Category: Wrestling Television Musings

Shane and Stephanie plea one last time for order to be maintained or else actions will be taken. Oh God, don’t tell me you’re bringing Triple H back to RAW. The show’s actually starting to get good.

(2011 Update: Why is that whenever the idea of HHH coming back is entertained in some fashion, I automatically assume the show is going suck as a result? It can’t be a coincidence.)

Actually, I don’t have much to comment on. I had a really bad case of indigestion last night that prevented me from paying full attention to the show, but at least the show wasn’t boring. I don’t like Punk’s chances of walking out of GAB as champion, though.

Another attempt at making Kane an interesting character… yeah, this is going to go over well. Let’s face it: Kane was at his best when he was wearing a mask. Now he’s like a second-rate Undertaker.

Finally, John Cena gets run over by a car. If only this were to lead to a nine-month leave of absence like it did that other fellow…

Overall, decent RAW. Not amazing, but still decent.

What was that thing people keep saying? Nothing ever happens during a WWE Draft?

Epic stuff going on, as this draft seemed to have made some actual hard changes.

Continue reading “RAW (June 23rd, 2008) – Draft Thoughts And… Yeah.”

Not so much to note on for last night’s RAW because I didn’t see everything. And the reason I didn’t see everything is because I was busy playing Mega Man X. You know, the original game for SNES. Before the Mega Man games started to SUCK.

But I digress. Let’s get to the three segments of RAW I did watch (the latter half mostly).

– Ken Kennedy defeated General Manager King William Regal The Third to fire Regal in what I thought was a perfectly good match. Mind you, it wasn’t one of their best matches, but it wasn’t boring and it certainly wasn’t filled with much silliness (except for that bit towards the end there).

– The Piper’s Pit segment hosted by Santino was fairly decent. I like Santino because he’s funny. What I don’t like is Santino being involved with a match with Jimmy Kimmel’s Cousin Sal. Who the fuck is Cousin Sal? (Sorry, I don’t watch that much Jimmy Kimmel).

– Randy Orton and JBL defeat HHH and John Cena to decide the stipulations for their respective One Night Stand rematches. Okay, how many times do we have to get hammered with Orton/HHH bouts on PPV? It’s bad enough we had to put up with it in 2004/2005, but enough is enough already. Those matches sucked ass then and they suck ass now. There isn’t anything they could do that we haven’t seen before. As for Cena/JBL, nothing they do will top their Judgment Day 2005 I Quit match in my mind… in fact, nothing Cena’s done since then has been able to top that.

That’s it for me.

The main event between Shawn Michaels and Jeff Hardy was actually pretty good – it’s almost make wonder if I’d pay money for this had it been on PPV. As much as I want Jeff to get the big one that he truly deserves, it’s probably not going to happen. After all, we know who’s winning that match and that’s the guy with the three Hs… who hasn’t been on TV for the past couple weeks.

I don’t know – seems pretty stupid to give the win to a guy who hasn’t been on TV for two weeks – regardless of their reasons – simply because it’s in the books, but this is WWE we’re talking about. Their booking plans make almost as much sense as TNA’s.

Other than that, nothing particularly special happened. Vince had his match with Hornswoggle and booked a rematch in a steel cage. Yeah, that’s going to bring in ratings.

Last night, WWE made the leap to high-definition filming for all their programming, with RAW being the first show of this new technological advance. Great for some people who have HD televisions, noteworthy for those who don’t… but otherwise, I can’t comment on the quality of the video since I still have an old TV and the differences are negligible.

Now, the show on the other hand… heh. That’s another story.

Continue reading “RAW (Jan. 21, 2008) – Now In Pretentious HD”

Three hours of RAW and… something to show for it. While the overall show was generally better quality than what usually goes on RAW, it’s still a pretty forgettable show. However, it’s eons better than the RAW X “awards” show, which was nothing remotely special. Some quick notes on the show:

– McMahon family portrait. It was nice to see a bunch of older folks like Sunny, Godfather, Patterson… Bastion Booger and his son… uh, never mind. The more pleasant faces were tolerable.

– Ladder match was fairly good. I did get the feeling that it was safer than others (not sure how to explain it, but it felt really standard and nothing daring – just like a regular WWE show these days), but still watchable.

– RVD beats Santino with an educated foot and a four-and-a-half-star frog splash (he didn’t get hurt, so it’s only four-and-a-half stars). Short, useless match, but it’s good to see RVD and it’s nice to see that JR didn’t forget that he was a former WWE champion.

– Evolution reunion. Meh. Leads into a six-man tag-team bout which doesn’t really do much for me, but it’s a solid match nonetheless.

– Hornswoggle vs. Khali Round 2… or at least it would have been if it weren’t for the debut of a new superstar… Hulk Hogan. No comment, next.

