SummerSlam‘s right around the corner.
Was this a good last Raw before the big show?
Find out by reading on!
They had a pretty unique Opener after a moment of silence because of the recent shootings.
Joe interrupted the intro.
The intro also featured a new theme song.
Can you tell I didn‘t really know where to put this info?
Anyway, Joe was standing on the announce desk because it‘s apparently pretty comfy.
He was yelling from the top of his lungs.
He did not do it!
He did not attack Roman and he was sick and tired of people accusing him of doing so.
Therefore once Roman comes to the arena he‘ll stop the show and demand an apology.
Then Becky came and the show went on as scheduled.
I love this!
They interrupted the intro, which made it feel more organic and all in all Joe‘s actions just make sense.
Too often in wrestling things that make no sense happen because the script demands it so I find it really refreshing when something logical happens.
Good job!
I love logic!
Can‘t wait to find out how this story pans out.
Becky Lynch and Charlotte Flair vs. Natalya and Trish Stratus:
After the really great opener they went back to delivering the usual.
Or did they?
I expected a boring match that was just there to remind us of the SummerSlam matches and I certainly got that here.
But I think they did it rather well.
Charlotte didn‘t tag and had Natty isolated the entire time.
Finally Becky tagged herself in and Natty put her in the Sharp-Shooter, refusing to break the hold after Becky got to the ropes, which forced the ref to end the match in favor of Becky and Charlotte.
Oh, yeah, Charlotte had stormed off after Becky had tagged herself in and so it was only Trish who could help Becky and so she forced Natty to break the hold.
That‘s all she did and that‘s good.
She should be treated as something special and it‘s nice that we didn‘t really get to see her wrestle.
Yeah, this was a good match for what it was.
I can‘t believe they pulled it off!
Good build!
Rey Mysterio vs. Andrade:
Let me guess, this‘ll be a pre-show match, right?
I sure hope it‘s gonna be at SummerSlam in any capacity whatsoever, because what we got here was absolutely great!
It surprised me that Andrade was booked as dominant as he was considering Rey‘s a Legend.
Not even the 619 could put him away, but nothing stuck on Andrade‘s side either.
So Zelina had to help him win, which I actually enjoyed.
Yeah, this was a really great match and I hope this feud continues!
The 24/7 title got one segment, which is indicative of just how much stuff they put in this episode.
There simply wasn‘t any time for more.
And quite frankly, one was more than enough.
Mike and Maria were sitting in the waiting room of her OB GYN appointment when Mike promised her to protect her.
In the doctor‘s room Mike hugged her and then the doc was revealed to be a ref and she counted to three and now Mike was the new champ.
Back in the waiting room Truth emerged and took the title off of Mike.
While this was sure a fun and funny segment I‘d deem it a cop out.
Yeah, there was no good way of taking the title off of a pregnant woman, I get that, but Mike betraying his own wife?
He‘s been portrayed as a big wimp, so I find that hard to believe.
But it is what it is.
There was never gonna be an easy way out of this.
I do however hate that Truth is the champ again.
I‘m so sick of him as champ right this minute.
Tomorrow that might change, but now I hate it and want to see someone else for longer than a hot minute.
So yeah, one was more than enough.
Brock Lesnar and Paul Heyman gloated about the heinous attack on Seth and Paul was surprised by the fact that Seth was actually there.
He then came limping out and was promptly attacked by Brock.
After Brock was done beating him to a pulp Seth grabbed a mike and asked if it was still worth it.
To him the answer was yes and he will take the belt from Brock this Sunday.
Well, not everything needs to be complicated.
Brock beats Seth up, Seth has a heartfelt promo about not giving up.
Sometimes that‘s all it takes and again this was a great segment!
Damn, could this be a good go home show when all is said and done?
Two good Raws on back-to-back weeks?
Let‘s move on to find out!
The Viking Raiders vs. two tiny little jobbers:
Seriously!
The Vikings beat the jobbers.
This needs to stop!
Week in and out they just end jobbers.
It‘s getting boring.
In fact even the commentary team understands this as Corey tried to make it interesting by calling one of the jobbers the guy from Coheed and Cambria.
