In this WrestleTalk News, WWE stars are upset with WWE, Vince McMahon spotted backstage
at Raw, and Luke’s review of last night’s Raw.
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On last night’s Raw, after it had previously been noted by reputable outlets, WWE officially
announced King and Queen of the Ring that will take place at the end of May in Saudi
Arabia.
Note that it’s called King and Queen of the Ring this time.
And not King of the Ring and QUEEN’S CROWN TOURNAMENT.
They’re doing it right this time.
The announcement on Raw was complete with a video package hyping the event, but there
were a couple of people who weren’t too pleased with the promotion of the show, that
being the current…reigning?
King and Queen of the Ring themselves, Xavier Woods and Zelina Vega.
Both taking to Twitter to voice their frustration, the pair was notably absent from the video
package, which is certainly a choice when they won it the most recently, and in Vega’s
case is the only Queen of the Ring to exist so far.
She said as much with her tweet: “Love that the last and FIRST Queen Of The
Ring wasn’t shown in that clip but ok 👌🏽” Meanwhile Woods went a step further and simply
posted a new version of the video package but edited to include him and Vega instead
of the other wrestlers WWE chose to highlight, with the caption: “I fixed it.”
Well hopefully these tournaments can be done correctly this time instead of the women’s
matches only being given a fraction of the time of the men’s ones and the winners of
the tournaments being treated correctly and maybe getting a title shot instead of Woods
technically beating Reigns but it being ruled a no-contest and then Reigns stomping on his
crown and bending it like it’s made of plastic undermining the whole thing.
Fingers crossed.
But who knows, as we’ve got Vince McMahon backstage at Raw again.
Wahey.
Several outlets including Bryan Alvarez, Dave Meltzer, Sean Ross Sapp and WRKD Wrestling
all reported that Vince was backstage at last night’s show.
So was this time for his continued push to take over creative once again?
No, not really.
But there is some breaking news though, Vince McMahon…no that can’t be right, can it?
Vince McMahon has grown a moustache.
Everyone drop whatever you’re holding, get to some shelter as soon as you can because
Vince has clearly lost it.
I’m mostly joking obviously, but it has been known for several years that Vince hates
the idea of beards and moustaches, maintaining his clean shaven look because ‘he can’t
let the beard win’.
So what has caused him to change his mind now?
Is he losing his mind when not in control of creative?
Well according to PWInsider and Sean Ross Sapp of Fightful, Vince was primarily at Raw
to visit John Cena, not to do anything else for the company, or run the show.
However, there’s always the ever-present looming threat of Vince, as WRKD Wrestling,
while confirming Vince was at the show, also mentioned that he has “had a hand in more
creative than people realize.”
Always reassuring.
Dave Meltzer on Wrestling Observer Radio also had some thoughts on Vince at Raw, and he
doesn’t think it’s as innocent as visiting a friend:
“He wasn't barking orders at people or anything like that, but he was in Gorilla all night
and I was told they tell you he's only there to visit John Cena, that's the story, but
there's more to it than that…It's not like he was there in charge and doing stuff, but
it's not like he was just visiting John Cena and saying hi to a few people and then left.
That didn't happen either…The truth is a little bit in the middle."
Whilst Vince has made his return to WWE, how about the team that he quite infamously wasn’t
too keen on that being FTR.
The duo made their return at Revolution following heavy speculation and teases from the team
that they may be on their way out of the company and potentially heading back to WWE.
So, naturally the next question was whether Dax and Cash were set to commit their future’s
to AEW past April, or would their return be short-lived?
Well, according to Fightful, the WWE speculation can now be put to rest as Dax and Cash have
both committed their long-term futures to the company.
The return of FTR at Revolution was reportedly kept a secret backstage, with many not aware
of it happening.
Not only that, but Fightful are also saying that all of the suggestions that they would
leave the company were in fact all part of a storyline.
Now over to Luke for Raw.
