WWE Raw: Looking At The "Go Fandango Yourself" Edition
If there's one message to take away from this week's Monday Night Raw from Greenville, South Carolina it would be expect the unexpected. From quick upset wins over champions to out of nowhere attacks on certain superstars, it seemed like WWE was really trying to get people talking. But did it work? Let's talk about it.
The show began with a handicap match featuring Sheamus and Randy Orton getting revenge once again on The Big Show. This time Randy and Sheamus are able to use their teamwork to easily dispatch the giant superstar with a Brogue Kick/RKO Combo clean for the win. After this, I wasn't sure what was left in this feud since they just got the victory. Well, my questions were answered later on in the night as with a second attack on Sheamus Mark Henry has now been added to the mix making this a tag team war this upcoming Friday on Smackdown. A match should be interesting to watch. WWE then tries to get you into the night as we hear from Heath Slater along with Jinder Mahal and Drew McIntyre as they tease a showdown between 3MB and the Shield. We did not get that of course instead we got a path of destruction from Brock Lesnar who wanted revenge on Triple H and suggested a cage match as the final match in their series of respect. I thought Heyman as always did a good job selling the match as his brutal and barbaric structure that WWE often has glossed over in the PG era. The attack on the three-man band look was impressive as well. Although, I did feel sorry for everyone's favorite rockers. Slater taking the F5 on the barricade was a good visual We move on to the US championship where WWE attempted to try to gain shock value by having Kofi Kingston unseat Antonio Césaro. Here's a tip though if you are going to do this don't mention how many days the guys been champion. Sure, it's a cool factoid, but you only bring it up when someone is getting ready to lose the belt. After a while, even the basic fan begins to notice the pattern. All that said, I thought the match was fairly good. However, going from one guy that can never seem to win to another seems rather pointless. The only thing that I can hope for is that Kofi and Antonio are given good pushes coming out of this and actually are made better because of it. And can we please stop the yodeling? Next, we hear from the new World Champion Dolph Ziggler with voice intact as Alberto comes down to cash in on his rematch clause, but not before the real Americans tread on the proceedings leading to Jack Swagger attacking Alberto and his knee. Later on, the match is made for Dolph to fight Swagger. Jack gets an unexpected victory putting them in title contention. But not before, Alberto extracts revenge using the cross arm breaker with Jack hanging off the stage. Before Booker T said it you knew it was coming a triple threat match will happen for the world title, I would assume at Extreme Rules, but it wasn't said. Another thing about this Booker T versus Teddy Long craziness Who the hell is supposed to the heel in the situation? Booker acted like a jerk on smackdown, but Teddy who's supposed to be a senior advisor makes a match on Raw about the World Title without asking him first? And Booker says Teddy should handle his business? Aren't you his business, Booker? We find out that Team Hell No will team up with the Undertaker next week in London, England against the Shield as the Tag Team Champions quickly dispatch the Primetime Players. Then we hear Ryback's explanation of the events leading up to "his turn" on John Cena. Now, I'll say this. The explanation made sense, and the true mark of any good heel is to feel like they're justified in their action. Kudos for WWE actually remembering continuity. This feud at least to me feels like the modern version of Hogan versus Warrior and I wonder what kind of singles match these two can put together at Extreme Rules. Next is probably one of the things that has been scratching my head the most as R truth defeats new Intercontinental champion Wade Barrett out of nowhere just days before they go to England for Raw and Smackdown. I understand what they were going for given Barrett will defend the title against the winner of the battle Royal challenge on the Main Event. Expect the unexpected but it just came off really weird. It almost made me think that Barrett was actually knocked out by the Lie Detector and did get out in time. In other news, this week we had WWE took something that went viral in Fandango and turned into a masturbation joke I don't know if they expect that to become a thing but I have to give Johnny Curtis some credit as he's playing up for all it's worth. I definitely think that's a good thing as much like his lighting display this week it will burn out rather quickly. Team Rhodes Scholars defeat the international incident of the Punjabi Playboy and Santino even with the help of Hornswoggle and his garden snake. I love Cody's reaction to that. You're not doing it right! Kaitlyn falls victim to twin magic as the referee seems confused and raises both women's hand, not realizing it was not a handicap match. Although, JBL and Jerry Lawler have a system for telling the Bella twins apart And I will give you two guesses what that was. We hear from a frustrated CM Punk, who abruptly leaves Heyman in the ring exiting not up the ramp instead to the backside of the arena. Much like he did in the now memorable promo back in 2011. Heyman's reaction was great and the announcers played it up well. However, if you've been following the Internet for the last few weeks, you knew the real reason was that he was banged up after wrestlemania and is going to take some much-needed time off. All that said, I thought it was a well done segment. This leads to the final segment of the night, which is a conversation between Ryback and John Cena. Unfortunately somebody turned on a camera before they were supposed to, and we got a glimpse of the shield backstage getting ready to make their entrance. I don't know if a was shown in the arena but on television. It really took way the focus of the segment, which I thought was it bad but it definitely made you look for when the shield was going to arrive. I thought Ryback turning his back Cena getting attacked by the shield was a good way to close out the night. All in all, it was not a bad episode of Raw but compared to the fervor of last week it can't hold a candle that fun