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And now, here’s the Best and Worst of WWE Raw for July 20, 2015.
Best, But Honestly Worst: When Did Louis Armstrong Become The Undertaker
As cool as The Undertaker is — and, admittedly, he’s cool as shit — here’s your semi-annual reminder that he’s kind of a terrible promo. All he’s gotta do to succeed at this point is be the Undertaker, you know? Take 15 minutes to get to the ring, say some spooky stuff, hit the “rest in peace.” That’s it. He’s mastered those things, and if you’re a 12-year old who’s into dragons he’s probably the best promo of all time. If you aren’t, there’s always a spot where he’s a few minutes in and it’s getting harder to remember which spooky shit goes where, and he just kinda stands there with his hand out making a confused face. He’ll pause, stammer, look around like he’s forgotten where he is and say something like, “at SummerSlam we must COMBINED OUR DESTINIES,” and everybody goes WOOO YEAHHHHH because UNDERTAKER. He’s earned it. He deserves to be able to stand there making fart noises with his mouth and get cheered for 20 minutes because he’s the goddamn Undertaker, but the promos themselves are cold boogers on a paper plate and are never getting better. Cold booger-reds on a paper plate.
Anyway, Taker says that Battleground was his TRUE RESURRECTION (WOO YEAHHHH) and it gave him a gravely Batman voice, which he will use to make Brock Lesnar rest in something something at SummerSlam. His motivations are simple: streaks are made to be broken but Paul Heyman won’t shut up about it, and also that WrestleMania match with Bray Wyatt never happened. Shut up, it didn’t!
I’m a little disappointed that he didn’t mention Brock breaking his brother’s leg on last week’s Raw right after the poor guy’d gotten back from a beautifully photoshopped Hawaiian vacation, but I guess when a guy makes you walk through a literal wall of fire and sets fire to your dead parents’ bones you stop fretting about his day-to-day problems.
Worst: Brie Bella, Worker
The Divas Revolution has been a long time coming, but three things bother me:
1. Stephanie McMahon being omnipresent and taking credit for everything. What’s her deal? I know she’s into pretending she came up with the idea for the Ronda Rousey or whatever, but Steph being all, “NOW THESE ACTION FIGURES ARE FRIENDS WITH THESE ACTION FIGURES” and just constantly bragging about them and taking mark photos is so weird and forced. Is she really into it, or is she just jealous of the past year of Triple H hiring Prince Devitt and Kevin Steen so he can make kissy wolfy-face hands with them on Instagram? Hey, remember when The Shield got really cool and popular and Triple H was constantly backstage with his arm around them talking about how perfect and special they are, and how everyone should politely smile and clap their hands for their cool and creative boss?
2. Michael Cole should never be allowed to speak to women. The guy’s been Pavlov’d into thinking that “you’re jealous” is a Diva’s only possible motivation, even when he just saw Stephanie McMahon picking teams and telling everyone they’re equal.
3. The Bella Twins. God bless them, but they do not still need to be directly involved in everything that happens. They have that triple threat match at Battleground where each team has to pick a representative, and Brie Bella — the worst non-Tamina wrestler in this batch of nine no matter how hard she’s trying — steps in. There’s a singles match the next night, and Brie Bella steps in. There’s a tag match announced for Smackdown, and Brie Bella’s in. Paige and Becky Lynch team up against Naomi and Sasha Banks, and the Bellas sit in on commentary to make sure everyone looks at and thinks about Brie Bella. I don’t think I’ve ever seen wrestlers spend a week working this hard to keep their spots. They’re like a twin set of doorstops, wedging themselves under the Divas division to keep it from opening.
If that was a plot point to get them heel heat I’d be all over it, but it doesn’t totally feel that way. It kinda feels like Bart just got an elephant and the other pets are learning English to get his attention.
The best part of all of this is Cole being like, “hey Alicia Fox, do you feel like you made a mistake by joining Team Bella,” and her being all, “WE’RE WINNERS,” like she’s ever getting a match.
Best: Charlotte
Popular opinion’s gonna go from “Charlotte’s great” to “of course they’re giving everything to CHARLOTTE” pretty quick, so I want to make sure I point out how good she is at what she does, and how happy I am that not only is she finding success on the biggest stage in wrestling, but she gets to do it while Ric Flair follows her around being a loving, awkward dad. Once the novelty of seeing her win matches has worn off, Ric needs to start managing her and doing that sassy stage dad thing they did in NXT for a few weeks.
Worst: Welcome Back To The Worst Finish In Wrestling
The Prime Time Players (the Tag Team Champions, let’s remember) wrestle Los Matadores. You may remember Los Matadores from not doing anything ever. The match should’ve been them putting heat on Darren for a while, Darren making the hot tag and all three members of Los Matadores bursting into flame.
