WWE RAW & Smackdown Thread

[Majingir]

Re: WWE RAW & Smackdown Thread

Segment took a nose dive real quick. I don’t know what WWE was thinking, especially given the show was in LA of all places. I can separate the person and their character easily, like yeah you can dislike Terry Bollea for being an awful person but everything he did for Pro Wrestling as the character of Hulk Hogan can't be denied. Wrestling never would have became what it became without him.

Lesson learned hopefully for WWE... keep him in the 2K games, sell his merchandise and apparently his beer, but keep him off your TV in the foreseeable future.

Figured they would've learned their lesson during that awkward Hogan/Titus WM hosting bit.

But definitely stupid on their part to think they could bring in Hogan and not expect boos.

Then again...Vince got cheered during his final appearances on TV so...

[SmashMan]

Re: WWE RAW & Smackdown Thread

Segment took a nose dive real quick. I don’t know what WWE was thinking, especially given the show was in LA of all places. I can separate the person and their character easily, like yeah you can dislike Terry Bollea for being an awful person but everything he did for Pro Wrestling as the character of Hulk Hogan can't be denied. Wrestling never would have became what it became without him.

Lesson learned hopefully for WWE... keep him in the 2K games, sell his merchandise and apparently his beer, but keep him off your TV in the foreseeable future.

Nobody's denying what he and the character did for wrestling. But WWE's been dragging him out at just about every type of big event over the last 10 or 15 years to do the same routine every single time. Think of your favorite 80s band. Imagine you saw them pop up, play their biggest hit, and leave. And this happened every few years. You'd get tired of it at some point, no? Then you layer on his outside stuff and people are really just tired of him.

...he namedropped Macho and Andre to try and reverse the booing (and failed) AND got the Netflix-WWE partnership booed on its' first night. It's pretty funny.

[ggsimmonds]

Re: WWE RAW & Smackdown Thread

I would've brought in Hollywood Hogan for that. Surely WWE would've known he'd get booed right? If you have to have him, at least play in to it.

That wouldn't have worked either. Heel Hollywood Hogan trying to sell his beer to the American middle class? Doesn't even make sense.

Maybe they thought they could use the flag as a shield or something, like the fans aren't going to boo the flag right? Right?

But the booing definitely turned up a notch once it became apparent that the Hulkster was trying to peddle his beer.
It was just a tone deaf idea

[ggsimmonds]

Re: WWE RAW & Smackdown Thread

Nobody's denying what he and the character did for wrestling. But WWE's been dragging him out at just about every type of big event over the last 10 or 15 years to do the same routine every single time. Think of your favorite 80s band. Imagine you saw them pop up, play their biggest hit, and leave. And this happened every few years. You'd get tired of it at some point, no? Then you layer on his outside stuff and people are really just tired of him.

...he namedropped Macho and Andre to try and reverse the booing (and failed) AND got the Netflix-WWE partnership booed on its' first night. It's pretty funny.

I mean, The Rock?

And his pop was still as loud (and positive) as ever

Edit: Tacking this on here to avoid triple posting, maybe an unpopular take but the deadman should stay dead for a bit. I love him but feels like his post retirement appearances happen with the same frequency as the past 10 years as an active wrestler.

[dubcity]

Re: WWE RAW & Smackdown Thread

Honestly I think people have (weirdly) grown to dislike him more recently for all the "Lies of Hulk Hogan" videos than for the stuff he said while being recorded 10 years ago. And probably for giving speeches at political conventions. LA in particular probably not the best market for him right now lol.

Regardless, a wrestler getting a huge reaction 30-40 years after his main run is probably asking a lot.

[SmashMan]

Re: WWE RAW & Smackdown Thread

I mean, The Rock?

And his pop was still as loud (and positive) as ever

You're right that he kept (and keeps) getting big pops. I thought Rock's returns were pretty corny until the switch into the Final Boss gave him some life again.

Edit: Tacking this on here to avoid triple posting, maybe an unpopular take but the deadman should stay dead for a bit. I love him but feels like his post retirement appearances happen with the same frequency as the past 10 years as an active wrestler.

Agreed with this unless they have an actual story to work him into. The WM appearance last year was good but every other one since his retirement has been pointless.

[TheMatrix31]

Re: WWE RAW & Smackdown Thread

That was the best intro in wrestling history. I think it beats Wrestlemania XV.

Rest of the show was good. Netflix ran smooth watching at my bros. I hope I can find a way to watch it without using Netflix going forward since I don't want to give that piece of **** company views. Happy the show went off without a hitch from a technical standpoint.

Royal Rumble in Saudi Arabia? ****ing dumb. ****ing DUMB.

Hated Punk winning. Absolutely hated it. And clean too. What? Dumb.

I guess I just have to get used to the cinematic nature of things. I have stated in the past how I don't like the feeling that I'm watching a movie and prefer the feeling of watching an actual live event. Graphics, visuals, etc are of course absolutely amazing but so overproduced. I realize that's what people like but I think wrestling is more immersive when it feels like you're actually watching something happening live rather than a movie or video game.

Taker showing up. Meh from an impact standpoint. Especially with the biker ****. Awesome to see him with Rhea though. Happy her feud with Liv appears wrapped up. They were running out of steam. I think they could have done a bit more overall but ultimately an excellent feud that took a long time to take its course and exactly what I want out of wrestling. Bravo to both.

LA crowd booing Hogan. Ridiculous.

Uso beating Drew. Dumb as hell too.

Didn't like Rock not being in character interacting with Cody. Dude, you signed off TV months ago with **** against Cody. What? Stupid.

The ring mat. Disgusting.

Why are they going to commercial during a main event on Netflix? Stupid.

Happy next week we'll hopefully get back into the swing of things re: regular weekly show flow.

