BRM Reviews the 1/4/2016 Raw (bad)

[Big Red Machine]

OPENING SEGMENT- Steph comes out. Then Roman comes out. Can we please start the show with something new? Let me guess: We’ll get a long talking segment with Roman getting smug and his smugness upsetting the McMahons, at it will all hype up the main event.
So Roman calls out Vince, but Steph says Vince isn’t here yet. That seems pretty irresponsible of him.
Roman says that if he loses tonight, he’ll be fired and thus won’t be able to get another job and feed his family. Since when was this a stip?
Oh. It turns out it wasn’t, which means the babyface was lying in an attempt to gain sympathy. Yeah. Because that’s a good way to make us like him.
Steph says that if Roman loses, she will make him wrestle every day on every show for years and years and years until he can’t wrestle anymore. Um… isn’t that what his job is right now? So how is this a threat? And why does Roman need to lose in order for Steph to do this?
She actually used the term “use,” which is the same term Vince used when talking about Sika last week, and Steph brought that up, too, so I guess the big angle here is that the McMahons are scumbag wrestling promoters. How is this news?
Well… this was bad, but at least it was shorter than usual. I think they were done by the by 8:13!

Wow. They’re actually hyping up a Lesnar TV appearance!

NEVILLE vs. KEVIN OWENS- 6.25/10
Neville’s ribs are taped up. Ambrose, who got powerbombed through the announcers’ table last week, is perfectly fine (and even wrestled last week on Smackdown). Then again, Neville might be fine, too, since he landed one of his dives with his taped up ribs right on Owens and didn’t sell it at all.
The match got better after that, and that 450 off the apron was nuts!

POST-MATCH SEGMENT- Owens beats Neville up after the match, so Dean comes out to make the save. So pretty much the same thing as last week. No, wait, Dean managed to avoid being powerbombed through the announcers’ table this time, and instead he put Owens through with an elbow drop. So much for all of that heat Owens got last week, right?

VINCE SHOWS UP LATE- JoJo interviews him. He says that charges were dropped against him because he has a good lawyer. You McMahons are rich. We get it. Shup up already. Vince puts over the fact that he is the special guest referee tonight.

STARDUST vs. TITUS O’NEIL- 3.75/10
The Ascension are not out here with Stardust because I guess we’re supposed to forget that that whole thing happened. Darren Young is not out here with Titus because… um…

BECKY, CHARLOTTE, & RIC FLAIR BACKSTAGE- okay.

BECKY LYNCH vs. CHARLOTTE (w/Ric Flair)- 5.75/10
Wow. Charlotte’s heel turn happened TWO MONTHS AGO, and they are finally booking a rematch just tonight, with no movement between now and then.
Charlotte is the champion, the bigger star, and has Ric Flair in her corner, but for some reason she entered first. I’ll assume Becky had to pee really badly during the commercial break, and wasn’t back at Gorilla Position yet by the time she was supposed to go out to the ring.

Byron Saxton tries to put Becky and Charlotte’s friendship by telling us that they used to call themselves “protein sisters because of their mutual interest in staying in shape and eating right.” I don’t know what sort of a reaction he thought this would get, but my immediate reaction was to laugh at their idiotic, childish name because not only is it idiotic and childish, but what makes them so special. Isn’t everyone on the roster interested in staying in shape and eating right?
Byron also completely failed to get over the idea that Charlotte cares more about winning than about being friends with Becky by pushing this stupid angle about Charlotte apparently being mean for not leaving a match to help Becky- a grown adult- who had *GASP!* gotten egg-nog poured on her. Both JBL and Cole rightfully made him look like an idiot for this.

They went about eleven minutes, and they have done much better together. The good news was the finish, which, for once, doesn’t make Becky look bad and also builds to a title match that should actually have some emotion going into it.
The bad news was the post-match beating Charlotte gave Becky. I thought this was too early to do something like this. IMO, it would have been much better to build to a match at Royal Rumble where the stip is the Ric will be barred from ringside, and we have Charlotte cheat there (roll-up with her feet on the ropes) to solidify the heel turn (to Becky). You could then use this to take you to Fast Lane while building up someone else (Sasha or Nattie) for Mania, or you could even have Charlotte dodge Becky in February and build up to the blow-off at WrestleMania.

