KawadaSmile

I think she already has one of the most important aspects on-point: presence. She looks and carries herself as this ultimate badass. Even if she isn't experienced enough (and to be fair, she's already great for someone with that little time in the ring), I'd argue she has more presence than someone like Ember Moon, even if the latter IS better in the ring. As for Han, this video is quite the segment. Could work in a pro-style federation, yeah.

The fact that you could see traces of his frustation at least ever since his match against Finn proves that the narrative has been there for a while, too.

I could do with someone using the briefcase to challenge the IC title holder, but what you just said is alright too.

One of the people at wrestling twitter said something about if we ever think about how storylines begin and end, citing the Summer of Punk as a storyline that involved quite a lot of people. And then I thought: holy shit, Rollins' rise to the main event until his feud with Triple H is similarly insane when you think about it It involves Roman Reigns, Ambrose, Batista, Randy Orton, Kane, Triple H, Stephanie, J&J Security, Finn Balor, Kevin Owens and Chris Jericho.

I think Cena kinda addressed that himself on Raw. All the routes to the big championship matches are closed. He lost the Rumble, and lost the Elimination Chamber. The only option he had was to challenge the biggest opponent possible - The Undertaker. But, alas, this match is not possible. Can Cena find a way to wrestle in the Grandest Stage of them All in a match that suits his status as an icon in the business? This is what led to him going for the WWE Title at Fastlane. If he loses that, he gets nothing of importance at all. OR DOES HE? It's something different, at the very least.

I actually feel the opposite. SmackDown may be in the shitters in general, but WWE has done quite the good job of keeping storylines easy to follow. Some quick examples: It doesn't take much to understand what's going on between Sasha and Bailey, for instance. The former upstaged the latter at every possible opportunity, the latter stood up for herself. The dynamics between Rollins/Jason Jordan were also pretty straight-forward. One guy lost his former tag partner, the cocky and brash son of the manager stood up and they worked things out until an injury took him out. Cena had no clear path to Wrestlemania for the first time in a long ass time, and you are seeing this frustration build from week to week. All of those feuds, never mind others like Asuka/Nia or even Titus Worldwide/The Bar, need any sort of social media to be understood. Hell, Roman Reigns pretty much made the narrative of his program against Lesnar explicit this week: he's there day in, day out, Lesnar is no-showing, taking pictures with Dana White; he's busting his ass full-time, Brock seldom even talks. If those stories are good or not, it's not up to me. But they are very, VERY clear and easy to follow.

Oh my God. I just saw maybe the single worst example of WWE Camera production EVER. https://twitter.com/AndrewTRich/status/968941863087550467 this is like... awful

Are you saying that Nakamura is coasting? Preposterous.

It's almost as if wrestling storylines tend to repeat themselves constantly... Although I do get the point that you need to shake things up in order to get some sort of variation. Austin was antagonized by Vince for years, yet it didn't felt as stale of a concept. With HHH/Steph... they just don't have the same charisma that Vince does (which is quite impossible to achieve), and they don't tend to show ass the same way Vince did. Of course storylines suffer due to those reasons. Look how HHH being the Almighty Hunter hurt his feud with Roman. If this Ronda/Steph program is a variation of Austin/Vince, I would be glad. Gimme Steph cowering in fear, or using every bullshit tactic possible, while making Ronda look like a badass killer. Also: fucking LOL at SD having Naomi/Riot (I would be so fucking in for this match, but no given reason to care) and Sami Zayn vs Baron Corbin (just no reason to care)

Well, Ronda is so much better here that I'm actually thinking she worked us yesterday.

Cena is truly the GOAT. Made me want something undesirable and made me mad that I wasn't gonna get it.

Great opening segment with the core of the Women's Division.

This and Volk Han at #4

I think it kinda worked, as awry as it went at points. She wasn't really a huge asshole to Dana White while she was on UFC, right? No reason why she should've been an asshole to Trips and Steph, so it's only natural that she was more polite, less angry. Then after all the elements came to light, she turned into the ass kicking machine. It worked pretty well, I'd say. She got a huge pop in the end and the crowd was happy.

