BRM Reviews the 5/30/2016 Raw (bad)

Post Reply
User avatar
Big Red Machine
Posts: 27378
Joined: Dec 16th, '10, 15:12

BRM Reviews the 5/30/2016 Raw (bad)

Post by Big Red Machine » May 31st, '16, 19:58

OPENING SEGMENT- HORRIBLE
The McMahons come out and bicker. Then they announce that starting in July, Smackdown is going to be going live every week, just like Raw. Shane explained to us that this “means better shows, better match-ups, better opportunities.” Why, Shane? Why does it mean that? What does going live have to do with any of that? If you wanted “better match-ups” on the show or to give people “better opportunities,” why couldn’t you have done that when the show was taped? If they think that going live is going to be come sort of cure-all, then they’ve got another thing coming. Newsflash: ALMOST EVERY SINGLE TV SHOW IS TAPED. People don’t just tune in to shows because they’re live. They tune in to shows because they’re GOOD. If you want more people to watch Smackdown, then you should just WRITE A BETTER SHOW.
Then Steph transitioned to hyping up Cena’s return without a single word about the Brand Extension. Then New Day came out and they were the ones who brought up the Brand Extension. It’s kind of weird that Shane and Steph wouldn’t be the ones to announce this, and it would still make perfect sense to then have New Day come out and worry about being split up. I know that’s a nit-pick, but as someone who works in communications, this just jumps out at me as a very weird way to introduce a major announcement (in reality, bigger than Smackdown going live and moving to Tuesday) to your audience.

Shane says that “it is true that there will be unique Superstars for both Raw and Smackdown.” What the f*ck is this “unique Superstars” bullsh*t. There are going to be SEPARATE ROSTERS. Saying that there will be “unique Superstars” for both shows doesn’t even mean what WWE wants it to mean here. Every Superstar is already a “unique” Superstar because they’re all different people (well… aside from The Usos. And Blake and Murphy. And, for practical purposes, the Shining Stars), therefore there already are “unique Superstars for both Raw and Smackdown.” Now, if they had said “Superstars who will be unique to Raw and Superstars who will be unique to Smackdown” that would be better, but it still creates a problem which is the simple fact that WWE can’t ever just use normal words. They have to have their own lexicon: “Superstars” instead of “wrestlers,” “WWE Universe” instead of “fans” (“brand extension” is also stupid, but at least there is a non-kayfabe argument that it is an appropriate term). If you want something to resonate with people, you can’t create this sort of barrier between the words you say on TV and words people would actually use when they are talking. The more “normal” you sound, the more easy it is for people to get invested in what you say. If my friends and I are talking about the “roster split” but on WWE they insist on saying “unique Superstars for both Raw and Smackdown,” every time I hear them say “unique Superstars for both Raw and Smackdown,” it makes it harder for me to latch on to what they want me to latch on to because it creates this instinctive mental reaction that “what they are talking about is not the same as what I am talking about” that needs to be overcome.

Also, imagine a relatively new fan who has no idea about the original roster split. What the hell is the phrase “unique Superstars for both Raw and Smackdown” going to mean to them? They’ll figure it out eventually, but just saying “separate rosters” would make a hell of a lot more sense to them the first time they hear it.

