HumanChessgame

"This Shaq guy is getting to be a hot commodity. I hear they just made one of those fighting video games about him and he was in a superhero movie! We'd better get him on the show while he's still relevant!"

Move it back to network TV.

It's kind of hard to believe the same group that came up with the dog's breakfast that was Wrestlemania put together this magnificent piece of work. This happens a few times a year - Raw will feature great matches with storylines advancing in interesting ways and no overly tedious promos, then be back to the same old schtick in a few weeks. I'm hopeful they decided to do a full reboot and get everything going fresh this week, but that remains to be seen. One thing latter day WCW actually did well was to make every title mean something by booking individual storylines surrounding them where the wrestlers vying for the belts made them seem important. It looks like they're doing that with the IC title and hopefully will do the same with the US belt. Just give a couple of guys a feud where winning that particular belt is the most important thing they're focused on, instead of it being a side item to a feud or a stepping stone to the world belt. When Ambrose told Jericho he had a note from Shane I was expecting something like this - Someone should shop Jericho and Dean's heads in there.

Anyone know what their shooting schedule is like? Part of me is wondering if they pulled the copout ending they did to gauge fan reactions and get a feel on just who to decide to kill off and have a couple different plot directions they could go with accordingly.

So the outcome of Shane's match ultimately meant nothing since he got to run Raw for a night anyways. Even though he did pretty much nothing the whole night. Enzo & Cass debut was everything I hoped it would be, though Carmella was a bit conspicuous by her absence. There are worse people to get into a first program with than the Dudleys. As stale as they are, they are still good on the mic and can work decently well in the ring. Poor Vaudvillians are going to be dead in the water, I'm afraid. I'd figured Ryder would drop the belt to a returning Cena, and really feel bad for him that he had to lose it to someone as insufferable as the Miz. Crews is still a physical specimen who is completely uninteresting in the ring. Someone had mentioned that since character work doesn't matter as much here than in NXT he might be better suited but time will tell. Corbin is still just another lumbering big guy to me. I might have cared about a Wyatts/LON feud if they had built on it when they started several months ago and had a Mania blowoff. Still, I'm not going to write it off as dead weight. Was it really that hard to have Roman do those types of promos from the beginning? The cocky "I don't give a fuck about the fans" swagger and few words is just the sort of thing he should have been doing all along. Main event was about 5-10 minutes away from being an MOTYC. I'm thinking (and hoping) the Sami injury is a work. Cesaro was in fine form and it's excellent to have him back. I'm going to temper my enthusiasm till they actually do something worthwhile with him though.

The tearaway Cesaro suit should make "Sledgehammer" start playing on the PA wherever you are when you pull it off.

So, pretty much the same program Styles and Jericho are in the midst of?

I look forward to a 15 minute promo about how he Overcame The Odds and felt the power of all the make a wish kids to help him get better faster and get back to action, followed by him probably winning the IC belt from Ryder.

