Smack Down Live! (7/19/16)

I want to get this out of the way. Monday Night RAW's main event match with Ambrose and Rollins ended in a double pin, which means the Champ retains. Rollins didn't win and Ambrose didn't lose. The TV ending showed Stephanie declaring Rollins as the winner, while the Network ending had Shane and Daniel debating the ending, asking the ref to view the finish, and declaring Ambrose as the winner. As a result of the finish, Ambrose and Rollins are having a title rematch for tonight on Smack Down.

I think I'm going to stop doing Monday Night RAW recaps. It's not because of the possibility of Ambrose going to Smack Down (fingers crossed!) but it's due to the fact there is way way WAY more WWE content to keep track of. Seriously, look at the schedule this week.

• Monday: RAW
• Tuesday: Smack Down Live!
• Wednesday: NXT and CWC
• Sunday: Battleground PPV

Yeah, that is a lot of WWE stuff. So, I'm not going to do recaps. I'll probably just do the PPV recaps instead. Probably, I don't know. I'm just a little worried on what's going to happen tonight again. It's looking obvious that Rollins is the #1 pick for RAW and Ambrose is the #2 Smack Down.

Will Ambrose actually lose the title this time before Battleground? Will Rollins and Ambrose be champs before Battleground? Will Reigns pin either one to become the new champ for the brand at Battleground?!

I take wrestling way too seriously, according to Vince -_-

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HE LOOKS GOOD IN BLUE!

Also, Ambrose won clean over Rollins for the Smack Down main event. Rollins was doing his Falcon Arrow combo which Ambrose got out of and quickly hit him with Dirty Deeds. Now I really hope he retains on Battleground this Sunday.

"MAKE DARREN YOUNG GREAT AGAIN!": Monday Night RAW (7/11/16)

Last week's Monday Night RAW was considered a throwaway episode. Even though it got one of its lowest TV ratings, it was still the most watched show on cable, even though there wasn't much progression with the storylines. This would be somewhat considered a go-home show for Smack Down (as far as tapings go) because next week it goes live. The results can be found here.

This was a surprisingly solid episode of RAW (except for the main event and final segment in the third hour). There was a lot of wrestling matches that actually featured a lot of the talent, a few in-promos and segments, and best of all, there was progress with the brand extension. Long story short, Stephanie will be the commissioner for RAW and Shane will be the commissioner for Smack Down (sadly relieving Shane from co-running RAW). Both have to choose their respective General Managers next week or else Vince will choose for them.

RAW kicked off with immediately with the Battle Royal, where strangely most of the contenders were made of tag teams like The Golden Truth, The Vaudevillains, The Usos, The Ascension, etc. The final 3 ended up being Darren Young, Apollo Crews and Baron Corbin. Crews clotheslined Corbin and both ended up going over the the top rope, leaving Young as the accidental winner of the Battle Royal. Young's win was such a wonderful surprise that he got a crowd chant, plus it was a treat to see Bob Backlund lift him up like he was nothing!

One interesting segment was The New Day's anticipated visit to the Wyatt Family compound. It was heavily inspired by Broken Matt and Brother Nero's "Final Deletion" match, drawing more on the idea of having an all out battle outside the ring and arena. It was a serious and thrilling displa, to see the New Day drop their positive act to take on Wyatt, Rowan, and Strowman, who legit looked threatening and monstrous without his tank top. Obviously, the Wyatt Family overwhelmed the New Day but that was beside the point. Bray Wyatt is finally believable as a cult leader and the "Wyatt Family" is not just Rowan, Strowman, and Harper (who was not included). They are truly a threat and it will be interesting to see how this visit affects the bond of The New Day.

The best match of the night goes to Cesaro and Kevin Owens, where Owens refused to even come into the ring unless Sami Zayn (who was on commentary) is kicked out. Stephanie listed to Owens' request and orders the referees to escort Zayn out. Their match was spectacular and there was also storytelling in the moves they were using. Owens was working on Cesaro's neck for nearly the whole match, so instead of using his signature Pop-Up Powerbomb to take Cesaro out, he uses a rarely used move to win the match. As Owens was angrily ranting in Byron Saxton's headphone about being the best, out comes Zayn from out of nowhere to jump him. He throws Owens into the ring and signals Cesaro to do his swing, which he happily obliges. Knowing that Owens and Zayn will be separated, they're really making the most of this feud.

The best segment of the night goes to Seth Rollins: Investigative Reporter, who debuted his new talk show, The Rollins Report, with an exclusive sit-down interview with Roman Reigns. I feared that Rollins was going to do the same bit where he interviews a picture of Reigns on the Titantron with Rollins mouth superimposed and speaking with his voice. Instead, it was Rollins in a suit asking questions with Reigns' answers taken out of context from his various sit-down interviews with Michael Cole. It was fantastic and funny. It was a new take on Rollins' campaign to remove Reigns and have a one-on-one match with Ambrose, which prompted the champ himself to show up and praise Rollins for having fun for once. He immediately calls Ambrose and his title reign a joke, and goes on to reiterate that he's the best member of The Shield. This is admittedly one of Rollins' best promos since his return and he's far away from being the chickenshit heel he once was last year. His rant sparked something in Ambrose, leading to what would be hands down the best promo of the night and the best promo of his career.

This was not goofy Ambrose. No, this was Dean "Fighting Champion" Ambrose and he gave 2 distinctly different promos. The first is addressing that he does like to have fun because he's the top man, and no matter who comes and leaves, who gets suspended, who "chases fantasies in some other sport," at the end of the day, he's the guy still standing there. If you want to see how easily Ambrose can command the audience, listen to how he got the arena to stop chanting as soon as he switched gears and focused on Rollins, leading to his second promo where he gets dark about how far he's come and how far he'll go to keep the title. Rollins is visibly shaken, even taking a few steps back as he went on. Ambrose basically accepted Rollins' challenge to have a one-on-one match and it will take place next week in the go-home show.

A lot of matches were set for Battleground and it's already looking quite promising. The one thing I'm worried about is what they're doing with Ambrose again. They're giving him his first title defense on RAW against Rollins, and they're already hinting that he may or may not be champion heading into Battleground. Here's the thing; if Ambrose retains, then he's most likely staying on RAW. They can't draft him to Smack Down if he's carrying what's basically RAW's title. So if he's going to Smack Down, Ambrose has to drop the title. I'm a little sad by this possible scenario, because of the fact that he cut an incredible promo and then he's going to lose, which has been a consistent pattern with Ambrose (MITB being the exception). The positive note is that Ambrose got to be a champ and fittingly, he's the last sole WWE champion before they introduce a second title belt. The last few champion have been a heel and most recently, in the sad case for Reigns, a tweener, as a reaction to the fans not accepting him as a champion, even though he's been putting on decent matches. The fact that they plan to cut short the first true babyface's championship reign is troubling.