So New Day want to know which show they will be on. Steph says they haven’t made a decision yet. They accuse her of “dodging the question.” That seems like an unfair accusation.
They devolved into childish New Day stupidity until Big E. asked the next question: “Who is going to be running Smackdown live?” (notice how they have to get that “live” bit in there? Has it not been kayfabe live this whole time?) Who the f*ck has been running it for the past few years? And why would that person/people still not be running it now? Steph responded that they don’t know who will be running Smackdown yet. GAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!
Shane assures us that “everything will be extremely well thought out.” Really? Because most people who think things out well figure out the important details BEFORE they make their major ground-shaking announcement!
New Day suggests that they decide who will run each show via “dance challenge.” F*ck this sh*t. WWE is trying to make this major ground-breaking announcement and get over the idea of the uncertain future which everyone in the company is now facing… and they thought that the best way to do that would be BY TREATING IT LIKE A BIG F*CKING JOKE.
You want to know what they should have done. They should have made absolutely no mention of this whatsoever on Smackdown until they’re about to go off the air and then have Cole say that Vince McMahon himself will kick off Raw by making a major announcement. Then you start Raw with Vince coming out and announcing the roster split… and then you just have him walk off. Have Shane and Steph try to talk to him (as if they have been caught by surprise by this- or like they knew but don’t have any details other than those previously released to the public) but have Vince brush them off. Now you’ve got an entire show during which you can speculate about every single possibility: Will one child run each show? If so, who will get which? Will they both have to work together run both shows? Maybe one of them is getting fired while the other runs both shows? Maybe one or both of them will have to work together to face someone else entirely. Corporate Kane? Former Commissioner Mick Foley? Maybe they’ll both be dismissed and we’ll get Hunter vs. Heyman. Maybe we’ll have Hunter & Steph one show and Shane on the other. Or maybe Hunter running one and Steph running the other.
What happens to the championships and the champions? Which tag teams will be split up? All of these possibilities that they could speculate on all show long to get over what they tried to do in this segment, except in a segment that won’t take up as much time, will feel bigger (because of Vince), create a feeling of mystery and intrigue instead of a feeling of “Shane & Steph are either incompetent or lazy, and will treat the announcement with the importance it deserves instead of treating it like a f*cking joke!

The dance contest is interrupted r(ight before Steph starts to dance) by the Vaudevillains and now it’s serious time as Cole talks how much they have accomplished since debuting on the main roster just under two months ago. Shane and Steph disappear without a trace, which as we all know is perfectly in character with how Steph has always reacted when she feels someone is interrupting her.

THE VAUDEVILLAINS vs. THE NEW DAY (w/Xavier Woods)- 1.25/10
We return from commercial in the middle of this match and the first thing the announcers do is plug Smackdown going live (no comment about the roster split, just about Smackdown going live), completely ignoring the match. Why not have them actually pay attention to the match for a few moments before having Cole say “in case you’ve just joined us, we kicked off the show with a major announcement which was…”?

They didn’t really do much of anything, despite going through a commercial break. Gallows and Anderson showed up and attacked New Day for the DQ. Throughout the match the announcers had been putting over how important it was for the Vaudevillains to win this match. You would think now that Anderson and Gallows have cost them this match, that the Vaudevillains will cut a promo on them or try to get themselves a match against Anderson and Gallows to get revenge on them for costing them this match, but I highly doubt that will ever happen even though it would not only let you give Anderson and Gallows a good clean win but also logically follow from one of your storylines.
Instead, Gotch and English respond by continuing to beat Big E. up, and then just leave him for Anderson and Gallows when they turn their attention to him.

There is a moron a few rows back with a sign that says “kitteh club.” I hope this person gets stuck in hours of traffic on the way home.

RENEE YOUNG INTERVIEWS GALLOWS & ANDERSON- good.
They say they attacked New Day to prove that they can do just as much damage with AJ as they can without him. Also, they are putting the tag team division and the whole WWE on notice, etc. etc.

BIG SHOW & APOLLO CREWS BACKSTAGE- meh.
Big Show was good aside from the stupid joke whose only purpose to plug the WWE Network. Crews’ delivery felt off, and some of the stuff they gave him to say was bad (especially that part about Sheamus “having a problem with the new era.” It’s just weird dialogue to talk about this “new era” like it’s some sort of cohesive entity” like a stable or something.