VINCE & SHEAMUS CONSPIRE BACKSTAGE- bad.
First of all, we KNOW the fix is in, so you don’t have to waste time showing it to us. Second, Sheamus’ acting here was not good. Either Vince was pointlessly trolling Sheamus, Sheamus was too dumb to figure out that Vince was being facetious, or Sheamus was acting for the sake of a camera that he isn’t supposed to realize is there.

TOTAL DIVAS COMMERCIAL- our teases for this season include:
- Nattie and Summer making out
- Eva cattily shoving someone into a pool
- Paige playing with cats
- Someone (a blonde, which I assume means Emma) being introduced by a guy (presumably Mark Carano) announcing to the others that “she’s our newest Diva,” because that is definitely exactly how such a situation would go backstage in real life.

RYBACK vs. BIG SHOW- DUD!
Before this match I learned the following things:
1. Ryback will be in this year’s Royal Rumble
2. Lilian Garcia is really doing it for me this week. Not sure why this week as opposed to others, but I’ll take it.

So the match starts out with Ryback getting a bit of offense in, but then Big Show hits Ryback with a chokeslam… and Ryback is back up a few seconds later, stumbling around like this was any other bump. Big Show goozled Ryback again, but instead of deliver his dreaded finisher a second time, he shoved Ryback over the top rope and out of the ring, to where Big Show can’t pin him. This was done so that Cole could explain to us that “if that happens in the Royal Rumble, Ryback will be eliminated.” The problem is that doing that at this point in this match made NO F*CKING SENSE!
Then the Wyatts randomly magicked themselves to ringside and started to beat up Ryback… and amazingly, there was no DQ for this. Did they make the referee disappear as well? We don’t know. The announcers never even mentioned that he was missing.
So basically, we got no finish to a Big Show vs. Ryback match for the second straight week. If you don’t want to beat either guy, DON’T BOOK THE MATCH!
Now the Wyatts are going after Big Show. Oh look! There’s the referee. He’s just standing by the timekeeper’s table, doing nothing. You didn’t even call for the bell, you lazy f*ck?
This was done so that Bray could announce (without a mic, for some reason) that his guys were all going to be in the Royal Rumble. Here’s an idea? You want to establish that the Wyatts are in the Royal Rumble and also have them look dominant on TV? HAVE THEM WIN QUALIFYING MATCHES! Then we could get people being entered into the match in a way that makes sense, matches with clean finishes, and people doing sh*t that actually makes sense (and don’t tell me “the Wyatts were trying to injure them to increase their chances of winning the Royal Rumble” because if that were the case, they should have been putting a MUCH more severe beatdown on both guys).

THE USOS vs. THE LEAGUE OF NATIONS (Alberto Del Rio & Rusev)- 7/10
The crowd cares so much about this match they are chanting “WE WANT LANA!” which just makes you wonder why she isn’t out here with Rusev, being a heel manager like she spent her first year on the main roster proving she could do very well. The last minute or two here was REALLY good.

Hey! Look! A graphic for the huge world title main event they have signed for tonight. This was the first time since Vince’s earlier promo that it had even been mentioned.

Now they’re giving January- and even advertising that this includes the Royal Rumble- away for free to new subscribers to the WWE Network. They must be getting desperate.

DOLPH ZIGGLER PROMO- he tried REALLY hard with the terrible speech he was given.

