Ratings:
Sheamus, Rey Mysterio, & Sin Cara vs. Alberto Del Rio, Chris Jericho, & Dolph Ziggler: *3/4
Brodus Clay vs. Jack Swagger: N/A (yay Dude Love!)
Miz vs. Christian (IC Title): **
Lita vs. Heath Slater (No DQ, No Countout): N/A
CM Punk vs. John Cena (WWE Title): **3/4
_________________
Reviews/Thoughts:
Tonight marks the start of 3-hour RAWs. It's hard to believe that the show made it to 1,000 episodes. And next January, RAW will have been on for 20 years. Just insane.
The opening graphics were great to remember the past, but also the now. Then. Now. Forever. Even a new Titantron for the occasion.
Vince starts the show to a nice pop. Welcome to Monday Night RAW! And D-X?! YES! Camo pants. Wait, wasn't there more of DX? WOOHOO! Road Dogg, Billy Gunn, and X-Pac come out on that infamous tank they used to invade WCW. Loved how Road Dogg self-censored "Ass" out of Bad Ass Billy Gunn. Vintage DX segments, and nice job on the HBK Playgirl reference. Sandow gets Sweet Chin Music and a Pedigree. Nice opener.
Nice to have Jim Ross on commentary. Nice goatee.
Rey Mysterio and Sin Cara on the same team for the six-man tag...talk about past and future teaming together. Sin Cara and Dolph worked in the ring together, even after Ziggler was vocal about Sin Cara's work at MITB. Even Jericho brought back the posing arrogant cover for a night. Biggest story here was Ziggler decking Jericho, allowing Sheamus to hit the Brogue Kick and get the win. Storyline there advances and is much clearer now. Jericho should be the face in all this, while Ziggler plays the heel. Relatively short match that I wish had more time.
So Charlie Sheen is on the show -- via Skype. Yay for being a social ambassador?
Onto AJ and Layla backstage. Nice job on showing how mentally unstable the entire locker room is. WTF MAE YOUNG'S HAND-SON LIVES. Easily had me cracking up.
Sonic must be a big sponsor now. Nice airtime. I want to learn to roller skate now. WWE continues to promote Tout and Shazam (one of those phone apps).
Meanwhile, Swagger again gets a mere mention outside of the ring. Brodus Clay gets the big entrance and then beats Jack in about 10 seconds. Oh yeah, DUDE LOVE AND A TYEDYE MR. SOCKO! So when is Swagger getting future endeavored? Not sure if this is one of those MVP-like losing streaks.
HHH and Trish Stratus in the back. HA, nice reference to one very awesome backstage segment. Let's do some yoga! But eh, it's DX crashing the festivities this time. I'm sure everyone wanted Stephanie to step in.
It's AJ/Daniel Bryan wedding time. Slick's back to be the minister of the wedding, and he looks great! Love it. Wow, AJ makes an amazing bride -- who just happens to be wearing her boots. Slick was just awesome. A lot of YES in the ring, and a lot of NO in the crowd. AJ said yes to another man with a proposal.
ROFL IT'S VINCE MCMAHON. Vince quickly says it was a business proposal. AJ is the new RAW GM?! WTF. Welp, any ounce of logic that even remained in WWE has left the building. Now DB has gone nuts. We need more crazy people here.
Punk/Bryan/Rock segment = gold. Rock says he faces the WWE champ at the Royal Rumble. Might be an awesome match if Punk were still champ at that time. Daniel Bryan = homeless lumberjack + oompa loompa. ROFL. Rock Bottom to DB. Rock's still got it.
Nice time to promote the Taker 20-0 DVD set.
Bret's the special guest ring announcer for this next match. Nice shoutout to Mr. Perfect. IC Title match between Christian and Miz. Christian tweaks the knee in the first few minutes of the match, and it ended up costing him. Good for Miz. Getting that re-push to the top after coming back from movie filming.
HHH time to get Lesnar's decision. Heyman came out first; he says no on behalf of Lesnar. HI STEPHANIE! She looks real good with all that gym time. Of course Heyman would tell HHH yes after all those fighting words. WWE was already hyping this match for SummerSlam. Lesnar finally makes an on-screen appearance again and gets knocked out of the ring. Brock looks like he at least went to the gym a bunch.
Austin/McMahon feud remembered. Absolutely epic. Best feud ever, in my opinion.
Santino and Hornswoggle hand out Brawling Buddies to the fans. Similar to the WWF Wrestling Buddies from back in the day, but looks slightly smaller.
Fink introduces the next match. Heath Slater's out first. Uh oh. Another legend coming? It's no DQ and no countout. HI LITA! Damn, Trish and Lita on the same episode again. I can die happy. No thong showing, though, because WWE's all PG now. OH YES, APA! Yet another markout moment for me seeing that. Then all the legends appear again. Twist of Fate from Lita. Clothesline From Hell from JBL. Moonsault from Lita. Done. Nice last hurrah for all the legends.
Sean Mooney is back with a short Daniel Bryan backstage interview. Nice to see he's aged pretty well.
Why is being the 100 millionth social follower a huge thing? I mean, it's great WWE has that many, but is he any different from the next guy?
Kane comes out for his match. Jinder Mahal leads Hunico, Camacho, Reks, Hawkins, and McIntyre. So it's a one-on-six handicap match? OH SNAP IT'S UNDERTAKER. Brothers of Destruction back together! Makes me wonder if he grew his hair back out, or if he's still bald. Oh, nice shaved mohawk look. Kane and Taker just stare at each other in the ring, then take out those six guys. Win.
Main event time with Punk and Cena for the title. Crowd very loud for this one. As I expected, Cena was the first to cash in MITB and NOT win the title. Cena doesn't need the title. Let Punk really have an extremely long reign. And Lawler yet again doesn't remember RVD telling people he'd cash in his MITB briefcase on Cena at One Night Stand many moons ago.
Good main event. Ref bump appears to cost Cena the title. Big Show with the spear and WMD to Cena. Punk all conflicted. He gets the ref back in and hesitates for the cover. Two count. Cena gets Punk in STF. Show back in to cause the DQ. Show nukes Cena and Punk doesn't help. Rock comes out to help. Punk takes out Rock. VINTAGE HEEL TURN!
Punk heel turn was great. I liked the heel Punk a lot. Even when he was doing his pipebomb promos last year, he had this cockiness to him that I wish he had from the start of his WWE career. People cheered back then because he was that rebel against the system, a refreshing feeling against the humdrum Cena promos and trying to break through that glass ceiling. Remember the stuff with the Straight Edge Society? Those were golden promos. This time though, Punk doesn't have to preach straight edge 100 percent. He can preach his gimmick as the best in the world.
It was a very good RAW, filled with memorable stuff. The matches weren't overly breathtaking, though. Only five matches in three hours, and two of them were squashes.
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