THE USOS vs. TYLER BREEZE & FANDANGO- DUD!
Golden Truth are on commentary. JBL keeps trying to use facts to convince them that they suck as a team and they shouldn’t be trying to be a team. Pretty much every phrase he used to describe them is exactly what I would say to Creative about this pairing. Hopefully someone in Creative has a meta moment and puts the axe on this atrocious pairing. As if to prove my point, every word ot of Truth’s mouth was (the industrial runoff that passes for WWE’s brand of) “comedy,” while everything Goldust said was an over the top justification for why they should stick together.
Before the match we got an in-set promo from Breeze and Fandango talking about the fact that they are undefeated… so of course they lost completely cleanly here to a pair of guys that aren’t doing anything right now. Goldust and Truth, our babyfaces, laughed at them for losing despite it just having been pointed out to us that these guys have yet to win a match, including two losses to Breeze & Fandango. What a pair of dicks.
Breeze and Fandango go over to confront Golden Truth, but Golden Truth work together to beat them up. I’m not going to say that this was completely devoid of good booking/artistic merit/whatever (the fact that they worked together to take down Breeze and Fandango here implies that they could be successful against them in the ring if given another chance), but this whole angle really just needs to stop immediately.

ROMAN REIGNS CALLS OUT SETH ROLLINS- bad.
Roman calls out Seth to come fight him. Seth comes out and teases fighting Roman but instead goes back up the ramp to get a mic where he then teases a promo. Then he teases going back to fight Roman but no one bought it because we all figured out what was going on by the time he had gone fifteen seconds without speaking a single word. Then he backed off and tried to tease fighting Roman again. It was, as the crowd chanted, “BORING!” Then he teased cutting a promo AGAIN before backing off. Meanwhile, between bouts of anger at WWE for booking this (that’s right, not heat on Seth’s for backing off but heat on the promotion for booking him to waste my time with this sh*t), I wondered aloud, “if Roman wants to fight Seth so badly, why doesn’t he just go get him?” Then, after Seth had walked backstage, they felt the need to tease Seth going to fight Roman YET AGAIN only for him to back off. F*ck this sh*t.

ZACK RYDER vs. RUSEV- 1.5/10
No Lana and no explanation for it.
Zack Ryder cut an inset promo that would have been a great promo if he had only been on the main roster for a few months, but a guy who has been on the main roster for close to ten years now and won a title at this year’s WrestleMania cutting a promo about how “people see me as the underdog” but “I am looking at this match as a chance to prove that I belong” is utterly ridiculous.
Short match. Rusev wins clean with the new bending backwards Accolade which I guess he is just using every time now. It didn’t look particularly good here, so maybe it works better with smaller guys.

POST-MATCH SEGMENT- Rusev begins to cut a promo on the USA. Titus O’Neil takes offense to Rusev calling himself a “great American” on Memorial Day. That’s fine… in theory. The problem is that Titus then continued on, asserting the following “American’s fight for what they believe in.” Well… didn’t Rusev just do that?
Then Titus, supposedly our babyface, proceeded to trash-talk Rusev and then hit him a cheap-shot of clothesline. What a f*cking asshole! Byron is praising Titus for “bringing the fight to Rusev.” This would be the same Byron Saxton who was decrying Gallows and Anderson for attacking Xavier Woods.

I just now noticed that we are well over an hour into the show and the MITB ladder match has not been mentioned once.

SHINING STARS PROMO- bad. They told there is a play in Puerto Rico called “Mosquito Bay” and then suggested we should visit there. F*ck off.

FLAIRS ANGLE VIDEO PACKAGE- same one from Smackdown. It was still good.

STEPHANIE SCOLDS CHARLOTTE FOR HER TREATMENT OF HER FATHER- I’m not sure what the point of this segment was because I’m not quite sure if Steph is supposed to be a babyface or a heel pretending to be a babyface. If she is supposed to be a legit babyface, then the point of this segment was for Stephanie McMahon, representative of all women everywhere, to show her extreme disapproval of Charlotte’s treatment of her father. If she’s supposed to be a heel pretending to be a babyface, then the point of this segment was to let Steph “fool” us by chewing Charlotte out but in reality she isn’t fooling us because we’re supposed to recognize that she is being a hypocrite (and some of her word choice here makes it pretty much impossible for this not be the case).
Either way, though, that second part is a big problem. If Steph is supposed to be a babyface, then her blatant hypocrisy makes her come off as an unlikeable person. If she’s supposed to be a heel pretending to be a babyface, then all this did was make me feel sorry for heel Charlotte that she has to stand there and take this bullsh*t from this hypocrite (and of course she stood there and took it because a McMahon must assert his or her dominance over the wrestlers in every segment he or she appears in).

