Wrestling Discussion Thread III

The Cappuccino Kid wrote:

Looks and sounds like AEW is about to cave in on itself too.

That press conference they did was bloody surreal. Just CM Punk munching on muffins giving out about being sued whilst his boss sits there next to him looking like a deer in headlights. Mental.

jesus h christ

Fozzy's new single is looking as good as expected.

I like the thought of Xavier Woods spending his Christmas Day doing playthroughs of F1 Pole Position 64 and Armorines: Project S.W.A.R.M.

On another note there's a forty-five minute programme on the WWE Network about the best wrestling video games, it's part of a series called This Is Awesome. It's an entertaining enough watch that doesn't just pay attention to the WWE games.

So, that's the Royal Rumble been and gone again for another year. What did we all think?

I thought it was leaps and bounds ahead of last year's Rumble which I thought was an utter disaster and nearly made me skip checking out Wrestlemania had it not been for the novelty of a Stone Cold match in 2022 and Cody Rhodes debuting. I really enjoyed the Men's Rumble a lot. I felt the star power was so much better than last year which was filled with so many lads who made me say "who the fuck are you", whereas this year felt pretty stacked throughout. Gunther was easily the standout for me and that mini-match he had with Cody at the end of genuinely had me biting on a few of the false finishes.

The Women's Rumble had that problem of me going "who the fuck are you" with quite a lot of the entrants, but I enjoyed the ending of the Rumble and also very much appreciated Zelina Vega coming out as Juri from Street Fighter.

Bray Wyatt's match was predictably shite, and the women's title match was a throwaway one, but I loved the Roman Reigns match and thought the aftermath was some of the best storytelling WWE has done in a long time. Really interested to see how that story is going to pan out over the next couple of months.

I though the men’s Royal Rumble was okay, but not very imaginative in the way it was laid out and a bit short on genuine surprises. Like you point out though, there was lots of TV personalities with recognisable music who got a reaction – and that’s much better than in 2021 and 2022. There’s a few folk who look like they’ll come out of it with an enhanced reputation too – and again that’s much better than 2021 and 2022, when the only thing to look back on is old people battering the stars who were supposed to be selling the tickets.

Apart from the finishing sprint the women’s Royal Rumble was no good. There was maybe about four people who got a reaction, and it was predictably rubbish because nobody gave a toss. A fifth got a big reaction from me – Nia Jax, but that’s only because I laughed when I remembered that time she starting shouting about her arsehole.

The only WWE YouTube clips I watch weekly are the ones with Sami Zayn and The Bloodline, and I was well happy that they landed this plot twist with such a brilliant angle. It’s the best storyline WWE have done since Batista turned on Evolution, and it might even surpass that yet.

What a sport.

Looks like AEW are on course for a massive stadium show in Wembley. Supposedly they've sold like 60,000+ tickets so far with the show still four months out.

Royal Rumble this weekend - I'll be tuning in with my brother. It's shaping up to be a good one with the likes of CM Punk, Cody Rhodes and potentially even The Rock all tipped for winning the Rumble.

Anyone else planning to check it out?

We've also had the huge news of WWE Raw coming to Netflix in 2025. Seemingly for us in the UK, we'll be getting literally everything WWE does on the service though, so Smackdown, NXT, PPVs, the works. Pretty tidy deal, all in all!

Everything? I didn't know that, I was tempted by just Raw but if its all gonna be on there I guess I might finally get Netflix after about 20 years of it existing.

I watched the Royal Rumble a few days afterwards. I thought the women’s match was the best one they’ve done yet. There’s been a few where I genuinely think we on GNamer could have done a better job, where we hold a Royal Rumble where Blenderbeer and IM_HERON come out as the surprise entrants and a_3_Headed_Monkey wins the match (because he looks like a right smelly bastart and all the other participants in the match eliminate themselves to get away from his honking pong). Fair dos though, the women’s match was athletic, complicated and pulled off really well.

The men’s Royal Rumble was probably somewhere in the middle on the best-to-worst ever list. It was all right at the time, but it doesn’t seem consequential at all two weeks later. That’s not just because The Rock has waded in and changed the WrestleMania main event, but it’s moreso because it’s just not a big news story anymore.

At a glance online, the number of wrestling folk and fans who are seemingly ignoring the fact that Vince McMahon is under federal investigation for sex-trafficking allegations is appalling.

