Official WWE Smackdown Thread

[almostbobsaget]

Re: Official WWE Smackdown Thread 2012

Punk said he didn't want Heyman at ringside with him, there were moments they Heyman look liked he was going to cost him his match with Jericho at Payback.

Heyman got jealous, and that started the rift.

[jvalverde88]

Re: Official WWE Smackdown Thread 2012

If the reason Dolph dropped the WHC quick was to put him in the main feud of the WWE then I don't mind.

[kingkilla56]

Re: Official WWE Smackdown Thread 2012

If the reason Dolph dropped the WHC quick was to put him in the main feud of the WWE then I don't mind.

You think that was the reason though? The WHC being part of that feud would have been great imo.

Random thought: Heels hold every championship right now.

[kingkilla56]

Re: Official WWE Smackdown Thread 2012

They need to stop showing Big Show weeping on TV.

[jvalverde88]

Re: Official WWE Smackdown Thread 2012

You think that was the reason though? The WHC being part of that feud would have been great imo.

Random thought: Heels hold every championship right now.

Has to be, the WHC is essentially a mid card title (in WWE's eyes at least) especially the way they have treated the belt the last few months.

[TracerBullet]

Re: Official WWE Smackdown Thread 2012

You think that was the reason though? The WHC being part of that feud would have been great imo.

Random thought: Heels hold every championship right now.

It may actually have been. It's starting to look like with a few things at least the writers showed a lot of foresight leading to where things are now. While some stuff just seemed cobbled together at the time, it's somewhat making sense now.

I think the 18 seconds thing was something they didn't intend with Bryan (they probably thought it would get Sheamus over), but what started it all. He had a somewhat slow build to this point since after Extreme Rules of last year. Somehow gets into a WWE title match at OTL, and stays in the picture for 3 months.

During that time they also catapulted AJ's popularity, which I believe they wanted, but they didn't figure out exactly what to do with her. They tried the GM stuff, but thankfully it failed and was canned. That led her to going around with the face of the company and the up and comer, Dolph Ziggler for a bit. That whole thing led her to the cynical personality she has now, and people eat it up.

Ziggler is who they saw potential in and realized that people like him a ton just for his in ring ability. The belt eventually was just used as a way to finally turn him face, which kind of sucks that it was used that way but that's really all it was. They know he can help out with the main stuff in the company now, though I still believe they don't see him as a possible top guy (hence the amount of losing he does even as a face). I don't know if he'll stay near the top, but they know that he's got a lot of popularity and would better serve there at the moment than as the World Heavyweight champ, which they've pretty much forgotten about.

Back to Bryan, they had him go crazy at the wedding, which led to him teaming with someone people generally like in Kane. It also led to the hilarious stuff which made Bryan loved even more. Got him over with more than the smarks with that as a face. Then they basically started this storyline using Wrestlemania. In between that they built up The Shield to take the current roles they have now as Enforcers in this regime (already showed they can be hired for things like this by the right people, so that's not out of the blue).

Big Show is also not as random as he may seem here. The last two feuds he's had? The Shield and Randy Orton. He comes back as a face and still has those problems and by extension problems with HHH/McMahons.

Right after Wrestlemania, they kicked off that weakest link storyline with Bryan. That storyline got him where he is now. They knew what they were doing with it while we complained about Bryan losing while with Kane while Kane always won. Eventually it became a way to break him and Kane up while making Bryan more awesome.

They've had miscues though. I think the Titles were supposed to make The Shield look tougher for this storyline, but they just kept getting DQ'ed till this thing kicked off which was pretty lame. I already mentioned the miscue with AJ, and they have been too hard on Dolph during this thing.

They obviously didn't foresee the Cena injury. So anything that was going to involve him is probably being re-written. Also, they were smart enough to move Punk away from the WWE Championship for this so they didn't have to crush him in any way.

Still, a lot of the writing does deserve to be crapped on because besides this storyline and I guess the Heyman thing, they are just flying by the seat of their pants right now.



TL;DR
Yeah, I think they planned the WH title drop by Dolph for the same reason as Jvalverde. They also planned a bunch of stuff with this storyline beforehand and a couple other things.

[Mercury112491]

Re: Official WWE Smackdown Thread 2012

You literally just had a whole post about how previous storylines that seemed pointless have all tied together. Then you finish it by putting down the writing for seemingly flying by the seat of their pants. How do you know these seemingly pointless stories won't all come together?

[TracerBullet]

Re: Official WWE Smackdown Thread 2012

You literally just had a whole post about how previous storylines that seemed pointless have all tied together. Then you finish it by putting down the writing for seemingly flying by the seat of their pants. How do you know these seemingly pointless stories won't all come together?

Which is why I said right now. Though I don't think the World Heavyweight stuff will turn into much with Del Rio. They're doing alright with the Ricardo/RVD feud, but I doubt that turns into anything for more than a few months.

The Real Americans/PTP feud was something they really couldn't plan for. You can tell because they never even had a face turn shown on TV for PTP, it just happened. So yes they are flying by the seat of their pants, but it could turn out well.

They neglected the titles that aren't the WWE title for the most part. It's why the Heyman/Punk feud is a little bland right now. They did nothing to build Axel up for this while they had Punk occupied with Lesnar. And speaking of Axel, if he's in the Handicap match, how is the title going to be defended at NoC unless he does two matches, puts the title on the line against Punk in the handicap match, or he drops the belt beforehand (probably to the guy on the poster). That's kind of piss poor planning right there because they've painted themselves into a corner by forcing a storyline within a storyline and if they do have him drop the belt, they're going to have a hell of a time making me think he and Heyman will beat Punk (without outside help of course). Maybe they can make something out of it.