"Happy Birthday America!": Monday Night RAW (7/4/16)

When they said this was a throwaway episode of RAW - as most episodes that fall on a holiday tend to be - they weren't kidding. The cold opening featured most of the locker room having a 4th of July dinner before a food fight broke out. Admittedly, this was a silly but fun segment. On a regular episode, any given match would've been the main event - WWE Champion vs IC Champion (with Dean Ambrose and The Miz hailing from Ohio), Seth Rollins vs Dolph Ziggler (also from Ohio), or John Cena and AJ Styles quickly turning into Cena, Enzo and Cass vs Styles and The Club. No, this is America's birthday dammit, and they're going to make the main event a 16-man elimination match featuring Team USA (consisting of Big Show, Kane, Bubba Ray, D-Von, Zack Ryder, Jack Swagger, and Apollo Crews) vs Team Multinational Alliance (consisting of Chris Jericho, Sami Zayn, Kevin owens, Cesaro, Alberto Del Rio, The Lucha Dragons, and Sheamus). The results can be found here.

I was about to say that there were no major storyline progressions but there actually was, it just has to be be done in promos as usual. For starters, AJ Styles and The Club made #BeatUpJohnCena a thing, where they planned out what they were going to do on each upcoming holiday for the rest of the year. As they beat up Cena, Enzo and Cass run in for the rescue, hastily setting them up in a 6-man tag team match for Battleground. This is good because it'll keep Styles and Cena II fresh, probably for Summerslam. Meanwhile, Charlotte and Sasha had a long, shouty promo about the women's title. And Becky got a quick win over Summer Rae, somehow setting her and Natalya for a match at Battleground as well.

In terms of interesting promos, that would go to The New Day vs The Wyatt Family feud, where Woods is doing the amazing character work. For once, someone is taking the Wyatt Family seriously and not even the Power of Positivity can stop Woods from worrying about Big E and Kofi and trying to keep them to stay away from them. Bray extended an invitation for the New Day to come over to their compound and this got Woods notably upset, even though Kofi and Big E were making making incest jokes about the Wyatt family earlier. The audience even got pretty vocal when Woods quietly walked away from them and left the ring, as if it was signaling the beginning of the end for the tag team champions.

Also interesting was Rollins cutting a long angry tirade of a promo on the announcer's table after his match with Ziggler, where he proceeded to talk more shit about Reigns (and get cheers because he's a heel??). Ambrose still remained neutral on the issue of removing Reigns from the main event but that doesn't stop him from messing around with Rollins. Even after his win over Miz, Ambrose psyched Rollins out by running back into the ring and walking past him to sit on the Spanish announcer's table to do commentary and promptly shutting up JBL. Ambrose also shuts up Rollins with Dirty Deeds on the Spanish announcer's table, to get back at him for last week. Sadly, Ambrose as a champ still isn't convincing a lot of critics (Vince McMahon fed a line to JBL on questioning Ambrose's stringy wet hair and he coolly reflected as him being naturally beautiful), which is making it more than likely that he's dropping the title at Battleground.

And finally, the main event, where it was expected that Team Multinational alliance would somehow turn on each other (thanks to Owens and Zayn), leaving Team USA to be the winner. I predicted that Ryder would be the last man standing for Team USA and I was half-right; Big Show tagged Ryder in to get the pin over Sheamus.

Battleground is being regarded as a low-level PPV, which is a dumb way of thinking considering that WWE has been trying to make every PPV matter following WrestleMania 32. The Shield Triple Threat is happening now because there's a good chance that all 3 would be separated (it doesn't really matter where Reigns ends up after the draft). Plus, it seems like a test run to see how good this feud can really get, now that Ambrose is the current WWE Champion.

"Dean Ambrose is a fighting champion!": Monday Night RAW (6/27/16)

Welp, they actually did it. They acknowledged Roman Reigns' absence for the next month. This was actually acknowledged by Seth Rollins who kicked off Monday Night RAW, who said he wanted to talk about it even though he was advised not to and yet a prepared screenshot of Reigns' apology tweet was put up on the Titantron. Ambrose interrupted Rollins and, being a babyface and a bro, said Reigns made a mistake and he owned up to it, but was still looking forward to the triple threat. This prompted AJ Styles and John Cena (who's celebrating his 14th WWE Birthday, prompting that wonderful Ambrose reaction gif) to come out, saying they should be added for the WWE World Heavyweight Championship. Stephanie came out and added to Rollins' complaint, saying that what Reigns did was an embarrassment but the bigger embarrassment was having Ambrose as their champion. She went into full Authority mode and set up Cena vs Rollins and Styles vs Ambrose as the main event, where Cena and Styles will be added to the Battleground main event if they win. The results can be found here.

This was another enjoyable RAW, although it was still a struggle to stick with 3 hours. There was less wrestling again and more promo time. It was nice to see 2 Women's matches again now that Sasha Banks has returned. The 2nd match with Summer Rae and Becky Lynch never happened because Becky just went over to beat the crap out of Natalya on commentary. Corporate Kane returned to plead to Stephanie for the general manager spot again and was interrupted by Miz and Maryse, fresh from filming "Marine 5." Kane decides to invoke the 30-day rule, where a champ must defend the title if they haven't done so. Seeing how RAW was taking place in Tampa, FL, there was a lot of speculation that someone from NXT - notably Finn Balor - might show up. The Demon did show up to challenge Miz for the IC title, only it was Demon Kane. The New Day and The Wyatt Family continue to build more intrigue as Kofi and Big E were up to their usual shenanigans of making fun of their opponent while their most vocal member, Xavier, appeared to be scared and wary of Bray.

Jericho hosted the highlight reel with Sami Zayn and Kevin Owens. Zayn did his most passionate promo yet, being upset at Owens and himself for holding each other back in their careers. Owens came back with a vicious truth of his own, saying Zayn was never happy for his success all because he did it as his expense. They both agreed to have one final match together at Battleground because they know for sure they'll be drafted to different roster. Oh, and they both superkicked Jericho in the end.

Cena vs Rollins was a fantastic match, bringing memories of their feud from last year at Summerslam. I was rooting for Rollins to win, just so Cena doesn't get added to Battleground. Rollins wrestles like a babyface so you can't help but root for him. The match unfortunately had a stupid ending where Cena was distracted by The Club (decked out in noticeably new gear with Japanese kanji for their upcoming Japan tour this weekend) and Rollins taking advantage by using the pedigree on Cena for the win.

Styles vs Ambrose was the main event. This was probably one of Ambrose's best match in a while, where he was being technical against Styles and keeping up with him. Also, keep in mind that Ambrose had just wrestled 2 matches in 2 other cities the night before, so I was completely surprised to see him wrestling again. Gallows and Anderson showed up, making it look like Styles might win until Cena came to the rescue and Ambrose smoothly rolled up a distracted Styles to hit Dirty Deeds for the win. Rollins, who was on commentary, came up and Pedigree'd Ambrose while The Club beat up Cena to end the show.

Even though the thought of adding Cena and Styles sounded exciting for Battleground, I'm relieved that it's still going to stay as a Triple Threat. I'm also glad that WWE is not hiding Reigns' suspension and even integrating into a storyline. I did find it stupid - too stupid to even suspend belief - that Ambrose being a champion and current face of the company is the worst thing to ever happen than the company's #1 guy being suspended for a wellness violation. Also, said embarrassment is going to Hawaii and Japan this weekend to defend the title and still fly back to do RAW and Smack Down next week. Even if Ambrose is just a champ for this month until Battleground, he's setting a ridiculously high bar as their champion workhorse. I would have no problem if Rollins wins the title back but if Reigns gets it back, he better be a monster heel. Until then, it's up to Ambrose and Rollins to carry the feud again.

