The Redman Report: WWE Raw 15/8/11: The Plot ThickensBy Jimmy Redman| August 18, 2011 The Redman Report So, Summerslam. Booker, could you explain what went down there? “WHUT DA HALE!” Thanks dawg. So, yeah. The question is, what in the freaking world is going to go down now? Lets find out. More questions than answers? They stole my line! THATS MY LINE! WOO! Anyway, you will NEVER guess who came out first. Not in a million years. But having said that, this was the best Hunter open ever because a) it was short and b) he played it straight just like I’d hoped, apologising for the call and denying any knowledge of Nash. So much so that when King was all “This is BS” he actually sounded crazy. But good stuff to build the intrigue. ALBERTOOOOOOOOOOOOO DEL RIOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO! He looks so different just walking out of the back instead of having a car. I presume thats for later. But man, so, so glad this guy is finally a world champ. His promo started slow, but when he got on to Rey it picked up and talking about waking up in the morning and asking himself, Alberto Del Rio, what he wants to do today, and he wanted to beat Rey Mysterio, that was absolute money. Good way to Cliff Notes the history they have too. Seriously cant wait for this match, even if Rey cant walk. Morrison vs Truth was a fun little brawl around to, maybe, end their feud, such as it was. Morrison’s box promo was hilariously wooden, even by his standards. But this was fun, basically working an entire match out on the floor is different. The early Barricade Chuck Kick was cool as hell. And Truth is generally a wonderful man. Loved the finish with the spinny chair suplex and super KNEE. Shades of Cena/Barrett. And the man finally gets a win. Fun stuff. Miz’s Subway spot was…weird. Weird in that there was no rhyme or reason for it and not even a payoff within the segment. Miz is kind of mean to the guy, and…yeah. Hit my music. It came across as exactly what it was: they needed to do a Subway ad, and Miz was standing around with nothing to do. He’s standing around even more than he already was, now that Alberto has leapfrogged him. Kelly! I’m psyched after the PPV match, and also because there’s still much more Beth to be had. This was a fine little tag match, the most important part of which was the Bella KICKING KELLY’S HEAD WITH HER OWN FOOT JESUS CHRIST. Shades of Melina! It was scary enough when Melina did those spots (in a good way), let alone someone who isnt Melina. I screamed. Anyway, this was fine. NatBeth! Holy God, Beth’s Dress! Beth in Beth’s Dress! Wow. As Booker T would say…something about a duck. So…Nash and Punk. Good: introducing Nash as a former world champ and whatever else. Good: Nash immediately explaining that he’s friends with Hunter. I didnt even know about the Godson thing. Also good was Nash explaining going to Summerslam and the text, which means either he or Hunter is lying, or someone appropriated Hunter’s phone. Also the fact that he said “whoever wins” has to be something too. But woah, when Punk came out and they went into “lets shoot brother for the internetz” they went off the deep end. Or, well, Nash did. Man did he suck. Even ignoring the content, man he sucked. Couldnt string a complete sentence together the entire time, to the point where it was almost sad. On the content, to me this whole entire segment encapsulates the key difference between the Nash, Russo, WCW/TNA style of “we’re shootin’ brother”, and the current Punk angle style of “we’re shootin’ brother”. The former is done purely for the lulz, its inside for the sake of inside to no end and pretty much completely mastubatory. The thing about the Punk angle is that even though we’re shootin’ brother every week, its done mainly to lend legitimacy and reinforce points that are already being made well within kayfabe, and the end result is that we’re building to this PPV match (or in the case of currently, building intrigue over its aftermath). We’re shootin’ brother for a point, a kayfabe, television point. So when you have a guy like Nash come in here and they go off on the well-tread internet arguments about vanilla midgets and guaranteed money and being “indyriffic”, bullsh*t that just aims for the internet pop and doesnt have anything to do with the angle, it just comes across as super lame. Thats exactly what this angle doesnt need to be, and hasnt been so far. Thats the one worry I had with adding Kevin Nash to this angle. Having said that, Punk to his credit saved the whole segment, he had excellent delivery, the text message joke was killer, and came off looking a thousand times better than Nash, which is a good thing whether it was accidental or not. He won the segment and actually came across as a cool, badass babyface, even going up against a giant like Nash. I like in general that nothing was even close to resolved. Enjoyed Ace being all “I cant believe how Punk spoke to me, John Laurinitis, the Executive Vice President of Talent Relations…oh, and you too Kevin.” The Dolph/Vickie commentary segment with guest wrestling by Swagger and Riley was…well, something. For having to sustain a combined bickering and loving xonversation for 5 minutes, Dolph and Vickie did well. And Vickie just up and deciding to steal JR’s hat and put it on Referee Black Ref and Referee Black Ref going nuts made the entire thing worth it. I love Vickie. Enjoyed the deadlift Swagger Bomb too. Having five people talking though, is way too much. Vickie expanding her roster is a great idea. Steph! “..get what they deserve” was an awesome line that said so much and yet still gave nothing away. The plot thickens. Bourne and Kofi are a great flippy babyface team. The list of tag teams that are better than the tag champs is still growing. As something, anything, for Kofi to do I’m cool with this. Also enjoyed King preaching about the tag champs. Alberto vs Rey was great fun. Not on the level of their SD matches, but still quite the fun main event. I mean, this man cant walk. But it was really good and the San Diego heat made it work too. Some cool rollups in this thing. And JESUS, that Asai Moonsault. YOU CANT WALK DAMN IT. Looked like it sucked too. What a crazy man. Loved the finish, they went all the way with Rey up to hitting the splash, crowd is going nuts, but oh knees up and the rollup! Its a clean win but still an asshole win, which makes it a total win. And then, because a clean win wasnt heelish enough, he decides to break Rey’s arm anyway (getting him off TV thankfully, for his sake, and after one of the most incredible short-term runs of work I’ve ever seen) and here comes John Cena! Its nice when we have to wait for him every once in a while. And he cuts a great, fired up promo, if not slightly nonsensical (“just wait till you defend the title”?) but the emotion was there; his honourable babyface ethos are offended by a heel cash in and attacking defenseless Rey. And not just a heel cash in, but THIS heel cash in. Cena and Punk worked so hard on TV and during the PPV match to honour the WWE Title, and here Alberto comes in and steals the title and, basically, ruins it all. Bingo. Cena challenges Alberto while Punk investigates the C, O, N and continues his crusade against the WWE machine.
