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From Bray Wyatt wrestling on a rare occasion to Drew McIntyre and Randy Orton's high-stakes main event, this week's edition of WWE RAW featured many contrasting moments.
The last episode of RAW before Survivor Series was an excellent show, which got progressively better as time flew by this week. Surely, an episode from the Red brand doesn't come by without a set of mistakes, but this week's show was good enough to get one excited for the 2020 edition of Survivor Series.
It should also be mentioned that the Red brand didn't rely on the brand invasion trope while building up to the upcoming pay-per-view, not even once.
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Here are the five biggest news stories from this week's episode of WWE RAW (November 16, 2020).
#5: New Day retained their WWE RAW tag team titles against The Hurt Business
Out of the two title matches announced for this episode, Kofi Kingston and Xavier Woods vs. Cedric Alexander and Shelton Benjamin of The Hurt Business went on first.
The winner, of course, would get the opportunity to face WWE SmackDown's Tag Team Champions (Street Profits) at Survivor Series. The outcome of the contest may have been predictable because Street Profits and The New Day have already established a storyline on the road to Survivor Series.
The only buildup to Survivor Series as far as MVP's faction is considered has been regarding Bobby Lashley's clash against the WWE Intercontinental Champion, Sami Zayn.
While Kinsgton and Woods got the better of Alexander and Benjamin this week, The Hurt Business may be out for revenge after the Survivor Series pay-per-view concludes this Sunday.
Meanwhile, The New Day and Street Profits are pretty much two of the most dominant babyface tag teams on both brands, so it will be interesting to see which team is currently better out of the two in their upcoming match.
#4: RETRIBUTION upstaged the WWE RAW men's Survivor Series team this week
While Team SmackDown could feature some inner-conflict thanks to Kevin Owens and Jey Uso's presence on the same team, the conflict amongst members of Team RAW is a far bigger issue at the moment, as seen during this week's episode of WWE RAW.
AJ Styles tried to band his team together by pitting them against the one faction that everyone hates, called RETRIBUTION. All members of the men's RAW team bring something different to the table, and they could easily defeat the Blue brand if they stay united at the upcoming WWE pay-per-view.
However, the dissension between Team RAW members cost them a match against RETRIBUTION, as Mustafa Ali rolled up Riddle for the victory when they broke into an argument.
Booking an inner-conflict angle between the seemingly dominant Team RAW feels like a fresh approach, rather than relying on the usual brand invasion tropes that happen every year.
Last night's episode of WWE RAW also allowed the Mustafa Ali-led faction to shine against the top candidates who will represent the Red brand at Survivor Series, and the female member of RETRIBUTION - Reckoning - also got her own moment, which will be further discussed in the next slide.
#3: Lacey Evans and Peyton Royce replaced Mandy Rose and Dana Brooke on the women's RAW team for WWE Survivor Series
As predicted in a separate article that looked at potential Superstars who could replace Lana on the Red brand's women's Survivor Series team, it was brought up that there was a possibility of Lacey Evans and Peyton Royce replacing Mandy Rose and Dana Brooke as well, which is exactly what happened on WWE RAW this week.
Although Lacey Evans and Peyton Royce didn't challenge Mandy Rose and Dana Brooke to earn their respective spots, Rose's injury from last week's episode possibly forced WWE to write off Brooke at the same time.
Reckoning launched an attack on Dana Brooke to establish this plot development, while Nia Jax and Shayna Baszler helped in writing off Mandy Rose in a six-woman tag match earlier in the night.
Meanwhile, Lana got put through the table by Nia Jax for a ninth consecutive week, as the former was responsible for losing the match while teaming-up with Jax and Baszler against Asuka, Rose, and Brooke.
The odds being stacked against Lana has turned into a relatively good story over these past few weeks, but Lacey Evans and Peyton Royce's team-up hasn't been positively received by WWE fans, for the most part. Which is why a certain section of the WWE Universe have been frustrated over the aforementioned replacements on Team RAW.
#2: Alexa Bliss and Bray Wyatt's excellent creative arc led to a one-on-one match between The Miz and Wyatt on WWE RAW
Bray Wyatt rarely wrestles on weekly TV nowadays, which is why it was a huge deal when an impromptu match between The Miz and Wyatt was made official on WWE RAW, as a result of The A-Lister's comments made against Wyatt earlier in the night.
At the same time, the storyline between Nikki Cross and Alexa Bliss reached its next stage, as The Fiend's demonic queen attacked her former tag team partner on WWE RAW.
Bray Wyatt's mannerisms and in-ring psychology as the Funhouse version of himself was fantastic, but it became clear that he was channeling a certain part of The Fiend on purpose.
Perhaps this was done to let the audience know that The Fiend and Bray Wyatt are more or less the same entity. But after Bray Wyatt defeated Miz, this theory was immediately contradicted when The Fiend appeared onscreen to watch Wyatt and Alexa Bliss head backstage.
This was a clever move made on Wyatt's part to shroud the viewers in mystery and keep the working dynamics between his different personas as ambiguous as possible. One could feel that WWE's production team also went out of their way to make this whole arc appear more nuanced than the rest of the card.
Bray Wyatt and The Miz are secondary players in the WWE title scene, as they misdirected audiences by teasing to interfere in the main event, which didn't happen in the end.
#1: Drew McIntyre will face Roman Reigns at Survivor Series after he defeated Randy Orton to become the new WWE Champion
Regardless of what would have happened in the main event of this week's WWE RAW, Randy Orton was screwed either way.
Apart from McIntyre, Orton had also been watching out for the threat of The Fiend and a possible cash-in by The Miz. The Viper was truly boxed into a corner when Adam Pearce came out and declared that a clear winner must be determined in the main event by no disqualification and no count-out rules, which gave Orton no other option but to face McIntyre in the ring.
Although Randy Orton picked up a slight advantage thanks to the no disqualification rules, he couldn't prevent the inevitable outcome where Drew McIntyre became the new WWE Champion.
Some may feel that it was useless to put the title on Orton, but short-lived reigns aren't bad when they make sense from a storyline point-of-view, which turned out to be the case with Orton who succumbed under the pressure of having been targeted by various WWE Superstars.
Now, the fans will get to witness what is expected to be a clash of epic proportions between Drew McIntyre and Roman Reigns. Both WWE Superstars have been holding the fort on RAW and SmackDown, and it only made sense for them to cross paths eventually.
The presence of a major title is no longer holding WWE back from booking a feud between Randy Orton and Bray Wyatt as well. A recent rumor indicates that Edge vs. The Fiend is being discussed apart from Edge and Randy Orton's long-standing plans for WrestleMania. Based on that, it is very likely that Randy Orton and Bray Wyatt could be involved in a major storyline after Survivor Series is over.
