WWE had another new Raw on Monday, what did the Pulse Wrestling crew think of the show?
Darren Paltrowitz
The Dusty Rhodes tribute, even if a lot of it was from last night, was heartfelt and appropriate. That was one of two things that kept my attention this week.
The other thing of interest was the return of Brock Lesnar and Paul Heyman. The World Title picture was getting to be a drag without them around.
The Divas division was made to look weak, yet all of that great talent is sitting there in NXT.
Tag teams were buried far into the third hour and limited to one match. As much as I like both New Day and The Prime Time Players, that does nothing for the division as a whole.
The Intercontinental and U.S. Title pictures are also in need of a reboot.
The Machine Gun Kelly performance was unnecessary, and as strong as Kevin Owens looks, he would have looked much stronger attacking a wrestler (or someone that knew how to properly take a bump).
On the bright side, there’s still NXT and there’s that July 4th special on the WWE Network coming up.
John Turnbull
The Dusty tribute was perfectly done and brought a tear to my eye. The rest of the show, not so much…
Ambrose vs Shamus was nothing to write home about and makes me dread a year of the big Fella being forced down our throats.Truth vs Barrett was a complete waste of time that makes Wade’s KOTR win seem like a mistake, and the night was looking dire until Kevin Owens entered the ring.
Ziggler and Lana do not have a lot of chemistry in my opinion, but his match against Owens was the best of the night.
I could not possibly care less about Kane vs Orton at this point. The Shamus interference did not improve the situation.
If not for the previous match, Big Show vs Miz would probably be the most pointless match of the night.
Reigns vs Wyatt could be interesting.
Paige vs Bella Twins showed that Paige has more talent and charisma in one hand than both of the Bellas combined. Bring up Charlotte or Becky Lynch and let them destroy these clowns already.
The musical performance was odd until Kevin Owens made it awesome by powerbombing MGK through the stage. Hilarious.
New Day vs Neville & PTP was entertaining, with the Players on track for a solid tag title run.
The Lesnar/Heyman appearance at the end saved the show from a D rating, with Paul E proving once again that he is the best hype man in the business – even when he doesn’t say a word.
Overall an average episode of Raw saved by a couple of decent matches and a brilliant tribute to Dusty.
Pat Metalhead
Having unexpected free time means I am now watching and reviewing more WWE PPV’s and RAW ? Where did I go wrong ?
Anyway, RAW Is Talking started of as usual, they went at it for about half an hour which led to Sheamus vs Ambrose for some reason. The fact Ambrose only sold his bad knee on occasion didn’t help here. Sheamus looked weak (backing away from and losing to a one-legged guy basically), this was to continue the Sheamus/Orton thing. Ambrose is not done with Rollins yet (he says), so I guess we know who will be playing the fall guy between Lesnar appearances.
I can’t help but laugh at the J&J stuff, these guys are great.
Hilariously R-Truth forgot he was in a match against Barrett, once he remembered he just beat the King once again. The 2015 King of the Ring’s profile is even lower than R-Truth’s right now. Again, why even bother making him King then ? Plus side, R-Truth has been entertaining me with is antics lately so that counts for something I guess.
Who the hell is Machine Gun Kelly ? OK, serious question, am I really THAT bad with American celebrities or is WWE just scraping the bottom of the barrel here ?
Tell you the truth, it has been something of a chore to watch RAW until now. So thank the wrestling gods for Kevin Owens. Best character in WWE right now (both in booking (mostly) and execution), Owens continued on his momentum. Love the fact that he feels Cena disrespected him by proposing to shake hands. Also liked the fact Cena was kept of screen to sell his injuries. Owens continued being his lovable self by telling Ziggler (who answered the open challenge) that he never said this was for the NXT title. Good match between those two, this was entertaining on all levels.
Paige stands alone as the No Direction crew declines her offer to join forces against the Bella’s. An opening for one of the NXT girls ? One can always hope.
Why am I watching a match between Kane and Orton ? Sheamus comes out, Director of Operations Kane makes this a no DQ match, Sheamus intervenes, Kane wins, yaddayaddayadda. Again I have nothing against either Sheamus or Orton but the only thing those two managed to achieve in recent weeks was to demonstrate how little chemistry they had.
Ryback is fun on commentary, he would almost make us forget how bad the rest of them are nowadays. Big Show trows Miz on Ryback, Ryback and Show face off, Miz wins by count-out. Silly but I had to laugh.
The Bella’s will tell you hope is for losers . Paige lost, again, match wasn’t bad but get to the point already WWE (assuming there is one).
I love that Owens power bombed Machine Gun Kelly (who?) off the stage, that was awesome . They should have Owens power bomb every WWE-style « celebrity » like that, would make them useful for once. KO’s expression when MGK offered to shake hands was gold.
New Day vs PTP and Neville was fun, Kofi continued to sell his injury and (logically) ended up being pinned. I like PTP and what they’re doing with the tag team scene for the moment.
What’s this ? Is Ambrose trying to talk Kane into donning the mask again ?
Big reveal time, but we already knew of course, Rollins next opponent is… Brrrrrrrrrrock Lesnarrrrrrrrrrrrr. Many are happy lesnar is back, but, having him come out like this, without any explanation, especially after the post-WM massacre is just confusing. So heel authority behaves like faces to put insurmountable face-like odds in the way of heel Rollins while Lesnar, who was lastly seen defying Psycho Steph, is now in league with them ? Well, at least we can look forward to Paul Heyman’s explanation next week. And I really mean that, it’s been too long since I heard a Paul Heyman promo.
Boring first hour, awesome Kevin Owens, some good support from the Tag Teams, this wasn’t too bad I guess, it’s just that WWE’s booking logic remains very confusing.
