Hello again faithful readers, it's time again for another class of home schooling, my weekly recap of the best in wrestling action, in my opinion at least.
This week as usual I will be talking about Monday Night Raw, but as an extra added bonus I will also talk about the live Smackdown special episode, as there were some interesting segments that warrant talking about.
It amazes me how fast things can change in wrestling. It's only been two episodes of Raw since Wrestlemania, and in fact only one episode since The Rock left again, but already it feels like a new beginning. I think we have Brock Lesnar's return to thank for that. It was literally in two hours, from the beginning of Raw with Rock thanking everyone, to the end of Raw last week, with Lesnar's return. That's how quick things can happen. And already it feels like a completely different show, even though the bulk of the feuds have been carried on from Wrestlemania.
Before I get into specifics, I want to talk about one other thing. I really like what they've done with Mark Henry in the last couple of weeks. I feel like he's been floundering a bit since he lost the World Heavyweight title. He was still a badass and really impressive, but it felt like he'd moved down a couple of steps. In a way that's a good thing, because it opens the door for new people to step up.
But in the last couple of weeks, with him in title matches against CM Punk, and especially with him getting victories over him, albeit dirty wins, it's really pushed him back into that top spot. I think it's highly possible that Jericho and Henry might form some kind of alliance in the coming weeks, especially if Punk and Jericho's feud is to continue after Extreme Rules.
Ok so let's talk about Raw to start off with.
And we'll start with the beginning. Lesnar and Cena. It just feels.. big. Like the Rock/Cena feud did. But in a way, bigger, because even though Lesnar left, he left for different reasons. And, with his career in the UFC .. he immediately has more legitimacy than just about anyone in wrestling, save maybe Kurt Angle. Broken freakin' necks give you tons of legitimacy.
So Lesnar is in the ring with Johnny Ace. Now it's pretty much solidified that they are trying to bring him in as a heel. Or at least, a heel in the eyes of Cena's fans. To everyone else it seems, Lesnar is definitely a babyface. How could he not be? This massive beast of a dude who has legitimately beaten up people is now back in the WWE? Of course he's going to get massive cheers. And then add into the mix that he's beating up Cena, who a decent portion of the fans love to hate, and there you have it: instant good guy. But a good guy in the same sense that Austin was a good guy. And, for the past 6 months or so, in the same way that Rock was a good guy.
One of my favourite things on Raw this week was that slap. Cena says with no microphone "I never got to thank you for last week" and then slaps Lesnar? Worked or not, the dude has some balls. I don't know if Lesnar was handing Cena a reciept with that shot that busted up Cena's lip, or if it was just an accident or an old habit, but because of the blood, everything was more intense.
I thought having just about the entire locker room come out to hold both guys back was a great touch too. Legitimacy seems to be the theme for my blog this week, but it really added credibility and realism to this situation. I know that wrestling isn't as guarded as it used to be and we see the heels and babyfaces interacting with each other sometimes, but even so, you've got Sheamus and Mark Henry next to each other, trying to hold Lesnar back. And what's more, Goldust was out there as well, but out of character, and in a suit. Realism. That's what's going on right now.
Really quickly, I see good things for Santino and Brodus in the future. Santino needs a storyline that is a bit more serious, to make him (I swear it's the theme this week) more legitimate. And Brodus is that guy. He's not so serious that it would be stupid for him to team with Santino, but he's also a badass. As long as the team isn't just used for a couple of weeks and then disbanded, things could really develop there. And Santino's backstage antics (until he met up with the stooges.. but i'll get to them later) were great. His interaction with Kane... brilliant.
Getting back to Cena for a minute, his backstage segment/promo/whatever we're calling those things these days.. was really good. As much as the WWE seem to be against it, this week was a perfect example of blood enhancing things, and making them bigger, and better. I'm not sure what Cena's promo would have been like, had he not been able to use the fat lip as a part of it. Hopefully the powers that be realise this, and figure out that blood, if used correctly, won't just look like excessive violence.
And.. as much as I don't want to admit it.. Laurinitis' work has gotten a lot better too. Hopefully it's a consistent improvement. Because bad Johnny Ace can be good tv, but really bad Johnny Ace is almost unwatchable.
Once again this week.. Lord Tensai proves that even if you have a really silly name, you can still be a badass. I mean even if they took the "Lord" part of the name away, and just called him Tensai.. that would be better. I don't really get what the point of ending the match without a pinfall is, other than giving Albert a chance to put that mist into his mouth.
Overall though, he's a different character type that we haven't really seen for a while in WWE.. he reminds me a bit of Hakushi, but I get the feeling he'll have more success than Hakushi did. I think we need to give him a few more weeks to grow and get comfortable in the character. Then we'll see some unique qualities come out, other than the moves and words he yells, that have already been figured out.
I've talked about Mark Henry, but let's talk about CM Punk. We all know that his character has become slightly less volatile, less of a cheered heel and more of a straight up babyface with an attitude, but this week CM Punk delivered a promo that was, to me, probably the best he's done this year. I don't know if the storyline stuff about his father is true in real life as well (my feeling is that it is), but when he talks about his father, and especially when he talked about the smell of the alcohol on him reminded him of his dad, it became real, worked or not. That kind of true emotion, that kind of real feeling.. that's what makes a good promo great. That's what pushes a wrestler to a top spot.