This was another great match. They did a very nice job of establishing all the competitors on an equal level, with no one getting the clear upper hand or looking that much dominant... ... at least until Braun appears. Then the match kind of turns into a game of survival, and that's what it's all about until the end. Braun is put over not as a Kane, or a Big Show, who got beaten by joint efforts in previous Chamber matches. Instead, he is put over as someone that even if you manage to pin for the three count, you are going to lose. Him kicking out of a dozen finishers and eliminating five people, one by one, was scary as shit, when you think about it. He was like Jason Vorhees and the other guys were the designated victims. But the match wasn't *just* about Braun. You had Elias being a smartass trying to make good use of his last entry position and picking up the scraps, and you also had Cena in a rare moment of despair, because his road to Wrestlemania might lead to a dead end. You had Balor getting a HUGE shine against Strowman, and Reigns/Rollins are usually very good with their friendly foe dynamics. In the end, Roman's victory ended up being a feat of survival, a fluke, more than anything else. Like Sarah Connor crushing the T-800 on the first Terminator. I dunno. Some movie reference.

Nia managed to look very fucking strong and for the first time since EVER, Asuka looked vulnerable, and her victory felt like a fluke. Good stuff.

Wait, what? Wrestlemania 31 he had a gigantic main event against Brock after winning the Royal Rumble (which people fucking hated because Daniel Bryan didn't win and they booked Kane and Big Show - at his worst - to take out most guys people liked). Supposedly he was going to win the match but they called an audible and had Rollins cash in, leading to a horrible title reign. Reigns spends most of the year making the most out of miserable feuds until he finally gets the title at Survivor Series, losing it shortly after. Finishes the year feuding with Sheamus/The Authority/Vince Goes into Royal Rumble 2016 as champ as a consequence of feuding with Vince. Whoever wins the Rumble, wins the belt. Hunter dumps him out, and then dumps Ambrose getting his 14th world title reign. Then he proceeds to make Reigns look like a fool for most of their feud (that's where the political hit came into play) and they seem to finally set that shit at Wrestlemania 32. All seemed right at that point, specially because he had that amazing feud with AJ (that they need to revisit at some point, please) afterwards. 2017! He has the horrible task of going against Undertaker for his last match (at least it seems like it) and spends the first part of the year setting up that feud which had no way of being anything but the main event of Wrestlemania 33, given that it was the wrestling equivalent of Old Yeller. When Brock beat Taker at WM30 it almost killed the show, so no way it could be placed anywhere else 3 years later. Afterwards, he spends the rest of the year turning Braun into a megastar. So, like, the only year that you could make the case that he shouldn't be on the main event is this one., but even then, they made it pretty clear, going back to 2016 or maybe even earlier, that Roman/Lesnar were not done with each other.

Match of the night right here. Sonya and Mandy looked like a threat early on, basically torturing Bayley until Sasha came along to even things up. Mickie had an amazing, albeit sadly very short run in the match, but curiously it was after she was gone that the match turned from good, but mundane, to great. Sasha and Bayley chasing down Alexa made for a good visual, and she managing to outsmart two friends turned foes was incredibly well done. Some batshit spots like the Twisted Bliss from the top of the cell or that spike DDT sure helped things. Alexa then delivers and AMAZING promo playing everyone in the arena. The title looks even more like a big deal and (at least the RAW side) women's wrestling is looking legit. Great stuff.

Miz/Braun or Miz/Finn (right now this one seems more likely) are absolutely fine ideas. I'm pretty sure Braun'll have his crowning moment at SummerSlam.

You answered your own question. The match never had a conclusive winner. They've been building it for ages, albeit very slowly.

We don't even know what Braun will do at Wrestlemania. For all we know he could be added to the main event.

Needs more Braun. Will they put the CWC on the main show? Has Nakamura been on tv since the Rumble? SmackDown is the Kevin Owens show. Everything else means shit to Road Dogg

Honestly Braun still comes out of the match stronger than when he came in. He eliminated every single person except for Roman, took a dozen fucking finishers and is the last man standing. You know they are aiming for Braun/Reigns II because the reaction when Strowman beats Roman for the title is going to be the biggest possible, as it usually is the case.

The Big Dog. The best wrestler on the planet. Roman Reigns. Fuck yeah, come at me Reigns/Lesnar II

This was a rollercoaster with a great climax.