"You deserve it!": Monday Night RAW (6/20/16)

For the first time in a long while, a babyface champ - a genuine underdog with organic and consistent fan support - graced Monday Night RAW. WWE World Heavyweight Champion Dean Ambrose (that sounds really good to say) was greeted with "You deserve it" chants before addressing the WWE Universe. He talked about hard work pays off. Ambrose wondered aloud that if Seth Rollins is "The Man," Roman Reigns is "The Guy," does that make him "The Dude?" The crowd agreed and Dean liked it and said call me whatever you like but call me "Champion." Reigns comes out amidst boos to congratulate Ambrose and reminded him of his rematch clause. Then Rollins comes out amidst cheers screaming that he beat Reigns so he gets a rematch clause. Interrupting Shane O Mac sets up Reigns and Rollins as the main event, where the winner will face Ambrose at Battleground next month. The results can be found here.

This was an enjoyable Monday Night RAW, although more time was spent on promos again and there was less time for the wrestling matches. They also addressed the upcoming Raw/Smack Down Draft, which will take place when Smack Down goes live on 7/19. To further emphasized how important this draft was, the first match of the night with Zayn and Owens showcased why these bitter rivals needed to be separated. Zayn got a win but Owens continued to beat him down after the match ended and even when they came back from commercial break. There was also the addition of the RAW and Smack Down podiums on top of the ramp, meaning WWE will be welcoming back a number of former general managers vying for the position for each brand. Hell, even John "People Power" Laurinitis returned before Shane told him that he would be running Smack Down.

The one segment I was not happy with was the women's division, where for some reason, Charlotte is defending the title against Paige. It wasn't a 3-minute squash match but it felt poorly paced and was full of botches, notably from Dana Brooke. Paige loses to Charlotte and all of a sudden Sasha Banks shows up, coming to her aid to chase off Charlotte and Dana. Look, I like Sasha but I hate that they kept her away from TV for a long time and now she's gunning for the title again. Meanwhile, poor Becky Lynch is getting beaten up by newly turned heel Natalya.

Speaking of returns, Bray Wyatt returned with Erick Rowan and Braun Strowman. Luke Harper is still out with a serious injury. Wyatt was interrupted by The New Day, which prompted him to come up with a chant on his own: New Day... Falls. This is a very weird yet interesting match-up so if they really are going ahead with this feud, they need to find the right balance for both teams to make this convincing.

Reigns and Rollins' main event match had Ambrose sitting on commentary and man, he was on fire. He put his former brothers over and showed how fiercely protective he is of his title. "Karma's a bitch and I'm WWE World Heavyweight Champion." As for the match, it was actually better than their match from MITB, save for a failed spot where the table didn't break when Reigns tackled Rollins. The two were unable to get back into the ring before the 10-count, resulting in a draw. The crowd wasn't happy with that so Shane came out and said we still need a contender. Ambrose gets into the ring and tells Shane he'll take them both on right now. Shane admires Dean as a fighting champion and decides to set up all former Shield members in a Triple Threat as the main event at Battleground. Ambrose happily accepts and goes up to both of his exhausted brothers and starts trash-talking them. Reigns gets up and tries to talk to Ambrose, who quickly turns around hits him with Dirty Deeds, which actually scares Rollins. Rollins tries to Pedigree a weakened Reigns after Ambrose left the ring, only to be hit from behind as Ambrose hits him with Dirty Deeds too.

So on top of them finally building excitement for the draft, the big takeaway is that the "WrestleMania-worthy" Shield Triple Threat is actually happening. There's a lot of complaints that the event is being wasted on what's considered a B-PPV event. However, the brand extension is heavily hinting that Reigns, Ambrose, and Rollins might get separated, so Battleground might very well be their last time to be on the same roster together. This is going to be an interesting month for Ambrose, who's now going to shoulder the pressure and responsibilities as a WWE Champ and as the face of the company. He is going to get even more attention now. On top of that, his wonderful cheerleader of a girlfriend Renee is comfortably and proudly posting more pics of Ambrose. I'm not too worried about Ambrose if he ends up dropping the title at Battleground, I just want to see him have a good run as an official champ.

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HEY, SO BREAKING NEWS. 

ROMAN REIGNS WAS SUSPENDED.

HE'LL STILL BE AT BATTLEGROUND.

"Ambrose Asylum: Electric Boogaloo": Monday Night RAW (6/13/16)

This is it. This is the go-home show of Monday Night RAW. Usually go-home shows are notoriously bad for having significantly less wrestling matches, backstage segments, and promos and sadly, that was the case here - there was reportedly less than 1 hour of in-ring wrestling in the 3 hours of RAW. Still, this show did as much as it can to create hype for MITB this Sunday while also addressing the impending roster draft and brand extension. The results can be found here.

The New Day and Enzo and Cass kicked off RAW to a weird start, with Cass telling Xavier that Enzo has put his lips all over Francesca the other night. It resulted in an amusing argument full of double entendres, resulting in Xavier Woods yelling "I'M THE ONLY ONE WHO BLOWS MY GIRL!" at Enzo's face. The Vaudvillains and The Club (sans AJ Styles) would come out to argue, which lead to be the first match of the night. The New Day has reached a point where they don't need the titles anymore so there's a good chance that they're going to lose their tag team titles very soon with the brand extension coming up.

Ever since Seth Rollins' shocking return at Extreme Rules and immediately being made the main event for MITB, there was very little reason to invest in his and Roman Reigns' feud. It was hampered by the fact that Rollins was still a chickenshit heel, even though his WWE: 24 Documentary painted him as a sympathetic babyface. On top of that, Rollins and Reigns never wrestled in the ring since the announcement and their story was only explained in video packages. That task fell upon Dean Ambrose and his talk show (which was brought back by Shane) to hype up their feud. The trios on-screen dynamic was great to see again. It was an excellent segment that re-established their history as The Shield and reminded the audience why this main event is important. Even better, Ambrose presented him as a threat to both of them, saying that if he wins MITB, he could just cash in and be the new champ.

Funny enough, the match that truly feels like a main event is AJ Styles vs John Cena. There was a bit of confusion as to why there was a contract signing, despite no title being on the line. Turns out Cena presented 2 contracts for Styles to sign; Cena vs The Club (barring The Club from ringside) or Cena vs Styles. Prior to the signing, Cena talked up Styles in a respectful manner, even name-dropping PWG, ROH, and NJPW (TNA was not mentioned) from his body of work. Styles, on the other hand, said that if he had stayed with WWE, he would be the 15-time World Champion because and beat Cena's "K-Mart shopping ass." Even though Styles turned heel recently, this feud doesn't feel rushed at all. Chalk it up to Cena and Styles performance and past body of work to give his a "big fight" feel.

Speaking of MITB, the entrants all got involved at the end of RAW with Ambrose vs Jericho as the main event, Cesaro being the ring announcer, Albert Del Rio being the timekeeper and Sami Zayn and Kevin Owens on commentary. It was wonderfully chaotic after Ambrose got another win over Jericho, who wisely grabbed a ladder and set it in the middle of the ring to grab the briefcase.

There are other matches and segments that happened but it's not really worth looking into. I mean, Sheamus and Apollo was just added as another pre-show match. And the women's division was represented in another rushed match where Paige got a win over Charlotte, thanks to Dana interfering. The women's title is not on the line, it's just a 4-women tag team match. Oh, and the IC title is not on the line either because The Miz is filming "Marine 5."

