7 Ups & 3 Downs From WWE Raw (18 April - Review)

6. Riddle Gets Serious

Finn Balor Matt Riddle
WWE.com

Matt Riddle has been a walking joke for much of his WWE main roster run, as the writers have treated him like an excuse to try out all their terrible stoner humor. It looked like we were going to get more of it Monday night, but thankfully, it was a ruse.

Riddle was strategizing with Kevin Owens and Sami Zayn about their six-man tag match against the Judgment Day and suggested taping up his big toe to create a new move, the Toe Bro, to counter Solo Sikoa’s Samoan Spike. KO understandably freaked out, when the Original Bro revealed he wasn’t serious.

Riddle then said what fans needed to hear: he wasn’t an idiot and he hadn’t forgotten what the Bloodline did to him, taking out Randy Orton and swiping their tag titles, with Solo trying to end his career several months back.

It might not seem like much, but showing that a goofy character knows when to switch it on and off makes them more three-dimensional and relatable, rather than a walking caricature. Thankfully, Riddle ditched the scooter for his entrance too.

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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.