The Best And Worst Of WWE Friday Night Smackdown 12/6/19: Dirty Dog

Previously on the Best and Worst of Friday Night Smackdown: Bray Wyatt talked about reptilian conspiracy theories, a handful of Superstars made returns of various intensities (Sheamus, Elias, Alexa Bliss), and Daniel Bryan got Dragged To Hell.

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Here’s the Best and Worst of WWE Friday Night Smackdown for December 6, 2019.

Worst: A Real Shit Show

WWE Friday Night Smackdown

Here’s Friday Night Smackdown in a single image: Roman Reigns doing a John Cena bit from 2009 and looking like somebody took a shit all over him. Friday Night Smackdown on Fox might sincerely be the worst and most embarrassing weekly TV show WWE’s ever put on, thanks to some combination of walking on egg shells to please a TV network, and the declining creative worth and mental stability of a 74-year old man who’d rather be running a football league.

In case you missed the show and are actually wondering what this image is about, it started as one of those Roman Reigns “main event style” matches that go about 15 minutes longer than anybody asked and try to build up the belief that Roman’s not just gonna end up spamming the Superman Punch at two minutes to midnight and spear a guy to win. If he’s up against Triple H at WrestleMania and it should go 15, it goes 30. If he’s on Smackdown wrestling Dolph Ziggler, a guy whose biggest contribution this year was losing to a bumbling old man as quickly as possible, it should go what, maybe three? Generously? It goes 18. At no point between second one and second 1080 is there a believable finish about to happen other than, “Roman wins with his signature moves,” or, “Roman doesn’t win, because 10 people ganged up to cheat him out of it.” That’s meant as less of a “Roman wins lol” knock, and more of a condemnation of WWE’s tendency to book every heel on the show as a cowardly loser and still ask you to buy their near-falls 17 minutes in.

So Roman wins, lol, and gets attacked by 10 people. When they aren’t huddled together in a realistic way waiting to get hit with wrestling moves, the security jobbers who carried King Corbin to the ring on a throne prove to actually be more effective than the show’s actual heels. Imagine a normcore Dark Order just kicking the shit out of Kenny Omega. With the Damned Numbers Game™ triumphant, Corbin and Ziggler chain Roman to the ring post like a sexy John Cena and pour dog food on his face. If you’re keeping score at home, that’s Breaking Point plus the time The British Bulldog poured dog food on Ken Shamrock. NWA Powerrr feels more modern than Smackdown right now.

Worst: Sir Not-Appearing-In-This-Film

The only thing advertised for Smackdown besides King Corbin’s® vow to humiliate The Big Dog™ was an explanation of what happened to Daniel Bryan. At the end of last week’s show, The Fiend appeared and dragged him into a hole in the ring, which every wrestling fans knows is a portal to literal Christian Hell. The Fiend also apparently gave Bryan a bare-handed shave, somehow. I actually managed to miss this on my initial viewing due to frustration blindness and Smackdown being filmed on the Virtual Boy.

This week I actually got a little excited to see what they were going to do with it. As a 2006 Ring of Honor World Heavyweight Champion Bryan Danielson superfan, I thought maybe my wish had finally come true and they’d shaved off his beard and given him a haircut. I love Goat Faced Hero Of The People Daniel Bryan a lot, too, but the wrestler I fell in love with was made when 1979 Bob Backlund and 1995 Bob Backlund did the Fusion Dance. The reveal on Smackdown? Nothing, don’t worry about it.

No, really.

“Trust me on this one, Miz. You don’t want to know what happened to Daniel Bryan. I’m not sure I want to know!”

That quickly pivots to a Bray Wyatt vs. The Miz feud built around Wyatt threatening Miz’s family, which is the worst thing you can possibly do as a human being in WWE. You could stab someone in the heart with a broadsword on Smackdown and Michael Cole would be like, “a VICIOUS ASSAULT,” but if you say, “I think your wife and kids are lame,” they call for your head. You are legally allowed to shoot someone with a gun in WWE if they “bring your family into it,” even if your wife is also a wrestler. This sets up Miz — who thinks Daniel Bryan is “like family” to the WWE Universe now, for some reason — frantically calling home to tell Maryse to lock the doors (to prevent an attack from a teleporting monster, good call Miz) and a backstage attack that’s basically Bray Wyatt propping up a cardboard box with a stick with a string tied around it, putting a DVD copy of Christmas Bounty under it, and waiting.

It’s now Miz vs. Wyatt at TLC, which is next weekend, to presumably set the stage for whatever they’re doing with Bryan. I hope he also gets to dress like a Rastafarian clown in Mil Muertes pants!