So that's the card for this Sunday. Seriously can't wait to be there! I'm pretty convinced that Ambrose isn't going to win (he's never won a match at MITB) but I won't stop cheering for him.

• Roman Reigns vs. Seth Rollins for the WWE World Heavyweight Championship
• John Cena vs. AJ Styles
• Dean Ambrose vs. Kevin Owens vs. Sami Zayn vs. Chris Jericho vs. Cesaro vs. Alberto Del Rio in a Money in the Bank ladder match
• New Day vs. Luke Gallows and Karl Anderson vs. Enzo Amore and Big Cass vs. The Vaudevillains in a four-way for the WWE Tag Team Championship
• Rusev vs. Titus O’Neil for the U.S. Championship
• Charlotte and Dana Brooke vs. Becky Lynch and Natalya
• Dolph Ziggler vs. Baron Corbin in a Kickoff Show match
• Sheamus vs. Apollo Crews in a Kickoff Show match

"This is important": Monday Night RAW (6/6/16)

Monday Night RAW kicked off with the most unique opening segment I've ever seen in a long time. Rather than the usual shot of the venue with the pyro going off, it started with Dean Ambrose walking towards the ring, where all 5 of the MITB entrants are perched upon 6 tall ladders, surrounding the MITB briefcase. They all had a funny banter on who was going to win, with Jericho reminding everybody who created this match before it devolved with everyone getting down from the ladders and beating each other up. This lead to a surprise appearance by the infamous former Smack Down general manager, Teddy Long. He tossed out interesting ideas for tag team matches before Stephanie McMahon interrupted him to get all entrants in 3 singles matches (Jericho vs Cesaro, Alberto Del Rio vs Sami Zayn, and Ambrose vs Kevin Owens). The results can be found here.

The other best segment of the night was the banter between AJ Styles, and John Cena. It was not just a typical heel talking down a face. There was a sense of truth in their promo, such as Cena calling Styles a dud for coming to WWE despite being heralded as the "hero of sports entertainment" and Styles flat out saying to Cena that "guys like you bury guys like me." Cena has somehow enlisted the help of The New Day to help him out, which makes sense considering Gallows and Anderson started feuding with them. Speaking of tag teams, thanks to a wonderful idea by Teddy Long, Stephanie added another match for MITB. There will a Fatal 4 Way for the title with The New Day, The Club, Enzo and Cass, and The Vaudevillains.

The absolute worst segment of the night goes to, no surprise, the women's division. Charlotte uncharacteristically issued an apology to the WWE Universe on how she treated her father but still maintained why she had to do it. She mentions that she took in Dana Brooke to be her protege, which saddens me that they had to go this route with her since Emma is still injured. Natalya and Becky came out to try to sway Dana from siding with Charlotte and of course, it doesn't work. There was dead silence for this segment and it pretty much showed that this whole Charlotte and Natalya feud is quickly getting stale. In a 3 hour show, there was no room for any women's wrestling. Not even for freaking Sasha Banks.

Neither Reigns or Rollins made an appearance tonight, which meant the world title was taking a break this week in favor of the MITB feud and Cena vs Styles. They ran 2 lengthy video packages that revisted their history together as The Shield as well as the beginning of their feud from their perspective. Rollins' video package incorporated some segments from his WWE: 24 documentary, which actually made Rollins come off a little different now than his chickenshit heel persona before his injury. No longer backed by The Authority, Rollins wants to prove that he can beat Reigns and he's been waiting 2 years to do it. Reigns video package, on the other hand, conveniently skipped his first 2 title reigns and his reliance on Ambrose and The Usos, despite him saying that he now stands alone. They even showed his WM 32 moment where he holds up the title to a thunderous applause that was clearly edited in. This was a great to build up their feud (and prevent Reigns from getting booed for cutting another promo) than that silly silent treatment they did last week.

To be honest, despite how this episode got mixed reactions by AV Club, I personally enjoyed it. Well, most of it anyways. I do want to note that Ambrose is being heavily featured again. He had a quick backstage segment with Owens, where he noted that Ambrose seems to be going off at the deep end more than usual. In addition to making another appearance on Sports Center with Coach, he has a scheduled match with Jericho on Smack Down. And the previous cancelled Ambrose Asylum (the talk show, not the cage match) returns for the go-home show with 2 very special guests. Once again, Ambrose is being positioned as the favorite to win MITB and they're making it obvious. It's funny that everyone wants to see this happen and knowing WWE, they'll go in a completely different direction and delay pulling the trigger on Ambrose. If he doesn't win, I'm fine with Owens, Zayn or Cesaro walking away with the briefcase.

Memorial Day Weekend Recap (5/27/16 - 5/30/16)

Friday (5/27):

• Went to Sweet Tomatoes for dinner
• Walked around Target for bit
• Played L4D2 with Dan and Corinne
  
  

Saturday (5/28):

• Went to IKEA, it wasn't terribly crowded. We bought a new door mat, a container for plastic bags, and a splatter guard.
• Ate at Suzuya, this small Japanese dessert cafe
• Went to 169 Market to buy ingredients to make Bicol Express. It was a minor success.
• Bought Overwatch and played for a bit

Sunday (5/29):

• Watched "The Nice Guy" starring Russel Crowe and Ryan Gosling. We opted for this move over "X-Men: Apocalypse" (we never wanted to watch the movie anyways). This was a great buddy film.
• I wanted to eat at this Guam restaurant, Red Ricem, for lunch. Vince couldn't find his wallet so we had to go back to the theaters to get it. When we got back, I saw that they were closing early. We went to Hot N Juicy Crawfish for lunch and ran into Joel, Pam, John, and Jonathan, who also just got out from Hot N Juicy crawfish earlier.
• We walked around Town Square and Fry's for a while before heading home

Monday (5/30):

• We stayed home the whole day
• We gave Yumi and Tsuki a bath
• I got restless and decided to go to the gym early, which was nice
• Got home to watch Monday Night RAW on Taima, which was pretty much a throwaway episode, save for a few segments and the main event match. Nope, I'm not making a Monday Night RAW post.

What to expect for Tuesday Night Smack Down!:

Ha, I had to make this because we had a 3 day weekend. Seeing how Monday Night RAW was incredibly disappointing, I'm hoping Smack Down will step up this week, especially now that they addressed Smack Down going live and each brand having a unique roster. Money In The Bank is shaping up to be an even bigger PPV with those feuds carrying into the draft.

The biggest and newest angle to happen, which looking back now was wasted on a holiday episode, was having AJ Styles and John Cena in a program. What was thought to be a friendly face vs face rivalry turned into The Club vs Cena. Yup, Styles officially aligned with his good brothers to be, well, The Club, but for reals this time. Funny how this feud is the New Era vs The Old Guard when Cena and Styles are both in their late 30s. I was excited for the heel turn but Vince wasn't because they just killed off the hottest babyface opposite Reigns, who they still refuse to make him into a full-blown heel.

