6 Ups And 5 Downs From Last Night's WWE Raw (Jan 1)

5. Opening With Something Different

asuka alexa bliss
WWE.com

Turn on Monday Night Raw at the beginning and 99 times out of 100, you’ll see someone either already in the ring or on their way to the ring, microphone in hand.

Raw almost always begins with an in-ring talking segment to set up the show, so any deviation is almost always a welcome change of pace. Monday, we got a bit of that, with Alexa Bliss stopping GM Kurt Angle on his way to (where else?) the ring. She complained about the match he made with her facing Asuka and urged him to change it.

Angle barked back at her, and then his music hit, so he abruptly ended the conversation and headed out. But for that brief moment, we got a behind-the-scenes-type glimpse, and it was a nice alternative.

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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.