I agree with this. The match was plodding and dull and even as decrepit as Taker is, there's still no way Shane should have been getting the best of him that easily. Was that the first time Hell's Gate has been countered? I seem to recall it always being a pretty protected move. The dive just seemed like a vain attempt to salvage something watchable out of the whole debacle. Problem being is that everyone realizes how nonsensical the booking was going into it and that there's no logical outcome to the match with the stipulations being what they were. Deciding to have Shane do some insane move to try and make the whole thing memorable didn't come off as daring or exciting, just a desperate attempt to generate a holy shit moment and detract from what a clusterfuck it was. The preshow matches were ok, but nothing memorable. The women's match was a lot better than I'd expected, Kalisto (thankfully) retained in a solid but non-outstanding match, and the Usos-Dudleys might as well been on Smackdown. Opening ladder match was inoffensive with some good spots here and there. Ryder winning was completely out of left field and probably far too late to really do him much good. He and Rawley finally had an act with some momentum that would probably do as well as either of them can as far as the ceiling it has, and him winning the title here didn't feel big but more like something as a placeholder. The New Day's entrance was tremendous and the match was decent. They seemed to be changing the stipulations on the fly - first it's 4 on 3, then 3 on 3, then maybe or maybe not for the titles. The LON winning clean was a real surprise. I'm not opposed to legends guys coming out and getting their shit in, but it did absolutely no one any favors for them to make a team that just cleanly won a match look like chumps. Jericho/Styles has been booked backwards from the get-go. This is the 5th match they've had. Putting them in a short lived team to break up and feud should have been done -before- they ever wrestled eachother, not after. Even with Jericho's excellent heel work and their in-ring chemistry pretty much everyone is sick of seeing this pairing at this point. Unless they have Styles start up the Bullet Club tomorrow night, this whole program has gone on way too long. Women's match was easily the best match of the evening. This is the best I've seen Charlotte work on the main roster and Becky and Sasha were in top form. I'm really surprised that Charlotte won (especially with what a big deal Sasha's entrance made her look like), but I guess they're going to do a one on one feud with her and Sasha before she drops the title. The Brock/Ambrose match was a steaming pile. It had been discussed here before that Brock is really starting to mail it in, especially after the Wyatt family match on the network, and he really seemed like he couldn't give a shit less here. Watching him wrestle is like fighting a boss in a video game that just does one move over and over again. This was an attitude era hardcore match, only even more sanatized and dull and the ending didn't feel special at all. The battle royale was fun for what it was and had the right amount of inoffensive absurdity to balance out the show. I'm really shocked Corbin won, especially considering he wasn't announced (that I recall anyways). Was Henry legit hurt? He sat out for almost the whole thing, then got tossed pretty quickly when he came back in. I've never seen anything special in Corbin, so we'll see if he can do anything on the main roster, should he actually be called up. It wasn't until the Wyatts came out that I realized they hadn't been in the battle Royale. Given how impotent they've been made to look, allowing them to beat the Rock down would have done a little something to re-establish their credibility, but instead it was almost as if they decided to find a way to make them look as ineffectual as possible. Main event was about like I expected it to be. The entrance was just so absurd and over the top that it bordered on self-parody. I didn't actively hate the match itself and it ended about how I figured it would. Like most of the rest of the people watching both online and at home, I was just glad it was over.

"Someone get on the roof and wiggle the antenna around!"

Will this thread be staying open for live discussion?

I expected the show to be good but, fuck, that was something else. The tag match was honestly my most anticipated of the evening and I wish they'd built it up about more and given it another 5 minutes, because it was pretty much a clinic of face/heel tag team psychology. All the cutoffs the Revival were doing (especially Wilder's under the ring move) were on another level. I'd thought this would be match of the night but was never more happy to be proven wrong. I'm one of the few people here who thinks Corbin is a generic hoss who does absolutely nothing for me, but his match with Aries was still pretty good. Aries winning with a rollup was probably the best way to finish it as Aries got the much needed debut win and Corbin didn't look overly weak. It wasn't until tonight I really warmed up to Nakamura. I've always thought he was just some skinny guy acting all spastic who I didn't buy as being overly stiff for no reason, but tonight he really clicked with me. Both he and Sami were just going all out and this match just kept getting better and better. Everything they did meant something and they kept pulling out more and more stuff. Nak countering Sami's diving DDT was especially brilliant. The women's match was also a thing of beauty. Nothing about it I can really point to specifically, other than Bailey working Asuka's legs and the ending making Bailey look strong even in defeat. I really hope she doesn't go to the main roster right away as she'd unfortunately get lost in the suffle. I find it kind of ironic Drake Younger was stopping a match due to blood loss. The main event was a lot better than I was expecting. I know Joe and Finn can both deliver, but they really stepped up their game here with Joe making himself look like a killer and Finn looking like the resilient champ who has a way to answer everything thrown at him. The ref stoppages actually detracted from the match for me as it brought down the pace. Still, the Bret/Austin homage was probably the best way to end things and I hope Joe gets called up. As much as I'd like seeing him as NXT ace, I really want him to get his on the main roster while he has tthe chance.

Plus it's a match on the preshow featuring nine other wrestlers. Eva probably won't get more than a minute or two of ring time.

Wrestling sites were the first websites I went to when I got regular internet access in 1996 or so. Scoops, RSPW (mainly for links to other sites), and Wrestlezone were my biggest stops (Scoops was my internet start page for a long time), plus random other places that would host video clips of ECW/Japanese stuff that took 30 minutes to see about 10 seconds of action. I also subscribed to Slobberknocker Central's Monday night recaps which were always a good read with none of the self-indulgent bullshit a lot of the regular recappers would use.