Despite what was advertised last week, they didn't feature a 7th MITB qualifying match. Instead, they had a 6 man tag team match with Ambrose, Zayn and Cesaro vs Jericho, Owens, and Del Rio. Team Indy Darlings won, with Ambrose pinning Owens after Dirty Deeds for the win. Speaking of which, it was mentioned on commentary that Ambrose was the odds-on favorite to win MITB. And as much as everyone wants to see the Shield Triple Threat happen, I personally think it's too soon for it. Rollins and Reigns need to build up their feud and Ambrose needs to get more wins again to get out the mid-card. Then again, they can't afford to hold it off and another freak injury happens by then. So I see another heel like Owens or Jericho winning it, or Zayn or Cesaro winning it. 

I don't have faith in WWE to push Ambrose again :/

"A Title I Never Lost": Monday Night RAW (5/23/16)

Seth Freaking Rollins kicked off the special 1200th episode of Monday Night RAW because of course he would. Rollins went at length about how he's back to take back the title he never lost and that even though he got a lot of loving fan support, he doesn't need anybody to win (plus he threw all the fan letters in the trash and set it on fire!) His former brother, Roman Reigns would show up with the title, prompting Shane McMahon to come out and quickly setting both Reigns and Rollins as the main event for the upcoming Money In The Bank PPV. The rest of the show focused on 5 MITB qualifying matches. The results can be found here.

Want to know the best part of Rollins' return? They significantly downplayed Reigns. Yes, Reigns came out with the title and trash talked (off mic) with Rollins but other than that, he didn't say a word. He didn't even cut his usual "THE GUY" promo. All the talking was done by Rollins and Shane, who had to give a rundown for the audience on what Rollins has accomplished prior to his injury. Rollins reappeared in a backstage segment with Renee but got distracted when he saw Stephanie. He went in for a hug but Stephanie stopped him, saying that a lot has changed and so has their business relationship. Rollins did state he didn't need anybody, so it was telling how sad he looked when he didn't get a warm welcome from his "mother."

Unlike last year's MITB, which drew criticism for hastily putting in Dolph Ziggler, Sheamus, Kofi Kingston, Neville, Roman Reigns, Randy Orton and Kane, this year, they made the effort to have those entrants earn those spots in qualifying matches. 5 spots were filled tonight with 2 heels and 3 faces. No word if the remaining 2 spots will happen on Smack Down or next week's RAW.

• Zayn defeated Sheamus (who randomly started to feud with Apollo Crews)
• Cesaro defeated The Miz
• Jericho defeated Apollo Crews (who no sold the beatdown he got from Sheamus backstage)
• Ambrose defeated Ziggler (in a technical match)
• Owens defeated AJ Styles (CLEAN!)
  

This lineup is already interesting for several reasons: Cesaro is going to put on a spectacular show as usual. Owens and Zayn are involved so there's a damn good chance they're just going to find any opportunity to beat each other again. Ambrose and Jericho are squaring off again, meaning there's a scary chance Jericho could screw Ambrose over and win the match he created 11 years ago.

• RAW also marked the much-welcome return of Big Cass' tag team partner, Enzo, which meant they were resuming their feud against "Bub and Devon Dud." Enzo addressed the concussion and said it was a hard sneeze. I'm now extra worried for Enzo.
  
  
• Not sure if this is will be an actual feud, or it might be WWE's way of trying to quickly move on from Adam Rose being released, but the Social Outcasts attacked New Day as they were celebrating Raw's 1200th episode. Oddly enough, there were signs of The Vaudevillains.
  
  
• Charlotte, Dana, and Ric came out for an in-ring segment about the state of the Women's Title. It got off to a very shaky start, mostly because Charlotte got annoyed with the crowd chants, but Charlotte finally split from Ric Flair. She addressed the issues of how everyone thought she couldn't win without Ric and she wanted to prove them all wrong. This prompted Ric to cry of course and tearfully leave. Looks like Charlotte is making her own version of the BFFs with Dana on her side.
  
  
• Styles and Owens was the main event qualifying match. Before it started, Styles came out to praise Reigns for being a worthy opponent (the audience booed of course) but he also talked down about Gallows, Anderson, and The Usos for interfering and costing him the match. Gallows and Anderson came out to confront Styles and ended with him breaking up with The Club. Gallows and Anderon didn't take this split amicably.

This was a great episode of RAW that's quickly establishing the next PPV with matches and storylines that will organically build towards it. Now the biggest question is who will win the briefcase. Prior to Rollins' return, the popular choice for getting the briefcase was Owens just so he can screw with Zayn and Reigns. But when JBL mentioned on commentary about the possibility of all 3 Shield members being in the title picture, now it's shifting to Ambrose to be the favorite to win.

Speaking of which, Ambrose seems to have a slight attitude change following Extreme Rules. His match against Ziggler was technical, just like their previous match for the Survivor Series WHC tournament, and he looked quite serious. His fallout interview however showed Ambrose coming off quite indifferent. Seems to foreshadow something here.

"Extreme Payback": Monday Night RAW (5/16/16)

The go-home show for Monday Night RAW was split evenly between actual wrestling matches and promos and segments, which was effective but somehow underselling Extreme Rules this Sunday. The results can be found here.

The major highlights were:

• The Miz and Cesaro vs Sami Zayn and Kevin Owens. This was a seriously fun match that played up both of the respective heels and faces either refusing to cooperate or trying to one-up each other. This is also the first time in a long while since "Steenerico" teamed up years ago. The match ended with Zayn pinning Miz and winning the match, only to end with Owens superkicking Zayn in the face. Owens vowed to take back his title.
  
  
• Dana Brooke vs Becky Lynch. Due to Emma's badly-timed injury, Dana stepped up to carry on the feud with Becky. While I can commend Dana for taking over, it really puts a damper on Emma and Becky's feud, which was building up quite nicely from last month. And Dana, who I thought improved the most on NXT before getting injured, didn't look too confident in the ring either.
  
  
• The New Day had a time machine segment (actually it's just a giant refrigerator box with stuff glued on) to make fun of The Vaudevillains' bygone era. They briefly stopped in 2009, where Kofi emerged to his old theme song and spoke with his Jamaican accent. Kofi cried out "2009 was my best year!" before they dragged him back in and emerged in the past, where everything was black and white, where Booty-Os are named Derriere Squares, and there were no video games. The Vaudevillains ruined the fun segment and stood tall over The New Day.
  
  
• Ambrose (sporting a shiner) called out Jericho and challenged him to having a rematch at Extreme Rules, which Jericho accepted. While Jericho was doing his "Gift of Jericho" pose ("Drink it in, Deeeeeeeeean."), Ambrose said he had a gift for him as well and gazed up as a black steel cage was lowered to the ring, complete with cheesy horror music and strobe lights. Ambrose suddenly went into menacing Moxley-ish mode and introduced the first ever Asylum Match, where there will be no escape and Jericho will never be the same again.
  
  
• The Usos defeated Gallows and Anderson, because of course they would. The Usos have started dressing in darker clothes and darker face paint, which complements Reigns' current tweener persona. The most surprising part was seeing Styles finally giving into temptation and using the steel chair to attack Reigns. AND THEN PERFORMING THE STYLES CLASH ON ROMAN ON SAID CHAIR. It was a amazing spot. Which makes it all the more frustrating knowing that Styles will not be a new champ this Sunday.
  
  
• Kalisto vs Del Rio was looking like one of their usual matches until Sin Cara and Rusev got involved in a backstage segment that spilled into the ring. Del Rio won the match and quickly left as Rusev went into the ring and dominated over Kalisto. Rusev looked like a monster heel again and it was fantastic.
  
