BRM Reviews the 8/5/2013 Raw

[Big Red Machine]

OMFG IT’S SMH!- Steph does a great job of playing a very neutral corporate executive. Like Laurinaitus’ character, except rather than just spouting buzzwords and thinking he is being clever, you can tell that there are actually wheel turning in Steph’s head.

DANIEL BRYAN GETS A CORPORATE MAKEOVER- yeah… this was not good. I was expecting some comedy with Dragon not wanting to shave his beard. Instead they trimmed his beard to an equally stupid shape so that he just looks like a lighter-haired Damien Sandow, and they had him give up on his established principles and eat meat. Even while being a heel, Dragon held fast to his veganism. It was an important character trait. He was “the world’s toughest vegan.” But NOW THAT HE IS A BABYFACE, he sells out his values to become more corporate. WHAT THE F*CK?!

Oh… and Dragon gets this corporate makeover… and Lawler and JBL are STILL making fun of his appearance and calling him a goat!

DRAGON PROMO- Dragon talks about how he isn’t the face of the company that corporate wants. He is too small and looks scraggly… so how could he possibly beat Cena? Because Cena is an entertainer and Dragon is a wrestler! A great promo, aside from a few things:
1) Is Cena not a kayfabe wrestler… and is Dragon’s wrestling not entertaining?…
2) We have seen before that Cena loves wrestling. He has been fired before and has found his way back. Even more importantly, it has been established that Cena doesn’t care about the big money. He even threatened to go to TNA if Vince fired him back in 2011.
Those “factual” problems aside, though, this had a MAJOR flaw in it… it was so completely out of place. This is the promo that Dragon cuts when he is rejecting the corporate makeover! This is the promo where he says that he is who he is and just because he doesn’t look like a poster-boy doesn’t mean that he can’t beat Cena because he is flat-out better than Cena is and that is what is important. It’s not what you look like that counts. It’s how skilled you are!... but this message was totally undermined by having Dragon cutting it in a suit, with he is slicked back and his trademark beard trimmed.

While he was cutting this promo, they panned out to the crowd and someone brought a sign that said “Mary me, John Cena.”
The first thought through my head was “okay. That woman is clearly not an internet fan, because if she was, she would know that Cena is dating Nikki Bella.” The second, much more entertaining thought through my head was “hmm… if she doesn’t know that, she must not be watching Total Divas, either. You know what would probably get some more attention on Total Divas? If Nikki hopped the barricade and went up and smacked this woman. That would definitely get some eyes on the show.

VINCE & DRAGON- Vince tells Dragon “we’ve never had anyone so unkempt. So you look like a miniature Mick Foley.”
Well… you’ve had Mick Foley, haven’t you?
Then they bring out a barber’s chair and after much soul-searching, Dragon agrees to sit in the chair… and they bring out Wade to shave him. What a disappointment. I was preparing myself to pop huge for Brutus Beefcake. Anyway, Wade is about to shave Dragon, but Dragon headbutts him then shaves half of Wade’s beard (which is always a fantastic idea for Crazy Hair Day at summer camp). Dragon then beats Wade up and reveals his new t-shirt… which is plain white aside from an arrow pointing up and the slogan “the beard is here.” FANTASTIC!

As a whole this was long, but fans were 100% into it and, aside from the thematic issues, it was fun (though if Dragon is back to his usual, unkempt look after his match tonight, things will be fine).

ROB VAN DAM vs. ALBERTO DEL RIO (w/Ricardo Rodriguez)- 4/10
So RVD clearly purposefully rams Del Rio’s head into a bucket right in front of the ref, but we don’t get a DQ? To make things worse, almost no attention was paid to RVD pinning the champ. Instead all of the attention was on Del Rio massacring Ricardo in an attempt to turn Ricardo babyface. I’m fine with babyface Ricardo… but this is not the time for it.

CODY RHODES PROMO- so Cody’s people were able to find the briefcase after it had spent TEN DAYS in the Gulf of Mexico? Really? And it opened up enough so that all of this sh(t could get inside of it… but the contract never floated out? Really?

MARK HENRY vs. RYBACK- DUD!
Ryback steals Fandango’s gimmick and just walks out of the match. This accomplished nothing aside from pissing me off.

TOTAL DIVAS HYPE SEGMENT- DUD!
1) You don’t need segments to hype Total Divas! You are running commercials for it!
2) You are doing this Total Divas show which has exposed relationships such as Dragon and Brie and Cena and Nikki… so if you are going to have Brie and Nikki argue about anything, it should be whose boyfriend is going to win in the main event at Summer Slam!

JOHN CENA PROMO- GREAT, but I think it would have been better if Cena had focused more on his presence as the poster boy. My

ORTON PROMO TO CENA- bad. If the plan is, as Vince’s promo a few weeks ago seems to have set up, to have Randy turn heel by cashing in on the Dragon vs. Cena winner right afterwards, they should be keeping Randy as far way from them as possible. Out of sight, out of mind.

BRAD MADDOX MAKES THE MAIN EVENT- I will admit that I marked out a bit once Dragon came down and think that this will be an awesome main event (if they give it enough time) and will be a good win for The Shield, but I really hate the fact that Brad Maddox didn’t have a main event signed OVER AN HOUR INTO THE SHOW!

