WWE Survivor Series 2018: Star Ratings For All 8 Matches

3. Men’s Traditional Elimination Match

Five Stars
WWE.com

This was bags of fun, strange booking aside. It never once dragged, it provided in-the-moment excitement, it furthered several future storylines, and it yielded the winning sight of Braun Strowman plucking and f*cking up Shane McMahon out of thin air.

What’s not to love? Well, a lot of the dumb sh*t.

WWE does dumb sh*t. That’s par for the course. Maybe we should be pedantic. Maybe we should question why Samoa Joe was selected to play corpse for Drew McIntyre (then again, a Jeff Hardy sudden elimination wouldn’t have had the same impact). Maybe Shane McMahon outlasting everybody was an infuriating decision, even if it leads to the fully-fledged heel turns fans are now desperate for.

But the exchanges between Finn Bálor and Rey Mysterio were pulsating, McIntyre was positioned as a star in a company with too few of them, a table was destroyed, and that’s never not fun, and Shane McMahon lost decisively because he is an egomaniac. This was a choice subversion of last year’s bullsh*t, in which Shane lasted because he was just so damn gutsy.

This served to advance wider storylines on both brands, tarnished stars but heightened others—the alternative is 50/50 booking—and wasn’t remotely tedious.

Star Rating: ***1/2

Contributor
Contributor

Michael Sidgwick is an editor, writer and podcaster for WhatCulture Wrestling. With over seven years of experience in wrestling analysis, Michael was published in the influential institution that was Power Slam magazine, and specialises in providing insights into All Elite Wrestling - so much so that he wrote a book about the subject. You can order Becoming All Elite: The Rise Of AEW on Amazon. Possessing a deep knowledge also of WWE, WCW, ECW and New Japan Pro Wrestling, Michael’s work has been publicly praised by former AEW World Champions Kenny Omega and MJF, and current Undisputed WWE Champion Cody Rhodes. When he isn’t putting your finger on why things are the way they are in the endlessly fascinating world of professional wrestling, Michael wraps his own around a hand grinder to explore the world of specialty coffee. Follow Michael on X (formerly known as Twitter) @MSidgwick for more!