The Best And Worst Of WWE Fastlane 2016

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And now, the Best and Worst of WWE Fastlane 2016. Surely make you lose your mind.

Best: Okay So Now Kalisto Is Absolutely The Better Man, Let’s Move On

Remember when Kalisto first won the United States Championship on Raw back in January? He lost it the next night on a Smackdown taping, and it built to a rubber match at the Royal Rumble with Kalisto going over. That put him up 2 matches to 1, and everybody was like, “okay, rivalry resolved, they traded victories and Kalisto proved he was the better man.” Instead of … you know, going with that, WWE revived the cycle for another several weeks to build to a 2-out-of-3 falls match at Fastlane — sorry, at the Fastlane Kickoff, because we need time for comedy segments and impromptu Curtis Axel matches — to decide who the better man actually is for realsies.

That happened, and it was probably Alberto Del Rio’s best or second best match since his return to WWE. I think I’d put it behind the Reigns match at Survivor Series, but it was still pretty good. It had a lot of the problems every Del Rio match has now — particularly the tree of woe double-stomp, which takes half an hour to set up even when he’s setting it up quickly and could be countered by just not holding yourself up and choosing to be tree of woe double-stomped — but it had some fire and a sense of urgency, so I liked it. WWE loves the “heel gets DQ’d in the first fall to get an easy win in the second” trope and always puts it over as great strategy, but I feel like a guy who can beat Kalisto straight-up like 70% of the time should’ve just stuck it out for a few more minutes and seen where it went. When you’re bigger and stronger than the guy, there’s no reason to put yourself in the hole just to make an already even match even.

But yeah, no, this was fun. It definitely should’ve been on the show proper. I think my favorite moment was the finish, with Kalisto going for Salida del Sol and Del Rio blocking it, only for Kalisto to change direction and snapmare him into the buckle. That was very creative, and a nice misdirection. Let’s all hope that this means Kalisto is the actual better man this time, no takebacks, and that he gets something fun to do besides “wrestle Alberto Del Rio” at WrestleMania.

The League of Nation is a bunch of f*cking schmucks, huh

Best: Banksy

If you want to know the difference between Sasha Banks and Brie Bella (and you don’t have eyeballs or anything resembling taste whatsoever), watch this WWE Fan Nation clip. Sasha hits the running knees in the corner, turns to the crowd and goes “ONE MORE?” The Cleveland crowd was pretty Cuyahoga River-quality all night, but they’re like, “YEAHHHH!” During Brie/Charlotte, Brie hits her running knee, turns to the crowd and goes “ONE MORE?” The crowd just kinda looks down at their phones and pretends like they don’t hear her. So Brie’s gotta stand there with her finger in the air, stalling, to no reaction.

I don’t think I expected much from this match, but it was (for what it was) honestly pretty good. Naomi still cuts a promo like she ran English through translate and back a few times, but her character work, particularly how she maintains her persona while she’s actually wrestling, is on a major upswing. Her look is there, her athleticism has always been there, and I feel like it’s all finally kinda coming together.

Call me crazy, but I think a semi-permanent Sasha/Becky team with a sort of Kevin Steen/El Generico dynamic could be money. Let them be friends and tag team partners, but acknowledge that Becky’s a likable, gullible, fired-up babyface and Sasha’s a talented but jerky borderline heel who is simultaneously a little unconfident and up her own ass. Banksy doing stereo submission finishers was the perfect call. I’m down for Charlotte vs. Sasha at WrestleMania or even Charlotte vs. Sasha vs. Becky, and I hope we get some combination of Horsewomen at the big show. Hell, let Bayley take a loss to Asuka on Friday and get her in there, too. F*ck it, let’s go for the gold. Without the Bellas around, we don’t even have a kayfabe excuse.

Best: Another Good Match

Kevin Owens beat Dolph Ziggler with a pop-up powerbomb, and we’ve seen it before. A lot. It was good, like it always is, and Owens being a champion heading into WrestleMania is absolutely right.

Without a lot else to say (besides Owens being more popular than Ziggler in Ziggler’s hometown), watch this:

That might be the best post-match promo I’ve seen in years. He puts over Ziggler as a great competitor and is still selling Ziggler’s offense during the damn Fallout interviews, but he’s also not afraid to body Ziggler for hanging out at high schools (“the play yard, at recess, he’s a cool guy, get it”) and being hated by his own family for being a terrible human being.

