[2012-02-19-WWE-Elimination Chamber] Daniel Bryan vs Big Show vs Wade Barrett vs Santino Marella vs Cody Rhodes vs Great Khali (Elimination Chamber)

[El-P]

This is an odd one.

 

Likewise CM Punk and Living Colour, Bryan coming out to the remix of Walkyries makes him stand out so much, whereas Barrett & Rhodes, already looking cookie cutter, have those awful generic, same sounding metal stuff. The WWE really lost the plot with music themes in the 00's.

 

Apparently, this is all about Big Show (who looks great) vs Bryan. So, Wade starting gets no reaction at all, although his work actually looks solid as all hell. So they have a match with Show, which could be a TV match for all it matters. Solid, looks good, but no heat. To insure even less heat, let's get Cody Rhodes in the mix. He's like a Stromtrooper : he's bland, doesn't do anything memorable and has no chance of winning. You can hear the "boring" chants.

 

Santino. Wow. No idea why this guy is in this match but he's crazy over. He does a few things then gets beat up. Show vs Wade vs Rhodes keeps on being solidly boring, the crowd soon dies again when Santino isn't involved. Somewhere there's a terrific spot with the two faceless guys suplexing Big Show on the steel, which is an insane spot for Show to take with his weight.

 

Great Khali. He looks even worse than before. Can't even walk right. Throws three awful Baba chops then Big Show (who's moving like a cat, a big cat but a cat nonetheless) spears him. Out. Well, that was worth the time, really… Shows turns to Brian's pod and the people chant for Santino. Well, this match isn't working. Then there's a really odd spot with Show actually breaking the chain links on top of the pod to get in. Well, Brian was due out in a minute or two, why even bother ? Show dropping himself inside the pod gets a huge pop, but then it opens and Show beats on Bryan a bit. Token "throw guys through the plastic" spot.

 

And then the ending stretch actually gets really good, Wade & Rhodes take out the Big Show, Santino rolls Cody into a surprise pin. Wade proceeds to have a very good match with Daniel Bryan until he gets eliminated. Wade isn't over, but his work really was crisp, well timed, good bumps, yeah, he's the Jericho-Arn of the match. Whatever happened with this guy ?

 

So, there's no way Santino is winning, right ? Well, the crowd still goes insane, like batshit insane for this comedy guy. Bryan does a hell of a job making them think he's actually got a chance. The excepted ending finally happens, but they have managed to turn a completely heatless match to an absolute frenzy, with the guy who has the less chance of winning ever (if you don't count R-Truth). That has to be considered great work. Post match with Sheamus attacking heel Brian was stupid though. Was he supposed to be a babyface doing shit like this ? Plus he was not over one bit… They really wanted this guy to be something special, which he never was.

 

Overall, it's hard to really rate as for most of the match it was completely heatless and went nowhere, despite Wade & Show really looking good, then got into a legit great final against all odds. You can argue Show was the MVP as he was the only person of interest during the entire first phase, but in reality Bryan truly was as he made the last segment work great and took the most spectacular bumps too. Khali got the Kane spot and sucked like nobody's business in it. Overall, I'd say very good I guess, but it's the tale of two matches, really.

[RazorbladeKiss87]

It's been a while since I have watched this match but I remember feeling similar to you about the first portion of the match. The ending stretch was fun and, while watching it live, I almost thought Santino was going to get the win. I enjoyed him a lot at that time and would have really liked it, even if they had to book themselves out of it.

[ShittyLittleBoots]

This holds up even better than I imagined. The final battle between Bryan & Santino is still pure mastery n' pro-wrestling magic, and honestly, everything before that also rules. Barrett put in some awesome work in the first half of the match; really liked his plan of weakening Show by going after his knee -- the way he kept that target during his multiple attacks on the man was some awesome stuff. Show was on a roll too, just pummeling people around - especially Daniel Bryan of course. The spot where he breaks into his pod so he can get his hands on him early was pretty neat, and the beatdown that followed was great. I would have to re-watch all the Chamber matches to see where this really ranks, but I'm pretty confident in saying that it is one of my favorite matches of the type that there has been. MILES better than the WWE Championship Chamber match that happened on the same night. ****