10 WWE Payback 2020 Impulse Reactions
The Good, The Bad & The WWE.
Approximately zero fans asked for the return of Payback as a pay-per-view, but leave it to WWE to find a number lower than that who wanted this particular incarnation.
Inexplicable beyond the possible need to get their money's worth out of the ThunderDome, staging a pay-per-view just seven days removed from SummerSlam only now makes a modicum of sense following the coming of the thing we never saw coming.
Roman Reigns' exhilarating return following Bray Wyatt's Universal Championship victory over Braun Strowman reminded the audience what an actual star looked like, in much the same way his face in the graphic for the Payback headliner gave the show an actual main event.
'The Big Dog' being back and packing quite a Championship-winning bite is as cool as it gets for the company right now, but it was apparent before the event just how much he was being relied upon following his return. Going into the go-home edition of SmackDown, the card only had four matches. Coming out, it made it to eight including the pre-show, but 'The Big Dog' himself hadn't yet signed off on his own headline battle.
Was Payback - like Reigns himself - to be a leaner, meaner take on the standard issue WWE supercard? Or - like The Fiend and Braun Strowman - a load of old sh*t that never made any sense after all?
10. The Group Known As Retribution Do Not Appear At The Show Known As Payback
Might as well get to this first so not to be accused of baiting anybody to click all the way through, but WWE's recent rabble rousers yet again decided not to bother with the pay-per-view setting.
The company need to make up their minds with what they want or realistically expect from Retribution.