Monday Night RAW finally managed to shake off its current habit of disappointing fans. This week’s show was full of energy that we were all desperately craving for, setting up some new feuds and working towards a highly anticipated Universal Title match at Great Balls of Fire.
Smackdown was certainly a worthy show in its own right, making this a very impressive week for the WWE.
Here are some of the main things we learnt from the last seven days:
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#1 The Roman Reigns/Bray Wyatt feud is over before it began
There have been a few occasions in the recent past where I’ve advocated for Bray Wyatt and Roman Reigns to become the main feud of WWE’s new era. Unfortunately, the company continues to handle Wyatt terribly, never allowing him to get important victories on the big stages.
This week on RAW, we were reminded yet again of this fact. Following the fatal five-way at Extreme Rules, we were expecting some new feuds to develop, and Roman vs. Bray looks like it is about to enter its latest instalment.
Unfortunately, the classic WWE mistake has been made, having the babyface get the win so early on. By kayfabe logic, why would Roman need to face Bray again? Surely the point of having a ‘babyface/heel’ dynamic entails the heel getting wins over the face, whether with the help of underhand tactics or not, which means the babyface is always on the backfoot, chasing their revenge. Now we have a situation in which another match between the two wouldn’t make sense.
I suppose, in reality, Bray vs. Roman isn’t the typical face/heel storyline. Bray is treated more like a babyface, and because he always loses important matches, it feels like we need to get behind him, in the way we would normally get behind an underdog babyface, to help his ascendancy up the card.
This means Bray is basically a face, and as we’re all well aware, Roman essentially represents the main company heel right now. Is it time to turn Bray babyface officially? If nothing else, it would make his current booking a lot easier to understand.
#2 Big Show and Enzo Amore could really work as a future tag-team
The story involving Enzo and Cass is currently the highlight of Monday Night RAW at the moment. This week, instead of seeing Enzo lying backstage after a blindsided attack, it was Big Cass who fell victim to the mystery adversary. This left Enzo on his own for his tag match against Gallows and Anderson. Luckily, Enzo found another ‘seven-foot tall’ giant to team up with, and it wasn’t just the in-ring action that impressed WWE fans.
Before the match, Enzo did his characteristically entertaining mic work, proving that no matter how far his wrestling career goes, he will always be an essential part of the roster. Instead of having Cass to bounce off, it was The Big Show that played second fiddle on Monday.
The chemistry between the two proved a very welcome surprise and turned this particular segment into a highlight of the show overall. The Big Show has proven time and again that his ability to do comedy is often more effective than being a larger than life presence between the ropes. The two fed off each other brilliantly, making references to things like Ice Age and even doing their own version of the S.A.W.F.T chant.
For the time being, Enzo and Cass probably still have a lot in front of them as a team, depending on where this current storyline goes. But perhaps one day, when Cass pursues a main event singles career, Big Show and Enzo can get together and provide this kind of comic relief on a weekly basis.
#3 Saying ‘Great Balls of Fire’ really ruins a superstar’s promo
Ever since the announcement that RAW’s next PPV will be titled ‘Great Balls of Fire’, the internet has been awash with memes, critical comments and general mockery. To be fair, it is a fairly absurd name for a show. Whether it is simply a reference to the popular rock n’ roll song of the same name or a sly attempt at injecting some lightheartedness into WWE’s calendar of shows, it’ll probably end up making us chuckle every time we hear it.
One thing fans hadn’t quite accounted for, however, was how the PPV name was going to sound when a superstar had to say it out loud, especially in the middle of a serious talking segment. This week, while Samoa Joe was doing an excellent job of talking up his upcoming bout with Brock Lesnar, he got to the point of the script in which we had to utter the name ‘Great Balls of Fire’, and I, for one, felt like the atmosphere took a bit of an unexpected turn.
It’s hard to take anyone seriously who stands in the ring, with full sincerity, and says something like ‘I’m going to end their career.... at Great Balls of Fire’, or ‘I will finally get my hands on so-and-so... at Great Balls of Fire’. I’m not sure whose job it was to come up with a marketable name for the event, but I do wonder whether they really thought it through.