ENZO & CASS PROMO- fun.

COLIN CASSADY & ENZO AMORE vs. THE DUDLEY BOYS- 4/10
Cole tells us that this is Enzo’s first match back since his high profile and series concussion at Payback. So why haven’t they been hyping this match up? A rematch of the Nattie vs. Dana Brooke match that we just saw a few days ago on Smackdown gets a graphic but this match doesn’t even get a mention (never mind whatever AJ, Owens, Zayn, Del Rio, Miz, Cesaro, Ambrose, Jericho, Ziggler- you know basically the entire upper half of the card- is doing)?

During this match was the first time since the opening segment that they mentioned the roster split and the possibility of a tag team being split up.
The match was very short, but G-d damn are those Dudleys great! Enzo & Cass won clean. Why the f*ck was this not saved for a PPV?

BABYFACES STRATEGIZE BACKSTAGE- Atrocious
Apparently it will be Zayn, Cesaro, & Ambrose vs. Owens, Del Rio, & Jericho. They have a f*cking blockbuster main event and they haven’t been hyping it up at all! What the f*ck?!
This was a “comedy” segment in which Dean kept saying that Canadians are not to be trusted. So either Dean legitimately dislikes Canadians and somehow didn’t know that Zayn is one and now we are supposed to think there will be dissension because Dean is a xenophobe… or Dean just thinks it’s funny to joke about hating Canadians and is being an asshole to Sami for no reason. So no matter how you look at it, this segment was full of bad “comedy,” and did nothing for anyone other than make Dean look like gigantic douchebag.

JOHN CENA PROMO- he comes out and cuts a patriotic promo, then talks about how he is here to stay even though it’s a new era, etc. etc.
AJ Styles comes out and the JBL put it over as a huge moment that John Cena and AJ Styles in the same ring. These would be the same JBL that keeps saying that the stuff AJ did before he got to WWE doesn’t matter. The crowd did manage to make it feel like a huge moment, though. Then they kind of killed that by having AJ give the standard company speech about how great and hard-working and dedicated Cena is and saying that he “wanted to be one of the first to say ‘welcome back.’” He couldn’t have said “welcome back” backstage?
Gallows and Anderson came out and accused AJ of sucking up to John Cena, and I definitely feel what he’s saying because it kind of came off that way to me, too. Gallows and Anderson gear up to fight… and about two seconds before it happened, the stray thought entered my mind that Cena might be about to get turned on a la Flair turning on Sting at Halloween Havoc and that’s exactly what happened.
So WWE decides that they are shorthanded on the heel side… so they have Rollins return from injury by attacking Roman and then have AJ Styles turn on John Cena. They think THIS will get people to boo their new heels? What’s next? Are they going to have Sami Zayn go heel by beating the up announcers? Undertaker making a return to beat up Kevin Dunn? Are they going to do this in the women’s division, too and have Sasha Banks beat up Eva Marie? Talk about completely out of touch with your audience (or just not giving a sh*t about what they think).
I think the idea with this was supposed to be that AJ decided to turn on Cena here and now rather than this all being planned from the beginning. The Club continued to beat Cena up, and I guess Cena has no friends willing to come help him. Then they kept beating Cena up. They did the same thing as the earlier Reigns & Rollins segment except instead of no violence, we got lots of violence each time. Despite AJ’s continued returns to attack Cena, only referees came out to help him.

NATALYA vs. DANA BROOKE (w/Charlotte)- DUD!
Dana wins after a distraction from Charlotte in less than ninety seconds. Hooray for the Divas Revolution! Nattie gets beaten up after the match until Becky Lynch makes the save. So, for the record, Nattie has more friends than Cena.

