Monday, June 3, 2013

Raw 6-3-13

Pre-show hype involves HHH HAVING A MATCH WITH CURTIS AXEL with zero build beyond them implying last week that he MIGHT be on the show. Now, he's not only on the show, but facing the guy whose nuts he cut off, and who did no damage to him despite Brock beating the shit out of him the night before. Also, The Shield faces Team Hell No and Orton, which should be yet another great 6-man tag with Bryan and the Shield. The show-opening vid starts off with the 3 stages of hell match - somehow, Cena's apparently hoping to raise the stakes on that tonight. How you can do that in a match with three stips AND a title on the line, I have no idea - maybe Russo's been rehired. Ryback's massacre of Kofi, and Brock beating up HHH at the PPV were showcased as well. For the first time since Axel-HHH, they just showed Axel destroying him instead of back and forth stuff. WELCOME TO THE QUEENDOM makes its TV debut. Steph talked about how tough HHH was, facing Brock and then Axel on back-to-back nights. She's made an executive decision to not allow HHH to compete, and she doesn't want her hubby jeopardizing her husband's health against a man WHO IS BENEATH HIM! Beneath him? Good to see them cut his balls off again five minutes after re-attaching them. Steph called the fans selfish, and then Vince came out and asked the fans to not boo his daughter - SHE HAS FEELINGS! The fans begged for HHH, which led to Vince saying that they care about him more than the fans. This is tremendous comedy. Then he said WWE was family entertainment, not a bloodsport, before also saying that Axel was beneath HHH. So Steph and Vince are heels...I think. This feels like a book with many missing chapters.

"If you had the app, you'd have seen...Steph and Vince leave without incident." Wow. What high drama. Bryan's monstrous ass-whooping on SD was shown. "Just to get you caught up, STEPHANIE MCMAHON WAS TRENDING ON TWITTER!" Because that's pertinent. THE MCMAHONS ARE TRENDING WORLDWIDE NOW! IF YOU HAVE THE APP, you'd see guys...like you...watching a screen with Raw on it...like you are...They went to another break, and it really hit me how crazy the pacing on this show is. In 20 minutes, they've had the McMahons out, seemingly turn heel, announce HHH-Axel, then cancel it and all but announce HHH's retirement. Also, there's a match going on. It feels like hour two based on the sheer amount of things that have happened. They came back and Bryan did a giant American Males clap to get Kane going. Giant COCO BUTT from Ambrose, but fuck that shit, WE'VE GOT TO TALK MORE ABOUT THE MCMAHONS. Shield feels like a total afterthought in this match. Orton is ruling it, with a big double draping DDT that he did with an excellent YEAAAHHH!? YEEAAAHHHHH! bit. Rollings interrupted one on Reigns with an enzuigiri. Ambrose hit five billions stomps to the gut, which was amusing. They're doing a great job teasing a hot tag to Bryan, which should lead to the building erupting. Cole is now reciting lines from Shield promos for some reason, AND STEPH IS STILL TRENDING WORLDWIDE ON TWITTER. This commentary is unbearable. Shield is using every little old-school trick to keep him in the ring, and thank God this match is getting time because, other than EVERYTHING BEING ABOUT THE MCMAHONS, the match rules. Orton hit a sweet dropkick to Rollins, which led to THE HOT TAG CAM and Bryan coming in. Bryan ran wild like a motherfucker and didn't just beat the fuck out of Ambrose with a kicking combo, but he ranad Rollins OFF THE TOP ONTO AMBROSE! Kane came in which led to a double chokeslam tease, then a shove and an enzuigiri to him to break it up. Confusion led to Bryan getting bonked by Orton, headlock driven, and pinned.  Holy shit this ruled. I'm going to love re-watching this on the UHD replays on Saturday. Alberto-Big E is now a series, but this is THE RUBBER MATCH. Actually, it's A rubber match since it'll be their second rubber match for a feud no one cares about. Also, Jericho signs a contract for the Punk match later.