  
• The main event ended with Charlotte and Natalya doing a contract signing with Shane and Stephanie in the ring. Charlotte was not happy seeing that the contract officially included banning her father from ringside, so Ric had to sign as well. A furious Ric Flair threatened Shane, who said he respected him too much to try to fight back, but it didn't stop Stephanie from slapping him. Charlotte was ready to lunge at Stephanie but Nattie caught her and did a sharpshooter. Ric and Charlotte slithered away and Raw ended with Nattie holding up the Women's belt up high.
  
  

So that's that. There's still Smack Down and two house shows left before Extreme Rules. Here is the complete card:

• Pre-Show: Dolph Ziggler vs. Baron Corbin in a No DQ match
• WWE World Title match: Roman Reigns vs. A.J. Styles in an Extreme Rules match
• Asylum Cage match: Dean Ambrose vs. Chris Jericho
• Women’s Title match: Charlotte vs. Natalya in a submission match
• U.S. Title match: Kalisto vs. Rusev
• IC Title match: The Miz vs. Cesaro vs. Kevin Owens vs. Sami Zayn
• Tag Title match: New Day vs. The Vaudevillians

Note: I'm actually more worried for Ambrose's match than I thought. To me, it seems nearly parallel to his feud against Lesnar in WrestleMania, where it had a great buildup and a lackluster match and ending. If they're going through the effort to have Ambrose be the poster boy for Extreme Rules with a match tailored for him, he better win this match. Then again, Ambrose has been known to lose in most gimmick matches...

"The New Error": Monday Night RAW (5/9/16)

This was another somewhat enjoyable episode of Monday Night RAW. I say "somewhat enjoyable" because a majority of the matches, while entertaining, had finishes that didn't make sense. I get that they have 2 more weeks left before Extreme Rules. It just seems like 50/50 booking is at play again. The results can be found here.

So here are the weird finishes to the following matches:

• Ziggler lost to Corbin
• Charlotte (C) lost to Paige
• Miz (C) lost to Zayn
• Rusev (#1 Contender) lost to Sin Cara
• Ryder lost to Owens
• New Day (C) lost to Dudleyz
• The Club lost to The Family via DQ
  
  

All the champs - with the exception of Reigns of course - just randomly lost in their respective matches. Corbin winning shouldn't be a big deal if it weren't for Ziggler randomly winning at Payback. Rusev lost to Sin Cara - SIN CARA - thanks to Kalisto interference. Miz lost to Zayn, making the IC title match a fatal 4-way. Ryder lost to Owens, once again reinforcing Ryder's almost pointless WrestleMania moment as a 1-time IC Champ. The most baffling is the third hour, which saw The New Day losing to The Dudleyz and the last-minute main event with Chris Jericho and Big Cass, set by Stephanie McMahon at the beginning of the show, never happened due to Ambrose's surprise appearance. The only other surprise was Dana Brooke making her main roster debut backstage in a segment with Emma and Becky Lynch.

The Reigns and Styles storyline is getting better and better each week. It's actually getting harder to tell if Styles would remain the steadfast babyface when everyone is using every opportunity to destroy each other. I mean both teams were nearly booed last night, though Reigns and The Usos got a much louder reaction. Speaking of which, it's important to note that the Bullet Club is now present across several promotions. The original leader, Finn Balor, is in NXT, "The Club" with Styles, Gallows, and Anderson is in WWE, and the remaining Bullet Club faction is strong in both NJPW and ROH, along with new additions Adam Cole and Adam Page.

I want to point out something quite odd here. The show started off with Jericho bragging about destroying Ambrose AND Mitch The Plant, whose death saddened the Twitter/Tumblr fans last week. WWE is not one to ignore something like this so they had Jericho display a quick montage of all the screenshots of everyone crying over Mitch, all while emphasizing numerous times that he severely injured Ambrose. When Ambrose returned, he destroyed Jericho's light up jacket which apparently costs $15k. Ambrose is exacting revenge on Jericho... over a potted plant. This was humorous to watch - and props to Jericho and Ambrose for doing their best to make this silly feud serious -  but it robbed the audience of a totally new main event match with another NXT newcomer against a legend. Did WWE intentionally move Reigns and Styles to the 2nd hour so that The New Day, The Dudleyz, Ambrose and Jericho will close out the third hour, where their ratings normally tank? AV Club thought their silly feud was the "shining star" of the show and F4W thought it was building up their feud well enough, while others have understandably thought this was getting sillier and stupider.

To be honest, I don't fucking care. I'm just happy see Ambrose every single time, regardless if he wrestles or not. It's easy to lose faith in the guy with how he's being booked and all but I can't not be entertained by him. Let's see how the go-home show next week will reverse all the 50/50 booking leading up to Extreme Rules. Also, I'm getting that damn poster... unless Ambrose is featured in Money In The Bank, I'm getting that too.

"The New Era": Monday Night RAW (5/2/16)

Now that Payback, the "first PPV of the New Era," has past, Monday Night RAW showed no signs of slowing down as they geared up for their 2nd PPV this month, Extreme Rules, which is a mere 2 weeks away. Unfortunately, the episode was a mix of rushing storylines and long segments. The results can be found here.

The major highlights were:

• Shane and Stephanie agreeing to work together to run RAW. She even presented Shane with a newly framed old photo of him and their dad that was crushed by Vince as a way to make amends.
  
  
• The siblings were interrupted by Kevin Owens who once again invokes his rematch clause for the IC title, only to get interrupted by Cesaro. Shane gives them a match (with Miz and Maryse on commentary). It resulted in a no contest once Miz interferred and Sami Zayn showed up. Zayn is now eyeing the IC title.
  
  
• Enzo's accident and concussion diagnosis was addressed by New Day. As a result, the Vaudevillains were awarded the match and will be facing against the New Day for the Tag Team Championship at Extreme Rules. The Vaudevillains got a heated reaction, proudly taking credit for Enzo's accident. The Dudleyz came out and said the tournament should just be restarted to find anther contender while Cass came out to declaring that he's going to avenge his family, resulting in an 8-man tag team match. Big Cass and The New Day defeated The Vaudevillains and the Dudleyz.
  
  
• Emma and Becky had a match! The two were originally suppose to have matches leading up to Payback but for some unexplained reason, their feud was put on hold (they feuded only through Twitter) and were never put on the card. Emma got a win over Becky with a freaking Michinoku Driver. WWE is clearly protecting Sasha, she hasn't had any televised matches on RAW or Smack Down in a while.
  
  
• A last-minute battle royal match was set up to determine who would be the #1 contender for Kalisto's US title. Notable faces included Apollo Crews, Baron Corbin, Curtis Axel, Bo Dallas, former League of Nations trio, Damian Sandow, and the return of Titus O'Neil. Notable absences were Heath Slater, Jack Swagger, and Ryback. Rusev and Ryder were the final 2 and, seeing how Kalisto's a face, Rusev emerged as the #1 contender. The reason why Ryback was not included  was due to ongoing contract disputes. It looks like Ryback will be joining Barrett on leaving WWE once their contract is up this summer.
  