JOJO INTERVIEWS DOLPH ZIGGLER- bad.
She asked him what exactly this “technical wrestling match” that he challenged Corbin to last week was. He doesn’t give her an answer. Instead he starts to talk about how he has been wrestling since age five and broke records at Kent State and whatnot. He also said that tonight he would finally have the chance to show off all of those moves. Right. Because we’ve never seen Dolph do any technical wrestling before.
He tries to play off of Jericho’s famous “Man of 1,004 Holds” by claiming to know 1,005. Then he starts to list them, including “superkick.” Yes. Dolph Ziggler, who just told us he has been wrestling since age five, thinks a superkick is a “hold.”
Then he did his usual bullsh*t promo about how tonight he is going to go out there and “steal the show.” What the f*ck does that even mean in kayfabe? He’s like the other side of the Vince Russo coin where he is worried about winning Worker of the Year votes that he, too, completely forgets that this is supposed to be a sporting event where the competitors are trying to win.
He then closed it off by randomly stealing from Chevy Chase, saying “I’m Dolph Ziggler. He’s not.”

DOLPH ZIGGLER vs. BARON CORBIN- no rating. Awesome segment.
Dolph is wearing amateur wrestling headgear and a mouth-guard. I guess that’s what makes this a “technical wrestling match,” although by that logic every time Cena and Ambrose wrestle in their jeans the matches should be street fights.
So… Dolph immediately kicked Corbin right in the nuts a la Kevin Steen vs. Nigel McGuinness from Return Engagement, although Steen did it before the bell so as not to cause a DQ. Dolph then grabbed the mic and on his way up the ramp announced that “Dolph Ziggler has been disqualified. And the loser of this match… is still Baron Corbin.” This was pretty awesome.

MIZ PROMO- So they have Maryse standing in front of a green-screen to introduce a Miz promo via Facebook from his “penthouse suite” that he is staying in because tomorrow is the first day of filming for The Marine 5. So WWE wants Miz to star in this movie but they went send his wife along with him for filming? At worst couldn’t Miz have just paid for her to stay with him? Having Maryse introduce a promo via Facebook over a green-screen instead of being in the promo with Miz at his “penthouse suite” just looked weird.
Miz’s promo was meh. I think they’re going to have him keep cutting these promos for a few weeks to remind us that he’s the champion while he is off filming the movie.

THE HEELS STRATEGIZE FOR THE MAIN EVENT- pointless arguing. Why can’t we have matches with teams that actually GET ALONG?! It’s not like there is anything at stake in this match?

Charlotte vs. Becky has been announced for Smackdown. They are also hyping up a promo by The Club.

SAMI ZAYN, DEAN AMBROSE, & CESARO vs. ALBERTO DEL RIO, CHRIS JERICHO, & KEVIN OWENS- 7/10
While Michael Cole is in the middle of putting Jericho over for inventing Money in the Bank, JBL decides to interrupt him to talk about Mitch the Plant and how Jericho committed “the worst case of potted plant assault since” some angle on the Barber Shop. The fans soon erupted in chants of “STUPID IDIOT” and I like to think they were chanting it at Bradshaw.
Of course the heels had to argue amongst themselves because G-d forbid we just have a main event wrestling match without this pointless sh*t. Dean pins Owens clean even though it would have meant a lot more for one of the other babyfaces to pin Jericho (who is probably leaving soon) or even Del Rio. But no. Owens beat AJ clean last week on Raw, therefore he must lose this week. Because that’s how you build stars.

A bad episode of Raw, although the final forty minutes were significantly better than the first one hundred and forty. It almost felt like they were booking this whole show on the fly. Stuff was rarely mentioned until it was about to happen (although the segment with Shane and Steph certainly contributed to this feeling a lot).

STUPID ANNOUNCER QUOTES:
1. JBL explains that “Frank Gotch was one of the best shooters of all time.”
What does that mean, exactly, in kayfabe?
Hold #712: ARM BAR!