Appalling but not surprising, I'd imagine The Rock's sudden involvement is partly to help sweep that under the rug a bit, not in a sense they wanna protect him necessarily more that they won't want it coming back to the company.

The women's rumble was great, loads of neat stories in there that they're looking to play off, Bayley completing the set was great, the impact of Jade Cargill was great, Chelsea Green was the low-key MVP and they even managed to make Nia Jax look credible.

I'll reserve my opinion on the mens side until we see where they're going with The Rock, the current set up of him siding with Roman makes for a good story at least but I'm very certain that wasn't the original plan.

Yeah, I definitely preferred the women's rumble this year. It's cool to see that they've moved away from stacking it with retired wrestlers and have confidence in their current roster. Echoing what the others have said about the men's Rumble - I was sort of expecting Rock to turn up in the Rumble itself, but I'm interested with where they're heading with his story with him seemingly cosying up with Roman now.

I missed the show, did Impressive Pelvis Wesley finally win the big one?

Just caught up on The Rock vs. Cody Rhodes feud and think it has been brilliant fun. I didn't have Cody in the same league as Roman or Rock, nor Seth to be honest, but this Mama Rhodes stuff and that beating in the car park really elevated Cody. He feels more like main event material, and a viable threat to Roman. I guess that was the purpose, considering the change in plans, and this feud feels like it will solidify Cody and Seth in that top bracket. Others might feel differently, but I think they have done a great job making Roman the top guy, but it has been difficult to believe someone could match him (outside of Brock Lesnar).

Yeah, the pivot they've done with The Rock has been great. I think The Rock's catchphrase touting act has long since grown stale so, regardless of whether or not it was the original plan, his heel turn has gone down a storm.

I think Roman's felt a bit diminished in comparison to The Rock, but maybe his aura being lessened a bit will make it more believable when he loses at Mania as I assume will happen.

I'm fair looking forward to it, definitely more so than any since the early 2010 days where I'd stay up live and watch it. I woke up in the middle of the night on Tuesday morning to go for a pish but immediately thought to myself 'I wonder if WWE have uploaded RAW clips onto YouTube yet?'; it's been a very long time since I've had that thought process.

WWE coming back to Glasgow in June for it's first ever Scottish PPV would have probably felt like a bigger deal if it weren't happening at the same time as the Euros. The Hydro is hosting SmackDown at the same time as Scotland kick off against Germany to open Euro 2024, and it sounds and feels like about 97% of Scotland's population is going to be in Munich for that.

I watched both nights of WrestleMania the mornings after they took place.

The first night was overall decent enough, and I especially liked the Rhea Ripley Vs. Becky Lynch and Gunther Vs. Sami Zayn matches. That Usos match was barking though, even with storyline context and months of on/off build-up. As for everything else, truthfully there wasn’t much that I imagine I’ll revisit in the coming months and years. I had dread when I saw there was nearly an hour and fifteen minutes of the broadcast remaining when the promo package for the main event began. I quite enjoyed it, but it feels like they could have accomplished all the same things in a lot shorter a time.

I thought the crowd were pretty poor considering the magnitude of the event and their likely costs of travel, accommodation and tickets, but apparently it was freezing cold there on the first night? I think that’s a nonsense excuse – I’ve sat in minus conditions and ate even colder pies than that at Scottish League 2 games, so they can shove that up their arses.

The second night was everything it should have been and more. I enjoyed all six of the matches, particularly the chaos of the two men’s World Championship ones. It was (I presume?) a really satisfactory conclusion to The Bloodline storyline they’ve been telling for the last four years, while adding new aspects to it that I hope can rejuvenate it in the future. I guess it’ll be parked for the time being though.

For all this chat about ‘a new era in WWE’, I earnestly hope it is and that they carry forward this momentum through the post-WrestleMania period. That’s usually one of the low points of the WWE calendar I know – and I remember last year’s Raw After WrestleMania had Vince McMahon’s dodgy tache and an unexplained Brock Lesnar heel turn. I feel optimistic this time around though, and I’m interested to see the directions they go in ahead of the events in France, Germany and Scotland and in advance of SummerSlam.

I'll pretty much echo those thoughts, both nights were good but night 2 definitely the bigger and better event and the way they handled the men's world title matches were perfect. I'm quite excited for what they have to offer going forward, the Raw and Smackdown that followed have set up some intriguing stories going forward too.