This is the WWE, after all, and for all their faults, they still know the basics of TV advertising. So expect the PPV name ‘Great Balls of Fire’ to be mentioned a fair few times by the commentators and superstars before the actual show reaches the WWE network.
#4 The WWE should have known Lana was going to receive a positive reaction
For a good few weeks, Smackdown Live have been teasing the debut of the re-packaged Lana. The former advocate for Rusev has had a strange relationship with the WWE Universe over the span of her short career. Initially being a very effective heat magnet, fans used to love booing everything she said and turned her into the ultimate target for the ‘USA, USA, USA’ chants.
She then won over a lot of people, seeing her slowly transition into a babyface, teaming up with Dolph Ziggler, which didn’t exactly go well. She then went back to being a heel, although this time as Rusev’s wife, as well as manager. All the while, however, a lot of fans have had a soft spot for her, maybe owing to how fantastic she manages to look everytime she walks down to the ring, or more likely her ability to talk on the mic and work off different kinds of crowd reactions.
It’s safe to say her debut this week was pretty well received by the Smackdown audience. She was initially cheered, and when we learnt that she wasn’t going to be inserted into the MITB women’s match at the next PPV, fans began chanting ‘We want Lana’. All of this was nice to see from Lana’s own perspective, but was it short sighted of the WWE not to just bring her in as a babyface?
Surely they knew fans would be excited to see her, and after such a long time off TV, audiences across the country are going to be excited when she comes out, at least for the next few weeks and months. In fact, it is a little dangerous for someone like Naomi to be involved in a feud with her right now. The dynamics of this rivalry is going to be a little off. As well liked as the champion is, her popularity feels a little unstable.
Fans cheer for Naomi because they have no reason to boo her, as opposed to genuinely liking her more than the other women. Lana will be going into this match at MITB as an awkward heel, receiving most of the fans’ adulation and love. If there’s one thing the WWE don’t need right now, it’s more awkward heels.
#5 The WWE Championship is still in very awkward territory
Enough time has passed for fans to digest the news that Jinder Mahal is WWE Champion. Whether fans have learnt to like it or not, Jinder is in the record books as holding one of, if not the, most prestigious belts in all of professional wrestling. And while the modern day Maharaja hasn’t exactly done anything wrong as champion so far, his reign isn’t exactly setting the world alight.
In fact, Smackdown still feels very much focused on the United States Championship right now, as opposed to the WWE belt. There is a much more believable person holding it, and his matches are normally reserved for the main event or at least the opening match of the show.
The fact that the next PPV is the MITB event is helping to shift the focus back on WWE’s signature championship somewhat, as 6 of Smackdown’s best are currently destroying themselves for a chance to compete for it, but that owes more to who the six men are, as opposed to how important the belt feels.
The champion himself was engaged with Mojo Rawley this week. It made sense for Rawley to be on TV, considering he did win the Andre the Giant Battle Royal at Wrestlemania and hasn’t been well utilised since, but to throw him at Jinder really did nothing for either of the two men or, for that matter, the championship itself.
Once again, the match involving the champion played second fiddle to a bout involving Kevin Owens and Shinsuke Nakamura. Perhaps Smackdown should take a leaf out of RAW’s book and not have the champion appear every week. At least this would make both the champion and the championship feel a bit more prestigious and elusive, as opposed to being lost somewhere in the middle of the card.
#6 And the Superstar of the week is... Samoa Joe
Despite his solid RAW main event match-up with Seth Rollins this week, Samoa Joe deserved to be the superstar of the week mainly for his promo work. All of us know what a talent Joe is, both inside and outside the ring, but in terms of his main roster WWE career, this was the first time the spotlight was well and truly directed at him.
Initially being a supporting character in the Seth Rollins/Triple H feud at Mania, and then going into the fatal five-way match at Extreme Rules as the least likely to win, his eventual victory in that match has catapulted him back into the attention of the fans.
He was given the space to talk about the prospect of facing Lesnar, doing a very good job of it indeed. He even had some great dialogue with Paul Heyman, perhaps WWE’s greatest current talker.
Applying the Coquina Clutch on Heyman was a nice touch as well, and acted as a prelude to how physical this rivalry with the Beast is probably going to be. There’s a lot to look forward to with this upcoming match, and this week was a very good first glimpse.
Congratulations, Samoa Joe.