  
• Stephanie was a guest on the Ambrose Asylum and said that he can ask her anything. Even though Ambrose saw through Stephanie's nice girl act, he agreed to have her on his show. Ambrose's "investigative journaling" eventually broke Stephanie and she decided to undo Shane's changes and cancel his show on the spot. Just as he taking his leave along with his beloved potted plant, Mitch, Stephanie announces that she was also bringing back The Highlight Reel, prompting Jericho to make a surprise entrance. Jericho one-upped Ambrose with The Codebreaker. And if that wasn't bad enough, Jericho took Mitch and slammed him unto the back of Ambrose's head. Twitter and r/SC were pretty upset.
  
  
• The now infamous (ok, not really) Chicago Screwjob was addressed. Not only that, referee Charles Robinson was addressed onscreen as "Lil Naitch," a nickname that was only used by online wrestling fans. Natalya was upset about screwed over and ended up doing a sharpshooter on Ric Flair. After the segment, Stephanie talked to Charlotte and Ric about setting up a rematch, this time making it a submission match to decide if the Figure Four or the Sharpshooter was superior. Also, Stephanie has banned Ric from being at ringside for the match.
  
  
• The main event saw Roman Reigns and The Usos vs As Styles, Gallows, and Anderson. The alignment of faces and heels are blurred, thus making their motivations completely understandable. In the 6-man tag team match, Not-Bullet-Club emerged victorious over Roman Empire. Gallows and Anderson gives a chair to Styles to take out an exhausted Reigns but he refuses to. The Usos takes the chair instead to attack Styles, resulting in Gallows and Anderson attacking them. Styles finally uses the chair to take out the Usos, which is the only thing Reigns sees when he recovers. He angrily Superman punches Styles, sets up the announcer's table and powerbombs Styles through it.

After breaking it down like this, there really was a lot of progress made, it was just a chore to get through 3 hours. I have to admit it that I'm liking this new storyline that Reigns is caught up in. It doesn't involve the Authority and the conflict is internal, or in this case, a faction that was made famous at NJPW who is now on the main roster. Extreme Rules appears to be having some Payback rematches and new matches being set up. Prepare for more stipulations! 

Speaking of which, looks like Ambrose is the poster boy for Extreme Rules! It doesn't mean he's main eventing a match or is the primary focus though. The Wyatt Family was the main focus for Payback but due to Wyatt's injury, they were unable to change the promotional materials, which is why the art direction is all about spooky woods instead of the shattered glass motif from the video packages. I found that odd considering they were able to quickly change the Toronto network special "March to WrestleMania" to "Roadblock" featuring Ambrose and HHH. With the Ambrose Asylum cancelled and Mitch killed off, hopefully Ambrose's feud with Jericho will be taken a lot more seriously.

"RESET: Into Darkness": Monday Night RAW (4/25/16)

All good things must come to and end. After having 3 back-to-back shows of Authority-free content, Stephanie McMahon returned to Monday Night RAW (sans HHH) to interrupt Shane. She announced that this was Shane's last night to run RAW because this Sunday at Payback, Vince McMahon will decide if Stephanie or Shane will take control of RAW. Once again, it's another weird stipulation that teases the end of The Authority storyline but at least it has a better and concise buildup, and this doesn't require Shane to do another death-defying stunt.

That opening segment with Stephanie really sucked the air out of the room, as Shane phrased it, and that disinterest affected the rest of show. Sad to say that the show really felt like a chore again, with more segments and promos than actual wrestling matches. The results can be found here.

The major highlights were:

• Chyna, who passed away last week, was acknowledged on RAW via a graphic and a touching video package. Despite their publicly estranged relationship and the personal problems she's had, WWE went out of their way to pay their respects to her. They focused on what she accomplished when she was with WWE and showed clips of her with DX and as Eddie Guerrero's beloved Mamacita.
  
• League of Nations have quietly disbanded and was put into single matches: AJ Styles vs Sheamus, Sami Zayn vs Rusev, and Roman Reigns vs Alberto Del Rio. And they all lost.
  
• The much-awaited in-ring debut of Karl Anderson and Doc Luke Gallows. They got wrestling gear and outfits that matches pretty closely to their NJPW attire. Even their entrance theme sounded similar to the Bullet Club theme. After a lengthy match, they defeated the Usos and started to beat them down until Reigns came out to make the save. Reigns is so tainted that the normally cheered Usos got boos and "USOS SUCKS" chants.
  
• The New Day, The Vaudevillains, and Enzo and Big Cass all came out to do their respective promos. It should be noted that the Tag Team Championship title will not be defended at Payback.
  
• There was a video package that talked about the 14-year history between Owens and Zayn's blood feud featuring commentary from the two. Not only did it explain the feud to casual fans but it also showcased a unique feud that has carried over from several wrestling promotions to WWE. It was a great opener to Sami and Rusev, who had a great match. Sami won, which infuriated Lana enough to throw her shoes at him, and got blindsided by Kevin Owens.
  
• For some freaking reason, there was only one Women's wrestling match again and it was just Natalya defeating Emma. Charlotte was on commentary. Becky, Sasha, and the other women were nowhere to be seen.
  
• Dean Ambrose abandoned his Ambrose Asylum talk show (and potted plant) to call out Jericho for attacking him from behind last week. Although their feud stemmed from Ambrose Asylum taking over The Highlight Reel, the real issue is that Jericho had become an egomaniacal top heel who brags about being untouchable. Ambrose is back in PPV mode and taking on Jericho because that's what he does. Their segment ended with Ambrose trapped in the Walls of Jericho on the announcer's table. Jericho has one-upped Ambrose a few times, so hopefully this means Ambrose gets a win at Payback.
  
• As I mentioned earlier, Reigns is tainted. The problem is that even though Reigns has taken on this tweener-ish persona, WWE isn't helping his image by showcasing a video package where he's meeting with Make-A-Wish kids. Those same kids were there at ringside and Reigns was smiling and interacting with them. When he went into the ring, the crowd resumed booing at him. Gallows and Anderson jump Reigns after he defeated Del Rio. Styles makes the save and tries to keep his brothers out of the ring and ends up getting Superman punched by Reigns. Just when it looked like Reigns was standing tall after taking out Gallows and Anderson, Styles comes back with the Phenomenal Forearm and lays out Reigns.
  
  

By the way, the crowd for this go-home show was pretty bad. AV Club pointed out that they only chanted a few times because the casual fans were supposed to. It's a lukewarm response for a go-home show which sort of takes you out of the matches. Nonetheless, the last 3 weeks for Payback has been handled quite well and the card this Sunday is full of new talent, save for WWE veterans like Jericho, Natalya, The Miz, and Ziggler. The only sad news about Payback is that the promotional materials still features The Wyatt Family and neither Bray or the rest have been seen since his injury.

RIP AMBROSE ASYLUM & POTTED PLANT

2016 - 2016

"RESET: Revolution": Monday Night RAW (4/18/16)

(Note: I'm trying to find all stupid film sequel titles since WWE is firmly following this clean slate theme following WrestleMania 32, hence the "RESET" titles).

Monday Night RAW went live on London around 12 pm PST and judging by the reactions on Twitter, it seems like the matches and storyline progressions have been the same quality with the last 2 shows, which is GOOD. Shane McMahon is being the benevolent RAW GM and is setting up matches for the rest of the night. And yes, I'm totally spoiling myself and watching a livestream of it, just so I can see how much they edit when it broadcasts at 8 pm.