– The “anniversary” battle royal… which is a nicer way of saying “Gimmick Match” featuring familiar faces such as Al Snow, Scotty Too Snotty, IRS, and… hey, they got Pete Gas! And Steve Blackman! And Gillberg! And who wins this match? Ted Dibiase, who buys out the match. Sweet.

– Kennedy vs. Jannetty. Okay match. Nothing special.

– And finally, Vince gets his ass kicked by Mankind, ‘Taker, and Stone Cold for naming himself the greatest RAW superstar. Stone Cold then declares the fans as the greatest superstars. I’m sure those fans are still waiting for their paycheques.

Meh. Okay show.

By the way, there’s a PPV this Sunday.

RAW at MSG – the show was admittingly better than last week and this bastard child angle is actually getting a few chuckles with Vince’s indiscretions. Some quick notes:

– Stephanie McMahon speaks… okay, I take back what I said about this show being better than last week.

– So they’re pushing Randy Orton as the next big threat by showing promo videos of all the legends he killed in the past few months. Yeah, I would feel threatened by a guy who’s making a career out of giving bloated legends past their primes a shitty little knee to the head. But I digress. At least they’re pushing Orton to be the next monster heel and hopefully he’ll end Cena’s reign of terror (at this point, I’ll side with just about ANYBODY!)

– Poor William Regal. Got the General Manager job and the only notable thing he’s doing is hosting rip-offs of game shows to advance a “love trapizoid” between Super Santino, Stupid Maria, Ron Simmons, and a piece of cheese. Fortunately, these are pretty fun so far and anything that involves the Iron Shiek should always be gold.

– So it’s been announced that Booker T will face Triple H at Summerslam. Because apparently, Booker hasn’t buried one too many times by the man of three Hs. It’s almost looking to be the umpteenth coming of the Ultimate Warrior and Booker T is assuming Hunter’s role of being McSon-In-Law’s bitch for ninety seconds or less.

That’s all I got. All in all, a pretty solid show that was at least better than what we got last week.

So after RAW’s glitchy abysmal rating, Mr. McMahon strikes back by announcing that he did fake his death… to hide any evidence of his rejuvinative powers. So what happens? William Regal wins a battle royal to become RAW General Manager. Well, it took them a year and a half, but RAW finally has a general manager.

Carlito’s Cabana becomes Cena’s Cabana. Holy Crap, this is a good reason why Cena doesn’t have a Cabana.

The Dating Game with Jim Duggans, Ron Simmons, and Santino… ugh.

Kennedy bored the shit out of me. And really… when the best promo guy on the show bores the shit out of you, it’s time to rethink your show.

Last week’s RAW may have scored a somewhat low rating, but at least it was a fairly watchable show. This one just reeks of crap. I’d rather watch No Holds Barred and Suburban Commando back to back to watch the rest of this putrid pile of vomit! If this is their answer to turn things around… well, keep trying guys.

Cue Ron Simmons.

DAMN!

A couple of points on tonight’s RAW despite it not being over:

– Carlito actually brings up his first win over Cena from ages ago. Oh my God! Actual continuity is being respected here? Did we get a new creative team and I didn’t know about it? Holy crap! But of course, Cena has to reference the period to other things. For example, that was back when Britney Spears actually looked hot or Linsay Whatsherface had her first line or something. Hmmm… maybe I should add to that list. After all, that was back when Cena had a personality and knew a wrestling move or two that actually looked threatening. Fortunately, Carlito vindicates himself by beating Cena and spits an apple at him. Match was pretty watchable by Cena standards.

– Mr. Kennedy swats Bobby Lashley in the shoulder and wins. Well, no complaints here. Lashley may be a generic musclehead but unlike some muscleheads, he can sell the shoulder injury as a weakness and not as an afterthought. So my respect level for him is up somewhat.

– Umaga kills the Italian guy again. Next.

– Randy Orton kills Sgt. Slaughter… everybody acts like it’s a big deal, except people tend to forget that Orton already kicked Slaughter’s ass a couple years back. So I guess it’s the same writing team with selective continuity memory after all. Okay, I get it.

– The battle of the kings. Lawler wins via cheap DQ. I still don’t understand the point of this feud. Booker doesn’t like Lawler calling himself king and they fight, but nothing’s resolved and next week they’ll both be called king. Was there any kingship on the line? Someone clarify this for me because I’m confused.

– Triple H is coming back at Summerslam. Another case of “Who gives a shit?” Of course, he’s going to come back. He always comes back. He could have twenty bulletholes in his fucking skull and he’ll still come back to do his generic punch-kick offense with occasional knee strike and underhook piledriver. Why bother advertising his return when it’s inevitable and obvious that he’s coming back? Only the most oblivious and dumbest person around (read: anyone working for WWE*) would not know Triple H will eventually return after a hellacious injury. Fuck, even my old college buddy who doesn’t watch wrestling knows old Trips is coming back. So what’s the point?

All in all, a fairly decent show despite my gripes. Nothing noteworthy happened, but that’s okay.

*may not be anyone working for WWE