The 03/28/16 edition of WWE Raw reviewed in about 4 minutes – featuring Shane McMahon doing a crazy flying elbow on The Undertaker through the announcers’ table, Roman Reigns repeatedly brawling with Triple H and much, much more on this final show before Wrestlemania 32.
THE FLYING MCMAHON
The Go-Home show for Wrestlemania 32 opened with The Undertaker and Shane McMahon flirting back and forth. Taker might have had all the best lines – “You need to watch your mouth rich boy.” “From the day you were born, you were you’re daddy’s bitch.” But Shane definitely got the best flying elbow through the announcers table.
That’s right, my second favourite thing to do in any wrestling video game, after glitching through ladders, was a great way to open the show. The Brooklyn crowd lapped this up, and, for once, the feud was framed as Undertaker vs Shane. i.e. Vince wasn’t awkwardly shoved in the middle to forget his lines.
Then it all went downhill. Here’s a rundown of a bunch of stuff that happened.
ZACK RYDER BEAT CHRIS JERICHO
AJ Styles came out to distract Jericho by dressing as the lead in a generic 90s kids TV show. That was enough for Zack Ryder to hit everyone’s favourite finish: the distraction roll-up (popper). Jericho saved the segment by throwing a tantrum, but when he accepted AJ’s Wrestlemania challenge, it felt very anticlimactic.
CHARLOTTE BEAT BECKY
Charlotte beat Becky in a good match for how long they were given. The three way between these two and Sasha Banks is one of my most anticipated matches for Mania.
KANE AND BIG SHOW BEAT SOCIAL OUTCASTS
The best thing about this Andre The Giant Failed Push Award segment was Curtis Axel quickly wishing his dad – Mr Perfect – a happy birthday. The second best thing was proof that DAMIEN SANDOW IS STILL ALIVE! It’s good that they’re using the Andre over-the-top-rope challenge to really focus on the younger talent. Like Big Shows. And Kane. And Mark Henry.
KOFI KINGSTON BEAT ALBERTO DEL RIO
The New Day were super over with the Brooklyn crowd and the League of Nations were super over with JBL. He said they were the modern day version of the Four Horsemen. Stop it, JBL.
KALISTO BEAT KONNOR
Kalisto squashed Road Warrior Konnor, for Ryback to then take the phrase ‘stare down’ way too literally
DEAN’S WONDERFUL WEAPON TROLLY
Paul Heyman cut a typically great promo while Brock Lesnar stood there and looked all Brock Lesnar-y. Ambrose wheeled a trolly down to go ‘weapon shopping’ underneath the ring, totally ignoring the Beast.
PAIGE BEAT EMMA
Say hello to the match you won’t watch at Wrestlemania! This built up Team Bad vs Team Total Divas for the pre-show, revealing Eva Marie as the latter’s big surprise member. Paige looked really pissed off about this. It’s nice when reality and storyline cross over like that.
STARDUST, MIZ AND KEVIN OWNES VS SAMI ZAYN, DOLPH ZIGGLER AND SIN CARA
The story here was that Owens didn’t want to be tagged in, so he’d be overly encouraging to his team mates Miz and Stardust. Unfortunately, this just made the crowd very bored, so they did the usual CM Punk and RVD chants. They woke up as soon as Owens finally went up against Zayn, though.
I’m a bit worried about Sami. Bar the occasional Ole chant – which tends to die out pretty quickly – the crowds don’t seem that into him. The WWE have done a really poor job getting people invested in his character.
And now, the main event…
AUTHORITY PROMO
Earlier in the night, Triple H and Stephanie cut the same promo they always cut, with Stephanie telling me I’m rubbish, and not as good as Triple H and that I’ve been a very naughty boy who needs punish-sorry, I totally lost interest, what were they saying?
It doesn’t matter, because here comes Roman Reigns for a scuffle. When you’ve just seen Shane McMahon flying through an announcers table, though, fisticuffs is going to feel a bit lacklustre.
The main event went exactly the same way – yet another Authority promo with Stephanie telling me I’m rubbish, and not as good as Triple H and that I’m a filthy man who needs to be bathed-sorry, I drifted away again.
When Roman Reigns came out to interrupt, I actually checked the bottom of the screen to make sure this wasn’t a replay.
This time, a bunch of heels came down to help Triple H out, for a bunch of faces to then save Roman Reigns. He tried to win the crowd over by suicide diving onto everyone outside, but Brooklyn reminded him: you still suck. .
For a moment, it felt like they were building to something grander to end their big go-home show, but nope. Just Triple H staring at Roman Reigns from the top of the ramp. That’s your big visual to sell Wrestlemania – a match nobody particularly wants to see, with a bunch of warm bodies to make it look bigger than it is.
This week’s WWE Raw is ‘Bore’ – the lowest of the ratings. This is your go-home show for Wrestlemania, and that’s it?! It was a show of very short matches and too long promos. Apart from the opening Shane segment, Jericho’s tantrum and Owens being great, there was very little on this show to genuinely enjoy.
But what did you all think? Let us know in the comments down below.
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