TONS OF FUNK vs. THE WYATT FAMILY (w/Bray Wyatt)- good squash.
The lack of Funakadactyls at ringside suggests that some horrible act of violence will befall Tons of Funk after this match. Not much happened, though. Wyatt hits Brodus with Sister Abigail, then Husky cut a great promo. Then Kane appeared on the TitanTron and cut a great promo of him home that seems to suggest that they will have an Inferno Match at Summer Slam… and Bray just laughs! GREAT!
More importantly, though, I have solved the mystery of the magically appearing rocking chair! Rowan brings it with him.

CM PUNK PROMO- great

KAITLYN vs. LAYLA- 3/10
So the reason that Layla turned on Kaitlyn is because she is an attention whore. Sure. Why not?
Anyway, I hated how this was done. This segment should have started with Kaitlyn storming out, grabbing a mic, and demanding that Layla get her ass out to the ring so Kaitlyn can kick it all over Green Bay. That is what people want to see out of their babyfaces! Not just waiting in the ring with a slightly pissed off look on her face. I’m not saying that the match was bad. It wasn’t, and I enjoyed Layla’s heel antics a lot. I’m just saying that there was a much better way to do this. One that lets Kaitlyn be a better babyface and one that extends the mystery of why Layla turned so that it doesn’t just feel like a random add-on to the AJ vs. Kaitlyn feud.
Oh… and if Layla wants all of the attention to be on her, why did she do AJ’s skipping this with her? This just makes it look like she is AJ’s sidekick.

CHRISTIAN vs. HEATH SLATER (w/3MB)- DUD!
On Smackdown Christian won #1 contender to the World Heavyweight Title. So what does WWE do with him here on this show? Do they have him cut a fiery babyface promo? Perhaps give him a big win over a top star? Nope. They have face a f*cking jobber in a match where he spends the majority of it getting his ass kicked. Then, after the match, he runs away from his two jobber friends.

CM PUNK vs. CURTIS AXEL (w/Paul Heyman)- no rating. AWESOME SEGMENT!

HEYMAN GUYS PROMO- Brock was better than I remember him being. Heyman was good… and we’re ostensibly getting Punk vs. Heyman next week.

KOFI KINGSTON vs. FANDANGO (w/Summer Rae)- 4/10
Hey… what do you know? Fandango didn’t run away. That’s an improvement. Kofi’s return should have gotten a lot more hype.

HUNTER & STEPH BACKSTAGE- Steph is crying because Vince yelled at her. Not only is she a grown woman and a company executive, but she is Vince’s daughter. She should be used to this sort of thing from him. Hunter was great, though. I just hope that they don’t screw up Dragon vs. Cena with whatever they’re going to do.

THE USOS vs. THE REAL AMERICANS (w/Zeb Coulter)- 4.5/10

DOLPH ZIGGLER vs. BIG E. LANGSTON (w/AJ Lee)- 4/10
Why are we getting this match again? Here’s a novel idea: Why not have them promote their match at Summer Slam by CUTTING PROMOS?!
The match looked sloppier than Ziggler usually is. In order to not give us a clean finish here, we had to have AJ and Kaitlyn brawl into the ring so Dolph could be distracted. This whole match just shouldn’t have happened.

THE SHIELD vs. RANDY ORTON, JOHN CENA, & DANIEL BRYAN- 4/10
This match didn’t even START until 11:00 pm, so it didn’t get much time, but most importantly, THESE IDIOTS HAVE NO F*CKING IDEA HOW TO BOOK THINGS!
The finish to this match should have involved Dragon and Cena having a miscommunication, leading to o them yelling at each other rather than saving Orton from being pinned, creating some more heat between them for Summer Slam. Instead, they had Dragon get the win clean, doesn’t build to Dragon vs. Cena at all (it doesn’t even help Dragon because he has already beaten The Shield) and gives The Shield a loss for no reason other than to give Dragon a pointless win.

AFTERMATH- DUD! Randy attacks Dragon and Cena and we even got an MITB cash-in tease from Orton, completely telegraphing any sort of Orton heel turn or cash-in they want to do at Summer Slam.

Overall, a much worse Raw than we have been getting lately. The only things that were good here were Cena’s promo and the Punk-Lesnar stuff.

[cero2k]

VINCE & DRAGON- Vince tells Dragon “we’ve never had anyone so unkempt. So you look like a miniature Mick Foley.”
Well… you’ve had Mick Foley, haven’t you?

More importantly, though, I have solved the mystery of the magically appearing rocking chair! Rowan brings it with him.

you've never noticed? you're not paying attention to your NXT

HEYMAN GUYS PROMO- Brock was better than I remember him being. Heyman was good… and we’re ostensibly getting Punk vs. Heyman next week.

Paul...Say something stupid!

[Big Red Machine]

More importantly, though, I have solved the mystery of the magically appearing rocking chair! Rowan brings it with him.

you've never noticed? you're not paying attention to your NXT

Not really. I'm also about a month or so behind. I had just never noticed it. It was always too dark.