well then.
NEVER EVER EVER START A SHOW WITH ADR. I mean, I hate going into an Aces and Eights rant about this guy and treading water with this, but... Man, this literally does feel like watching the Pussies in Leather on my TV again. Five minutes of ADR on my TV is ten minutes too many, add on top of it that this is literally the most pointless gimmick I've seen in a long time, a complete waste of the first good use of a midcard belt in 20 years, and Zeb only having one promo to cut over and over and over and... Three minutes into Dorito vs The Man that Forgot His First Name and I couldn't get to the fast forward button fast enough. Hey, remember when Neville secretly became a damned workhorse who couldn't have a bad match with so many of the new faces on NXT? Now not only am I not wanting to watch his matches, not only is he getting pinned by one of the worst finishes imaginable, not only did he get very little offense in in a 10+ minute match, but then he ate a lame postmatch beatdown and they reminded us that freaking PAC is being used as a warmup guy for Jack Swagger. Ugh. In theory it can only go up from here. In practice, I just watched Finn Balor and Apollo Crews wreck house on NXT and then turned on the main roster and saw this, jarring to say the least.
...On Raw, I popped to see the Usos, but them getting what probably would have been a nice fun squash victory over the Descension just rang hollow after that opener.
That catapult/spinebuster/flying legdrop combo remains awesome though, so credit to Konnor and VIktor.
Then Dean Ambrose and Kevin Owens got to have a back and forth backstage promo and all was right with the world.
Happy days are here again!
...then there was the extended squash from the Wyatts which was kinda weird. While it never felt like the babyfaces had any chance in hell in a 20 minute glorified squash and - even without reading spoilers - you knew it would be a clean sweep... hell, they're keeping the Wyatt unit really strong. So strong that it's making me forget what Cena did to them. Hell, all these guys getting their own small time in the ring to shine made them all look dangerous, every guy getting a pinfall in a different way was fun, and in the end Kalisto and Titus even gained a good bit by fighting so valiantly against clearly overwhelming odds, which is the sign that these dudes are looking dangerous. So, in the end this was quality...
...then King Barrett vs Ryback happened and I went back to the fast forward button... then rewound it a bit and saw a really cool finish of a sleeperhold reversal into the Shellshock. That was sweet. Otherwise, all I can think watching this show at this point is if I should give up the dream of being a columnist or wrestling writer of some kind because of shows like this that just give you nothing to talk about. Lets just try to make something up on the fly for the next segment of nothing, shall we?
Nice to see they've solved the mystery of "who attacked Natalya?". Now they can move on to the next mystery of "who gives a fuck?"!
Then something magical happens! On the first episode (I think) since Rollins was hurt (it's still live to me, dammit!) with Cena and Orton and Rollins and Lesnar and THE DEMON KANE and Nikki Bella and such main event stars like this out... the first show is main-evented with the two people that deserve to be main eventing, dammit. "Mr. Thursday Night" Dean Ambrose vs Kevin Owens, and they put on a PPV-quality bout full of really good psychology and an actually innovative finish. Go out of your way to see this!
...and skip the rest of this show for sure.