[chronoxiong]

Re: WWE RAW & Smackdown Thread

So The Rock is no longer the Final Boss or what? He straight up acted like a babyface out there. What on Earth is going on here? Other than that, RAW did feel like a supershow. The matches were pretty big with high stakes in majority of them. Happy to see Rhea win back her Title but I do feel like no one came out of this feud as the winner. It went for far too long. Curious to see where Liv goes from here because Rhea has some big time feuds coming her way. I assume Drew losing to Jey is meant to keep their feud going. And the main event match was a good one as it was great to see Punk wrestle on "free" TV again. But dang. The finish. This feud can't be over yet. No way. And sometimes I forget who the World Champion of RAW is because the shows NEVER revolve around him. Overall good show. I already miss watching RAW on USA. Its been a big part of my life watching this on USA (and cable).

[TheMatrix31]

Re: WWE RAW & Smackdown Thread

Oh yeah, where the flying **** was Gunther.

Stupid.

[Bard]

Re: WWE RAW & Smackdown Thread

Some of y'all are just funny. The Netflix debut was not for us. We received some decent matches, but let's be real, they wanted to promo and have some good matches for the potential new fans.


Which worked. I had quite a few fans that are not fans, or just come over to watch the Royal Rumble every year, that will now be watching every Monday.

Sent from my SM-S908U1 using Tapatalk

[The Kid 24]

Re: WWE RAW & Smackdown Thread

So what the **** was with Rock and Cody? So we're just supposed to forget what transpired between them leading up to WM 2024?

And I honestly thought Rock was gonna turn on Roman and put the Ula Fala around his own neck.

[ggsimmonds]

Re: WWE RAW & Smackdown Thread

That was the best intro in wrestling history. I think it beats Wrestlemania XV.

Rest of the show was good. Netflix ran smooth watching at my bros. I hope I can find a way to watch it without using Netflix going forward since I don't want to give that piece of **** company views. Happy the show went off without a hitch from a technical standpoint.

Royal Rumble in Saudi Arabia? ****ing dumb. ****ing DUMB.

Hated Punk winning. Absolutely hated it. And clean too. What? Dumb.

I guess I just have to get used to the cinematic nature of things. I have stated in the past how I don't like the feeling that I'm watching a movie and prefer the feeling of watching an actual live event. Graphics, visuals, etc are of course absolutely amazing but so overproduced. I realize that's what people like but I think wrestling is more immersive when it feels like you're actually watching something happening live rather than a movie or video game.

Taker showing up. Meh from an impact standpoint. Especially with the biker ****. Awesome to see him with Rhea though. Happy her feud with Liv appears wrapped up. They were running out of steam. I think they could have done a bit more overall but ultimately an excellent feud that took a long time to take its course and exactly what I want out of wrestling. Bravo to both.

LA crowd booing Hogan. Ridiculous.

Uso beating Drew. Dumb as hell too.

Didn't like Rock not being in character interacting with Cody. Dude, you signed off TV months ago with **** against Cody. What? Stupid.

The ring mat. Disgusting.

Why are they going to commercial during a main event on Netflix? Stupid.

Happy next week we'll hopefully get back into the swing of things re: regular weekly show flow.

The show had a major PPV feel to it because all the faces went over. It was like a payoff show.

But the entire night I had the feeling that today's wrestling just isn't for me. I didn't like the flow of any of the matches. The in-ring product is just so different from when I enjoyed wrestling, not going to make any arrogant better/worse proclamation, its just not for me

[J_Posse]

Re: WWE RAW & Smackdown Thread

The show had a major PPV feel to it because all the faces went over. It was like a payoff show.



But the entire night I had the feeling that today's wrestling just isn't for me. I didn't like the flow of any of the matches. The in-ring product is just so different from when I enjoyed wrestling, not going to make any arrogant better/worse proclamation, its just not for me

Yeah, all wrestling is 'indy - rific' today so if you don't like that style (or hate it like Jim Cornette) then it can be hard to watch.

But then someone does something amazing like Bianca on Friday & I'm sucked back in.

Sent from my Pixel 7 using Tapatalk

[SmashMan]

Re: WWE RAW & Smackdown Thread

The show had a major PPV feel to it because all the faces went over. It was like a payoff show.

But the entire night I had the feeling that today's wrestling just isn't for me. I didn't like the flow of any of the matches. The in-ring product is just so different from when I enjoyed wrestling, not going to make any arrogant better/worse proclamation, its just not for me

I’d say give it one more shot next week. I still don’t think it’ll be for you (today’s style is still pretty different than the old days) but it’ll probably be a better representation of how WWE matches go now. Last night was especially bad because they were working around all the extra segments.

Obviously ignore this if you’ve watched recently and didn’t like it. Not sure if you’re a ‘check WWE out once in a while’ guy or just checked in after a long time because of the Netflix premiere.

[ggsimmonds]

Re: WWE RAW & Smackdown Thread

I’d say give it one more shot next week. I still don’t think it’ll be for you (today’s style is still pretty different than the old days) but it’ll probably be a better representation of how WWE matches go now. Last night was especially bad because they were working around all the extra segments.

Obviously ignore this if you’ve watched recently and didn’t like it. Not sure if you’re a ‘check WWE out once in a while’ guy or just checked in after a long time because of the Netflix premiere.

Check it out once in a while.

In an interview I once heard HHH say that he is a slow burn guy when it comes to storylines. Best way to describe is it that I'm a slow burn guy when it comes to individual matches. I like slow builds that showcases wrestling and leads to a singular climax. Matches today seem to aim for a edge of your seat action movie flow to them. Multiples finishers, several false endings, etc. Its like "everyone loves the climax to a match, so what if we make the climax 80% of the match?"

I watched Gunthers match vs Orton months ago and that was good stuff.