----------

Once again, Monday Night RAW continues its wonderful momentum post WrestleMania and laying the groundwork for Payback. The new hit "show", the Ambrose Asylum kicked off the first hour, with an insanely loud London crowd cheering for "Deano!" as Ambrose welcomed Shane McMahon as his first guest. They get rudely interrupted by Kevin Owens, followed by Sami Zayn, and finally Chris Jericho. Shane saw an opportunity and announced 2 new matches for Payback: Chris Jericho vs Dean Ambrose and Kevin Owens vs Sami Zayn (finally!) He also made Ambrose and Owens the main event to end RAW. The results can be found here.

Unlike last week, the pacing of the show started to drag in the third hour. The major highlights were:

• Jericho and Zayn being the first match of the night, which was a better showing from their match at Smack Down last week (minus Ambrose and Owens distracting the commentary team). Jericho cheats with an eye poke and wins over Zayn.
  
• AJ Styles finally meets Karl Anderson and Doc Luke Gallows in a backstage segment. AJ was so happy to see his boys and appeared to be unaware that the 2 made their debut last week by taking out the Usos.
  
• Mauro Ranallo appeared to be filling in for Renee Young, who said she was stuck in the US due to her work visa.
  
• Reigns and Styles had a brief segment in the ring, where Reigns promises to defend the title and to get respected instead of being liked without the title, whereas Styles said he wanted to be liked and respected to be a champ. As Styles left the ring, Anderson and Gallows attack Reigns from behind, leading to a backstage segment where Reigns is suspicious of Styles after his boys attacked his cousins last week (holy crap, continuity).
  
• Baron Corbin squashes Fandango and rockbottoms Dolph Ziggler who was on commentary. I want to point out that Ziggler looked so indifferent to be there. Can't blame the guy; he's been jobbing out NXT callups.
  
• Cesaro interrupted the Miz and Maryse segment, where the Miz said Cesaro had to fight against Rusev, who was accompanied by Alberto Del Rio and Sheamus. Cesaro said he spoke to Shane to change up the match where the LON and Miz would fight Cesaro **rips his tearaway suit** and The New Day. Since Cesaro's return, he's gotten more confident and looking more and more like a main eventer.
  
• The tag team tourneys saw The Vaudevillains advancing over The Usos and Enzo and Big Cass advancing over the Dudleyz. This sets up the 2 NXT tag teams competing for the tag team contendership at Payback. The Vaudevillains got little to no reaction, which was strange considering how over they were for NXT TakeOver:London a few months back.
  
• There was only one women's match segment and it was a doozy with Becky, Sasha, Natalya, and Paige vs Naomi, Tamina, Charlotte, and Summer Rae. Natalya put the sharpshooter on Charlotte, who quickly tapped out. Knowing 50/50 booking, Natalya needs to look strong before losing to Charlotte at Payback.
  
• The main event with Ambrose and Owens was really good. There was a lot of brutal looking spots, such as Owens doing a frog splash on Ambrose outside the ring, and Ambrose countering Owens frog splash with his knees up. An exhausted Ambrose wins the match, only to get hit by Jericho's Codebreaker.
  
  

Unfortunately, there's still the inevitable return of The Authority with them possibly addressing Shane on how he's running RAW. It still doesn't make sense why he's been the last-minute GM for the last 3 weeks so it might finally catch up to him soon, possibly before or after Payback. Speaking of Payback, these are the matches set for May 1:

• WWE World Hvt. Title match: Roman Reigns vs. A.J. Styles
  
• Intercontinental Title match: The Miz (w/Maryse) vs. Cesaro
  
• Sami Zayn vs. Kevin Owens
  
• Chris Jericho vs. Dean Ambrose
  
• Women’s Title match: Charlotte (w/Ric Flair) vs. Natalya (w/Bret Hart)
  
• Tag Tournament #1 contender Finals: The Vaudevillians vs. Enzo Amore & Big Cass

"RESET: Electric Boogaloo": Monday Night RAW (4/11/16)

Just hours before Monday Night RAW went live, it was announced that "due to overwhelming social media support," Shane McMahon would be hosting RAW again. This is one thing to nitpick regarding Shane's storyline but I'll let it slide. If last week's episode was good, last night's episode was great. The results can be found here.

All 3 hours of RAW, which normally feels like a weekly chore to sit through, was consistently entertaining. Shane McMahon kicked off the show by announcing upcoming matches on tonight's card and giving opportunities to other people. It has been such a long time since the show has had a mostly neutral GM who not only made sure the audience would enjoy the show, he also made sure to look out for the talent. He gave Sami Zayn another chance to be another possible contender for the WWE WHC title by going up against AJ Styles, and Zayn and Styles put on a great hardhitting match. He sets up Kevin Owens and Cesaro in a match, where the winner will face off against the Miz for the IC title. He also kicks out Owens for threatening to harm Zayn again and cost him his match. He announces a tag team tournament where the winners will face off against New Day for the Tag Team Championship title. And in one small hilarious in-ring segment, Shane (via a crumpled memo from Ambrose's pocket) cancelled Jericho's "Highlight Reel" and replaced it with "Ambrose Asylum."

On top of well booked matches were a few surprises. First was Karl Anderson and Luke Gallows taking out The Usos. While WWE didn't officially acknowledge them as Bullet Club, that didn't stop the audience from chanting their name. The Tag Team division looks promising with 2 new NXT call ups (sorry Lucha Dragons and Ascension) and now these new "Outsiders." Another surprise was Dr. Phil, whom the audience feared would be a throwaway celebrity guest, who actually tried to reach out to Charlotte and implored her to stop using Ric Flair to cheat her way to the top. This might be the start of a much needed split between Charlotte and Flair since she's turned heel.

Shane even set up the main event match that saw Roman Reigns and Bray Wyatt teaming up against Sheamus and Alberto Del Rio. It was a baffling set up, considering Reigns and Wyatt's drawn out feud from last year. The crowd reaction basically changed Wyatt into a babyface while Reigns was continuing to get the boos. This was a refreshing change from the last time Reigns and Wyatt closed out RAW. As tweeners (the champ being more of a dick and the cult leader being more of babyface), they had good chemistry, even though Reigns remained cautiously adamant after they won.

Overall, this was another feel good RAW following WrestleMania and it really seems to reflect that they're taking extra steps to improve their product. The main story is not about Authority vs Reigns anymore. Now we're seeing other talents getting the spotlight. We're seeing storyline progression. And most importantly, the show ended on such a good note and renewed excitement for their upcoming shows. I'm just happy that 3 of my current favorite wrestlers (Ambrose, Cesaro, and Owens) got TV time.

So I mentioned last week how worried I was that WWE killed Ambrose's momentum (again), especially after WrestleMania. I honestly didn't expect him to appear on RAW at all until Jericho's Highlight Reel segment was announced. I'm excited at the fact that they're quickly moving Ambrose and Jericho into a feud. This doesn't appear to callback Jericho's shoulder check to Ambrose from Night of Champions or when Ambrose eliminatied Jericho from the Royal Rumble. Instead, this is a cocky Jericho saying he's untouchable after beating AJ Styles at WrestleMania and Ambrose simply stepping up. He's back in TV mode, where he's being goofy instead of intense, which is fine for him. At least he'll get a believable win this time.