GIVING IT TO YOU RAW…What Happened Last Night (May 25th, 2015)
Hello
Enthusiasts! Well, I don’t know about
the lot of you but I would say that the WWE isn’t all that jazzed for its own
Pay-Per-View. It could just be me but, I
felt that for a “Go Home” show of sorts, it left We the Audience
wanting. Yet, this may be more of an
experimental time because what was presented seems to attempt to
integrate some old standards with fresh faces yet, not so much with a fresh
take. I felt very blasé towards the end,
not exactly the sentiment one would want for an audience if you’re trying to
get them to pay.
We open in Uniondale , New York
The first match of
the evening does well in getting our blood going a bit for Ambrose and Rollins
have some shit to prove. So, when they
dance, they mean business. As for Reigns
and Dad, they’re keeping up with the heavy-hitting so, I don’t mind that. I still would like Dad to get the win more
often but I’m not sure if that will ever be a priority with Creative but they
should certainly consider it if they want their shit to sell. Anyway, the back and forth keeps us
entertained when Ambrose gets a hot-tag against Rollins towards the end and the 2 of
them, running low on gas, get a bit tangled up after Rollins lands a kick to
Ambrose’s head. They finally figure it
out and Ambrose manages to pin Rollins with what I hear is called a
“Backslide”. Makes sense from the look
of it.
After that, we get
the next installment in the Rusev & Lana saga as R-Truth quickly falls to
Rusev after a Superkick. Rusev then calls
Lana out so that they can “talk”.
Beforehand, we got a shot of Lana and Dolph Ziggler hanging out
backstage and I mention this because Ziggler is being true to his words and not
taking this whole “development of their romance” too seriously but at the
same time, not seeming too disinterested.
He keeps it cool. In any case,
Rusev pleads for Lana to come out and she does eventually abide. Rusev apologizes and it looks like they might
reconcile but then Rusev still has his old-school, Eastern Block ways and starts
ordering Lana around trying to set her back “in her place” but Lana says she’s
over it and leaves the ring and Dolph Ziggler happens to walkout as a new beau
would to check and see if everything’s okay.
Lana says it's fine and plants a smooch on Ziggler leaving Rusev to
blow a fuse.
We then have a
“King” Barrett and Ryback go for a round for no real reason other than that they
both have a stake in the 6-Man Elimination Chamber match for the
Intercontinental Championship. It’s an
okay dance. Nothing we haven’t seen before.
Ryback is still nursing a “rib injury”, not sure how real it is but
Barrett sticks to them like it hurts.
Ryback doesn’t take too kindly to this and feigns it being too much at
one point and when Barrett goes for the Bull Hammer, Ryback serves up ShellShock
for the win.
To follow, we have
Stardust and Neville have at and it’s a decent match. The theme of the show appears to be have a match
and then follow it up with “story”. This
may be why the matches are very "OK" this evening.
We’re supposed to be pulled in by the “drama”. With Neville still bearing a wounded knee,
Stardust takes it upon himself to attack it with all his bizarre glory.
Neville wasn’t so hindered that he couldn’t execute his Red Arrow
though, and he uses that for the win.
It’s at about this time that Bo Dallas comes out. He wants to give Neville some “inspiration”. All he has to do is “Bo-lieve” and take
another dropkick to the injured knee.
Yes, that’s what it’s all about.
The drama continues,
with Dolph Ziggler and Sheamus working up more interest for Elimination
Chamber. These 2 know what they’re doing
and so the match was solid. Since these
2 will be among the many battling for the Intercontinental Title, they come out
meaning business as well. Lana comes out
for this match also and stands ringside, providing support for her new
“beau”. Rusev also comes out towards
the end of the match. Ziggler tries not
to let it faze him and delivers a nice Superkick to Rusev but that leaves him open to
Sheamus and he deals Ziggler a Brogue Kick to earn the win. Then Rusev, fiend that he is, gets in the
ring and settles Ziggler into a merciless Accolade, right in front of Lana,
yelling at her to “Kiss him now!” Well,
that’s how you get booed and Rusev owns his heel status with dastardly aplomb.
Next up, we have
another 2-Chapter match with John Cena facing off against Zack Ryder for the US
Title Open Challenge but, not before talking about Kevin Owens and who everyone
plans to root for. I thought this
match-up a little odd because it does utilize tonight’s special guests, the
main cast from Entourage. Apparently, Ryder is from Long Island, not
too far from the night’s venue, which apparently is a pull because Ryder is well
received and put on one of the better matches I’ve seen him in but…I think it’s
clear to We Enthusiasts, that Ryder is the #1 Jobber on the roster. I don’t think I’ve ever seen him win a match and he sure as hell doesn’t win this one. If I was in the Entourage camp, I’d be a little pissed. Yeah, you get visibility with Cena but they
back the loser and not just that, the guy we all know is going to lose. There’s
0 suspense. That doesn’t really give the
audience much impetus to see the movie, in my opinion. With these crossovers, one would think it
should be set-up to be a win-win. Here, it seems like 2 camps that aren’t aware of
each other cut each other cheap deals just ‘cause they didn’t really care. Guess Vince McMahon didn’t watch Entourage and it doesn’t look like Mark
Wahlberg is a big WWE fan, regardless of working with The Rock in the past.