Instead, The New Day shows up and distracts Titus, causing him to lose the match. I don’t want to f*ck with WWE’s only booking idea, but they need to institute a rule where if somebody’s wrestling and a non-participant’s music starts playing, the ref can call time out and everyone has to go back to their corners while the interruption’s shuffled out. That’s the one thing I’d do if I got put in charge of WWE, and I’d be the least popular person in the history of the company. Mid-card Raw matches would go forever. How are teams supposed to win or lose without whoever they’re feuding with showing up to make them mindlessly stare up a ramp? THAT’S HOW YOU KNOW WHO HAS THE MENTAL ADVANTAGE. THIS IS IMPORTANT.
Worst: Everybody Shut Up, Mom And Dad Are Talking
Triple H and Stephanie were the worst versions of themselves on Monday.
They made sure they were the only important people on the show. The Undertaker is a f*cking undead wizard who teleported into Battleground from beyond the grave to attack the most overpowered character in WWE history during a WWE World Heavyweight Championship match. Undertaker’s like, I AM GOING TO MURDER AND LITERALLY BURY YOU, and then we jump backstage to Triple H and Stephanie all, “wow, what a great marketing opportunity, let’s make sure everyone notices our great event SummerSlam.” Triple H is on the phone with Paul Heyman — “on the phone” with Paul Heyman — and gets the better of him, telling him to GROW A SET and do what he says. This is super easy, especially when Heyman’s not actually in the scene and you’re yelling into a phone. While that’s happening, he makes sure to bury The Miz for some reason. Stephanie does her Baby Mine act with the Divas.
They don’t want Undertaker and Brock to fight before Sunday … SummerSlam is this Sunday, right? … so they gather the roster that doesn’t matter (hi, Kevin Owens!) into a room and turn them into security guards. When Stephanie tells everyone to shut up and pay attention, they do. Basically the entire episode felt like Snowpiercer is what I’m trying to say. I kept hoping Cesaro would rise up from the back of the room and lead a mutiny.
Best: Big Show Literally Kicking The Miz’s Ass
Speaking of The Miz, he loses in like a minute to one of Big Show’s transitional moves. One day WWE will realize that we parrot what they tell us and that if they say “nobody cares about this wrestler” over and over thinking they’re being ironic or funny, nobody’s going to care about that wrestler. But it is not this day!
The match was nothing and set up a challenge for “Tough Enough, the reality show?” Big Show wants an injured Ryback to put up the Intercontinental Championship in the face of God and ZZ on a game show full of people who don’t give a rat’s shit about wrestling. The best part is the framing of Show’s promo, though, with him repeatedly kicking Miz in the ass while he talked. I don’t know if they were trying to illustrate “kicking a man while he’s down” or what, but mission accomplished.
I’d like to believe Sandow was forlornly watching all alone backstage, lying beside the TV, selling the ass.
Best: KAIJU BIG BATTEL
So I guess Battleground happened and a lot of the finishes didn’t make sense, so they devoted giant chunks of Raw to expository speeches. Undertaker opens the show, Seth Rollins gets 80 minutes to explain his motivations in hour 3 and right in the middle we’ve got Paul Heyman. Heyman accepts Undertaker’s challenge on Lesnar’s behalf, spitting in the face of Triple H’s DIRECT ORDERS like a JERK, and Taker teleports in to threaten him. Lesnar runs out to brawl with him, the entire locker room of expendables pours out to separate them, and we get an admittedly pretty-awesome pull-apart rumble between two of the biggest, strongest, craziest characters on the show. It’s like an undead wizard King Kong throwing hands with a sponsored-by-sandwiches Godzilla.
It’s fun to play Where’s Waldo with the crowd. Hey, it’s Brad Maddox! Hey look, Damien Sandow got back on Raw! Look, The Ascension thinks they’re people!
The fight goes backstage and a bunch of security guards show up, and if you’ve ever watched wrestling you know the only thing stronger than a group of wrestlers is a group of wrestlers in cop costumes. They zip-cuff Lesnar and lead him away, hopefully to a series of promos where he lurks in a jail cell like he’s goddamn Matanza and threatens The Undertaker’s life for a month. He needs to show up to SummerSlam all malnourished with an enormous, flesh-colored beard. Anyway, this was great.
One question, though:
… nobody liked their first match, right? Like, I’m not imagining that? It was important and unforgettable because of the finish, but it had nothing to do with “the finish,” it was the result. Now we’re adding a year and a half, and putting a guy who’s worked four matches this year against a 50-year old who’s worked one? Plus, we’ve kinda illustrated that Brock spectacle matches only really work when he’s up against someone we think deserves to be destroyed. It’s why the Cena and Reigns matches worked, but Rollins didn’t. Are we … are we cool with this not being very good again?
