In order to do these reviews, I usually sit home on a Sunday night by my computer, bouncing in and out of live discussions with other wrestling nerds to get a feel for the consensus of the show. As you already know, this time was different, as I was actually at the event with my fellow nerds, but in order to properly provide for my fan, I was in my seat, pen and pad in hand. While it is quite unfortunate that this review cannot include sardonic jocularity directed at the announce team, it will include crowd interaction, as this severely alters your perception when you attend a live show. With that said, it was certainly an intriguing pay per view to attend in light of 2 major storylines commencing within the last month. Both were integral components to the respective championship matches from their shows, and both proved to overshadow the fact that this show crowned a number of new champions. It was a crazy night, and here's the perspective of a guy who was there.
The show began with Zack Ryder entering to a nice hometown pop. Even I popped for him, because his music is awesome live and he has come home! He cut a promo about living his dream out which separates him from us fans followed by talking about working out and spray tans. Despite this attempt at getting heat, the crowd only booed him for the duration of the promo. Is there a better character than Ryder though? This guy needs a Jersey Shore-esque stable and I may start a facebook petition so that it happens! As for his match, he faced MVP, who got a great reception from the crowd. The last show I was at, his face pop was rather dull, but this crowd was hot, and he was certainly a beneficiary. They had a short match with Ryder picking up the win with The Zack Attack. The only thing I don't like about Ryder is his finisher. Give him a new finisher and he is a major player waiting to happen. Woo woo woo, you know it!
After watching some promo videos for Tribute to the Troops and WWE in general, we finally go live at 8 PM. The arena filled up a lot from 7:45-8 and it looks like the last minute plug at MSG the previous night got the last few tickets sold. Just a note for anyone planning on attending WWE live (and you all should!), the pyro is LOUD!!! It's literally "cover your ears" loud. After recovering from the sonic boom type pyro, the live audience was pleased to hear "No chance" fill the airwaves as the Chairman is here! It's not that often that most of us are in the same room as a man worth almost a billion dollars, so this is a treat. Vince's appearance is short lived but impactful, as he announces that Bret Hart is unable to make the show, thus eliminating Bret being able to answer to NXT's demands. WIth no Bret, Vince figured to be the man in charge that NXT would go after, but after shaking hands with his "chosen one" Drew McIntyre, he was shown getting into a limo and leaving, thus negating that possibility.
McIntyre was coming out to live up to the chorus of his song. "What is yours, now is mine" is what he hoped to say about the Intercontinental Title held by Kofi. Of course, he was the last holder of this title, so this match was his opportunity to win it back. That issue should have been enough to fuel the match, but the larger issue is the one between Drew and Teddy Long. The Smackdown GM had been the object of Drew's disdain for a while, so Drew called Teddy out to watch the match from ringside so that "when he won, Teddy could hand him the title personally". Things don't often go as planned, and after a pretty solid 10 minutes of wrestling clearly carried by Kofi, mayhem began. First, Kofi's dropkick missed Drew and took out the referee. WIth the ref down, Drew called for Teddy to come in the ring and ref the match himself. Older fans will remember that Teddy got his start as a referee many moons ago, so it was a bit nostalgic to see Teddy don the black and white again. This stupid strategy didn't work for Drew, as Teddy refused to count for him (who didn't see that coming?). As they argued about it, the crowd, including myself, erupted as Matt Hardy came through the crowd and attacked Drew. After a Twist of Fate, Drew was hit with the Trouble in Paradise and pinned for the loss. A bit of a clustered ending, but from a storyline perspective, it made plenty of sense. The wrestling was quiet solid before that, with Kofi hitting a few moves that drew mass approval from the crowd. If Kofi ever develops a real character and personality, he will make a great main eventer, because he certainly can outwrestle almost anyone.
The Harts are shown on screen and talk about their match later tonight which none of us knew about. They apparently will face the Usos and Tamina in a six person tag, which means the tag titles won't be on the line. Good idea since that is a match that should be promoted, and this gives us a chance to see the women get a little ring time as well.
