WWE Raw review catch-up (5/6, 5/13 and 5/20/13)

Those who read my General Blog (specifically the comic reviews) know that I've been working on a crossover for Fanfiction.net that has taken up a lot of my time. That said, I haven't forgotten about my reviews here.

Simply put, I haven't been looking forward to writing these. Raw has been a generally unpleasant experience the last few weeks. It's weird, some parts of the show are done well and carry it, but so much of it angers me. As such, my system may be keeping Raw at a higher level than it should be in the competition with Impact Wrestling.

I am still judging by segments, but to save space on these three reviews (yes, I'm just going up to this week in order to be completely caught up), I'm FINALLY utilizing by "Good, Bad and Ugly" system to recap. The Good and Bad are self-explanatory, but the Ugly is something unexpected (either positive or negative) that evoked a reaction of sheer amazement from me. Let's get to it!

5/6/13

The Good - Randy Orton d. Damien Sandow (3.25 stars): A surprisingly fun match given I had no expectations at all for it. Damien did a song parody of Randy's music and then managed to get some actual offense in. I never expected Sandow to win, but the fact that he looked competent against a legit main eventer means A LOT, and WWE should make a point of doing this with every match (wishful thinking, I know). Good segment all around, and for those curious, this got an 8.25/10 when I rated it.

The Bad - Heyman and Lesnar trash Triple H's office: Holy crap, did this thing just not want to die. This freaking segment went on for over TWENTY MINUTES and most of it was Heyman just standing around with a camera making snide comments about the building and random people. I literally caught myself thinking, "Did I just watch two guys ride up an elevator for 45 seconds?" And yes, I did watch that. And are we supposed to believe that WWE is THAT easy to enter? If that's the case, then the New Age Outlaws should have just busted in when they did that 'TNA invading WWE' schtick a few years back. Lastly, I love how Triple H just shrugs all this crap off and says, 'I've got two offices, b**ch!' It's just a lovely way of letting everyone know that this segment didn't accomplish a damn thing. Ugh. By the way, this got 2/10.

The Ugly - Kaitlyn's secret admirer: I don't know how to feel about this. I'm thrilled that the WWE writers have gotten their heads out of their ass long enough to actually write a storyline for some Divas, but I really am depressed if THIS is their best work. Kaitlyn has a secret admirer who is texting her from a hidden number (technology that NO ONE has, by the way) and Khali is volunteered by Natalya to act as a spy. What? There's nothing technically wrong with it, but it just feels surreal and I can't believe this is getting green-lighted. Then again, this is the company that sees a problem when the models they hired to wrestle leave after years of no crowd reaction to pursue actual modeling... then solve that problem by hiring more models instead of raiding SHIMMER or Chikara's rosters. I think I should just write a master's thesis on all the things wrong with WWE's promotion of women's wrestling, but this blog will be long enough as is.

5/13/13

The Good - Mark Henry and Sheamus sell the Texas Bullrope Strap Match: I will say right now that I HATE strap/bullrope matches. They are the same formula every time: One guy beats up the other most of the match, when he's ready to touch each corner, the other guy sneaks behind and does the same, then they fight for who touches the last corner. It's stupid. BUT, I will say that Henry's feats of strength and the mic skills he and Sheamus showed on this show were great. I'm fairly sure I'm missing the point of what WWE wants, because Sheamus looks like the heel, but it's still fun. (Seriously, though, all the promos have been Henry performing awesome feats of strength and Sheamus kicking him in the face. No new viewer is going to understand why people boo Mark Henry.) I may be odd, but I love the interactions between these characters. Promo got 7/10, by the way. (The Elimination Tag match got a 9/10, but I wanted to talk more about this promo. I try to keep to the highlight of the show normally, but it's HARD to sell a bullrope match to me, so I felt it deserved credit.)

The Bad - Kofi Kingston d. Damien Sandow in under 3 minutes: You know how earlier in this blog I wrote I could write a master's thesis on the problems with the Divas division? Well, I guess I'll make a doctoral thesis out of WWE's secondary title picture. Seriously, after all the good you did for Sandow against Orton, you have him take an ass-beating to Kofi freaking Kingston? I like Kofi, but he's been booked as a joke champion. Hell, ALL the U.S. and Intercontinental champions in the past year have been booked as joke champions. Does WWE actually think winning in under three minutes helps anyone? It doesn't. The winner can't showcase their full move set or get the crowd to rally behind them, and the loser looks like a total b**ch for being unable to last long enough for the bathroom lines to clear up. WHY does WWE even bother trying to put so many people on Raw? YOU HAVE SIX HOURS OF TV CONTENT! You have more than enough time to give everyone at least 8 minutes of wrestling. Heck, longer matches mean your writing team doesn't have to do as much work writing feuds and backstage crap, which is great considering their track record recently. This segment is everything wrong with WWE today, and it gets 1.5/10.