And now it’s time for my review of Monday Night Raw - aka the first Monday Night Raw
that actually feels like the Road to WrestleMania edition of Monday Night Raw… in about five
minutes.
The show kicked off hot with Kevin Owens and Solo Sikoa, who went after each other with
a lot of fire.
Unfortunately - and this would be a recurring theme for the night - this was not about the
actual in-ring action.
These two could have a killer match, but that’s not what this was here for, it was all about
the post-match angle.
Jimmy Uso jumped in and caused a DQ - is that you, Vince? - and Sami Zayn ran down to make
the save.
Zayn again extended the olive branch to Owens, which was again rejected.
I don’t think Zayn realises just how much he broke Owens’ heart when he sided with
The Bloodline.
He knows he did wrong for sure - that’s why he’s trying to make things up - but
I don’t think he truly knows how hurt Owens is.
We saw a segment backstage where Zayn again asked for them to be on the same page.
We don’t have to be friends, but we need to work together in order to take this group
down.
Owens just told him that he should go back to Roman Reigns and stroke his ego.
Just leave me alone.
This is all awesome and powerful stuff, and it got even better when we got to the main
event.
Bobby Lashley cut a pretty lousy promo on Bray Wyatt, but it’s a promo of quality
befitting the feud.
Carmella asked Chelsea Green to be in her corner for her match with Bianca Belair, but
it didn’t really help her as Belair dispatched of Mella with little fuss.
There was still a little bit of ‘Carmella in complete control’ when we came back from
the ad break, but it just felt like bad commentary rather than actual fact like it was last week
in the Asuka match.
Mella got a couple of nearfalls off Green distractions, but Belair never felt in actual
danger and won with the KOD.
The heels beat her down and Asuka made the save.
I smell a tag team match in a few weeks time, playa.
How will they co-exist, etc.
I could really do with this Asuka vs. Belair feud to get started.
The Miz was in the ring to act as a moderator for the face-to-face between Seth Rollins
and Logan Paul, which was a pretty good segment if you like three people acting like enormous
douchebags and getting amazing crowd reactions for their efforts.
Paul got great heel heat, and Rollins felt like the biggest and most over babyface on
the show not named Sami Zayn.
They finally set up a match for Mania, and Logan Paul stood Logan Tall when he hit Rollins
with that One Lucky Punch.
I still think Miz is going to help Paul win at Mania and that will spin off into a Rollins
vs. Miz feud for the next month or so until the rematch at King and Queen of the Ring
in Saudi Arabia.
Turns out last week’s announcement of Brock Lesnar vs. Omos - sorry, OMOS - was not a
fever dream, and the big lad beat Dolph Ziggler in a short and incredibly heatless match.
This had a fun set-up, though, as Mustafa Ali - Dolph’s biggest fan - got the match
made and was in the crowd to cheer him on.
It was pretty funny.
You’ve also got to respect Brock Lesnar, man.
He looked at a spooky match with Bray Wyatt and decided that he’d rather not.
He looked at taking an absolute beating from Gunther and decided he’d rather not.
So instead pitched a match where he has to do such little work and take fewer bumps for
as much money in the shortest amount of time possible.
It’s an admirable stance to take.
Finn Balor had Johnny Gargano beat until Edge made his third return in as many months and
helped Johnny Wrestling pick up the win.
It was a match with a lot of potential, but wasn’t there to be about in-ring action
and was there for the Edge return.
Edge returning and attacking a member of Judgement Day.
Haven’t seen that one before.
Piper Niven beat Nikki Cross in a very quick and heatless match, and we got some comedy
backstage where Rick Boogs accidentally got Elias a match with Bronson Reed for next week.
Can’t wait to hear that lack of crowd reaction.
But speaking of crowd reactions, John Cena was on the show.
John Cena came out to a massive reaction, and felt like a bonafide megastar of epic
proportions.
He also looked genuinely choked up by the reaction he got, which was quickly interrupted
by Austin Theory who challenged Big Match John to a Big Match at WrestleJohn-ia.
And Cena said no.