They furthered the weak link deal after the match by having Bryan shake his head, then the faces argued a ton in the back. Kane, KANE OF ALL PEOPLE is saying that Bryan has lost touch with reality. Bryan's going to have another match and BEAT THE RESPECT INTO SOMEONE. I vote for Swagger. HHH asked where Vince is, so he apparently doesn't know where his father in law is in the building. Steph met with him and called him Paul, so you know it's real. Also, Steph made sure to say CURTIS AXEL ISN'T WORTH IT! Vince's bright blue suit and pink tie are marvelous. Usos have new yellow and blue face paint that matches their gear - between this, their moves, sweet theme, and dancing, they come off like stars in every way but the booking of them, and crowd reaction - which would improve with better booking. Their opponents with no names before the break are the PTPs. The Uso TOLD THE WWE UNIVERSE ON THE WWE APP that the face paint gives them the edge. Loved Titus hitting a backbreaker and then throwing Jimmy like he was nothing after it. The Twitter crawl showed the fans talking about HHH, just in case anyone forgot about him. Cole talked about he and King being in the new Hangover.  "How much ya get paid for that? As much as Vergne Gagne with Super Clash?"  - Love JBL. They did it for union scale, btw. USOS WON, and did a wacky dance afterwards. Dug this. AJ, in shorts, is coming out with Big E for his match next.

WWE is a founding partner with the Special Olympics, and in case you missed the video on it, they had the commentators talk about it too. Loved them showing the crowd going nuts during Ricardo's intro. He's easily the most over part of Alberto's act. Clips of this feud just make it seem even more samey. Usos are trending worldwide, which isn't mentioned by the commentators because they're not important I guess. Alberto took a sick bump into the barricade when Langston just chucked him into it. Also, the McMahon drama was re-re-re-re-re-recapped. Also, the WWE app has a Zeb promo...but back to the HHH deal "for a moment". Basement superkick led to JBL name-dropping Chris Adams. Rampage armbar lift led to him going over the top with it, and then getting armbarred in the ropes. This series is working wonders for Big E, who finally appears to have some presence in his matches. Armbar was turned into a cradling armbar for a win by Alberto. Nice finish. Could've done without the leg spread wedgie shot of Big E. Sheamus is coming out to face Cody, instead of Sandow, who he's had an issue with. Seems odd since this doesn't seem like a PPV program, but I don't mind them building that up more instead of just doing it out of nowhere.

Loved the clip of the Sheamus/Sandow stuff from Raw. They've got wonderful comedic chemistry together. JBL was greatly offended by THE IRISH BRUTE Sheamus. Maybe they can find the Russian Brute and have Sheamus beat him up. JBL talked about the shell game never being on the up and up, or three card monty. However, ROLLER DERBY IS REAL! Also, Sandow is gloriously plugging JBL's wife's new book. They did some moves. Crowd gave zero shits. Both Cody and DOC appeared to have vacationed on the wrong side of the sun. Loved Sandow saying that Cody was just playing possum after the White Noise. Sheamus won with the kick. This was every mid-card Sheamus match ever, then he was a dickhead to Sandow.

They showed clips of Total Divas, which appears to have wacky sound effects added to moves. HHH and Steph continued their conversation from before as if it had never continued after the last scene. So I guess they just walked around the building for an hour and said nothing. HHH wants to face Axel next week to start the show, and they showed Ryback massacring Kofi. Bryan walked backstage and KICKED A CART, which led to Ryback showing up and expositing. Kofi had surgery on Thursday...for an injury that apparently happened on Friday. Also, Ryback's puke. Is bigger. Than Daniel Bryan. The acting here was simply amazing. I enjoyed Ryback saying Bryan was the missing link. Maybe he'll paint his face green after losing to Ryback. Vince talked to Axel, who he earlier said was BENEATH HHH. He made Axel-Cena a no DQ match, which apparently helps Cena WHO LOST BY COUNTOUT last week. Fandango faces someone next.

MizTV on SD was hyped up with Orton and Team Hell No. Summer Rae is dressed like a really hot bumblebee. He's facing KHALI, to continue their feud from a month ago. They hyped up the USA show Graceland, poorly. Fandango now has wacky armbarnds along with his gear. JBL talked about Finlay wanting to give Hornswoggle back to the stork. Tremendous. Cole lost his shit numerous times at JBL's commentary. This was a debacle, but it prevented any focus on the actual match - which in this case, isn't too bad a deal. Miz came out to prevent Fanango from leaving, and he got bull hammered for that. I think Fandango lost via countout. Or something. Who knows. They just focused on Barrett/Miz once Miz came out.

THE WWE APP DOES EVERYTHING! YOU CAN BUY TICKETS AND GEAR WITH IT! Sheamus-Cesaro was announced on ME, so maybe it'll happen. Bellas and AJ team up to face the Funkadactyls and Kaitlyn. JBL tried to put over Axel's undefeated streak, but Cole made sure to bring up that the Cena and HHH ones were tainted - so he's only really better than Sin Cara so far. A please push Ryder sign made air, so I'm sure ME will be changed to just Show killing him for an hour. Kaitlyn hit a flying boob job to a Bella, before a...thing resembling a knee lift and bad reverse DDT resulted in AJ leaving and Kaitlyn winning with the spear.