Worst: Six More Weeks Of Bray Wyatt Interfering In Roman Reigns Matches
Luke Harper interfered in their match at Battleground, so instead of going in another direction with it, we’re continuing the Bray Wyatt vs. Roman Reigns feud with non-stop interference. Am I insane? I get a lot of feedback that’s like, “I don’t always agree with you, but-” Is this what you disagree with me about? Are there people out there who love matches ending in a bunch of nothing? Do you watch Harper and Reigns wrestle for a few minutes and start going, “man, I wish Bray would get out of his chair and attack Reigns, so we can see a disqualification!”
The good news for Roman is that his little buddy Dean Ambrose is here to even the odds. Dean Ambrose isn’t Denzel, but I can see him as Denzel’s friend! So I guess they’re building to a tag team match at SummerSlam, or they’re gonna shoehorn-in Sting and run a six-man tag. Who do the Wyatts add as their third man? CAN IT BE HULK HOGAN. CAN HE COME TO THE RING AND LEGDROP BRAY?
Worst: Words And Words And Words And Words And Words
I think everyone was the worst version of themselves last night. Seth Rollins certainly was. He disappears during the Undertaker’s attack at Battleground, then magically shows up like two hours into Raw to cut a promo about how he lost by disqualification but is still WWE World Heavyweight Champion. Nothing like a guy who can’t win matches without the help of early-2000s independent circuit cruiserweights and the middle-management version of f*cking Kane cutting braggy promos about how he lost to make us … I can’t even finish that joke. Support him? Not support him? Want to see him get his ass kicked? When he’s 8 minutes into one of those 25 minute promos he does you kinda don’t want ANYTHING for him, you just want him to take it the hell home.
He’s interrupted by John Cena. Do you know the worst version of John Cena? It’s the one who is totally fine after “one of the biggest matches of his career” or whatever and morally judges everyone around him. He’s the John Cena that calls the WWE World Heavyweight Champion a joke to his face, is correct because John Cena’s the only important character on the show, and nothing happens. He’s just right. He calls the champ a coward, and the champ cowers. This is building to a big payoff where Cena EASILY DEFEATS EVERYONE, chuckling while the heels deal with personal problems he’d never be affected by.
I hate to sound pessimistic, and I’m sorry. I just see these guys defaulting back to zero so they can build to SummerSlam, and it’s frustrating.
Best: Lana Rae
The bad news is that Dolph Ziggler’s windpipe isn’t permanently damaged and that he’s talking again.
The good news is that now Rusev has the upper-hand in this game of Eurasian love one-upsmanship and has Summer Rae dressing like Lana and mocking her to make her feel bad. I sincerely hope Lana feels terrible about everything she’s done. Lana Rae shows up looking top shelf as hell, and Rusev comes in all “aw shucks” and makes out with her with his eyes open so he can stare down Lana. This would be heel as hell if Ziggler hadn’t responded to Rusev being all, “f*ck her, she sucks, I’m moving on” by dragging Lana to the ring, repeatedly insisting that him f*cking her should make Rusev feel awful and then making out with her in front of him. Ziggler and Lana are jerks, and by the transitive properties of the Fandango/Summer Rae/Layla love triangle, they have to get humiliated for like three months in a row to make it right.
Lana proves my point during the main event when she interferes, attacks Summer and starts throwing shoes. Are those the actions of someone who isn’t jealous, and doesn’t realize she jumped to the wrong sinking ship?
Best: Two Divas Matches On The Same Show!
Sure, it came with a velvet painting of Stephanie McMahon cradling a baby fawn or whatever, but we got a 13-minute Divas tag team match on Raw — the second Divas match of the night, no less, and the second to feature Actual Wrestling — so thank you based Divas Revolution.
For the longest time I’ve thought that the only thing keeping WWE audiences from accepting women’s wrestling as a viable thing and not a garbage bathroom break is WWE spending more than two weeks every three years deciding women’s wrestling’s a viable thing and not a garbage bathroom break. WWE audiences will believe almost anything you tell them, so you just say “hey, this is good” a bunch and put on matches featuring performers you trust to be good, and bam, it works. Paige and Becky Lynch wrestle Sasha Banks and Naomi, and if you need to know whether or not the formula works, listen to the pop Paige gets off the hot tag. That’s a crowd that’s watching and giving a shit about what’s happening, because what’s happening’s worth giving a shit about. See how that works?