DOLPH ZIGGLER vs. HEATH SLATER (w/Bo Dallas, Adam Rose, & Curtis Axel)- 4/10
AHA! My sarcastic prediction from last week about a new incarnation of the J.O.B. Squad was right!
Oooh! Oooh! Oooh! New mission: I’ve got to think of a name for these guys! Let’s see…
The Beaten-down Clan
The Legion of Gloom
Team Very BAD
The No Remorse Snore
The Minimum Wage Outlaws
Men on a Mission (to lose every match they’re in)
Team Mangled
Bore Machine
Z-Z-Z-Factor
The Calamitous Connection
The Snore-porate Ministry
The Nega-Powers
Loser-os del Mal
deaDRagon
Four Dudes With Ineptitude
Da Sh*t Squad
Tons of F*cked


Okay, okay, okay. I’ve narrowed it down to the top 5, which I’ll probably just cycle through:
Los Shat-adores
The Desperation Corporation
The Main Event & Superstars Mafia
The Sad-icalz
Meh-volution

Okay. Back to the match.
Well… apparently someone had to lose to a jobber, so WWE picked fan-favorite Dolph Ziggler. Thanks, WWE. He doesn’t lose cleanly, of course, as Heath needed help from his Meh-volution cohorts to get the roll-up victory off of a distraction.
After the match, the Main Event & Superstars Mafia cut a promo. Adam Rose appears to be back on his happy pills, so that’s good for him. He seems to have slipped McGillicutty something, though. Bo was still Bo. Heath said that “Social Outcasts” was trending worldwide. I’m not sure if that is supposed to be their name, but even if it is, I’m sticking with the Sad-icalz et al. because “Social Outcasts” is a terrible name.

THE NEW DAY USED MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS TO ANNOY PEOPLE BACKSTAGE- and now I’m dreading their inevitable promo even more than usual.

MATCHES FOR SMACKDOWN ARE ANNOUNCED-
Becky challenges Charlotte for the Divas Title. That’s fine.
Owens challenges Ambrose for the IC Title, despite the fact that Owens failed to win in his rematch (on the 12/22 Smackdown), and since then has only won one match, which was tonight. This was not good.

VINCE & ROMAN BACKSTAGE- waste of time. This would have made sense if Roman was the challenger, and Vince was gleefully reciting all of the little things he could DQ Roman for doing and thus screw Roman out of a title shot, except that Roman is the champion, so a DQ won’t get the belt off of him.

NEW DAY PROMO- we are thirty seconds in and I already want this to be over.
Now for the good news: Chris Jericho apparently somehow knew that New Day were going to use a countdown gimmick in their promo, so he paid off the production guys to troll them and turn their countdown into his entrance. So HOORAY! JERICHO IS BACK!
Jericho then put the entirety of my thoughts on the New Day into words. So Jericho is in the Royal Rumble. Cool.

THE NEW DAY vs. KALISTO & THE DUDLEY BOYS- 7/10
Cole miscalled the Bubba Bomb as a “Full Nelson Slam” even though it is clearly not a slam.
I got all happy because it looked like they were finally going to distract the ref before doing the Whazzup, but instead they decided that they needed to distract the ref so a legal participant in the match could should Devon off the top rope.
I try not to pick on the marks (and I do use that term because that's what most of them seem like) whose Tweets get displayed on the ticker at the bottom, but a user named @not_gabriela tweeted the following:
“Becky gets her title shot on Smackdown! Now I have to watch!”

Yes, not_gabriela. That is the theory of how all of this works.
Hopefully one of the WWE higher-ups will notice @not_gabriela’s tweet and remember that a good way to get people to watch your show is to announce matches in advance and promote them on TV in advance.

WWE WORLD HEAVYWEIGHT TITLE MATCH WITH VINCE MCMAHON AS SPECIAL GUEST REFEREE: Roman Reigns(c) vs. Sheamus- DUD!
So when we got back from commercial Sheamus had Roman in a headlock. If Vince is the referee and Vince wants the title off of Roman so badly, why doesn’t he just Montreal him right now?
Okay… this has all gone to sh*t. Why did they call for a second official when Vince is completely conscious? Or at worst, why not use the precedent set when Heyman turned heel in 2006 and have Steph use her authority as a company executive to count the pin? It’s clear that the only reason for this was to buy time for Roman to kick out of the Brogue Kick. Then another ref made the count for Roman after he punched out Scott Armstrong. This was stupid.
Here the finish I would have done:
Vince tries to screw Roman, so Roman KOs Vince just like they had him do. Then, when Roman hits Sheamus with the spear he doesn’t go to make the pin because in my world Roman isn’t a f*cking idiot who didn’t remember that he just punched the ref out five seconds ago. Instead, Roman would drag Vince’s body over to where Sheamus is, then pin Sheamus while grabbing Vince’s wrist and using the unconscious Vince’s arm to count the three. This was you have the same situation except that instead of Roman winning because of a brave referee who was then assaulted by Vince, we have Roman outwitting the Authority and humiliating Vince.

