Seriously, guys, I totally phoned-in last week’s RAGER. (I typed it two days before Thanksgiving, can you blame me?)
But now that we’ve had our fill of turkey and yelling at each other out of the way, it’s time to look onward to this week’s subject: The Shield.
For those that are unfamiliar, The Shield is the name of the group that consist of Dean Ambrose, Seth Rollins, Roman Reigns (former indy darlings to all you wrestling hipsters as well as NXT alum). All Avengers jokes aside, I’m just glad we don’t have to hear Michael Cole say “those 3…well, NXT upstarts” anymore. But now I find myself questioning as to how WWE will face the challenge of making this different than what we saw with Nexus.
Let’s be honest, they’ve got a Corre mentality (because, you see, in The Corre, apparently everyone is…equal) with a Nexus-style mission statement which is vague enough at this point so the writers aren’t backed into a corner but still too specific to last more than 4 months without becoming redundant. The more successful stables (DX, Four Horsemen, Evolution, etc) were a mix of established wrestlers that teamed with younger talent to help push them and essentially give their stamp of approval or the group really didn’t have any specific mission other than to crush the competition. As much as it hurts me to say that, 3MB could potentially have a longer shelf life than Shield. Why? Because 3MB doesn’t really have some grand purpose to aim at, they can just go from target to target and Shield has set out for this quest to protect justice in the company (which looks a lot more like attacking Ryback at the end of every show).
What was a strong point for Nexus early on was that they indiscriminately beat up anybody and everybody in their quest to bring down “the establishment.” However, the giant purple wall they hit was when they went straight for Cena and stayed on him for month after month after month.
My solution for Shield is simple: Go after heels too. Say a heel picks up a dirty win, have Shield come out and give that heel the ritual table smash and show that they’re really all about their mission statement. However, I feel like there needs to be an alternate motive to be discover eventually because these guys coming out and being vigilantes every Raw is going to get old after a while. It would be a lot like the end of every Raw and PPV turned into a waiting game of when we sat around and waiting for Nexus to show up.
Of course, all of the internet is waiting and licking their chops for it to be revealed that Shield is really only protecting Punk (whether by his own design, Paul’s or on their own) and giving Punk another chance of running a stable. Only this time, he’ll get the full backing of everyone backstage (unlike SES) and not thrown into his lap just to give him something to do (New Nexus).
Before I go any further, don’t misread what I said earlier about 3MB. I don’t actually think they’ll last longer, there’s a difference between not booking yourself in a corner and completely aimlessness.
Earlier when I was recording this week’s podcast with Joel (which you can listen to here on Pulse Wrestling and follow us on twitter @CRAttire *Shawn Michaels-like cheap plug*), my co-host had a very interesting desire that he voiced. He talked about TLC and how lately its been modeled after the following:
1 Chairs Match
1 Tables Match
1 Ladder Match
1 Big TLC Match for WWE Championship.
He mentioned that he would really like to at least see a ladder match for the tag team belts now that we have more of an emphasis on tag teams. I have to say that now that I’ve thought about it, I agree. It’s been a long time since we’ve seen that. Matter of fact, we have seen that since DX vs JeriShow at TLC 2009 and that was only two teams. We know the tag championship is probably gonna be on the line so might as well make it interesting, yes? Yes.
Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do,
Chris
The Answer: The True Tale of Black Friday (so what if it’s a week late)
Gather ’round, boys and girls, and let Uncle Chris tell you all about the true story of the holiday you know as “Black Friday.” Every Friday after Thanksgiving, villagers pour out in the wee hours (named after the inconvenient hours when one has to get out of bed and use the bathroom) to buy Christmas presents for all their loved ones or tolerated ones. The shops opened earlier and made bigger and better deals for those individuals that braved such early hours. Eventually the desires for these items at such a low cost made some villagers hostile and created horror stories that were repeated throughout the land. It is said that in those times of hostility and anger, the mythical beast known as Cthulhu observes their misfortune and then delivers those stories to public forums like the book of faces or the twitter machine. This is done to reward those who stayed in during those hours but still wish to hear of the horrid tales. Merry Black Friday to you and yours and may Cthulhu be in a giving mood for us all.
