BRM Reviews the 12/3/2012 Raw (horrible)

[Big Red Machine]

TEAM HELL NO vs. THE PRIME TIME PLAYERS- 4.75/10

THE SHEILD ATTACK TEAM HELL NO- if this means that we will get Dragon and Kane against Tyler and Moxley… HELL YEAH!

CENA & SHEAMUS BACKSTAGE- eh

Tamina is your new big heel diva and you don’t even show her entrance on TV?
AJ LEE vs. TAMINA SNUKA- 3/10
I wish this match were longer. I popped huge when AJ got the roll-up, though.

PAUL HEYMAN, PUNK, & MIZ SEGMENT- Have a heel manager bury a new product because it doesn’t talk up his charge enough! Now THAT is a creative way to shill a product! I love it!
Punk was very good here and Miz was just great, but the whole polygraph thing is dumb because polygraphs have been shown to be extremely unreliable and tend to give a lot of false positives.

JOHN CENA & SHEAMUS vs. DOLPH ZIGGLER & THE BIG SHOW- The wrong guy got the win here. Why have Cena pin Ziggler? If the injured Cena can beat Ziggler, why should we think Ziggler has a chance of winning at the PPV? Instead they should have had Sheamus pin Show which gives us cause to believe that Sheamus will win his match on the PPV, giving us incentive to buy the PPV.

MR. MCMAHON & VICKIE GUERRERO SEGMENT- hated this. Vince’s purpose here was to force Vickie into making the match, and his reasoning for making a stip that was so unfair to the heel was as retribution for the humiliation of a babyface. The problem with this is that it is selective enforcement. Why is Vince stepping in here, yet he doesn’t step in to rectify other humiliations of babyfaces by heel authority figures.
I also didn’t like the Heyman-Ryback match. I’m pretty sure that Paul Heyman is a kayfabe employee of CM Punk, rather than WWE, so Vickie can’t book him in a match.
The one thing I did like here was Vickie’s delivery of the line “oh, No sir. Yeah. Lying is bad.” Just freakin’ PERFECT!

BRAD MADDOX vs. RANDY ORTON- good segment. The Shield have a legitimate reason to gripe here, as Orton vs. Maddox seems like an unfair match, and the fact that it was a squash proves it.

DOLPH & VICKIE BACKSTAGE- horrible. Dolph has to be an idiot not to realize that Vickie had no choice here, and that Cena’s injured leg makes a ladder Dolph’s best choice. The Heyman interaction was pointless, and the Cena stuff wasn’t good, either.

FATAL FOUR WAY MATCH FOR THE WWE UNITED STATES TITLE: Antonio Cesaro(c) vs. Kofi Kingston vs. R-Truth vs. Wade Barrett- 6/10
Their justifications for Teddy Long showing up are ridiculous.

PUNK TAKES A POLYGRAPH ON MIZ TV- this was just horrible. Having the Shield assault Miz here really feels like a stalling tactic intended to prolong the mystery because WWE can’t think of anything else to do. The brawl was good, though. Aces & Eights could take a lesson from the Shield: there is no reason to run away if you have superior numbers!
I also really disliked Ryback beating Punk down at the end of the show. We already know that Ryback will beat Punk if he gets a fair chance. Having Ryback use weapons to destroy Punk doesn’t do anywhere near as much good as letting Punk escape with his heat.

Overall, a horrific episode of Raw.