too, who wrestled about 20 seconds with Robert Roode this week.
The 4-Way IC Title match got four great promos throughout the show – Apollo Crews is a prick, Big E is joy, Kevin Owens is serious, and Sami Zayn is peaking on a cocaine binge. This seemed like a natural PPV match, but as the SmackDown main event it got more time to stand out as another naturally flowing multi-man match where everybody showcased their thing before Aleister Black ran in and kicked Big E in the head.
205 LIVE (5/21/21)
Asher Hale vs. Ari Sterling opened the show, a battle of the new class that I thought was pretty great. With current WWE I don’t rewind often — in fact I fast-forward a lot more — but I went back for like 3 or 4 things here. Impressive showing and physical match. The Bollywood Boyz vs. August Grey & Ikeman Jiro was your tag team main event.