Well, that’s then I guess.
But Theory wouldn’t accept that.
He called John balled and wondered why Cena - the man all about respect and not giving
up - is showing him no respect and giving up on the match?
Cena then cut a vicious promo on Theory, explaining that he wanted to pass on the match for Theory’s
own good.
Because if Theory loses, he loses everything.
If he wins, he’ll have to deal with the Raw After Mania crowd and he won’t have
Cena to pull in the reaction for him.
Because in the most damning part of his promo, Cena told Theory that he’d rather be going
bald than have WWE pipe in fake crowd noise to make it sound like people care about him.
Ouch.
Cena eventually accepted the match and said it was the biggest mistake Theory will ever
make.
It was a killer promo and performance by Cena.
Theory was no slouch here either, and really played up that he did not expect this side
of Cena to be here tonight.
It was simple, but very effective build for a match that Cena is destined to lose and
put over the younger guy just as The Rock did for him all those years ago.
Cena also did a passing of the torch moment with Cody Rhodes, which was nice.
Baron Corbin wanted to join Maximum Male Models, and Maxxine said she’d consider it if he
could beat Chad Gable.
He could not, and WWE didn’t have the Theory courtesy to pipe in fake crowd noise to make
it sound like people were into this.
Team BeXtreme celebrated their title win last week with Trish Status, and the trio challenged
Damage CTRL to a trios match for WrestleMania.
Bayley accepted, which was not well received by Dakota and Iyo, and the babyfaces stood
tall.
There are apparently some twists and turns coming in this story, and I can see Trish
turning on her team at Mania.
And the main event saw Sami Zayn take on Jimmy Uso in a match that was again not about the
in-ring action and just about the post-match.
Jey Uso appeared in the crowd and was there to see his brother lose to Sami.
He got in the ring and seemingly made his choice.
Torn up, he left the ring and hugged Sami Zayn.
The crowd exploded into UCEY and HOLY SHIRT chants.
What does this mean for Mania?
What does this mean for The Bloodline?
What does this mean for Jimmy and Roman Reigns?
But just as these questions rattled through our minds, Jey Uso superkicked Sami Zayn and
beat him down with his brothers.
It was an awesome moment, and a wonderful wrinkle to this story.
There’s a really good argument that Jey didn’t do this for Roman, and he didn’t
do it because he hates Sami - he did this to save Jimmy.
If he didn’t return to The Bloodline, Reigns was going to blame and punish Jimmy for everything.
So Jey made his choice.
He chose to save his brother.
The same reason he acknowledged Roman in the first place.
That’s why it looked like he was torn when in the ring with Jimmy, and it’s why he
hugged Sami.
It wasn’t a swerve for the sake of a swerve, it was a conscious choice.
He did what he had to do.
It was an awesome ending to the first Raw since Elimination Chamber that has actually
felt like it was worth tuning in for.
The in-ring work was lacking and it sure felt every minute of its three hour running time,
but it had some big angles and some really great build for Mania.
This week’s Raw is 4 out of 5.
Hey, can I let you in on a little secret?
We’re working on a new limited series of video essays about videogame movies based
on a book I wrote a few years ago.
This has been a project we’ve wanted to do for the last few years, and we’ve been
working hard on it behind the scenes for the last few months.
The channel is called CutScene and we need your help.
We’re looking for Image Gathers who can work to a brief with a knowledge of videogame
movies like Street Fighter and Super Mario Bros, as well as the world of video games
like Sonic the Hedgehog and Metroid.
If this is you, well we want to work with you.
This will be a paid role that will last around 1-2 weeks, but if it all works out we could
bring you in for other WrestleTalk projects.
Please email support@wrestletalk.com with your application.
I’ll be doing a special Q&A livestream tomorrow afternoon on the new channel to talk about
the project, and we’d love it if you could help us reach 1,000 subs.
There’s a link in the video description.
But until then, here’s Oli Davis reviewing AEW Revolution, which he really quite enjoyed.