Maybe I’m awful too, but the accidental random noises that happen during the interview really tie it together. I don’t know if I’ve identified as much with a wrestler’s struggle in a while. There are moments when I’m running behind on my writing and I’ve gotta crank out 5,000 words about some terrible Raw and hit every single second of it so someone doesn’t ask me why I left it out, and I’m tired and hungry and I’ve gotta be funny and my next door neighbor won’t stop playing his guitar and I just want to Incredible Hulk through the wall and throw it and him down a flight of steps. I’ve said it a lot, but Kevin Owens is the voice of my generation. My entitled, angry, passionate, honest, insufferable, dedicated piece-of-sh*t generation.

I’m excited to see which one wrestler Dolph Ziggler will wrestle on every show for the next 6-8 weeks.

Worst: Brie Bella Does The Opposite Of WrestleMania 30

On paper, ignoring the Bella Twins’ fluid alignment that allows them to simultaneously be heels and faces and not succeed at either, this is a great story. Brie’s entire WWE family is either injured or retired, or so injured they might have to retire. Her twin sister had to have major neck surgery and might not ever get into the ring again. She can’t leave her house for 3 months. Her husband just had to step away from the thing he loves most in the world because his brain won’t cooperate with his body. These are people who could legitimately die if they keep their jobs. Hell, even John Cena’s injured. Brie’s the last one standing — the smallest, least confrontational, least successful of the bunch. She has to carry Daniel and Nikki on her shoulders. For her Divas Championship match, maybe the last one she’ll ever have, she wears Bryan’s kickpads and throws Nikki’s forearms.

In practice, the story is, “Brie Bella doesn’t know how to do anything.”

… #WWEFastlane pic.twitter.com/fsg66tUvfX

— Jocay🇪🇨 (@Jocay19) February 22, 2016

Charlotte’s shown that she doesn’t really excel unless she’s in the ring with someone exceptional she spent years training alongside in NXT (and even then it sometimes gets a little iffy), so putting her in a big championship match with a big, important emotional story and asking her to walk Brie Bella through it’s like asking a 15-year old to bartend. You’re gonna get drinks and they’re gonna be close, but they’re also probably going to taste like urine.

Brie Bella trying to drag Charlotte to the ground with HAND LEVERAGE and only getting a crucifix when she talks her opponent into lying down and doing it to herself is piss-poor. That move looked worse than Ric Flair.

If you only care about the story, Brie and Charlotte told a fine one. Brie tried hard, she summoned TOTEM SPIRIT AMERICAN DRAGON and TOTEM SPIRIT FEARLESS NIKKI and neither worked. She hurt herself doing her own move, got too caught up in the details and couldn’t close the deal. She had Charlotte in a Yes Lock, transitioned it into a nice-looking Tequila Sunrise, and then just sorta jumped face-first into the middle rope. It was very Brie Bella. She tried, and trying is admirable, but trying hard does not always mean you’re good at what you’ve tried hard to do.

In the nicest way to say this as possible, I hope this is Brie’s last high profile match, and that they don’t cram her into a WrestleMania thing just to get someone doing Daniel Bryan moves and taunts on the WrestleMania card. Do a Total Divas battle royal or something. I think there are enough people on the show to make it work. Give Brie a big win there, and present her an Andre the Giant Memorial Battle Royal trophy with a statue of Eva Marie’s husband on the top.

Best: Cool Dads Explode

Most of the conversation I’m hearing about the dream match of Chris Jericho vs. AJ Styles ~~that we’ve already seen twice~~ is about Jericho kicking out of the Styles Clash. You’re either on the “it’s total bullsh*t, there goes the idea that WWE’s protecting the move” side of the argument, or the “why are you complaining about everything” side. As you may know, I never complain and am critical of those who do. Ah I can’t even type that with a straight face.

But yeah, Jericho kicks out of the Styles Clash. From a fan of wrestling as a whole (including what happens outside of WWE), I’ll admit, it’s a little sad. It’s the first time we’ve seen the move in an important WWE setting, and it’s AJ’s first singles PPV match. If he hits a move that got famous for breaking people’s necks and it’s against Dave-Coulier-in-Brian-Setzer’s-Orchestra-ass Chris Jericho, he should win with it. He doesn’t, though, and has to put Jericho away with the Calf Crusher.

So, like, I see both sides of the argument. Jericho probably shouldn’t have kicked out. But it did heighten the drama of the match, put over the story of over-the-hill Jericho refusing to give up against this, uh, 38-year old rookie, and showed that Styles was resourceful enough to have more than one way to put away a WWE legend. It’s also probably true that Styles should acknowledge but retire the Styles Clash in WWE, because he can’t realistically do it to like half of WWE’s roster, and, you know, Michelle McCool did it first. I’m serious about half of that. He can keep it for big matches or big moments against smaller guys, but he looked like he was struggling to get it on increasingly dumpy but pretty average-sized Jericho. Also, if we’re being honest and stepping away from kayfabe for a second, the move is dumb as f*ck. It’s a flapjack from no height with all the momentum going into your legs. The only time it ever looks like it even KINDA hurts is when someone takes it wrong and he actually almost kills them.

