We had a shock WWE title change!
Seth Rollins is the inaugural WWE Champion.
Gunther kicked a man’s face off.
I’ve been meaning to talk to you about that Gunther, you might want to lay low for a while
because you’re probably wanted for murder.
And Jimmy Uso proved blood is thicker than slightly less related blood - turning on Roman
Reigns and sparking Bloodline: Civil War.
I’m Oli Davis, welcome to the WrestleTalk News review of WWE Night of Champions 2023.
Before we get into the review, I’d just like to ask you all to subscribe to WrestleTalk
and make sure notifications are set to always on (unless you don’t want spoilers).
We’ve got loads of videos coming up on the Bloodline fallout and AEW Double or Nothing,
and subscribing is the best way to make sure you get them first.
Also, another disclaimer: I watched Night of Champions with a crowd of 82,169 [HAVE
‘REAL ATTENDANCE: 150’ in text on screen] at our WrestleTalk watchalong party - who
reacted to stuff like this:
And this.
So I was high on atmosphere, and loved this show even more.
The Premium Live Event opened on the final of the tournament to determine the second
best in the world - third if you count Roman as two separate people! - AJ Styles vs Seth
Rollins to become the inaugural World Heavyweight Champion.
This was one of the more predictable matches going in.
Not that the action wouldn’t be awesome, it’s Seth Rollins and AJ Styles.
More that it’s hard to get really fully excited when one of the participants winning
makes no administrative sense.
This is a title expressly designed for Raw, and AJ just got drafted to SmackDown.
But it’s not like WWE haven’t done crazy swerves for the sake of it in the past, and
the match being placed as the opener made it feel a bit more unpredictable.
The watchalong crowd felt the buzz in the air and got mostly behind Styles, me included.
But that’s how good Seth Rollins is.
Despite him being the predictable choice, despite me hating his obnoxious gimmick, within
ten minutes of solid wrestling and a brain buster from AJ on the ring apron, I found
myself cheering for Seth.
Rollins continued the match psychology, tweaking his knee on a dive outside, letting AJ take
over in the slightly heel role, working over a body part.
It led to some excellent spots, like Seth’s leg collapsing while trying to hit a stomp.
It wasn’t all perfect.
There was a weird sequence where Seth Stomped AJ’s hair, which AJ didn’t know whether
to sell or not, so he somehow did neither.
But the final Pedigree trading sequence was terrific.
Seth ultimately won in the predictable, but right move.
Triple H presented the belt afterwards, for the winner of the best Pedigree.
As it’s also the World Pedigreat Championship.
Trish Stratus and Becky Lynch followed that up with a really entertaining match with a
great finish.
Trish was great, hitting every variation of a hurricanrana she could muster.
In the ring, off the top rope, through the ropes outside.
She is both a hurricarana type Pokemon, and also somehow A BETTER WRESTLER NOW THAN SHE
WAS IN THE ATTITUDE ERA.
She should’ve remembered her type when she tried a submission later, attempting a Sharpshooter
because she is Canadian, ey, which Becky reversed into another Canadian move, the Walls of Jericho!
The finish came when recent NXT call up Zoey Stark emerged from under the ring and hit
Becky with her Z-360.
Trish followed that up with the Stratusfaction for the win.
Not just a good heel finish that furthers the program, but a great pairing that’ll
hopefully quickly elevate Stark up the card.
And for the blood red cherry on top, Becky finished the segment with a busted open nose,
smearing the viscous liquid over her face.
And you know business picks up when Becky gets a busted open face!
After renowned spiritual figure Brock Lesnar told Ali to “GET A LIFE”, WWE played a
video package of Ali visiting Mecca.
It was really well done, totally at odds with the loser gimmick Ali has had on Raw over
the last month.
It turned out to be a classic case of WWE resetting a character the week of the show
for the location they were in.
Usually that often fails and smacks of insincerity.
But because Ali and Gunther are so freaking good, it was really effective - and they went
onto have actually my match of the night.
Gunther is a perfect wrestler.
He didn’t take a single bump for five whole minutes, well over 50% of the match.
Gunther didn’t take a bump… for almost five times as long as the whole
of Rhea Ripley vs Natalya.
This was similar to Zelina Vega’s showing in Puerto Rico at Backlash, with Ali getting
even more of a chance to shine in his comeback - even hitting his 450, and at one point,
a crazy walking powerbomb.
It all just seemed to power up Gunther, though, with him booting Ali off a springboard in
the best spot, and winning with two vicious lariats.
This was awesome.
My only criticism is it’s a shame there was no proper story going in, and Ali wasn’t
built up as a credible opponent.
If WWE had invested in Ali, this could’ve been an excellent emotional match, as opposed
to just a fun one in isolation.
I thought Bianca Belair vs Asuka was the least best thing on the show.
They wrestled fine, with Bianca’s gymnastics and Asuka’s charisma, but it never got away
from just feeling like an uninspired repeat of their WrestleMania match.