Gosh, could you imagine them actually wrestling?
Welcome home, Sanitarium I say!
But yeah, this sucks.
We need a real feud for the guys.
Bring on Street Profits.
I already said this.
Lame, moving on.
Welp.
They had a really good in memoriam video for the late grate Harley Race.
They‘re good at those.
So, yeah, my condolences to his family and friends and may he rest in peace!
Drew McIntyre vs. Cedric Alexander with Kurt Angle as guest referee:
Earlier Kurt did a segment with the Street Profits and then Drew came by and made fun of him, telling him he was the one who put him on the shelve once, so he shouldn‘t cross him.
None of this was relevant however because not only did Drew go after Cedric before a match ever officially took place, but the Fiend also appeared and took out Kurt with Mick Foley‘s Finisher, which is now his, I guess.
Yeah, I‘m still not excited for Bray Wyatt‘s new gimmick, but at least it wasn‘t a direct confrontation with Finn, which is always appreciated.
So, yeah this one was kind of a throwaway segment, but it served the purpose of reminding us of the Fiend‘s existence, so that was nice, I guess.
The New Day (Xavier Woods and Big E) vs. The OC (Gallows and Anderson)
Gallows has a painted face now.
I guess they‘re trying to make him look more brutal or something.
Whatever, doesn‘t really do much for me.
Styles was at ring-side, while Kofi wasn‘t.
I think they‘re casually moving the three New Day members apart from each other.
It probably won‘t be long until they go their separate ways.
This match ended after a few moments when Styles attacked New Day.
Ricochet came out to help and I give you three guesses as to what happened next.
The New Day (Xavier Woods and Big E) and Ricochet vs. The OC:
Gallows pins Woods.
I hate me right now!
Those are the only notes I took!
I guess I didn‘t care because we‘ve already seen New Day fight so much, but they lost and that‘s kind of important.
I like that they‘re really establishing the OC as a big heel stable.
And I think I know why that is.
With the Universal title belonging to Brock right now they don‘t have a Superstar to be the face of the company on Raw.
I sadly don‘t think that Seth‘ll pry the leather strap from out of the beast‘s clutches on Sunday and therefore they need someone to fill in while Brock will be off hunting or farming or whatever it is he does when he‘s never showing up on Raw.
That‘ll be AJ and his friends and it‘ll be too sweet.
Yeah, they‘re heels, but AJ is just such an incredible wrestler that it will work to put him as the face of the brand even as a bad guy.
So, yeah, while I didn‘t care for it it did make sense to have this.
So far there was nothing on this show to really outright hate or think of as unnecessary.
I surprisingly dig this show so far.
Let‘s see what‘s next.
Joe had been informed that Roman was nearing the arena so he stopped the show by sitting in the ring for a minute to CM Punk chants from the crowd.
Hmmmm, no, I don‘t think that‘s really all that reminiscent to what Punk did, but good job of acknowledging that that‘s exactly what WWE wants you to think about.
Anyway, after a second Joe was sick of waiting so he went outside to the parking lot.
I guess no one‘s got patience anymore these days.
There he saw Roman arrive and then a car smashed into Roman‘s car!
He then ran to his help immediately and even Triple H came to check on him.
Jeez, that‘s a brilliant segment!
I love how a bad guy actually checks if a baby‘s all right or not.
That‘s human and not some character archetype.
You know that‘s big with me.
Hm.
I think this was my favorite segment of the night.
Yeah, it was just brilliant.
I can‘t believe I‘m actually excited for and interested in a Roman Reigns story!
Who will it be?
Elias?
Maybe two attackers and Joe will team up with Roman?
Will this lead to a Joe face turn and Roman and him becoming a tag team?
As crazy as this sounds I kinda want that.
It‘s so out there that it might just work.
Yeah, I‘m excited!
This was brilliant!
Okay, let‘s move on to something less brilliant.
The Iiconics vs. The Kabuki Warriors vs. Mandy Rose and Sonya Deville vs. Alexa Bliss and Nikki Cross in an elimination match for the WWE Women‘s Tag Team Championships:
It‘s not that this match was really bad or anything.
That‘s not what made it not brilliant.