About 2 years back I watched about half of the 2003 series and was surprised at how good it was about putting together the original comic storylines while adding to it. This reminds me I should go back and finish watching it sometime. I haven't seen any of the current Nick series. Is it back to being geared towards a younger audience? I've found the first cartoon series has aged really poorly. Here's what facebook says is a new trailer-

Didn't Vince mention during his promo this past Monday that Shane/Taker was going to be the main event?

Last night I spent about 20 minutes trying to find a cool looking Pentagon Jr shirt to order online somewhere. I haven't bought a wrestling shirt since the Wanted Dead Cactus Jack shirt I had about 15 years ago. Bailey is fantastic, but Pentagon is getting my vote.

I thought the book was awful but decided to watch the show anyways. Surprisingly, they took out all of the saccharine crap that weighted the book down and actually capitalized on some of the more interesting aspects.

In 7th grade or so I put my friend's brother in a headscissors lock for a while when we were having a wrestling tournament in the living room. He started choking really bad immediately afterwards and I thought I had seriously hurt him or something. As far as wrestling as an adult goes, getting drunk and doing wrestling moves on eachother on one of those bigass trampolines is a lot of fun. But if you hit your buddy with a superfly splash he might barf.

There's a slow-mo video here of Neville's injury and it looks like he bent his ankle pretty badly the wrong way. It sucks if he's hurt as well, though from the looks of things he was probably destined for the battle royal or the multi man IC title match that looks be happening.

The Dolph/HHH match and Roman beatdown would have been a lot better if it had closed the show out. Putting it in the middle like that made it just seem like unimportant filler. That closing segment was terrible. Shane flubbing his line wasn't a huge deal, but his promo didn't make him sound convincing at all, and his attempt at fighting Taker made him look sub-jobber level. There's no way I can buy that he stands any chance at all at a physical confrontation.

Huh, up until now I had always thought Roadblock was another of Fred Ottman's gimmicks. Now I realize he's a different person.

IRT the stream being bad tonight - this was one of the first times during a live event I've never had streaming issues, though I'm watching on a wired connection instead of wifi like normal. Also agree that the crowd was either not that loud or maybe it was just the acoustics/micing of the building. Main event was legit good and one of if not the best singles matches Ambrose has ever had. The opening minutes with him screwing with HHH were top notch. I figured there was going to be some type of fuck finish, but the way it ended was still dumb. Rest of the card was decent enough. Charlotte/Nattie went a lot longer than I expected, but I'm guessing that has something to do with Nattie being the local hero or whatever. I was also surprised at how long Stardust/Sami went. Another really competitive match that shows Stardust should get used more and better than he is, but I don't know how they'd do that. NXT tag match was nice and I hope this means Enzo and Cass are being called up in the next week or two. Harper/Lesnar was disappointing. First some inane babble from Bray about it being a 2 on 1 match, then he never even gets near the ring (which is usual as he usually has the others do his dirty work), then we get a glorified squash. The opening sequence had me hope for Harper and Bray stiffing the fuck out of eachother for a while, but nope. Agreed with the others that said Brock has been built up so much it's going to be borderline unbelievable when someone gets a decent amount of offense in on him.

The tag match was fantastic, but this should have happened to kick off their feud and not now. Jericho turning was one of the most telegraphed turns in recent memory and while they've had several quality outings so far, the inevitable Mania match will still be just another retread. Ryback's promo was Ultimate Warrior level disjointed with none of the unintentional humor. He's already got Warrior's level of ring skill and cardio, so I guess he might as well copy his promo style too. How long is Roadblock even supposed to be? I'm only seeing 3 matches announced so far.

Owens is going to wrestle Big Show and we're going to like it. Or not. Probably not. I'd be more interested in seeing Owens/Adam Bomb, personally. There's nobody I'd rather see Owens wrestle less than Big Show; perhaps not even Kane. Fortunately, Kane seems destined for the Andre midcarder battle royal. As if the card wasn't shaping up to be enough of a wet end, I get the sinking feeling Ryback is going to be winning the battle royale. Fortunately winning it has prompted the previous winners to go absolutely nowhere.