6 Ups And 2 Downs From WWE NXT (Jun 18)
1. The Vom Place At The Vom Time
I've said a lot about Aliyah's recent matches... mostly because we get another one every single week, so I've kind of got to. But this is easily the most difficult moment of hers to accurately grade because, despite the very obvious problems, it was also the first time a lot of pieces began to click. Let's review.
After better developing her character as something we could actually invest in and take seriously, NXT chose to have her beaten in three minutes or less by Santana Garrett, Kayden Carter, and Xia Li. This is a problem, because no sooner have they given her a gimmick have they made her a perpetual loser, and stuff like that starts to stick.
A win over Xia Li represents a logical step-forward here, and having her take pity on Robert Stone at the same time feels like a substantial piece of narrative, but the problem came at the end. If you think I'm about to rag on Stone 'BLOWING CHUNCKS' here you're mistaken because as bad as that was, their gross-out stuff is actually ok when it's used to tell a story. The problem was the roll-up.
In letting the match end in such an unforgivably sloppy way, you reset this 'Actually, Aliyah is ready to be an NXT star' story back to square one. Whoever's fault the kickout was, they needed to come up with another finish here, not allow the match to end as awkwardly as that.