Iron Moose

Tatum tweeting "MY HOME" after Ivar and Oba smashed through the barricade was great. A bit unfortunate that she wasn't on the show after last week. Jacy was bleeding quite a bit after her match, I hope she's OK. Fallon's outburst makes sense given what she's been through the past months (taking Jazmyn's Pele for Thea, being on the outside of the Stand and Deliver celebration, regretting breaking up with Brooks and Jensen, getting upset by Jaida without anyone in her corner). It also feels more real than Jacy's one-dimensional (albeit delightful) contrarian villainy, and it's not out of left field to be exasperated with Chase U - but it'll be disappointing if it leads to a YOU FANS promo and slide towards cruelty for the sake of it. I really like Sol as a basically reasonable person that everyone is OK with, it lets her interact with a lot of Big Personalities and find a more sure footing as a character. Jaida was a bit nervous on the mic but ultimately delivered; Sol seemed to be rushing a bit to hit her marks. Both Sol and Jaida had good asides while Ariana was talking, and Mia is probably in the ladder match to steady it out. Ridge on the verge of being pulled into the Chase U vortex is intriguing. Him and Andre being reasonable to each other was really nice to see, somehow.

c'est étrange que ça se traduit comme contrecoup - je le lis plus comme 'recoil' que 'backlash' ... ça vient de google translate, ou un autre logiciel? Pour les Kabuki, on devrait mettre 'guerrières' sauf si i.elles cachent quelque chose ... Ours Meurtrier me fait MDR Pour le propre évènement, j'attendrais Sami, Corbin (la France lui adore, et je n'ai aucune idée pourquoi), Ricochet si Samantha est présente ...

this is in no way intended to be a gotcha! comment, but I think it's important to make allowances for the crowd steering alignments over the intent of the writers. That there's a distinction between rejecting the story while engaging with it (Io/Bianca in PR; refusing to accept Becky as a heel, leading to The Man era), versus disregarding the story (the MEAT chants for Miro/Hobbs when their respective alignments were ... unclear at the time?), but I'm not sure where or how clear that border is...

this is brilliant, and aligns well with how the hottest wwe AND aew stories over the past years have had the gloss of office politics behind them.

this is the kind of analysis I really dig. I do think the venue setup is uniquely unusual, but yeah, a lot of things felt a bit off.

Ava should draft Dwayne, be told he's not available, and then stare into the distance and mutter "... no, he never is. " And then everything continues as expected.

Roxanne, through no fault of her own, strikes me as a real challenge to pull up to the main roster. I think another few months in NXT to figure out a synthesis of her current edge with faceness would help her a lot. I think the struggle is in finding a balance between regressing her character to be easier for a big audience to get to like and follow, versus bringing her up with her current, snarkier outlook. Witness the main roster struggles of KC2, Candice and Indi and Team Kick - a big part of why I think they've had trouble connecting is that a lot of their character development (that situates their current personas in opposition to their previous selves) happened years ago, effectively offscreen.

Meanwhile, on LVL UP: Riley Osborne d Kale Dixon - I will assume this was flippy and competent but I'm too tired for it right now. Karmen Petrovic d. Wren Sinclair, in another really solid base performance from Wren, possibly the best Petrovic has looked outside of her very chippy series with Lola. I think this suffered a bit from being face-face and I'm not sure what Petrovic is going for with her makeup, but she has some great kicks and counters. The commentary re Wren's Harry Potter fandom was off-putting and infantilizing, which seems to be happening more and more as the NXT Women's division skews younger, but that's a concern for another time. Hank & Tank d Javier Bernal and Drake Morreaux in a very big, dumb, fun display of horseplay.

Last time she was concussed she was out of action for quite a while, and shortly after she won the Rumble she had an interview where she spoke about her knees being in really bad shape. Last week, during the Liv backstage attack, she had her other forearm in a brace of some sort. It could be a lot of things, I guess. Anyway, they also announced that next week there's a battle royale to name the next women's champion. Not sure who they go with, but given the impending draft I'm hoping NXT gets a few people in the mix.

This also applies to Jacy's sudden re-heeling, turning away from Thea (when they were a genuinely fun team against Chelsea and Piper) and towards Jazmyn, and what seems like the plug being pulled on Thea/Riley.

it's also paternalistic, and a big part of Thea's character since the towel was thrown in has been asserting her independence.

Ruca/Davenport ended up being a very able Face Guts It Out performance, but I am a bit disappointed because I think the story called for Fired Up Face Loses Because They Stop Themselves From Going To A Dark Place. Blair shoved nine months of Sol's life into rehab and physio - I feel like starting mad or starting cold would have been preferable to the slower build we got. Wren continues to do lots of little things right; Grace's character work continues to delight. I hope Dolin's OK.

Solid episode overall. Nyx held up her end and it looks like we're building to a big tag with Kiana/Izzy/Jacy and Kelani/Fallon/Thea. If they pull in Nyx I guess the faces can bring in Brinley or Wren? Trick has IT. For the sake of Sol's character development I really hope she doesn't come out smiling next week and do her entire entrance routine. The story calls for anger. Stacks' match essentially being a kamikaze mission to hurt Ilja's chopping hand was smart.

Guest Ref Punk was an intriguing part of the journey, such that feels like it undermined the eventual Special Guest On Commentary destination. it was like the sound chip on the talking The Rock doll got stuck between "look at you now" and "MAMArhodes" Also if Mama Rhodes doesn't slap The Rock real hard during 'mania (or I guess whip him with the belt?) what are we even doing here

Shayna tries to get involved: And Punk enters the conversation (well, at least two conversations at once)