Yes, we’re doing the PPV musings early this week. Also, this is the last one for a while, as next Wednesday will begin my weekly visit to the first year of WCW Monday Nitro, which turns 30 next week. Hopefully, this run lasts longer than the NWA-TNA run did.
In any event, the people have wanted it and after almost a decade, WWE has delivered another all-women PPV event because we have an AEW megashow to counterprogram and we’re going to do that by swamping the weekend with all sorts of mediocre programming. Starting off with a run of the mill NXT show that featured a Slammiversary contract signing and nothing else of note unless you’re a regular NXT viewer – and I’m not – and then following that up with the latest Saturday Night’s Main Event, which featured GOLDBERG coming out of retirement to lose in his retirement match against GUNTHER and then getting cut off in the middle of his retirement speech.
And then there’s this show… which I’m only watching because I am genuinely curious to find out if there was any match that could match or surpass the superb All In match between Timeless Toni and Mercedes. This show that WWE pulled out of their ass purely for the sake of counter-programming AEW. I mean, let’s call a spade a spade. The only reason there was an Evolution PPV in the first place was to give the women something to do because they couldn’t wrestle in Saudi Arabia. Once that started to lighten up, there was no need for another Evolution… that and there was no Cold Ronda to build this show around.
So was there anything on this show that surpassed the All In match that I mentioned? The short answer is “maybe.” The long answer is the rest of this post.
Since these are all women’s matches, I’m going to save myself a few keystrokes and forgo adding “Women’s” to the various titles on hand here.
Intercontinental Champion Becky Lynch defeated Bay Ley and Lyra Valkyria in a triple threat match to retain the title. Good, strong opening match between three extremely talented women and the crowd was really into it.
NXT Champion Jacy Jane defeated Jordynne Grace with a betrayal from Blake Munroe (the former Mariah May) to retain the title. So they brought in Mariah May, gave her a name change, people were cheering her, and the first thing they did was pair her up with Jordynne Grace so that she can eventually turn on Grace and go back to being the heel that she was in AEW. Works for me. The match itself was fine, though my lack of familiarity with the NXT product meant that I wasn’t really as into this match as the crowd seemed to be.
Tag Team Champions Roxanne Perez (subbing for the injured Liv Morgan) and Raquel Rodriguez defeated Asuka/KAIRI, Baby Flair/Alexa Bliss, and a pair of NXT women whose names I don’t recall in a four-way match to retain the titles.
WWE Champion Tiffany Stratton defeated Trish Stratus in a short but largely decent match to retain the title. Trish got a standing ovation, afterwards. Don’t know how much she has left in the tank, but looks like she could go a few more rounds… and I don’t see why not.
Jade Cargill defeated Glow “Naomi” Girl in a No Holds Barred match; Bianca Belair was the special referee. This went about ten minutes and really ended when it was starting to get good… or maybe it’s the right length of time considering Jade is… still under development. Naomi tried. That’s as far as I’ll go.
Stephanie Vaquer won a battle royal to earn a World title shot at whatever PPV that WWE has in Paris. It’s a battle royal. There are lots of women in there; some I know, others I don’t. It’s a thing that happened and not in a bad way; just a meh sort of deal, y’know?
What began as a World title match between champion IYO SKY and challenger Rhea Ripley – and quite the match while we’re at it – ended after 20+ minutes of action when Glow Girl decided to cash in her Money In The Bank briefcase to make this a triple threat… which lasted about a minute before Glow Girl pinned IYO to win the title via briefcase shot to the head and moonsault combo. This is why I said “maybe” in regards to this show having anything that could match or surpass the Toni/Mercedes match at All In, because I thought that the Iyo/Rhea match was really, really good and that it could have been great had it not been for the cash-in, which kind of ruined things for me. Nothing against Glow Girl winning the title; I just wish that she hadn’t interrupted a really good match in the process of doing so.
For what it’s worth, Evolution was just fine. The opening match and the main event were the only real standout matches on this show and everything else was stuff in the middle to pad out the show. I won’t say that this show was a complete waste of time because that’d be lying. I enjoyed some of the show, but was largely indifferent for the rest of it… which more or less matched how I felt about the first Evolution show; a show that didn’t feel entirely superfluous, but obviously was.
Do I need an Evolution 3 any time soon? Probably not… but we’ll probably see it again down the line, especially if WWE is intent on this counterprogramming AEW strategy. That’s the only reason for this show’s existence.
Sigh… I think I’m done with modern wrestling. I’m sticking with the old shit from now on.
dtm666 