The Divas title match is next, so it won't separate the main events like it often does. It is listed as a Fatal 4 Way match, but it is actually a 5 way dance, as Alicia Fox's hips definitely have a mind and personality of their own. None of the divas got much of a reaction, which is a real shame because I know they work so hard. Apparently they got called boring the night before at MSG, and I'm ashamed at my fellow NYers for their lack of respect. As such, I cheer the faces, Gail Kim and Eve. Speaking of Eve, blue is a great color for her. She looked stunningly beautiful live. I wish I was closer to truly appreciate her beauty. Unfortunately for her, she was on her way to a victory after hitting her neckbreaker finisher followed by a moonsault (her arsenal continues to grow), Alicia and her hips pulled her out of the ring and pinned Maryse herself to win her first title. This makes both female titles held by co-champions, as Alicia and her hips join Laycool in that category. I don't get the appeal of Alicia, and neither did the crowd who was stunned at this development. I understood that they wanted to sell the idea of the Fatal 4 Way being unpredictable and for titles to be fragile, but it sucks that Eve had to drop her belt so soon. However, that fragility would be important later in the show......
Next was a backstage promo between Big Show and Rey Mysterio. Show shows Mysterio his fist and says that because the title is on the line, he wont' hesitate to use it on Mysterio, who's head looks about the same size as Show's fist. Rey responds that as big as Show's fist is, his heart is bigger. Could he BE any more cheesy? It's one thing to give it your all in competition and for others to define you for your heart, but it is another to sell yourself as having a big heart. That might be the single worst promo I've ever heard in that regard and as much as I dislike Mysterio, it made me hate him that much more. I still can't believe he said that! How tacky!
BREAK THE WALLS DOWN! A nice surprise to the crowd as Chris Jericho makes his way to the ring. He's supposed to be a hated villain, but the New York crowd is loving him! My friends speculated that it's because he was born in New York. I think it's more than the NY crowds respect talent and instead of doing the right thing and booing him as a sign of respect, they cheer him and do the opposite of what would make the show come off better. Jericho cuts a great promo which prompts a guy near me to scream "Go Jericho Go!" a few times during it. Of course, this is a nod to Jericho's first WWE promo, which he referenced in this one, making the argument of how important he's been to the WWE. This leads to Jericho, who is not getting any heat despite his typical heel shtick, to reveal that he requested a match with Evan Bourne because Bourne feels he can make a name for himself through Jericho. Bourne comes out to a decent reaction, but it does not compare to previous faces, which leads me to question if this push is going to work.
The Bourne/Jericho match may have been the best match of the night. We had dueling chants during this one as well, which was quite amusing since the "Let's go Jericho" chants were a lot louder then the "Let's go Evan" chants. It was also quite evident that not one person over 13 was chanting for Evan, because the pitch of those chants was quite high. There were some nice spots in this one, none more impressive than Evan's hurricanrana off the top rope which he leaped flatfooted and locked on Jericho's head about 7 feet up. Apparently the Bourne to Fly moniker means he can actually jump high and isn't just a spot monkey who likes to fly. To the disdain of Jericho fans everywhere, the veteran put the youngster over after a beautiful shooting star press onto Jericho's back. Jericho acted like he was shocked, but we know that he felt good about making this young kid look great in a rare Pay Per View appearance for him.
