Bayley turns heel on Becky Lynch! Bray Wyatt enters the Universal Title picture! And King Corbin is still a very real, very distinct possibility.
And there was a backstage fight at AEW All Out!
Click the timestamps in the video description below to go straight to any of those stories and learn more!
I’m Oli Davis – give us a subscribe, press the thumbs up button, and answer our question of the day in the comments: What do you think of Bayley turning heel? Because I’ll be replying to people FROM OUTTA NOWHERE! And click the ‘i’ above my head to give your rating of the show – where you can choose from: RawSome, Cor, AVRAWGE, Poor and RawFul – as I review the 2nd September episode of Monday Night Raw!
It’s quite a jarring gear change to go from watching the intense, realistic, strong style products of New Japan, AEW and NXT UK over the weekend to an in-ring contract signing on WWE Raw between Braun Strowman and Seth Rollins. Sports entertainment!
The segment was quite the opposite of the realism in those other promotions, with both men’s promos scripted in that WWE style that nobody ever speak like in real life.
Thankfully this was all interrupted by one of the best things in WWE right now, The O.C., which led to a tag match between Rollins and Strowman and Galanderson – which Seth managed to win with a roll-up. Again, really dodged a bullet by not signing with AEW there, Good Brothers!
But don’t worry, we’re still definitely getting that contract signing – as Stone Cold Steve Austin will be moderating it on next week’s Raw in Madison Square Garden. Which is totally not just a way to sell more tickets because they’ve only currently sold half of them…
The brawling continued afterwards, where Braun accidentally collided with Seth, and because it’s not believable that three men can overcome Strowman, Bobby Roode and Dolph Ziggler ran down to work him over too.
Now because RooDolph The Impromptu Tag Team only became a thing last week, they got an enhancement win over Zack Ryder and Curt Hawkins next to establish their new act. RooDolph looked good, but Hawkins and Ryder are hardly fierce competition, and there’s a much easier way to get both men over. Grow moustaches!
Lacey Evans then made her long-awaited return to Raw (it’s been a good six weeks) for a match against an always-smiling Natalya, which rather undermined all Sasha’s heel work from the last two weeks, making it feel like her character’s 73rd reset in the last 18 months.
But the quality of her in-ring work and intensity really made Evans look good, who won with a Women’s Right. Who would’ve thought that letting Lacey wrestle matches against very talented in ring workers would get her over more than months of just doing catwalks to the ring?
Becky Lynch then cut a promo about how Sasha Banks and Charlotte got all the chances when they were initially called up to the main roster, and now look where they are. This brought out Sasha to cut a significantly better promo than last week, feeling much more like her Boss character from NXT. It was so intense, she even said the word ‘bitch’. That’s when you know it’s serious in WWE. The Street Profits then noted backstage how they’re not allowed to say that on-air, so let’s cut to commercial – completing their transformation into WWE’s version of Deadpool.
Banks vs Becky for Clash of Champions – or CoC as it can, and should, be abbreviated to – was made official during the break.
Cedric Alexander wasn’t just selling his arm injury from last week in his King of the Ring Quarterfinal match against Baron Corbin, he was also jumped by The O.C. earlier in the night, giving him even more obstacles to overcome.
It made for a very effective babyface hook, as Cedric and Corbin put on the best match of the night – yeah, even better than Joe vs Ricochet – with loads of amazing near falls, and protecting Alexander in defeat. Now Corbin isn’t being so overpushed, we can appreciate him for the very solid act he actually is.
After months of Viking Raiders squash matches not connecting with the audience, WWE finally tried a different tact – letting the enhancement team cut a promo on your local hometown. It worked a little bit, and the crowd were more into the Raiders as a result.
Raw’s second quarterfinal King of the Ring match saw Samoa Joe take on Ricochet – a mouthwatering dynamic of big guy vs speed.
