Kairi Sane returned to WWE!
Roman Reigns predictably won!
And John Cena got squashed.
Or should I say… spiked.
I’m Oli Davis, and this is my review of WWE Crown Jewel 2023… in about 10 minutes.
Crown Jewel kicked off with one of its two huge returns - actually having a match on
the pre-show.
The last WWE Premium Live Event to have a pre-show match was Clash at the Castle in
September 2022, where Madcap Moss and the Street Profits beat Austin Theory and Alpha
Academy.
It meant nothing.
Sami Zayn and JD McDonagh, however, wanted their Crown Jewel pre-show bout to have some
meaning.
Because, in Tempest’s words, they somehow had a standard pre-show match, where they
also beat the s*** out of each other JD took a weird monkey flip lawndarting himself
into the bottom rope early on, his giant head presumably gathering too much momentum, which
appeared to give him a painful looking canvas burn on his abdomen.
He proceeded to bump around like crazy, and Sami won with a Helluva Kick in nine minutes.
One of the more subtle takeaways here is how Sami being on a Saudi Arabia show feels totally
normal.
He reportedly wouldn’t appear on them out of moral objections for years, and the Saudi
regime didn’t want him anyway because of his Syrian descent.
But here he is, opening the show, popping the crowd, while wearing a pristine white
regional thawb shirt.
Because the only way to get your regional thawb shirts pristine white, is by sports
washing.
Sportswashing.
It’s Saudi Effective!
The main card opened on Seth Rollins defending his World Heavyweight Championship against
Drew McIntyre, where Michael Cole immediately made a mistake.
He said Drew’s first title defence after winning the WWE Championship was at Money
in the Bank 2020.
How dare you forget the true main event of WrestleMania 36 - Drew beating ‘Tall Paul’
Big Show.
The shade at AEW.
As has been the way every time I’ve watched Seth defend his title on pay-per-view, I wanted
him to lose.
I wanted Nakamura to beat him.
Balor to beat him.
Hell, I was even rooting for AJ Styles to crown the inaugural champion.
I find Seth’s character and performance incredibly grating.
Rollins continued to sell his back from the Nakamura feud, in that way only Rollins can.
Ow, my back, it really hurts.
Immediately hits move that’ll damage his own back.
Which Drew targeted, revealing an increasingly heelish opportunism.
Interestingly, despite his bad back, Seth managed several Will Ospreay looking moves.
Could this be teasing the hottest free agent in wrestling coming into WWE imminently?
CM Punk return confirmed.
The final few minutes were very back and forth, where I totally bought into McIntyre winning
off a missed Phoenix Splash - no one ever hits the Phoenix Splash!
- into a Claymore for a great near fall.
But Seth went full DX for his final sequence, hitting a Superkick, Pedigree and Stomp to
retain.
As preannounced, Damien Priest then came down to cash in his Money in the Bank.
But just before the bell was rung, a masked man attacked him, who revealed himself as
Sami Zayn, and ran off with the briefcase.
This was never brought up again, and is likely destined for a midcard filler feud to prolong
Priest’s story actually progressing.
There were a lot of possibilities going into this match.
Drew winning, Damien cashing in, Damien getting chucked out of Judgement Day.
They chose the least interesting option.
Rhea Ripley defended her Women’s title against Nia Jax, Raquel Rodriguez, Shayna Baszler
and Zoey Stark next.
Where she didn’t have Judgement Day by her side.
Instead, she had like 16 Saudi Arabian dudes.
In one of the more bizarre entrances of the year, men in traditional Saudi Arabian dress
walked out one-by-one to line the top of the ramp.
It took ages.
There were way too many of them.
But it did give our live watchalong crowd something to pop along to.
Nia was the main foil here, doing some dodgy looking offence, posing for heat, and then
getting taken out by someone else in the match.
Zoey Stark had a really fun spot where she hit a crossbody outside, which was caught
by the cameraman (or woman!) taking a bump themselves as Zoey leapt over them.
The finish was inventive, as Raquel covered Shayna, but Rhea hit an avalanche Riptide
on Zoey to break it up, pinning Baszler herself to win.
It was announced that Survivor Series in several weeks time will be WAR GAMES!
Which was sadly not in William Regal’s voice.
But that’s not the only huge Survivor Series announcement.
We’ll be hosting our first ever overnight watchalong party for it.
So if you’re in London on the 25th November, come watch the show with us and get your tickets
from the link down below!
Going into Crown Jewel, I had John Cena vs Solo Sikoa as one of the more predictable
results on the card.
Cena beats Solo, but only just to protect Sikoa in defeat, setting the GOAT up for a
17th world championship chase against Roman Reigns.
It’s right there.
But what happened was one of the more shocking finishes in Cena history.
After a totally template ugly Cena match, where he gets worked over loads, sells like
he’s a sack of potatoes, then goes 5 Moves of Doom…
Sikoa spiked him.
Ok, that makes sense.
This is the part protecting Solo, where he nearly wins, then Cena hits an AA…
But then Sikoa hit another Spike.
Wow, that’s two finishers.
But Solo’s walking around.
He looks like he’s cocky.