The Ugly - The Y2J-Fandango Dance Off: This segment suffers from what I call 'Going Too Long syndrome.' Nothing was that bad, and I like that they actually flew out Jericho's dance partner from Dancing With The Stars, but Fandango's over-sexualized voice makes this back-and-forth unbearable. I hear 'sex sells' so often, but I think Linkara says it best, "Sex doesn't sell. Porn sells." If women in skimpy outfits and guys talking dirty (leaving sex to your imagination) sold, Wonder Woman would not only have a TV show by now, it would be the highest rated thing in television history regardless of its quality. But she doesn't, and this is stupid. Hell, the reason Edge and Lita's 'live sex celebration' in 2005 was so high-rated was because WWE convinced enough idiots that they were actually going to show free porn on cable television. Where was I? I got off track. But yeah, the only other thing good to come out of this was Summer Rae actually got a chance to showcase a dimension to her character besides 'dancing bimbo,' but this was a mess, and I gave it 4/10

5/20/13

The Good - The Shield d. Hell No and Kofi (4 out of 5 stars) - This was a TV Match of the Year candidate easily. I was pumped by the end of this one. Team Hell No and Kofi actually had me thinking that they could get the win for a period of time here, but The Shield continues to be booked solidly by getting a win. Completely clean too. I loved this. Whoever has been in charge of the Shield storyline needs to be head writer because he gets how to make people give a crap about people in matches. The Shield looks impressive every time, and with the exception of 3MB (whose existence continues to baffle me), everyone comes out looking fairly strong for hanging with them. Good stuff, and this of course gets a rare 10/10 from me.

The Ugly - Paul Heyman brings in Curt Axel, and Triple H gives no f**ks - I need to go out of order on this one. I was really into this promo at the beginning. Heyman said he was going to bring in the newest Next Big Thing for this company, and I was excited to see a guy get pushed. He went with the man formerly known as Michael McGillicutty. While I'll admit, this guy was good in the ring on NXT, he was boring as piss on the microphone and honestly, having Heyman as his manager early on could make him look like a threat. I liked this idea and Heyman sold him PERFECTLY.... And then the other shoe dropped. Triple H let the air out of this guy's hype in one "the grown-ups are talking" line and one slap to Axel's face. This move baffled me completely. In what world does making this kid look like a total punk help him become credible in any way? This segment got a 6/10 from me, and I left with some hope that Axel would pull a Shelton Benjamin and steal a win over The Game...

The Bad - Triple H has a concussion... I think?... : Ok, so let me get this straight... Triple H comes out and embarrasses Curt Axel on national TV earlier in the show. They have a match where Triple H is clearly getting the better of him and about to win. (He even hits the spinebuster, which is of course the setup to his finisher, The Pedigree.) But then, with one move left in the tank, he leaves the ring and rolls around with a 'concussion' in what felt like one of the most awkward and possibly ill-timed angles ever produced by the company? I'm starting to think the @CrankyVince and @HugeWolfDick users are actually Vince McMahon and Triple H, and all those crazy things they say are actual thoughts. Because someone out of their mind is clearly running the Triple H angles to think that this episode was going to make Curt Axel interesting. This got 2/10 from me and that's being generous.

Show averages: Taking all the promos and matches into account, here are my averages for each show:

5/6/13: 5.0/10
5/13/13: 5.1/10 + .25 for a strong, 24-minute match = 5.35
5/20/13: 5.7/10 + .25 for a 20-plus minute match + .25 for actual commitment to the Divas = 6.2/10

As a final aside, I do want to applaud AJ Lee on being by far the most interesting Diva today and for finally showing off in the ring. That said, it should speak volumes about this division's credibility when knowing ONE submission hold makes you an unstoppable force. But hey, from the independent matches I found, AJ is actually a really competent wrestler, so maybe they'll give her time to showcase that skill! (I'm an optimistic bastard today, aren't I?)

With my off days falling on Tuesdays now, I should be able to do Raw reviews much easier now, so there's that to look forward to. See you soon!

Follow me at twitter.com/seantherebel and like my page at www.facebook.com/SeanNetworkBlogs. Also, like Wrestling Memes' page at www.facebook.com/wrestlingmemes. The dude produces some funny stuff. Credit to the fine people at the page for the images in this blog.