The Day WWE Monday Night Raw Died
Where to even begin with Raw 25?
WWE answered that question with "Stone Cold Steve Austin", but forgot to show their working. 'The Rattlesnake' came out to disrupt a self-congratulatory segment featuring the McMahons, hitting Stunners and drinking beers without saying a single f*cking word. The man made millions with a single f*cking word so over that it still gets barked in arenas 20 years later, but wasn't permitted to put a microphone to his mouth in front of a red hot Barclays Center crowd.
Austin infamously cut a stop-what-you're-doing-and-go-and-watch-this-promo promo in the aftermath, using an unsuspecting Mike Rome as a vehicle to voice his obvious frustration with the creative oversight. It makes for a cathartic viewing getting to see one of the many misused performers spew their bile, as it did two years later when some prominent recent WWE escapees did the same online. But more on those later. We've got legends to get to after all!
The show was peppered with matches featuring the current roster as a way to get all the main players ready for Sunday's Royal Rumble, but the other focus was fitting in every major name they'd booked for the night. The list made for a hundred different fantasy booking scenarios of segments and skits that best served some of the iconic figures from Raw's past. But a clear lack of direction for everybody from Austin onwards only highlighted the parasitic influence of the company's broken creative machine.
CONT'D...