His arrogance is going to walk him right into that AA…
But then Sikoa hit another Spike.
And another.
He hit 11 Samoan Spikes right into Cena’s throat, and won.
It felt like Brock Lesnar’s 16 suplex destruction of Cena back in 2014.
This is hopefully huge for Solo.
Where I went in thinking this was a match to build Cena vs Reigns, perhaps it was actually
to build Sikoa for Roman’s title.
As for Cena, I guess the actors strike is winding up?
It’ll be very interesting to see what he does next - whether this is just a way for
him build a Solo rematch, leave again, or starting to put him at a level where he just
puts other people over.
We then got a 10 minute talkshow segment nobody wanted - MizTV hosting Saudi Arabian comedian
and actor Ibrahim Al Hajjaj, for Grayson Waller to try take over with his own segment.
Ibrahim sided with Miz, continuing his babyface push, and then hit one of the worst People’s
Elbows I’ve ever seen.
And Snoop Dogg’s was this year!
I’m sorry everybody.
Logan Paul is a better wrestler than Rey Mysterio.
STOP BEING SO INCREDIBLE.
Not only in a kayfabe way, as Logan beat Rey for his United States title, thanks to a sneaky,
sneaky YouTube helper, Santos Escobar being an idiot and leaving the brass knucks right
next to Paul, and Logan using them on Rey’s finish with some great dramatic irony staging.
But also in a wrestling ability way.
Logan was borderline flawless as usual.
Jumping split legged leapfrogs, military press reps, Buckshot Lariat.
But it was him saving Rey’s life that added a whole new level of respect for him.
Mysterio went for a springboard moonsault, but appeared not to get enough distance on
it.
He was heading headfirst straight down into the mat.
So Logan leaped forward, caught Rey in a tombstone position, dropped down to his knee to stop
Mysterio breaking his neck, and seamlessly transitioned it into a powerslam.
For someone with so few professional matches, to not just have the athletic ability, timing,
ring psychology and facials, but to also be so aware of your competitors safety that you
can prevent a potentially disastrous injury while making it look like it’s part of the
match, is incredible.
I am very much here for Logan’s US title run.
I think LA Knight beating him for it at WrestleMania would be a perfect overarching story for it.
Bianca Belair and IYO Sky were having a decent enough match for 12 or so minutes, but they
had a tough Match of the Night act to follow.
It wasn’t until the final few minutes that this got the other best moment of the show.
Bayley, dressed like a disco ball, kept distracting the referee, with Belair getting a visual
pin.
But IYO accidentally hit her outside.
Still, Bayley was undeterred.
She was trying to help IYO win.
Belair realised she had to get rid of Bayley if she was going to stand a chance - hoisting
her up for a KOD, but then Dakota Kai broke it up.
Wait a second…
Dakota Kai isn’t Japanese.
Because it was actually a returning Kairi Sane!
I forgot that was a reported option!
Kairi took out Belair outside.
Belair just beat the 10 count, for IYO to immediately hit her with the moonsault to
retain.
Kairi hit the best flying elbow in the business afterwards, and the two posed together.
And just when you think this story can’t get any better, with Kairi returning and reuniting
with IYO, the camera cuts outside to show a heartbroken Bayley.
She really is IYO’s biggest fan.
She really was to be trusted.
But now her own heelish past, and the mistrust that has caused, could’ve forced her out.
This is very good complex storytelling, rather than going with a straight turn.
It’ll hopefully give the SmackDown Women’s division a proper Bloodline/Judgement Day
level storyline it’s been missing.
Cody Rhodes and Damien Priest had a really fun match, somehow cramming in more than most
of the other fights on the card, while being the joint shortest overall.
Both guys hit their finishers in the first few minutes.
There was an interference bonanza in the middle, when Finn distracted the ref, for JD to strike
Cody - he’s not even in the faction - and Jey Uso to chase them all and Dominic off.
For Cody to hit three CrossRhodes in the end to win.
There was no sign of Sami Zayn, who stole the briefcase earlier.
And the main event saw Roman Reigns vs LA Knight.
I was so curious going into this match.
This is the first Roman title defence all year that hasn’t been super connected to
the overarching Bloodline story, meaning it could lack a lot of the drama.
And Knight, as over as he is with the live crowd, isn’t the most exciting in-ring performer
bell to bell.
I’d say both those concerns came to pass, with this being one of the weaker Roman Pay-per-view
matches, being his shortest by quite a way.
I never believed in any of Knight’s near falls, Roman working over Knight didn’t
have the same charged intensity as other matches, and the finish - Solo Sikoa distraction and
Jimmy Uso interfering, putting Roman’s foot on the ropes after Knight’s BFT - is overdone
and uncreative at this point.
Chanting yeah at everything was fun though.
Make sure to subscribe and enable notifications, because I’m going to do a deep dive into
whether Roman Reigns’ title run is working on the WrestleTalk News.
After an incredibly hot pay-per-view streak, this show continues the downward trend of
Summerslam, Payback and Fastlane.
Crown Jewel 2023 is 70%.
But what about Logan Paul as WWE Champion?
Watch our pitches in Fantasy Booking Warfare!