4 Ups & 5 Downs From WWE WrestleMania 39 Night 2 (Review)

1. Blowing All Your Goodwill In 3 Minutes

For the past two months, WWE did something it has struggled to do for years: They successfully told a difficult story and steered crowd reactions exactly how they wanted them to go.

WWE deserved a ton of credit for deftly navigating the competing storylines between Sami Zayn and Cody Rhodes vying for Roman Reigns’ titles ever since the Royal Rumble, weaving the two together rather than keeping them miles apart. Somehow, they lured even the most cynical fans into feeling something for the product again and believing that things were different this time.

Then they went and pulled the same sh*t Roman finish again, spectacularly botching the easiest main event finish there’s been since Hogan/Andre at WM 3 or Austin/Michaels and Mania 14. They took what was on pace to be possibly the best WrestleMania ever and deflated a large segment of the fanbase in mere moments.

WWE managed to torch the goodwill that they’d built up during the past couple months in those closing moments. Lapsed fans and those who were hanging on due to the strength of the Bloodline story were invigorated by Sami Zayn & Kevin Owens’ win Saturday, but it’s likely that many will turn their backs after this ordeal.

AEW fans who followed Cody over just saw that WWE is exactly who they thought they were. Triple H said afterward that Raw is just the next chapter in the story, but we’d bet that a lot of fans don’t pick the book back up.

Mind-blowingly stupid booking.