VINCE PROMO- he declares that Roman will be defending his title in the Royal Rumble match. Umm… WHAT THE F*CK?!
If I had to guess, the reason for this would be the following: It allows Roman to lose the belt without being pinned and thus set up as the conquering hero who will win the title at WrestleMania.

A very bad show from WWE. Not a good way to start off the new year

STUPID ANNOUNCER QUOTES:
1. Michael Cole says that we “haven’t seen” Hunter since Roman beat him up at TLC.
I guess Cole wasn’t watching Takeover: London, and no one has told him about it since. That makes WWE look pretty bad, don’t you think?

2. Cole says that Roman “pretty much got” Vince arrested last week.
HOW?! Vince was the one who grabbed the cop, and he did so because he didn’t like what the cop said to Steph because of something that Steph did. This is the sort of thing the heel announcer would say.


3. Byron Saxton (about Kevin Owens)- “He’s a prize fighter with no prize to fight for.”
Okay… someone needs to give Byron an education in wrestling 101. This is a combat sport. The winner and loser each get money, but the winner gets more money. Owens has a prize to fight for in EVERY match. And even if that weren’t the case, Owens wants the IC Title and the way you earn a title shot is by getting wins, so every match Owens is in is him fighting for a prize because a victory is a step on the road in pursuit of his ultimate goal.

4. Cole (to Dean Ambrose)- “Kevin Owens has not been himself since losing the Intercontinental Title to you.”
How so? He’s been a bully, a trash-talking asshole, and a sore loser. That is exactly Kevin Owens.

5. Cole (to Byron and JBL, about the Royal Rumble)- “Remember how that match works, guys: *Cole proceeds to explain the rules and stips of the Royal Rumble*”
Time to go on a little writing-related rant here: I’m not sure why this annoyed me this week more than other weeks, but it did, so here you go.
Bad exposition in your book/script/TV show is exposition that has no real purpose in the story- by which I mean the existence of the actual expository dialogue is unnecessary from the internal point of view of the story. A textbook example of this is characters telling other characters things that all of the characters already know, and that all of the characters already know that each other knows. Cole explaining this to JBL and Byron- as if WWE announcers would somehow need to be reminded of the rules of the main attraction of the second-biggest show of the year- is a textbook example of this.
This happens often in WWE, and I think one of the major reasons for it is that WWE, in their desire to be a TV drama instead of a professional wrestling show has shied away from alternative methods of getting this information out to the people who theoretically need to hear it: the audience. They rarely do video packages hyping up matches, which would easily explain the rules, so they have to rely on clunky exposition from the announcers to each other, and it makes the show look bad and the announcers look dumb.

[Big Red Machine]

I didn't even notice it until just now, but there was no John Cena on this show at all, with no comment about it whatsoever.

[Big Red Machine]

No Kane, either.

[cero2k]

DOLPH ZIGGLER vs. HEATH SLATER (w/Bo Dallas, Adam Rose, & Curtis Axel)- 4/10
AHA! My sarcastic prediction from last week about a new incarnation of the J.O.B. Squad was right!
Oooh! Oooh! Oooh! New mission: I’ve got to think of a name for these guys! Let’s see…

as per Bryna Alvarez, "3MGeek"

[Big Red Machine]

DOLPH ZIGGLER vs. HEATH SLATER (w/Bo Dallas, Adam Rose, & Curtis Axel)- 4/10
AHA! My sarcastic prediction from last week about a new incarnation of the J.O.B. Squad was right!
Oooh! Oooh! Oooh! New mission: I’ve got to think of a name for these guys! Let’s see…

as per Bryna Alvarez, "3MGeek"

Mine are better, especially because there are four Ms in this group.