Upcoming Reviews:
FIP in 2005
ROH Validation
PWG All-Star Weekend V: Night 2
DGUSA Open the Ultimate Gate 2013
ROH/CMLL Global Wars Espectacular: Day 3

User avatar
KILLdozer
Posts: 5930
Joined: Dec 16th, '10, 22:54

Re: BRM Reviews the 5/30/2016 Raw (bad)

Post by KILLdozer » May 31st, '16, 20:31

Dolph Ziggler kickin' Corbin in the crotch is pretty funny.
When they come, they'll come at what you love.

User avatar
NWK2000
Posts: 1490
Joined: Feb 26th, '14, 00:52

Re: BRM Reviews the 5/30/2016 Raw (bad)

Post by NWK2000 » Jun 1st, '16, 08:15

Big Red Machine wrote: STUPID ANNOUNCER QUOTES:
1. JBL explains that “Frank Gotch was one of the best shooters of all time.”
What does that mean, exactly, in kayfabe?
I think shooter is another term for "technical/collegiate wrestler" There was a stance you could pick in Smackdown Just Bring It for your create-a-wrestler called "Shoot fighting" where the hands were up. I could've sworn they've also referred to Bob Backlund as a shooter at some point.
NWK Reviews is closed for business for now.

User avatar
Serujuunin
Posts: 2441
Joined: Dec 17th, '10, 19:56

Re: BRM Reviews the 5/30/2016 Raw (bad)

Post by Serujuunin » Jun 1st, '16, 10:18

This whole episode was so infuriating because of all the terrible booking decisions. There was nothing on this show that was worth watching to me, and that's sad.

User avatar
Big Red Machine
Posts: 27378
Joined: Dec 16th, '10, 15:12

Re: BRM Reviews the 5/30/2016 Raw (bad)

Post by Big Red Machine » Jun 1st, '16, 10:33

Serujuunin wrote:This whole episode was so infuriating because of all the terrible booking decisions. There was nothing on this show that was worth watching to me, and that's sad.
I wouldn't quite say that the AJ turn wasn't "worth watching" because the execution was pretty good, but otherwise I completely agree with you. They make this gigantic announcement last week and then Raw isn't even business as usual. It's worse than business as usual. They blew their entire creative wad last week, and now, with the exception of the Cena vs. Bullet Club feud, I expect them to coast not only up to the PPV, but all the way up until the draft as well, which is a real shame because this period between the announcement of the impending split and the actual split itself offers so many opportunities for storylines that are completely unique to this situation.
Hold #712: ARM BAR!

Upcoming Reviews:
FIP in 2005
ROH Validation
PWG All-Star Weekend V: Night 2
DGUSA Open the Ultimate Gate 2013
ROH/CMLL Global Wars Espectacular: Day 3

User avatar
Serujuunin
Posts: 2441
Joined: Dec 17th, '10, 19:56

Re: BRM Reviews the 5/30/2016 Raw (bad)

Post by Serujuunin » Jun 1st, '16, 15:21

Big Red Machine wrote:
Serujuunin wrote:This whole episode was so infuriating because of all the terrible booking decisions. There was nothing on this show that was worth watching to me, and that's sad.
I wouldn't quite say that the AJ turn wasn't "worth watching" because the execution was pretty good, but otherwise I completely agree with you. They make this gigantic announcement last week and then Raw isn't even business as usual. It's worse than business as usual. They blew their entire creative wad last week, and now, with the exception of the Cena vs. Bullet Club feud, I expect them to coast not only up to the PPV, but all the way up until the draft as well, which is a real shame because this period between the announcement of the impending split and the actual split itself offers so many opportunities for storylines that are completely unique to this situation.
The AJ execution was good, but it baffles me that they want to turn him right now when he just organically feels like a babyface. Trying to force the fans to feel a different way about him isn't going to be terribly successful, and especially if they want him to be booed and Cena to be cheered. We all know that won't happen, same as it didn't happen with Roman. And it's also baffling to me why they're trying to force Rollins to be a heel when people are excited to see him back, and still trying to push Roman as a babyface, because we all know that isn't going to happen either. Their top two angles are completely bass-ackwards and it's so infuriating.

Post Reply

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 16 guests