WWE Elimination Chamber 2019: Star Ratings For All 7 Matches
1. WWE Championship Elimination Chamber Match
Pro wrestling at its core is a magic show designed to make the patently absurd a glorious, suspended reality. Champion Daniel Bryan and chancer Kofi Kingston perfected the premise deep into Sunday night with a 12 minute masterclass.
But first, before the classic match-within-a-match, the bloody good match itself: less ostentatious and contrived than the most indulgent Elimination Chamber matches, the character work and the connective sequences made for absorbing drama. Every elimination made sense on a character level, but that reads as something dry. The action was not dry; Jeff Hardy, marking his 20th year of big-bumping insanity, draped AJ Styles over the top turnbuckle and hit AJ Styles with a unique variation of the Swanton Bomb. The resourceful and intelligent Daniel Bryan blasted him with the running knee to remove him. A daredevil like Hardy was always going to take a dumb risk, and this was a creative means of developing and intensifying the story. Randy Orton’s RKO elimination of Styles was refreshing, too; foregoing the catch variation, he grabbed AJ before he even made the jump in another unpredictable spin on an expected development. Joe left under less auspicious circumstances, but at least left Bryan’s chest thoroughly minced.
Bryan and Kingston brewed such a potent near-fall cocktail in their unforgettable sequence. Kofi Kingston’s Trouble In Paradise is over, and protected, but isn’t such a killer that Bryan’s kick-out broke the spell. This was a clash between Bryan’s superior skill and the fight of Kingston’s life—and what an amazing, perfectly-paced clash it was.
Looking beyond the big moments, contrast Bryan’s facials here with those he pulled so arrogantly against Santino Marella seven years ago. He looked shaken, almost haunted, by the spirit of 2014. He knew exactly which force drove Kingston’s performance. And consider, too, the eternity it took him to apply the LeBell Lock. This wasn’t dragged out for melodrama, nor was the acting hammy—Bryan was simply drained, and sold that exhaustion with stunning credibility.
We expected some sort of retread of the Elimination Chamber sequence of 2012; instead, Bryan and Kingston levelled up to and arguably exceeded the match-within-a-match crafted by The Undertaker and Shawn Michaels at the 2007 Royal Rumble.
Star Rating: ****3/4