WWE Royal Rumble 2018: Star Ratings For All 6 Matches
4. Men's Royal Rumble Match
This was an utter triumph. The below star rating may reflect the pure relief of the endorphin rush - but is that not the point? The match is calibrated to generate excitement and hope. It didn't just meet the remit; it shattered all reasonable and wildly optimistic expectations. The Rumble is a platonic dream match never quite as good its impossible promise. This was the promise manifested. This was, ultimately, a checklist of awesomeness.
Finn Bálor entered a superb performance, the likes of which renders months of moaning on this Author Page redundant. Andrade Cien Almas and Adam Cole entered credible showings in a welcome continuation of the NXT teaser trope. The Heath Slater running gag, in which he ran into a battering each time a new entrant entered the fray, set a tone of immense creativity - a theme reflected in the work itself. Bálor and Nakamura wrestled a blinding, state-of-the-art match-within-a-match ahead of the closing stretch. The returning Rey Mysterio - Rey Mysterio! - looked the best he's looked (in a WWE ring) in a decade. Kofi Kingston restored the lustre of his near-elimination spot; before the camera panned down - even Kevin Dunn did his bloody job on the night - it looked as though this spelled the end of the trope. The athleticism required of the leap back into the ring was jaw-dropping. It's no wonder the New Day remain so over - they are as creative as they are well-versed in the This Is Awesome chant-generating modern WWE formula match.
It wasn't perfect, hence the near-perfect rating. The Hurricane's cameo appearance felt as anachronistic as the character itself. WOKEN Matt Hardy eliminating Rusev was a head-scratcher: are they actively trying to botch the act? Also: Dolph Ziggler's return, after all that, felt like yet another rib played at his expense. Even if he isn't as good as he reckons he is, he didn't deserve that.
That finish...that finish was perfect.
Almost unbearably suspenseful, this grabbed the audience by the throat and forced them to confront, yet again, the grim prospect of another desperately uninspiring revisit of an uninspiring recent past. We were allowed to breathe, and hope, and then despair again, as the field of six thinned to four thinned to two - with the future waged in a great war versus the past.
Arresting, emotional, and perfectly attuned to the fanbase, that future prevailed. What a thrilling, welcome result Shinsuke Nakamura's win was - and what an awesome subversion of a wretched night WWE treated us to on Sunday.
Star Rating: ****3/4