Ratings:
Kofi Kingston vs. David Otunga: *1/2
AJ vs. Nikki Bella: *
Cody Rhodes vs. Great Khali: DUD
Big Show vs. Drew McIntyre: 1/4*
Mark Henry vs. Yoshi Tatsu: N/A (squash)
Chris Jericho vs. Sheamus: ***1/4
__________________
Reviews/Thoughts:
Small tidbit: Lilian Garcia's right shoe broke when she made her entrance before the show. She still carried on in good spirits.
Christian starts with the Peep Show, even getting a few pops. So it will indeed be a 12-man tag match at WM, six guys for Long and six for Laurinaitis. Johnny and Otunga are on the show. Then it's Long and Aksana coming out. No elbow drops needed for Aksana. Time to recruit Christian's services! Cheap heat on Columbus fans. One more match for the World Title. Pretty obvious that Christian was headed to Johnny's side anyway, so I'm glad Teddy said what he said, refusing to "beg" for Christian's services.
I'll admit, WWE has done a good job of building Johnny's team up strong at the outset. Christian's "not medically cleared" yet, but Otunga gets fed to Kofi tonight. Kofi's the newest member for Long's team. Nice pick. Poor Otunga the ambulance chaser gets to compete in his slacks and dress shoes. Christian has one of those Johnny faces. Cole is doing some major kissing up. Sorry, you'll never replace Bobby Heenan.
Good, Otunga doesn't have excess body oil. Christian gets involved, so Long tells the ref and ref throws Christian out. Cole and Johnny are like..."how is this fair?" Um, it is. Good job on failing reasoning and logic, now go back to school. Otunga removes the belt to use as a weapon, Santino takes that. Trouble in Paradise and Kofi wins. Sounds about right.
DB is in AJ's corner for her match against Nikki Bella. DB continues to show more dominance in the relationship. Note that AJ came out alone, then DB got his own entrance. DB did root AJ on, I'll say that. Good spin kick by AJ on her comeback. Nice job by DB to avert twin magic, good counter by AJ to get the rollup win. DB celebrates like he won the Stanley Cup.
I hope AJ actually turns heel in all this. She played a decent heel role in FCW.
Cody and Big Show at Mania for the IC Title. If Show wins, Cody should be elevated to the main event picture. I think Cody's ready. The match was not good at all. Cody did all he could, but Khali is just horrid.
New shirt for Orton as he delivers a promo. Front of the shirt is a simple "RKO" with a neat design. Randy embraces hate. Feud apparently stems from last summer, when Orton won against Kane and Kane shook Orton's hand. Orton's now facing the monster again at Mania. Good. Let them go all out.
McIntyre is back on TV thanks to Johnny. Big Show's the opponent tonight. Oops. Nice and short. Nice knowing ya, Drew.
Yoshi's getting fed to Mark Henry tonight. Squash. If you're not in a Mania match (at least on the main card), you're getting fed to those who are.
Jericho promo. I like the "alcoholic gene" storyline. It's well-known to wrestling fans that Punk's dad was an alcoholic, but it's a nice twist on the real-life situation. Didn't think a guy mentioning taking a drink of alcohol could get booed. Guess Stone Cold's influenced me a bunch. DB and AJ come down to the ring in the middle of the match.
Jericho and Sheamus was really good. Back and forth, crowd loved it. Impressive how Sheamus skins the cat to get to the top, even when it's late in the match. Multiple close near falls. Sheamus throws Jericho near DB and AJ, so DB hits a low dropkick to Sheamus behind the ref's back. Jericho gets a countout win. Not the finish I wanted, but it makes sense. Sheamus goes after DB. Since DB got away, Sheamus nuked Jericho with the Brogue Kick. Good finish to the show.
2 comments:
Thanks for the great review. I missed Fridays airing, but a coworker here at DISH told me that I could find it in the free section of DISHOnline.com. After watching the entire episode I started to question why I still watch at all. I was not thrilled this week by Raw or Smackdown. I know they are called “Captain Charisma” and “Mr. Excitement” but I couldn’t think of 2 people that could possibly offer a worse opening then those 2. I would have changed the channel for a few minutes if I hadn’t been watching online. Christian plays an ok heel, but Laurinaitus has no personality, good or bad. We have 2 matches right off the bat that include outside interference. Then we have 3 squash matches. (We all know Khali goes down anytime a super star faces him, he only beats jobbers) Then we have a great main event, with some great wrestling, only to end in a count out due to outside interference. I have always seen the “formula” in the WWE, but now it’s like the match results are written on some dice where you can only get 6 different outcomes, 5 of which involve someone on the outside getting involved.
For the most part, free TV shows are primarily meant to further storylines, and eight or nine times out of ten, match quality suffers. Too many PPVs may be part of the problem.
As for Christian and Johnny starting the show off, it was not the best, but at least WWE won't have Khali cutting a promo at the start. I'm irked at the whole "one more match" catchphrase Christian has.
I wish WWE would switch up their formula and produce better free TV matches, even if it means fewer overall shows. Quality over quantity, in my opinion.
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