The action really picked up in the last third of the match with dives and near falls, and the finish set up a rather fun stipulation for next week. Ricochet and Joe both pinned each other, meaning it’ll be a Triple Threat with Corbin in the semi-finals – allowing Baron to do an excellent ‘Triple threat match?!’ reaction line backstage.
For once, an episode of Firefly Fun House was only the second best thing on an episode of Raw. Bray Wyatt apologised to Finn Balor for the Fiend being so rude to him at SummerSlam. Bray’s definition of ‘rude’, it seems, is snapping a guy’s neck! And then Vince McPuppet appeared to berate Wyatt for challenging Braun or Seth for the Universal title. Bray fantastically responded by feeding Vince McPuppet money. Good cow.
After posing with the rest of the puppet gang, he promised Seth or Braun he’ll see them in Hell, presumably a reference to October’s Hell in a Cell pay-per-view, where Bray is advertised to be fighting for the title.
While this was as brilliant as usual, the production design of the initial Firefly Fun House run wasn’t there. This instalment felt much more like a set constructed backstage, as opposed to a full day of filming in a studio. And Bray’s face rather goofily morphed into the Fiend’s near the end, which is a rather on-the-nose touch more reminiscent of Balor’s goofy Demon promos than the Fun House’s usual subtly – which implies other WWE higher-ups are starting to offer their creative input.
Charly Caruso then asked Rey Mysterio why he’s such an old, stupid loser, why doesn’t he just retire, isn’t 619 actually your age, to which Rey replied Eddie Guerrero’s son Dominic had convinced him to keep fighting!
Ahead of Miz challenging Shinsuke Nakamura for the Intercontinental title at CoC, he beat Cesaro here. Cesaro continues to look brilliant in every match he has, and also continues to lose.
And the main event segment was the Women’s Champions Showcase – pitting Raw and SmackDown Women’s Champions Becky and Bayley against Women’s Tag Champions Alexa Bliss and Nikki Cross.
The match was just a background to the angle that came at the end. Sasha jumped Becky for the DQ and started hitting her with a steel chair. But Lynch’s heroic babyface tag partner saved her by taking the chair from Banks… to then smile at Sasha and start hitting Becky with it too! Thank God it wasn’t a baseball bat, otherwise we really would be getting Bayley Sting.
This was actually set up rather smartly throughout the night, with Bayley not commenting on Sasha’s actions in an earlier promo, but saying how she won’t be overshadowed by Becky.
The crowd reacted big time to the turn, with thunderous Yes chants as the show quickly went off-air. And the angle certainly was exciting, and a much needed revamp for Bayley, who’s done nothing of note since becoming champion.
But, at the same time, it’s a sad state of affairs for how spectacularly her babyface run has been botched on the main roster. And it creates a very heel-heavy women’s division, with Becky as it’s only real main event babyface.
This was a pretty exciting episode, with some much needed focus put upon the mostly ignored women’s division in recent weeks. Seth vs Braun continues to be a problem, smothering both the main event and tag divisions, but overall, this week’s Raw is Cor!
Pete will have all the details on the backstage fight in AEW very shortly, but first – yet another exciting announcement!
The first episode of our brand new series WrestleTalk Showcase premiered yesterday – check that out right after you’ve watched this video! – where we featured our partner promotions WrestleGate and Frontline. Well we’re very excited to announce Luke and I will be doing a live WrestleRamble at their next shows on Saturday 5th October in Nottingham, which will also feature Rampage Brown, Nathan Cruz, Robbie X and our WrestleTalk Scholarship winner Callum Neuman!
Tickets are £12 using the link in the video description below, or totally free if you buy tickets for the Frontline and WrestleGate double header that starts at 2pm! You’ll also get to hang out with me and Luke as we watch those shows!
Now over to Pete with the news…
Great review Oli! Cheers lad.