I actually kind of liked what Jericho did with his promo this week. It's a bit silly, saying Punk needed to start the 12 step program.. but he's a heel. Heels can get away with saying things that are completely stupid, but because they believe them, they seem credible. I liked his line about unleashing the "demon alcohol genes".
CM "drunk" is a little hokey though. It fits sure, but it's just feels a little.. off.
What I do like about this feud, is they're not having Punk and Jericho in matches involving each other every week. It makes the times that they do actually get in the ring together for a match special. It's the way it used to be done.
Now.. once again after the match with Mark Henry, Jericho attacks a hurt CM Punk and pours alcohol all over him. This is the second week in a row we've seen this, and to me, we don't need to see it any more. I did like Jericho's one line "Drink it in ya stupid idiot".. I love how he uses really childish insults like that, and still makes them seem really .. well really insulting.
What I did not like is that they used real beer to pour on CM Punk. I know that Punk would have been told about it before hand, and I know that they wouldn't have done it without Punk saying he was ok with it, but still, the guy is legitimately straight edge, and yet he's had beer poured into his mouth this week. I'm also sure that Jericho would have done his best to not be excessive with the beer around Punk's face, which is why most of it went on his shoulder and back/stomach as well. But really, in a more general sense, it's the WWE not caring about CM Punk's lifestyle choice.
Yes, this is the realism era, it's all about legitimacy, but surely they could have used non-alcoholic beer. Or just used the whiskey again. In the end though, it seems fairly obvious that CM Punk will get his revenge, and I'm starting to get the feeling that it might be some kind of I quit match that it happens in, where if Jericho loses, he has to leave WWE. Could be a good way to end things.
Just quickly before I finish up the Raw section, I said I'd mention the Three Stooges. Will Sasso delivered an amazing impersonation of Hogan. The crowd seemed a bit shocked more than anything.. and I was with them the first time I watched it. Hogan is working for TNA, so why would they want to do anything that promotes him? The only thing I can think of is that Will Sasso is a massive wrestling, and more specifically Hogan fan, so they let him do that bit. And let's face it, he nailed Hogan. Not just the voice, the body movements. And, even better, he took Kane's chokeslam amazingly well. I love that guy's work.
Ok let's talk about the main event. I'm impressed with Otunga more and more every week. He's finally gotten a decent character happening with some signature kind of movments and mannerisms, and his work in the ring has improved immensely since he was in NXT and the nexus.
And once again this week's episode ends with Lesnar getting the better of Cena. This time with a Low blow before the F-5. I've noticed though that Lesnar is executing his finisher differently these days. He's not doing the rotation part of the move that he used to. If you go back and watch an F-5 from 2003, it looks quite different to the 2012 version. In the 2012 version, he lifts his opponent over his head to get him in position for the "ddt" part, whereas back in 2003 he would turn him at the same time. Check it out. I prefer the 2003 version.
So overall a decent episode of RAW. I think the pattern needs to change for next week though, mainly with Punk and Jericho. No more alcohol baths. I do think that Lesnar is going to keep being booked as an unstoppable machine though. Which as long as it's done right, will work well.
Now let's talk quickly about smackdown before this turns into a short novel.
Daniel Bryan delivered a great promo last week, breaking up with his "girlfriend" AJ. And this week we were going to be treated to a very special Piper's Pit. Now, normally when I write my blog, I've watched everything I'm going to write about. I haven't watched Piper's pit yet, so I'm going to write the following part of this post as I watch for the first time. And then I'll get into a couple of other parts of Smackdown.
It's always great to see a Piper's pit. Rowdy is one of my favourite talkers out of anyone. His Piper's Pit from Wrestlemania 5 is one of my favourite non-wrestling wrestling segments ever.
I really hope this Yes chant catches on heaps more. It's such a simple thing, but works so well with just about everything.
I don't really like that they're portraying AJ as someone who seems to be completely clueless. I mean yeah, they can portray her as in love with him, but I don't really understand why she wouldn't have figured out that Bryan is using her. The rest of her character doesn't seem that dumb.
Piper got really intense talking about the "no's". I love Roddy. All in all it was a pretty good segment. Probably not right up there as one of the best Piper's pit episodes ever, but it was good. And we learned that it's going to be a 2 out of 3 falls match between Daniel Bryan and Sheamus, which should be a really good match. Hopefully they don't just squash Bryan again .. only this time in 36 seconds.
The last thing I'm going to talk about, and it's just a quick one, is Ryback. This character is so much better than the Skip Sheffield character. It's more believable, yet still larger than life. From what I've read about the way Ryback was originally, it's a slightly different version in 2012, but it's still impressive, and again something slightly different. Like a combination of Goldberg and Rhyno or something. I'm definitely interested to see where it goes.
Ok that's about all for this week. Until next time, you can follow me on twitter at @TheOZMouthpiece , leave me a comment on here to let me know what you think, and also, check out my articles on http://pwjournal.wordpress.com There's only two on there for now, but check it out nonetheless.
I'm the Aussie Mouthpiece, and now, my business is concluded.
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