Yet, in the 2nd
chapter of this match, we get another surprise attack from Kevin Owens and that
at least has my interest piqued for Elimination Chamber so, it’s not all lost.
Moving along, we
have a downright sloppy match between Paige and Tamina. About the internets, it seems like most
blamed it on ring rust for Tamina but Paige has been out of the game a short
bit too and the double combination of being on the bench for a bit I think
contributed to the poor performance for both.
I already have a bit of a problem with the Divas Division because they
often seem set to “Slumber Party Pillow Fight” or the “Outside the Club Fight”
but nothing close to the connections you see on the men’s side. Not sure how it goes in NXT but from what
I’ve been hearing, Natalya will finally have something to do once those ladies
start getting called up. Nevertheless,
Tamina gets the win because…that would probably happen regardless.
We then have a
big-ass 10-on-3 Tag Team match with every tag team except for The Usos and
perhaps Erick Rowan and Luke Harper gunning for The New Day. Well, it’s a big ol’mess of people thrashing about, flipping and kicking…I really don’t know how they go about these things but
it’s chaos from beginning to end but a flamboyant display nonetheless. Not very surprisingly, the melee ends in a
disqualification in the New Day’s favor but Cesaro & Tyson Kidd aren’t too
happy about that and send The New Day on their way with a congratulatory Swing
with a Kick.
That brings us to
the main event, Dean Ambrose vs. Seth Rollins but there’s a complication. You see, earlier during a promo, J&J try
to muscle in on Dean Ambrose for some reason and Ambrose, being the Lunatic
Fringe that he is, takes ‘em out but a Cameraman was sort of too close to the
action and The Authority persuade him to press charges or at least get Ambrose
arrested. He’s “arrested” in a later
promo and after all this hub-bub, he’s not even available for the main
event. Stephanie McMahon takes the lead
as spokesperson and explains to us that they have to be responsible and that
the safety of all employees is
important and they have to do what they must to ensure that they provide a safe
working environment. Well, it appears
that Roman Reigns has something to say about this safe working environment and
begins to show this right when Triple H is about to move on to other business. J&J, Dad and Rollins start to handle this
problem that is Reigns and a beatdown ensues. Now, this bit
bothered me. I’m all for a beatdown,
especially if Reigns is in the middle of it, and it’s fine for the most part
but there’s this one moment when Reigns explodes out from everyone that is just
too staged and completely deflates the action.
The crowd is kinda “meh…” too so, lemme just say this. The beauty of wrestling entertainment is that
it borders on reality. If you wanna see real fighting, you go see
boxing or MMA /UFC . If you wanna be entertained, you go watch an
action flick but in the WWE, you have to make We the Audience think it’s real. It’s kinda an entertainment sleight of
hand. We know it’s all loosely scripted
so the job is to sell the script. In the
case of Reigns, he will always be a figure where less is more. It’s safe to say that he’s already too much
in a lot of ways so, he doesn’t so much have to be dialed back but evened
out. I can believe him being able to
power his way out of a small dogpile but I don’t see it happening like
that. Brawls and such should be handled
like a real bar fight or something. I
can see J&J hanging off of him like Gremlins when he stands up but I don’t
see him exploding out to the point people go flying. Please.
If this is the dramatic retelling of the skirmish, sure we can
exaggerate but if the game is selling this shit believably, there’s no need to
exaggerate when it comes to Reigns. Let
them have at. If he actually explodes
out and someone goes flying well, then that happened, but if it’s staged to, I
put money on people loosing interest.
“Lie” to us but don’t try to fool us.
Anyway, even with that dramatic pop, Dad’s right there to shut him down
with a Chokeslam. Rollins and J&J
gather up the contract that Ambrose was supposed to sign and just about then, a
commotion starts up from behind the ramp.
What’s this? Looks like Ambrose
found a way out of the clink. He “stole”
himself a paddywagon and look, it’s loaded too.
Ambrose and Reigns team up and send The Authority running and Ambrose,
well he signs the contract anyway and let’s Rollins suck on that.
All right, so I
wasn’t all that taken with this episode of RAW
but I’ll be honest and say that it’s certainly wasn’t as bad as it could have
been and so, at least they’re maintaining but it’s looking like Smackdown will
have to do a little bit of tidying up to keep us at least going, *shrug* “Why not?...”
See You Thursday,
-Nicole Alexis (^_~)
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