Worst: Rockstar Dud

I don’t know why, but WWE decided to take the guy whose previous angle was literally, “is married,” and move him into an unrequited romance plot with Dana Brooke. On this week’s show, Maverick finds Brooke backstage and gets sad because she rejected him, asking what Dave Batista has that he doesn’t. A nose ring, for starters. Elias shows up and sings a song about how he slept with Maverick’s wife, which enrages the guy who (1) has not slept with his own wife, and (2) is actively attempting to cheat on his wife on network television.

Drake, infuriated and yoo-miliated by some vague white guy ennui, calls out Elias for a fight. Because he’s short, and short is the worst thing you can be in WWE right now besides a hater of families, this leads to him getting punked out like a little kid and punished in front of everybody. Congratulations, WWE, you hired one of the two wildly talented dudes who kept TNA afloat creatively for years and booked him as an impotent pants-pisser who gets spanked. This shit makes Lashley and Rusev look like Survivor Series ’98. He’s gonna get some cheers for bumping Elias like three months from now and WWE fans are gonna be like, “SEE, IT WORKED.”

Just turn him into a eunuch and be done with it already.

Worst: OH NO

WWE Friday Night Smackdown

If Roman Reigns being yoo-miliated by King Corbin and Drake Maverick being yoo-miliated by Elias wasn’t enough, here’s Alexa Bliss being OH MY GOD YOO-MILIATED by Mandy Rose when Mandy [checks notes] [squints] removes one of Alexa’s false eyelashes. Michael Cole sells it as, “OH MY GOD, ripping her eyelashes off her face!” I mean, that’s technically true. What’re you, five? Join us next week when Mandy commits the heinous act of removing one of Alexa Bliss’ shoes.

In Other News, Here’s The Greatest Showman Lacey Evans Defeating A Lady In A Circus Costume

WWE Friday Night Smackdown

She’s dressed like this because she’s “The Ringmaster,” get it? I think she’ll do better once she wins the King of the Ring tournament and becomes Stone Cold Haley Jones. Until then, check out this extremely natural and believable feed into a very natural and believable arm drag.

Sheamus Is Returning Home!

Returning home to Smackdown is basically the pro wrestling equivalent of The Scouring of the Shire. There are plenty of other places to live, Sheamus. Have you thought about central Florida?

And Finally, Just So I Have One, “Best”

The closest thing to a watchable … anything on this episode is the four-way elimination tag team match to name a number one contender to the Smackdown Tag Team Championship, since the pay-per-view is like eight days away and oh shit we forgot to book it. It’s The Revival overcoming the only other team in the division not currently holding the Smackdown Tag Team Championship, Heavy Machinery, as well as also-rans the Lucha House Party and the duo of Shorty G and Short Ali.

The finishing stretch is good enough to make you wish they’d devoted the full 17 minutes to Gable and Ali versus The Revival in an actual tag team match that told a story, and continue wishing Chad Gable wasn’t still being called “Shorty G” and dressed like a little boy being forced into a “he likes basketball” photo shoot by his parents at the photography studio in the mall. It looked shockingly out of place on a two-hour show dedicated to adult spankings and Alpo humiliation, but I appreciate at least somebody trying.

Updated TLC card:

  • New Day vs. The Revival again
  • The Miz vs. Bray Wyatt
  • Roman Reigns vs. King Corbin

My thoughts:

WWE Network

Best: Top 10 Comments Of The Week

EvilDucky

Wait wait WAIT, I thought Funhouse Bray was a wimp who didn’t fight anyone. DAMMIT WWE, all I ask is for continuity with ONE person…

JayBone2

WYATT: I used to have a family…and then my dad had to go to work for tax season.

Dave M J

You know, normally the situation for a stupid name for me is: I hate it, say it’s gonna be weird calling them that, eventually get used to it, and it sticks.

I can’t do that with Shorty G. He’s Chad Gable. End of story.

troi

Now all I want is for Miz to beat Bray Wyatt and rub it in Daniel Bryan’s face forever

The Real Birdman

Are you really a Marine if it wasn’t produced by WWE Studios?

dl316bh

It seems we’re setting up the Kennel from Hell II: This Time It’ll Work, Maybe?

Flair4thegold

I’m all in on Miz solving crimes like the flamboyant southern detective he is. If this doesn’t end with him talking about holes inside of donut holes what are we even doing here

Harry Longabaugh

If only Miz had a former tag team partner who spent four seasons dealing with demonic pro wrestlers…

AddMayne

Chads dressed like he just came out of a middle school locker room that smells like AXE body spray

Son of Tony Zane

Corbin: “Dolph, you can either sit there crying, eating can after can of dog food until your tears smell like dog food to make The Big Dog come back or you can go out there and get The Big Dog back.”

In summary,

WWE Network

Thanks for reading. Drop down into the comments section to let us know what you thought of the show — LOL — and give us a share on social media to help keep us in the business of wanting to kill ourselves for spending our Friday nights with two hours of WWE’s worst ideas. Join us next week for TLC, hilariously! See you then!

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