Oh, who shall we have Bianca beat this Premium Live Event?
Let’s just do the same thing from two months back.
I was pretty tedious… until it wasn’t.
Asuka missed a mist spot.
Asuka mist, literally.
When Bianca ducked.
But Asuka had another trick up her sleeve.
Or should I say mouth, because she misted her own fingers - so when Belair hoisted her
up for the KOD, Asuka gouged Bianca’s eyes with the finger mist, leading to an Asuka
win in one of the most surprising upsets of the year.
Nobody (apart from Dan The Truth Layton) on our end saw it coming.
But it was right there.
Bianca had recently passed the milestone that made her the longest reigning women’s champion
of the modern era.
Triple H only cares about getting on the long reign leaderboard.
He has no use of your reign once it’s reached number 1.
And the crowd had already started to sour on her the previous month in Puerto Rico.
Belair either had to turn heel or lose the title.
And everyone was very happy that the title went to Asuka.
Here’s a clip of how the watchalong’s reaction…
Just as awesome was the next match, where Rhea Ripley absolutely brutalitiesed Natalya
in 1 minute 10 seconds - throwing her into two sets of steel steps and hitting a Riptide
to win.
Dominic’s overjoyed celebration for Rhea was several times longer than the whole match.
Happy birthday Natalya.
Yes, that actually happened on Natalya’s actual birthday.
I love it when you can feel the joy of the wrestlers coming through in their performance.
Dom and Rhea are having so much fun together, it’s infectious, and it makes them amongst
the best acts in wrestling right now.
If I take the whole losing at WrestleMania decision out of this, as this would be way
better if Cody had the championship, I think the Rhodes vs Lesnar feud has been really
well done - particularly in presenting Cody as a smart babyface, as opposed to a dumb
one risking his body.
Because Cody geniously turned his big disadvantage going in - a broken arm - into his biggest
weapon - a titanium cast.
After a brief tour of Suplex City, Cody got on top casting down blows, which Brock sold
by turning increasingly brighter shades of the colour red.
We then entered the big move portion of a Lesnar match, always my favourite, where Cody
kept doing CrossRhodes, and Brock just kept locking in the Kimura on the broken arm.
He seemingly held on forever in one amazingly dramatic spot.
Like Seth in the opener, Cody is such a good worker at match psychology, he makes you so
invested into cheering him.
But the Adversittity ruled in the end ‘I think Cody should fail a Money in the
Bank cash-in yet’.
Quiet, Adversititty, don’t get ahead of yourself.
As Brock locked in the Kimura once more, and Cody passed out from the pain.
Crucially, he didn’t tap, meaning both characters, and us as viewers, still want to see a rematch.
The main event was a bigger deal than I realised.
Not just because of the Bloodline implosion, but also because Sami Zayn was wrestling in
Saudi Arabia.
I’d been a bit cynical in the lead up to it, with Sami’s Saudi show involvement being
such a charged subject since they started running there - where it’s been reported
Sami hasn’t been used there because of his Syrian ethnicity.
So for him to suddenly be on one felt complicated.
But he came out here, in the main event, visibly emotional, in Saudi dress.
There was a tangible passion in the arena, similar, but different, to that other fan
reception in Canada.
For all the WWE PR bulls-word speak, of being on the forefront of change, this touched me
in a way I wasn’t expecting.
God dammit, Triple H is even good at sportswashing.
The tag match, of course, was awesome.
Over 25 minutes long, it had all the slow pacing, twists, turns and star power of every
Roman Reigns match you’ve even seen.
And when he shared the ring with Zayn, it was electric.
But the finish is what we’re all here for.
Rudy Charles didn’t just take a ref bump, he took a ref death when he got struck full
force by an errant Roman spear.
This let the Usos run in to take out Owens and Zayn.
So far, so Bloodline.
But then Sami ducked, and Jimmy and Jey superkicked Solo - and Roman was pissed.
Reigns started shoving the Uso brothers in the face, bullying them, intimidating them.
He’s pushing Jey, humiliating him, like he has done for three years now, when suddenly
it wasn’t Jey who turned, it was his brother Jimmy who superkicked Roman in the face!
“I’m doing what you should’ve done a long time ago,” he said to his confused
and conflicted brother.
“I got you” - ANOTHER SUPERKICK TO ROMAN.
Jey didn’t know what to do.
It’s a wonderfully nuanced depiction of an abusive relationship within a pro wrestling
storyline.
Even now, even after Jimmy broke the Roman spell, Jey still can’t muster up his own
courage to leave.
Instead, Jimmy ushered him out, as KO and Sami hit their finishers on Solo to win.
What an incredible swerve, but one that makes perfect sense, with Jimmy finally standing
up to Roman instead of Jey.
This brings the Bloodline Saga right back to the HBO level quality we had before WrestleMania
39 Night Two and I cannot wait to see what happens next on SmackDown.
WWE Night of Champions is 96%.
Now go watch Adam Blampied’s fantasy booking of CM Punk’s AEW return!