Good day, sunshine. Despite your attempt to hide behind the moon, you still shine brightly in the sky. Your dangerous rays which burn my skin shall be extinguished soon by my gang of galactic warriors! Until then, enjoy this edition of The Fantasy Book.
When we left off, the tag teams of Roman Reigns/Big E and John Cena/Sami Zayn won their respective matches. This set up two semifinal matches to see who will go on to win the Money in the Bank briefcase. The first match up is Roman Reigns versus Big E.
After their tag team victory against Matt Hardy and Kofi Kingston, Big E had attacked Roman Reigns to soften him up for later. The rest of New Day also participated in the beat down, leaving Reigns laying. For this match, Reigns comes to the ring first, favoring his ribs and limping noticeably. The crowd does not care though and continue to boo him mercilessly.
Big E Langston makes his way to the ring next, being flanked by Kofi Kingston and Xavier Woods. All three men are smiling and we get a full promo from New Day on their way down the ramp. Reigns stands in the ring looking on in contempt instead of his normal smug grin. Langston climbs into the ring and the match begins.
Of course, everyone assumes Reigns will win this match, despite being hurt because he’s Vince’s golden boy. Sure enough, that is exactly what happens. Big E controls most of the match by pushing around Reigns, using his strength to power through the injured ribs of Reigns. Reigns does hit a few hope spots (Samoan Drop, etc) but the crowd boos these instead of cheering. Eventually, Reigns decides he has had enough selling the injury, slides out of a Big Ending attempt, and hits a Superman punch on Big E. Kingston and Woods jump up on opposite sides of the ring to cause a distraction, but Reigns hits Woods with a big boot and then Kingston with a Superman punch. Reigns then runs around the outside of the ring and hits a drive-by on Woods before getting back in the ring to spear Big E for a three count.
The crowd really did not like that result, and Reigns can’t even be bothered to sell his injuries as he confidently gets his hand raised. The ring is cleared and the crowd takes a few sips of a refreshing beverage since they have another round of boos upcoming.
The second semifinal is John Cena versus Sami Zayn. Zayn teased, after their tag team victory, seeking revenge on Cena for receiving an injury in his first match on the main roster. But, in an interview before the match, Zayn said that he was just joking with Cena. He has no hard feelings and he is excited for the biggest test of his career.
The crowd hates Cena on par with Reigns it seems. But it seems pretty clear that they expect Cena to move on to face Reigns in the final. So we get the typical John Cena match with Zayn playing the extremely plucky babyface. The match is far from a classic, but Zayn’s ability to sell the crap out of anything brings it to a pretty good level. In the end, Cena goes for an Attitude Adjustment, but Zayn flips out of it. Cena spins to hit Zayn with a clothesline, but Zayn ducks it. Zayn grabs Cena around the waist, runs him into the ropes, and rolls him back, arching himself over Cena and gets the surprise three count. The crowd is shocked. Cena is shocked. Even Zayn is shocked. Cena tries arguing with the referee, but eventually concedes that the victory is Zayn’s.
With the final match set in The McMahon Games, we turn our attention to the Woman’s World title. The champion is Alexa Bliss and she will be involved in a gauntlet match. This gauntlet match has slightly different rules, as all the women wrestlers will be involved. The champion will start and each competitor will get two minutes. If the challenger doesn’t get a victory in that two minutes, the champion moves on to the next wrestler. But if someone is able to pin or submit the champion in that two minutes, they become the temporary champion and move on in the gauntlet at that point.
Basically, with only two minutes, the challengers are at a disadvantage. But the champion is at a disadvantage in that she could get worn down as the match progresses. To start things off Alexa Bliss steps into the ring with Carmella. Instead of writing lengthy pieces about each of these segments of the match, I will just bullet point them:
- Bliss defeats Carmella at 1:35 seconds with a right hand followed by Twisted Bliss.
- Bliss defeats Lana at :32 seconds with her double knee stomp move.
- Bliss defeats Tamina at 1:01 seconds. Tamina attacked Bliss immediately after Lana lost, but she missed a Superfly splash and Bliss was able to cover for the pin.
- Bliss and Dana Brooke went to the 2 minute limit.
- Bliss continued on as she survived a Bank Statement by Sasha Banks until the 2 minute limit ran out.
- Nia Jax defeated Alexa Bliss with a Samoan drop at 1:41 to move forward.
- With Jax the new temporary champion, she squashed a returning Summer Rae in :23 seconds.
- Jax crushed Alicia Fox in :54 seconds.
- Jax and Charlotte Flair went to the 2 minute limit.
- Jax and Naomi went to the 2 minute limit.
- Jax and Becky Lynch went to the 2 minute limit.
- Paige then made a surprise return and pinned Jax to take the temporary championship.
- As Paige celebrated, her next opponent turned out to be a debuting Asuka. Asuka defeated Paige with a roundhouse kick to take the temporary championship.
- Asuka and Bayley then wrestled to the 2 minute limit, although roughly half that time was Bayley trying to steady herself to wrestle Asuka again.
- Asuka then made Natalya tap out at 1:51 seconds to the Asuka-lock.
- Asuka defeats Naomi at 1:33 seconds with two consecutive hip attacks and a small package.
- Asuka defeats Mickie James at 1:20 when she dodges a Chick Kick and nails James with her own spin kick.
- Asuka and Emma went to the 2 minute limit although Asuka controlled most of the match.
- The final match of the gauntlet has Becky Lynch facing off against Asuka. These two went to the 2 minute limit. The match ended with Asuka outside the ring after Lynch had hit two Bexploder suplexes on her. The crowd was heavily into the quickness of this match and were definitely buying that Lynch might have come away with the belt if she had another few minutes. Regardless, Asuka takes the Women’s World title, holds it high above her head, and backs up the ramp, never losing eye contact with Becky Lynch, who it seems would be her initial feud on the main rosters.
Something a little different there. Surprise returns of Summer Rae and Paige and the surprise debut of Asuka. All that’s left is the final of The McMahon Games, and we will get to that next week. Can Roman Reigns capture the MITB briefcase to all but secure himself the World Heavyweight title? Or will his rib injury keep him from grabbing that brass ring? And can Sami Zayn, the Underdog from the Underground, scratch his way to victory? Will Zayn’s head even be in the match after his surprise victory over John Cena? Stay tuned…
