Braun, Bobby and Drew had this amazing match where they did all the big beefy moves, and
Roman and Cesaro had another amazing match in a different way where they made it really
slow and methodical and psychologically dense.
And The Miz was eaten by zombies.
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Like my review of your third favourite WrestleMania of the year, WrestleMania Backlash… in about
10 minutes.
The pre-show match saw Gangs of New Sheamus actually put his United States title on the
line in an open challenge - somewhat undoing all his heel work on Raw where he ensures
his matches aren’t for the belt.
Ricochet answered from outta Main Event and unsurprisingly had a very good match.
Despite being buried into obscurity, Ricochet is still one of the most spectacular wrestlers
in the world, and Sheamus is on the best in-ring run in his WWE career.
After an exciting seven minutes, Ricochet dodged a Brogue Kick to be knocked out by
a follow up knee for Sheamus to retain.
Sheamus cut a heel celebration promo afterwards, but Ricochet attacked him and stole his coat
and his little hat.
So we’re presumably starting a Sheamus vs Ricochet feud for the US title by having Sheamus
decisively beat Ricochet in a match for the US title.
Clean, not even with his finishing move.
Barely an inconvenience.
After an opening video package for Zack Snyder’s Army of the Dead movie instead of the actual
wrestling pay-per-view - but I’m sure that’s the end of that promotional tie-in deal - the
main card opened with the Raw Women’s Championship match of Rhea Ripley defending against Asuka
and Charlotte Flair.
Despite their story having very little substance, and that Asuka was beaten clean on the go-home
Raw, all three women put on a fast paced slugfest, making this feel like an actual blood feud.
The finish was odd, though, where Charlotte booted Asuka into a Riptide, letting Ripley
retain while Flair just… stood on the apron.
There was no reason why she couldn’t break it up.
So either it was a slight positional botch, or something far worse…
Charlotte was being controlled by a supernatural force.
There were a few moments where Flair looked like she was standing very much like demonic
Alexa Bliss, with her head cocked to the side.
This could be foreshadowing whatever WWE have planned for Charlotte vs Bliss.
I’ve seen a lot of people praise the Mysterios beating the Dirty Dawgs to win the SmackDown
tag team championships - being the first ever father and son team to do so.
The victory itself was very sweet.
Rey’s whole reason for staying with WWE was to help his son become a wrestler, and
now he’s won the tag titles with him.
That’s both a hell of a personal and professional achievement.
I just thought the match suffered from Daniel Bryan at WrestleMania 34 syndrome.
Dominic had been taken out earlier in the night by what seemed to be an ottoman storage
unit backstage, cushion first.
The hardest part of the sofa.
This meant Rey effectively fought a handicap match for 10 minutes, which I found monotonous.
And when Dominic eventually came down for the hot tag, he got cut off right away.
As did Rey when he tagged back in.
It was a match of cold tags, but the result was heartwarming.
Now here’s a message from me back when I didn’t have so many eyebrows.
Before we get on with the rest of the episode, I’d just like to say a huge thank you to
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If you were looking at the fans on the ThunderDome screens, you might’ve thought WWE were doing
a special show just for people from Corpus Christi.
But no, the atmosphere wasn’t dead, they were actual zombies.
Because The Miz vs Damien Priest - a feud with absolutely zero supernatural elements
to it apart from the fact that it’s been going on forever and will never die - was
a lumberjack match, with NXT wrestlers on the outside made up like the undead.
But not just any mindless, flesh eating zombies, thank god.
These zombiejacks knew the rules, only attacking the wrestlers when they stepped out the ring.
Who looks at Priest, one of the coolest voiced, badass looking guys on the roster, and thinks
he’s the one we overload with celebrity and horror gimmicks right at the start of
his main roster run?
Miz and Priest teamed up to fight off the zombies.
John Morrison ran down to film his audition tape for Army of the Dead 2, and then got
eaten.
And Priest won the match, leaving the zombies to presumably eat The Miz.