I liked the Code of Honor after the match, even if Jericho giving the “y’did good, kid” shake to an 18-year veteran was a little much. I hope it’s punctuation on the end of the feud, though, and I like that Jericho actually worked to put the guy over for WWE audiences. That didn’t happen with Bray Wyatt. And how great is it that AJ’s new history is that he started in WCW, went to Japan to become IWGP Champion and is now looking to finally prove himself?

Worst: New Day Jumps The Shark

Edge and Christian talk about the New Day’s history, and how they started off as happy clapping guys and nobody cared about them. They only got popular because they started ripping off Edge and Christian, say Edge and Christian, and it turns into them all being friends and The New Day devolving back into happy clapping guys. That … really sucks. I’ve read a lot of comments lately about people thinking New Day’s spark was plateauing, and sadly this might’ve gotten me on board with that.

Edge and Christian are the Kevin Smith movies of wrestling. They were great when you were younger and Clerks is still a film school masterpiece, but you get older and you outgrow it and you realize Chasing Amy is about an idiot and Dogma is too obvious, and now you’re left with Tusk and sh*t and your youth is gone. Dude’s still out there being Silent Bob and being all, “hey guys, weed, comic books, snootchie bootchies” and you just want to forget being 20 and watch something good.

There’s something really disheartening about New Day shaking their booties at The League of Nations while Edge “makes it rain” on them. I know that’s probably funny, but … I don’t know. Edge was weirdly hung up on race the entire segment, calling them chocolate and saying they were the love children of E&C and Beyonce. I’m not crying racism or anything dramatic, but dude would not stop pointing out their blackness. And then he’s making it rain on them? The old white guys are telling the dynamic, modern thing why it’s a ripoff and doesn’t work, and they’re all just like, “that makes perfect sense, now we’re friends?” No thank you?

I think the larger point is that the segment wasn’t funny, and it didn’t really accomplish anything. You could argue that it turned New Day face, but did it? They just kinda did what faces told them to do, and taunted a heel team without actually doing anything to them. The League of Nations are impotent as hell, too, so there wasn’t a real sense of urgency or consequence to it. It just felt like sh*tty WWE comedy, and New Day are popular to people like me and you because they feel like not that.

I guess we eventually lose all the great funny heel acts to babyfacedom at some point. The Rock, Chris Jericho, New Day. We’re just kissing babies and hugging fat girls again. That’s fine, it just stops being the part of wrestling I like, and feels like is for me. It’s like the main roster equivalent of your favorite NXT guy getting called up and brutalized in the mid-card. The death of creative energy, because it’s now created by committee to make sure the most people watching like it. Don’t shake your butts because Christian told you to, guys. Hit Christian with a damn trombone.

Worst: Welp

If you want to know how important this match was, I almost forgot it happened, and it’s the only thing on the show WWE Fan Nation didn’t upload a clip of. There’s a clip of R-Truth vs. Curtis Axel, but not of your three babyface titans taking on a trios team that used to be good enough to beat The Shield in a Match of the Year. Now they’re just jobbing to guys nobody takes seriously in a throwaway match in the middle of a throwaway pay-per-view.

That about does it for the Wyatt Family, right? Before the Royal Rumble they were beating up Brock Lesnar, and reports had Lesnar facing Wyatt or Braun Strowman at WrestleMania. Now Lesnar’s probably wrestling Dean Ambrose, The Undertaker doesn’t want anything to do with them and they’ll probably end up in a multi-team tag team match or the Andre battle royal. What else can you even do with them? When they can’t combine their powers to beat Team Boring Smackdown in a feud that started six days ago, why the hell am I ever, ever taking them seriously again? What, are they gonna spooky lightning attack AJ Styles next week? Who gives a sh*t? They aren’t going to win the war, or even most of the battles, and when it’s over they’re just going to reset and repeat. F*ck the Wyatt Family. I’m done.

Best: Bo Dallas Has A Great Safety Rating

Bo Dallas is my heart in wrestler form. Maybe that’s why he looks so weird?

Worst: R-Truth Vs. Curtis Axel (??)

