5 Ups & 5 Downs From WWE Raw: Day 1 (Results & Review)

3. Skippable Material

The Rock
WWE.com

When The Rock returned out of nowhere on SmackDown last fall, it truly was a magical moment.

When Jinder Mahal came out as the announced “former WWE champion” and was interrupted by Rock Monday night, it felt like fait accompli. There was no way Mahal was the surprise return, and Rock’s appearance to defend the people and America against the foreign heel was necessary by wrestling booking standards.

That was all fine and good, but on its face, Rock’s promo was not. Sure, fans cheered, laughed and chanted along to his direction, but it felt like Rock was spitting all the material they had cut from his previous 10 appearances because it wasn’t good enough. If you just wanted the experience, you could have fast-forwarded after the surprise pop died down to him dropping the predictable People’s Elbow to get to the newsworthy stuff.

As a moment, this will get a lot of clicks on social media and get fans juiced, especially the pointed comment about Roman Reigns. But for as much of Raw programming as this segment ate up, it frankly was not his best material. Diehard Rock fans will love it though.

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Contributor
Contributor

Scott is a former journalist and longtime wrestling fan who was smart enough to abandon WCW during the Monday Night Wars the same time as the Radicalz. He fondly remembers watching WrestleMania III, IV, V and VI and Saturday Night's Main Event, came back to wrestling during the Attitude Era, and has been a consumer of sports entertainment since then. He's written for WhatCulture for more than a decade, establishing the Ups and Downs articles for WWE Raw and WWE PPVs/PLEs and composing pieces on a variety of topics.