Soooo, I guess I'll try to do this.
Guess the easiest way to explain this show was that I loved and hated everything at the same time.
It was stupid booking combatted with a fresh feel to everything, things you just don't see all that often.
Fun Fact: If you watched both Raw and Smackdown - lol - you got 40 minutes of opening segment chit-chat! :yay: So if you enjoy Sheamus promos, you're on Cloud Nine.
Seriously though, this opening segment was pretty rough, with a few bright spots: First, New Day. Second, New Day mocking Roman's 18000 catchphrases. Third, New Day making their white guy announcer voices again. Fourth... Sheamus. Ya know, Stone Cold Sam Adams has a bit of a point, Sheamus's promos really have improved... or maybe that's being across from Roman Reigns, who's saying the most generic shit now. "Why don't you come down RIGHT HERE TONIGHT and we can fight!" ugh, where's some magic beans when we need 'em. But Sheamus looks like he's having a blast! Speaking of such, whoever wrote "Ambrose stands in the ring while Roman and an Uso do all the talking for da family" can go blast off into outer space. Also whoever decided to have one heel faction undermine another who was out there to announce what a third heel faction wanted. Also, this convoluted nonsense of the League of Babyfaces announcing a match announced by the Authority, then the New Day changing the match, then "WWE officials" getting that stipulation changed. This was SO Russo, but I'm all for some Russo right now.
Line of the Night: "At TLC, we'll be in a Tables, Ladders, and Chairs match. That means your little buddies over there can't interfere." - Roman, who has the IQ of broccoli soup.
as for Tyler Breeze vs Neville, I couldn't pay attention as I was too distracted by the sad trombone music and trying to finish my time machine...
okay, the good things about the Divas' match: BECKY!!! Beck-y! Beck-y! Beccck-y! The bad things start with how hard it is to transition that over to text, and then... Is it just me, or is this Charlotte turn dumb as hell? Then the match with Brie never gets going before the dumb ass Irish Whip Fail finish with Charlotte getting butthurt and breaking up a submission, which causes Brie to win the match and her theme song to cause blood to pour out of the ears of the five people who actually watch Smackdown before Becky gets pissy at Charlotte for not waiting five fucking seconds for Brie to tap and... I watched this after NXT which... is... not recommended, especially with the same chicks involved in this "match" where LITERALLY EVERYTHING IS DONE WRONG... but I kinda liked it, just because it was just cool to see Becky not being in the shadows anymore and a fresh face as the top face (only face?) of the division! :yay:
New Day vs La Familia was a TON of fun!!! Thanks, Snowwie, for only watching Smackdown (outside of that tournament) so I'm not as numb to six-man tags as most because this was a blast. Double hot tags to dudes who are pretty great at them before all hell breaks loose at the finish and dudes are flying everywhere and amidst all the chaos New Day cheat to win. Great! And then Roman gets a handicap main event, which I believe 82% of handicap matches in the last 3 years have been won by the person with the disadvantage. 70% of them were because Kane ran in for a DQ, but still.
Speaking of new things, Bray Wyatt actually wrestled in a TV match!!!!?!?!?!??! What the hell? Yeah seeing him utterly wreck Devon was awesome! Please, more Bray Wyatt squashes, we need them! And the postmatch attack was so pro wrestling too. Bray held Devon in the Sister Abigail position, and threatened Bully/Dreamer to come in. Like a live hostage scene. Come in, and he eats it... Then the goons throw a table in the ring and set it up, Bray tries to throw him into it, but Devon escapes! And then throws Rowan into it instead, causing the hillbillies to be stunned enough for the ECDUB dudes to run in and start laying haymakers with kendo sticks and MORE EXCITEMENT AND CHAOS ENSUES! Love this! Duck Dynasty gets the advantage, Dreamer goes through a table, and they all pose in the ring. Welcome to Smackdown, where Wyatt looks strong every week before he gets beat up on Raw again
The main event... wow... what to say about this...
*gulp*... I liked it.
Was it stupid to not just have the babyfaces win with a 4-on-1 advantage? Yeah. Was it ridiculous for one member of a tag team - gotta let the Royal Jester look like a jackass - get DQed for the same shit people do in every tag match? Yeah. But this just felt very unique and different and like there were actual odds to overcome, and Roman really didn't overcome them. He won the match due to an insane bout of luck, somewhat-believably (by WWE standards) laying everyone out outside, punching ADR across the announce table and sneaking in the ring right at the count of 9.5, and right after the countout win Sheamus boots him in the face. This came across MUCH differently than Cena piling the Wyatts on top of each other with AAs or whatever.
Honestly, my biggest issue with this show was how inconsequential Ambrose and the Usos felt in the end. Granted, they tried to save face because he would have got his shit kicked in in the end had those three not made the save, but... Roman fighting off all three guys - individually, but still - kinda made you wonder why he needs the help of these three guys.
But in the end, this came off to me like Vince made the call of "Book Roman to beat the League 4 on 1 mwahahahahaha" and the writers just doing the best they can. Weird show though.
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