No shade at Mike McGillicutty or Goldust getting an angle on a pay-per-view, but yo, you’re gonna put this and 20 minutes of Edge and Christian regressing the New Day on Fastlane, but Alberto Del Rio vs. Kalisto in a 2-out-of-3 falls match for a championship ends up on the pre-show? BOTH of those things should’ve been on the pre-show. On whatever show’s on before the pre-show. Like, Renee is just getting out of hair and makeup and Axel’s in the ring pinning Truth in front of nobody. Edge is insulting Xavier Woods like, “You remind me of P.K. Subban” and Woods is turning it into an Earthbound joke as doors are opening.

Best: The One Match On A One-Match Show

And now, the main event. This was DOPE. Brock Lesnar triple threats are bulletproof, apparently.

What I loved the most about the match is that it told a story that made sense, and the crowd could understand it and actually get into it. It’s not a Brie/Charlotte situation where they tried to force a story on you with no real history or sh*t to believe … they used the friendship and gang-team history of Ambrose and Reigns and the earth-eating abilities of Brock Lesnar to build the early portion of the match around Brock’s physical insanity, then had Ambreigns team up to Shield powerbomb him through a ringside table to put him down for a minute. I say “for a minute,” because he recovered and started wrecking shop again. So they had to put him through a SECOND table with a SECOND Shield powerbomb. The in-between saw Reigns and Ambrose in a heated, urgent singles match, both because they wanted to win and go on to Wrestlemania and because they knew Brock could get up at any second and they’d be f*cked. I LOVE that. The action being fast, dynamic and logical brought it all together. I think my favorite part is Dean Ambrose being smart as hell and realizing Brock Lesnar’s two major weaknesses are steel and low blows. They’re really making me like Dean Ambrose lately.

There are a few problems, and … well, they kinda involve Roman Reigns, so I’m sorry if you’re tired of reading that. The first is the finish, which I mostly liked. Brock has had most of his energy depleted from those table bombs — one would incapacitate a normal person, so two bringing Brock down to 50% makes sense — and Roman gets a spear on him. Brock at 50% is most people at 100, so he grabs Reigns in a Kimura. Reigns tries to fight out of it, so Ambrose rushes in with a chair and starts beating them both down, breaking the hold and saving the match. Ambrose knows how to win triple threats in the video games, apparently. The steel knocks Lesnar out of the ring … aaaaand then Reigns just spears Ambrose and pins him. Not only that, he seems totally fine after the match, aside from looking kinda blown up. His staredown with Triple H is like beginning-of-Raw Roman. This is a guy who not only just had a grueling match, but got the sh*t beaten out of him with a steel chair AND almost had his arm broken in a Brock Lesnar Kimura. He should’ve been dead on his feet. But I guess you’ve gotta look good in the “main-eventers staring at each other under the WrestleMania sign” portion of the video package.

The other thing is that Roman was the most predictable, safest call, as we continue to not have any idea how to promote Roman Reigns to WWE crowds. It’s what would happen if Rocky Maivia hadn’t turned heel when people were chanting for him to die, and WWE had just been like, “no, you like this guy, we promise.” It doesn’t make Rocky a bad performer, but that obviously existing clash between what WWE crowds and WWE promoters want is just too much. I’m hoping they add some kind of unexpected spark to the main, whether it’s inserting Lesnar and Ambrose to make it a four-way or adding Rock and Shawn Michaels in Roman and H’s respective corners and maybe throwing Daniel Bryan in as guest referee like Scott Hall suggested. It needs something.

As it stands, it’s Triple H threatening to bomb his fourth WrestleMania main-event — the sh*tty fourway in 2000, the overshadowed match with Jericho and the pile of vomit with Orton — and Reigns not having a Seth Rollins Money in the Bank out to survive 100,000 people booing him. What’s even the point, you know? Roman already got his big win and his coronation a few months ago. It’s not like this is the end of a big story. It’s his fourth title shot and third title reign since November. Woo?

Best: Top 10 Comments Of The Night

The Mighty One

You know what they say; when it’s Reigns, it’s poor.

MillionDollarDan

Brock Lesnar’s hand is going to bust through that wreckage like Kevin Nash’s at the end of the Nina Turtles movie.

SHough610

Roman spearing Brock had heart. But Dean Ambrose hitting Brock in the groin had Brock getting hit in the groin.

Lester

The Network keeps crashing, presumably out of shame.

Nevers

This PPV is a hogwarts.

Ironavenger6491

Axel: “I’m a Tank with a Ferrari engine!”
Bray: “I have felt a disturbance in the force…”

Brocky

*Jericho goes in to the locker room*
“Whew, what a match! The crowd was hot, the finish was great, and the upcoming guy got the rub, did you guys see that?”
Camera shows kane working on his taxes on a tablet while ryback and big show are eating their way through a pile of cold cuts.
Big Show: “see what?”
Jericho: “nevermind”

tgbusteed