You know, there’s been a lot of negativity surrounding wrestling lately. With AEW coming around, fans have begun picking a side, and arguing with fans about which side is better, even to the point of insulting people for choosing the “wrong” side. So in times like these, let’s have a look at something that will make us all feel, just a little better.
Hangman Adam Page came out on a horse at AEW All Out, and he’s decided to name that horse Hunter Horse Helmsley. … Yep, that’s…that’s the story. Hunter Horse Helmsley. Also, Asuka has started her own gaming YouTube channel. She’s been posting a lot of Mario Maker clips to her Twitter so…should be fun! Please join us on ScreenStalker. Also Finn Balor has shaved his head and the wrestling world went insane. Well, that was some good news. Good job everyone, let’s wrap this up and go home.
Now we feel a little better about ourselves, and the wrestling industry as a whole, let’s talk about something positive. *gets handed a piece of paper* sigh
AEW’s All Out took place this past Saturday, featuring the craziest ladder match in possibly ever, PAC defeating Kenny Omega, and Chris Jericho being crowned the first ever AEW Champion. On the Buy-In pre-show, the women’s casino battle royale took place, with the winner being gifted a spot in a match to determine the first ever AEW Women’s Champion. The match was eventually won by Nyla Rose, but it’s two other competitors that have made the headlines.
During the bout, there was a very interesting interaction between Sadie Gibbs and Bea Priestley, where Sadie seemed to no-sell Bea’s strikes, and Bea sandbagged Sadie’s gorilla press. Bea then promptly no-sold Sadie’s gorilla press, and eliminated her from the match.
According to Square Circle Siren’s Casey Michael, who was backstage at the event, this led to a backstage altercation between the pair after the match, with Casey tweeting:
“Also, Sadie is a real one for swinging on Bea backstage last night. Put the title on her PLEASE.”
Sadie is a real one? I think that name’s taken…
In all seriousness, if there is a problem between wrestlers, it’s best it’s solved outside of the ring, without physicality, rather than a public display during the match that everyone can see.
But it might be more than a little backstage scuffle that might be taking place between AEW and WWE, as the two companies are preparing to go head-to-head in the Wednesday Night War.
After AEW’s All Out received almost universal praise, with almost all rating it a good to excellent show, the average fan might think that it would have WWE slightly concerned. However, this may not be the case at all.
Former WWE and Lucha Underground writer Chris DeJoseph has done a series of tweets that make for some very interesting reading. After posting a rather scathing review of All Out, DeJoseph clarified his stance on the show.
“I’ve taken a lot of flak for my unfavorable [opinion] of last night’s @AEWrestling show. I want them to succeed. But that show lacked story. And if you want the “average” fan to be invested, if you want to gain an audience, story trumps all, and that was severely lacking.”
“Like I talked to @wwe peeps today and @AEWrestling isn’t even on their radar. And especially so after last night. Sorry not sorry.”
“Sorry again but @wwe are laughing. @JRsBBQ looked like he wanted to hide last night.”
It’s an interesting note about the show that it may not draw in the average viewer, however it seems fairly clear that AEW is catering to the more hardcore fan, and WWE has responded to that by moving the one brand that appeals to hardcore fans the most to directly compete with AEW on Wednesday nights.
Also if any other stories are to be believed, AEW are very much on WWE’s radar, hence the whole NXT to USA thing. They may not be competing against the main roster just yet, but it will be interesting to see come October 2, how AEW and NXT stack up against each other.
There’s some controversy a-brewing in the MCU surrounding Falcon and The Winter Soldier’s Disney+ series! Press the video to the right to be taken to ScreenStalker with myself and Luke to find out the news! And AEW and WWE stars have quit! Press the video below that to find out the details now! Press the thumbs up, subscribe and bell icon to enable notifications, and leave us a comment letting us know what you thought of Raw! A special thank you to our lovely pledgehammers on Patreon, some of whom you can see scrolling below me right now! I’ve been Chopper Pete Quinnell, and that, was wrestling.
5 years ago by Andy Datson
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