The finish works, too. Tamina tries to interfere (looking like she just stumbled in from a Sonic & Knuckles fan-fiction) and gets booted off the apron, but it doesn’t change the ending. Paige locks in the PTO. Sasha sees her partner in trouble, slides in and boots Paige in the side of the head. Paige gets caught with a Banks Statement, and while I’m honestly not sure who was supposed to be legal or whatever, Paige submits. The heels win a match because they’re GOOD AT WRESTLING, and the faces still look like they could’ve had it at any second. Becky gets to be a Steampunk Ricky Morton, Paige gets to be a Satanist Robert Gibson and B.A.D. get to be the world’s most light-up-shoesiest Midnight Express.
One thing, though:
Worst: The Bellas On Commentary
You might not have enjoyed the tag match because the Bella Twins were busy being a drunk girl at a party who won’t stop talking on commentary. Longtime viewers know that the Bellas on color is a death sentence for any Divas match, because the Bellas only have one gear: talk about how the Bellas “fill.” They fill like the other Divas are just jealous! They fill like they’re being disrespected because they work hard! This whole thing hurts their fillings!
It’s incessant, and none of it contributes positively. It’s a person with their back turned to a wrestling match, putting over nothing but their interpretation of a story they’ve just made up, starring themselves. It works for a heel character to be self-obsessed to the point of insanity — Dana Brooke, I’m looking in your direction — but it doesn’t work here for two reasons:
1. The Bellas aren’t heels. They’re free-floating alignment fairies that heel it up when they want and point-around for cheers when they don’t, and everyone around them just has to adjust. They’re the women’s wrestling equivalent of Triple H and Stephanie. It’s Poochie and her sister, Shittier Poochie. Nikki isn’t justifying her actions as a heel, she’s explaining why she’s a face and wants you to go along with it without any self-awareness whatsoever.
2. If you heel at the expense of a match, you’re doing it wrong. Bobby Heenan was a heel announcer, but devoted most of his time to making his points of view as ridiculous as possible so the people at home would go, “that guy’s wrong, Hulk Hogan’s great.” Jesse Ventura did something similar, appealing to the primitive 80s smarks by pointing out that Hulk Hogan was a lecherous cheater, but with an insulting confidence that made wrestling fans disagree with him whether they wanted to or not. Heel announcers and heels on commentary can get over how they feel and how awful they are without being the undying focal point of everything. Your thoughts and character motivations are seasoning on the steak, not the seasoning and the steak and the plate and the fork.
Best: Cesaro Gets To Be Friends With Zack And AC
Seriously, look at this:
One’s the hero protagonist who constantly acts like a jerk, routinely break kayfabe without consequences and gets whatever he wants. The other’s a jock with authority issues who’s important, but not as important as the first guy. They once got into a fight in the hallway, but they’re FRIENDS FOREVER.
Anyway, they team up with Screech (Cesaro) to take on Kevin Owens, Rusev and Sheamus. Apparently Cena and Orton wanted to take the night off, because they mostly just stand on the apron while the heel team falls apart. Sheamus is Mr. Money in the Bank, meaning he doesn’t care about wins or losses or ANYTHING and would rather be somewhere braiding his beard to make it look MORE like a dog’s ass. Kevin Owens is heartbroken and pissed at everyone, even moreso than usual, so he gets into physical altercations with his partners and eventually bails. That leaves UNDERCOVER BABYFACE RUSEV to wrestle the match 1-on-3.
So, how does that usually go?
Oh, right. Lana interferes and beats up Rusev’s manager, leaving him super all alone and fighting against the odds. The babyfaces, all three of them, get in the ring at once and start doing comical finishers to him as punishment. The referee just stands around and lets it happen without forcing anybody into the corner, because John Cena is The Law. All the faces cackle and cheer while they beat up this sad Bulgarian dude with emotional issues, and that’s the end of the show.
At least Cesaro got to be one of them, right?
Best: Top 10 Comments Of The Night
ScooterMcGooch
Lesnar/Taker can’t happen. There’s no giant SummerSlam sign for Taker to stare at to make it official.
Slideshow Bob
Do you think Becky flew them here in her gyrocopter?
Johnny Slider
Charlotte should wreck Brie as easily as Brock did Seth, only for Michelle McCool to pop out of the darkness and rip Charlotte’s extensions.
Harry Longabaugh
Theory as to Titus’ newfound dominance: he finally cashed in all of his Redemption Points.
HollywoodLanceCharmstrong
Triple H: I’m calling in Veronica…
*John Cena drops in from space*
Mr. Royal Rumble, TheCensoredMSol
All my 9.99s if this promo is interrupted by the Taker-Lesnar brawl plowing through the wall like the dance number in Blazing Saddles.
JonSte13
The greatest trick Cena ever pulled was convincing the world that he wasn’t the same ol’ Cena.
The Real Birdman
Alicia Fox is officially the best Bella on commentary
Riven
In an oddly ironic twist, Sheamus has left and I now find myself entertained.
Gratliff
Just spray NWO on his back and be done with it