The random matches for the titles is kind of what's still got me not completely pleased with the writing as of late. Yes, we get some nice matches like RVD vs Ambrose, but it's still just thrown together. We will luck out compared to normal though because besides the IC title at the moment, every other title does seemingly have a storyline for once (we'll probably get Henry/Show vs. Rollins Reigns and Ziggler vs. Ambrose, very possible Ziggler and Show actually team up as well).

[TheShizNo1]

Re: Official WWE Smackdown Thread 2012

Damn, TB. You give the writers that much credit?

Sent from my SCH-I535 using Tapatalk 4

[Segagendude]

Re: Official WWE Smackdown Thread 2012

They need to stop showing Big Show weeping on TV.

Yeah, I agree. He turns from a seething angry giant into a blubbering wuss in 5 seconds...

[ChaseB]

Re: Official WWE Smackdown Thread 2012

The concussion with Ziggler did him in more than anything when it comes to his title reign I would think. On top of that, he's been making some poor choices about who he calls out publicly, which might also be hampering him a bit.

And as for the PTP stuff, they became faces on a whim because of Darren Young coming out. I'm surprised how smooth that has gone so far, though who doesn't love doing the millions of dollars dance?



So I think that and Ziggler were sort of the curve balls. But I think WWE knew Cena needed the surgery for nearly 2 months so they had some time there.

I still really like the Heyman/Punk stuff. I do think they need to bring in another guy to go against Punk at or right after Night of Champions (another Heyman guy perhaps), but it's still got plenty of steam because Heyman is just so damn easy to hate and Punk is still getting enough shots in to make me think he's just one more day away from ending Heyman.

Bryan's overness is still over-joyous to me, and I still can't believe how much people love him.

Love Bullyback. He needs to actually be a bully and do random bully stuff in the ring to make it more hilarious, but it's a good shtick and character arc for him after some misfires once he had nowhere to go after the Cena feud.

I think The Shield can continue to do what they do and that's put on fun matches in a 3-man format, tag format or singles format while still getting to be a part of a major storyline. Why I'm quick to defend them is because each has clear strengths, and at least 2 of the 3 are fantastic in the ring (and Reigns I think seems to be getting better though it's always hard to tell since he gets used right when he's in it might be clouding my overall judgment).

Brandon Stroud sums up why I like this avenue for The Shield really well:

"The Shield can be a great team who legitimately care about one another, but are also heartless scumbags. This is a great example of that.

They are, irrefutably, a TEAM. They’re in this together. They’re a bunch of NXT guys who decided to improve upon the Nexus formula by showing up as a unit, raising hell and actually sticking together and winning instead of developing supporting cast Decepticon drama. You’re never gonna see a Shield “Corre.”

They’re also terrible, opportunistic, violent people. The backstage segment where they were intimidating to Vickie but sorta licked Vince’s boots was the first sign of them being liars about the whole “justice” thing. They want to topple old regimes and jack legends who are hogging the spotlight, sure, but they want it for THEMSELVES, because they are wrestlers who are trying to win and keep their jobs on the main roster. This is when remembering NXT exists comes in handy. NXT is all about “who’s gonna make an impact and go to the main roster.” All about it. The Shield made the biggest impact of ANYONE, won a bunch of title belts to justify their spots, and do whatever they can to keep them. Purposeful DQs, working as Triple H’s thugs in a long con, whatever.

Believe in The Shield, even when they’re lying."

I also really do think the Triple H heel turn is fantastic. He's the first heel I hate from both a smark and mark standpoint in a long time, and Orton is right behind him now. It's a tough thing to do now for heels to really be hated by everybody, but I think those are two guys that are easy to dislike on multiple levels. The fascinating thing to me will be how to continue to play angles to both groups to increasingly make both sides despise heels. It won't completely work all the time especially if they'd have to manufacture dirt-sheet stories etc. to get one side riled up, but it's fun to dream on the new avenue this can go down.

This Grantland article by Shoemaker essentially sums up a lot of why I like what's going on right now in that department.

Overall, I'm rather excited about how things have been going. Lots of change for the better right now. And between NXT, WWE and NJPW (and Dragon Gate USA on a slightly different level) I've been loving wrestling more than I have in a long time.

[woody2goody]

Re: Official WWE Smackdown Thread 2012

The more I watch what they're doing, the more I'm enjoying it. This week's Smackdown, with HHH there and the opening segment felt 'big'. It felt like something they would make a big deal out of on Raw.

PS - Randy missed out the 'W'.

[kingkilla56]

Re: Official WWE Smackdown Thread 2012

HHH stop messing with the truth Heath Slater!

<iframe width="420" height="315" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/Ys3MvTaB4Tk" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

Btw Kofi is totally about to win the Intercontinental championship again. Heyman probably has a new Heyman guy coming soon.

[Bard]

Re: Official WWE Smackdown Thread 2012

Welp i know one Survivor Series match, Aj/Layla/Alicia/Askana vs. Total Divas.

[simgamer0005]

Re: Official WWE Smackdown Thread 2012

Welp i know one Survivor Series match, Aj/Layla/Alicia/Askana vs. Total Divas.

I actually like this fued, so it would be cool if it's still going on by then. I guess you could call this a heel turn for Alicia Fox. And I think it works very well to have AJ with a team of heel divas. Because before this it was pretty much AJ against the world and I think this stable works.