7 Ups & 6 Downs From Last Night's WWE SmackDown (Jan 22)

3. Three Stars Deliver Five-Star Segment

Bringing Vince McMahon into a main event programme is always risky. The Chairman is still a legitimate star, and still capable of popping a rating, but his family's propensity to hog the spotlight from other stars means there's always a chance these things will go off the rails.

Fortunately, that wasn't the case last night. Vince meditated the AJ Styles/Daniel Bryan summit well, and the result was another great clash of personalities between SmackDown's two main event rivals, building further hype for what should be an excellent Royal Rumble singles match.

AJ spoke well, but Bryan, as usual, was the highlight. He came off genuinely unhinged when the fans hit him with his own "fickle!" chant, and the WWE Champion calling himself "The Planet's Champion" and "Voice Of The Planet" was f*cking great. So too were his interactions with Vince, who ordered his champion get in the ring at one point, growing sick of his diatribes. Being that Bryan's character is exactly the kind of person you can imagine McMahon despising in real life, this came off extremely well.

Having refused to get into the ring all segment long, Daniel eventually found himself sprung upon by Styles. It was Bryan who won, though, fleeing into the ring, hiding behind McMahon, then notching the Busaiku Knee Kick to leave his opponent lying.