It was the fact that they introduced these titles to a lot of fanfare and now no one gives a crap about them.
I don‘t care, do you?
Yeah, I didn‘t think so.
And I don‘t think this match will change that.
The Iiconics were eliminated immediately so there had to be new champs.
Asuka eliminated Mandy and eventually Alexa eliminated Kairi and now Alexa and Nikki are the new champs.
And that‘s just weird to me.
The whole pairing of Nikki and Alexa is weird.
It feels like they were heading into the direction of breaking them up just a few weeks ago.
It felt like the most organic story in the world.
Alexa would betray Nikki and she‘d realize just how manipulative she really was and then she‘d triumph over her and become a really big baby.
But that never came.
It never happened and that‘s sad.
I don‘t like them as a unit.
After all of the injuries she‘s had I‘ve cooled a lot on Alexa and I think she‘s dragging Nikki down.
The fact that this relationship is so incredibly weird and wrong will do nothing to elevate the titles and we‘ll just never see them anymore again.
Hmpf, there are simply too many titles in the WWE.
But it wasn‘t all bad here, as I said the match was decent.
And Corey Graves was on fire!
He called the show Mandy Night Raw and proclaimed that Kairi‘s afraid of scurvy.
Get it? She‘s a pirate.
I completely lost it when he said that.
So great.
Well, we‘ve got one more thing to talk about and it‘s a big one!
The last, big thing was a very special episode of Miz TV.
And that‘s the most funny thing in the world!
Every episode of Miz TV these days is presented as special.
But, yeah, it was a contract signing for Miz v Dolph and Shawn Michaels was there.
So it was actually a bit special.
Dolph still thought that Shawn and Miz were nothing but ass-kissers and that when he beats Miz he‘ll finally get the appreciation he deserves.
After he signed the contract Miz told him he was looking forward to beating him on Monday.
Wait, Monday?
Yeah, Monday, cause the contract wasn‘t for a match against him.
Waiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiit!
Noooooooooooooooooooooo!
Really?
Is this happening?
Okay, so at this point I went downstairs to scream a little.
You see, my cat is afraid of loud noises so I couldn‘t get excited with him right next to me.
When I came back to continue watching I saw Shawn Michaels say that it wasn‘t him, sucking all of the excitement and energy out of me and then Goldberg‘s music hit and I was sad.
Even a Sweet Chin Music to Dolph couldn‘t better my mood.
You tease the biggest match in history, the original versus the copy and then you don‘t do it?
Instead you give Dolph to someone who‘ll end him after one Spear?
Dolph Ziggler vs. Shawn Michaels would‘ve been the greatest thing in the entire freaking world!
Goldberg vs. Dolph Ziggler however… well, am I the only one who doesn‘t care about Goldberg?
I am, right?
Sorry, I just don‘t.
This feels like Shawn was scheduled but had to drop out at the last minute and so they replaced him with Goldberg.
I‘ve talked about the story model from South Park before, right?
You have to link your elements with therefore instead of and then for it to be a good story.
Let‘s see if it checks out here.
Dolph Ziggler attacked Shawn Michaels, therefore Miz defended him, theref0re a match was made, and then it turned out to be Goldberg as an opponent.
It makes no sense!
Their flimsy attempt at fixing this was to tell us that Dolph had tweeted about Goldberg but that doesn‘t justify this.
Yeah, sorry, this is just a let down.
Hm, maybe Saudi Arabia will get Shawn vs. Dolph eventually, but I don‘t care about Goldberg.
I‘m a sad, sad man right now.
The disappointing ending aside this actually was a really good go-home show.
Yeah, we had two good Raws in row.
I like that.
My favorite segment was Roman and the car attack, but I had a lot of fun with a lot of segments.
And even the stuff that didn‘t do it for me, such as the Fiend attacking Kurt made sense as build for SummerSlam.
I honestly don‘t have more to say here.
This was a good episode.
Well, if you disregard the whole Goldberg thing, cause that was just cheap!
Do you like Goldberg?
Tell me in the comments.
Feel free to share my sadness with your friends.
I‘ll see you for SmackDown once it‘s finished.
Have a great weekend!