Kane delivered some glorious exposition about Ryback before going into a great speech about how great Bryan is. Bryan yelled at Kane to not come out to help him, and it led to Kane delivering a great line - CALL ME WHEN YOU FIND YOUR MIND, CUZ IT'S OBVIOUS YOU LOST IT! They hyped up the Wyatt family on commentary and showed a new great video on them. Love the giant redhead in a mask - reminds me of Matthew Good's "Carmelina" video years ago. Bry-Back is up next. They brought the ambulance out for Ryback, which they've really gotten over as "his" deal. The sirens sound far better than the "feed me more" bit, and him doing his usual intro while standing on the back of it helped this stand out. They talked about HHH being in every three stages of Hell match other than the next one - so I guess he's not just the king of kings, but also the king of Hell too. Nice wacky backflip toss from Ryback to Bryan. Ryback's new black, red, and white singlet makes him seem a bit more evil - which I dig. Half crab from Bryan got the crowd hyped up, which led to the Indian deathlock>elbow combo that he even turned into a pin. I cannot wait to use that move in a video game.

They came back to Cole saying THIS MATCH HAS BEEN A CLINIC IN PAIN for Ryback. A fan tweeted about wishing real-life meetings and contract signings were like the ones in WWE. They talked about Ryback having the edge in the lumberjack match since Cena's never pinned him...even though Ryback's never pinned Cena either. Then Ryback has the edge due to the tables match based on the Kofi deal, and has the edge in the ambulance match. SO THE ODDS ARE STACKED AGAINST CENA AGAIN! Cole then talked about Cena's match wtih CURTIS ANGLE! HYYYUUUUUGE flying headbutt 80% of the way across the ring from Bryan ruled, and led to more big kicks to the chest and a big powerbomb to counter the death kick. Ryback reached for another one, but got No Locked. Holy crap this ruled. So much better than their SD match. Suicide dive led to a slam into the table ala his Jericho match on the NXT debut. Ryback brought a table into the ring, which wasn't a DQ until he powerbombed Bryan through it. Wow. Bryan won, Ryback looked strong, and this match ruled. Win-win-win in every way. Cena saved Bryan from being powerbombed through it again ala Kingston, who means more being injured than he does on the active roster. Since Cena was out, this led to a generic theme hitting that took me a few seconds to realize it was Axel's. He's got new gear - basically just generic black stuff with his dad's singlet arrow on the front.


The back has AXEL with two axes on it - decent-ish gear I suppose. King pointed out that it was odd for Vince to make a match meant to be against Axel that actually favors him since Heyman's out there. Axel took a chairshot to the back they Heyman sold wonderfully with sympathy pain. Cena brawled outside, which led to a count from the ref - so yeah, this stip really doesn't do anything to resolve last week's issue of a countout. Tons of green pages on the announce table - I wonder if they're for rewrites. Dropkick to Axel was meant to send the dropkick into Axel's face in theory, or at least close to it. Didn't quite work out that way in execution. Axel really used the no DQ stip well with things like...a generic mid-match armbar. Axel's facing Jericho on SD, which I'm guessing he'll win thanks to Heyman. Great way to give Axel a big win over a name guy and further the Punk feud too. Cena missed a shoulder charge and smacked the chair. Another count starting. Cole talked about count outs "obviously" being in this match. Another Curtis Angle mention by Cole. TREMENDOUS chairshot to the back from Axel - great snap to it and Cena sold it perfectly.

Perfect-plex on the chair was countered into the STF. Heyman grabbed...an iPad Mini and Axel hit Cena in the head. So a spear through an LED wall doesn't hurt Cena, but an iPad Mini does. Or not, since he was fine and was able to then tease an AA through a table before Heyman begged him to not do it. Axel snuck up, but got his ass kicked by Cena before Ryback attacked Cena and drove him through a table. ANOTHER FUCKING COUNTOUT WIN FOR AXEL! At Payback, RYBACK RULES. And Curtis Axel/Angle should really petition to have a match with Ryder so he can be guaranteed a pinfall win.



Screens -
http://www.imagebam.com/gallery/yhnvrl871wr9tsr22mc3tx1rwpktbx6a

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