Expect him to sell that until at least tonight’s episode of Raw.
I hated this.
It made me embarrassed to be watching professional wrestling.
I could feel it making me dumber.
And, worst of all, I think it severely sets back Priest.
What did AEW’s Chris Jericho think?
“Zombies...ZOMBIES?
Wow that just set wrestling back 30 years.”
What did you think of the zombie involvement?
Let me know in the comments down below because I’ll be replying to as many people as I
can in the first 15 minutes after this video goes live FROM OUTTA NOWHERE.
Then WWE announced their next pay-per-view will be on June 20th and it’ll be Hell in
a Cell.
Stop doing horror stuff in June.
At least it’s not called WrestleMania Hell in a Cell.
Yet.
Thankfully everything else on the show was very good to freaking awesome.
Bianca BelAir retained her SmackDown Women’s Championship over Bayley by wrapping her braid
around her legs in a roll-up - presumably setting up a rematch, possibly in Hell in
a Cell.
Then Braun Strowman, Drew McIntyre and Bobby Lashley legit had one of my favourite WWE
matches of the year.
Ironically after having four weeks of TV build with almost exclusively filler, this match
was all killer with not a single pause for breath.
Lashley and Drew set the tone almost immediately by hitting a double stalling suplex on Braun,
making you think anything could happen.
Which it proceeded to do.
Strowman did a cannonball of the ring apron - trains don’t flip - Drew threw Lashley
through the tron so much it exploded, and Braun powerbombed McIntyre through the announcers
table, without even removing the monitors.
Christ alive, are you actually trying to kayfabe hurt him?
Drew hit a Claymore for the finish, but by then Bobby had run down to steal the win - making
Drew vs Bobby a possible Hell in a Cell match.
Although I think we all want Lashley to move onto someone else now.
And that someone is called Keith Lee.
And the main event saw the latest masterclass in Shakespearian wrestling.
Roman’s matches are unlike anything else in the world right now: slow, long, dramatic
and, most importantly, completely character based.
It’s like the action is secondary to the struggle of wills.
Each match is the story of a different challenger trying to bring down the Tribal Chief, and
each time they get so, so close.
Reigns had a game plan: destroy the most dangerous part of Cesaro’s offence, his right uppercut
arm.
He did that over nearly half an hour, but would get cocky by trash-talking ‘DB - Daniel
Bryan to you and me’ into the camera - giving Cesaro convincing hope spots to fire back.
But all of Cesaro’s guts couldn’t repair his limb, and he couldn’t keep on the crossface
or the sharpshooter, or properly hit the Neutraliser.
Roman overpowered the arm and made Cesaro pass out in the Guillotine all by himself,
crucially without the Usos.
Which is very welcome, as I’ve heard some criticise these main events for making Roman
look weak, despite him also being SmackDown Thanos.
I must admit though, the Jey Uso interference has become somewhat repetitive, and Roman
winning by himself helps progress the Jimmy storyline.
Cesaro’s post-match selling was terrific, acting like he’d just woken up after passing
out.
But the show-closing angle felt lacklustre after the match’s high drama.
Seth Rollins came down and brutally beat up Cesaro, shattering his arm in a chair on the
ring post, being annoyed for him for moving on from their feud.
Reigns and Jey just walked away.
What did you think of WrestleMania Backlash?
Let me know in the poll on a pole match on our community tab, where 72% of you went for
‘but also Miz go eaten by zombies.’
Yeah, it is hard to move past that bit.
The top two matches on this show were excellent.
The women’s three way that opened was fast-paced and fun too, BelAir vs Bayley was very good,
and the Mysterios win was heartwarming.
But, as I’ve already said a lot, it’s hard to move past Miz getting eaten by zombies.
And for that, I’ve got to chop off a point.
WrestleBack LashMania is 4 out of 5.
And there were developments on WrestleTalk’s live reactions too, as me getting blown up
was finally explained.
Here’s a promo video for informational purposes, I can’t watch it’s too painful…