We saw the promo video for the World Heavyweight title next, and the whole thing was based around Kane's quest to find Undertaker's attacker. Obviously this will play a major role in the match, but we were hoping to at least get some decent wrestling before the inevitable breakdown. Given that this is a title match, I figured it was an opportune time to hit the food stand to avoid lines. As such, I missed the first couple of minutes of action, so upon return, I found a beached whale outside the ring and masked men inside of it. It was quite an interesting site. I asked the guy next to me how Big Show got laid out outside and he said "Mysterio". I laughed very hard, but soon realized it was true and disappointment replaced laughter. The rest of the match flowed pretty decently, with the standards "2 men out, 2 men fighting" booking. The spot of the match came when Swagger hit a German suplex on Punk who was hitting a German suplex on Rey. Of course, the ending of the match saw Kane come out with a coffin, which looked like he was wheeling a shopping cart. Everyone acted intimidated nonetheless, and Kane invaded the ring. After short deliberation, he grabbed CM Punk and pulled him out of the ring. This led to Punk being chokeslammed into the coffin, which would have led to awful things, but Luke Gallows saved Punk and they ran out of the arena. Of course, Punk was still a competitor in the match, so this effectively took him out, and ruined my chance at correctly predicting this match. Then, my worst nightmare happened. Rey Mysterio hit the 619 and springboard splash on Swagger, then pinned him to become new champion. After that promo earlier, he should have been banned from meaningful competition for like 6 months due to corniness, but not we have to see him prominently featured as Smackdown's champion. Not only that, but why must Mysterio always hit his finishers to win? A guy that small should be defying the odds and winning almost every match with rollups to steal victories. It would make a lot more sense. I hope this title reign is short lived and Punk takes the belt off of Rey, but I will tell you that the kids I interviewed before the show were certainly a lot happier with this outcomethan I was.
The noise level from Rey's big win paled in comarison to that of the noise made when John Cena appeared on screen for a promo. As was normal for the night, it started with boos and soon got overpowered by cheers, making it impossible to hear the first few words of the interview. It wasn't that important, as he was merely hyping his match later, but I still do not like when fans don't know when to stop so that we can hear what is going on.
Next was my giddy fan moment, as The Miz came out for his U.S. title defense. Of course, never to be outdone, Miz decides to berate R-Truth for looking ridiculous when he raps his way to the ring. This led Miz to actually rapping with his own lyrics to R-Truth's song. It's things like this that make me love The Miz. Of course, R-Truth was not happy with being mocked, so after he rapped his way down to the ring like always, he asked the crowd "if you think The Miz's rapped sucked, let me hear you say WHAT'S UP!" The heat was on for the U.S. title. As great as the pre-match stuff was, the match did not live up to it. Perhaps it was because the high flying Truth was grounded due to his ribs hurting, but it was a very boring match to see live. You could tell that the Miz was doing what he could to keep it exciting, but it just wasn't working, and people were genuinely excited to see the match end, regardless of outcome. The Miz did pick up the win here, and got a pretty nice pop considering he's a heel. Remember though that NY crowds will cheer anyone, and in a combination of popping because the match is over and a show of appreciation for Miz's skills, he got a nice pop for the victory.
With little time in between, we went right to the 6 person match between the Usos and Harts. Nothing too insane to report here, though I feel obligated to report that Tamina is extraordinarily ugly. There literally is no redeeming feature about her that would make any guy find her attractive. This is in staunch contrast to Natalya, who some might find muscular, but is quite attractive none the less. After the guys battled it out for a bit, the women found themselves battling at the end while the guys were sprawled out on the outside. Tamina hit a Samoan drop and went to the top rope to hit her father's splash. She even gave the Superfly hand gesture before going for the splash, but she missed it and Natalya capitalized with her awful finisher for the win. It was an ok match to throw on the card, but I feel that this story has lost a lot of steam. I'm about ready for the Usos to get their title shot, lose, and the Harts to move on to their next contender.
We get to the main event, and my friends and I realize that it's only about 10:05. We wonder whether this will be an epic, 45 minute encounter, but we ultimately guess that it will be a half an hour match and 10 minutes of NXT stuff afterwords, getting us to about a 10:45 finish. After almost 5 minutes of introductions which saw very little boos outside of Cena, we got underway. There were a lot of dueling "Let's go Cena" "Cena sucks" chants throughout this match, but what amused me most were the kids in front of me rooting for Sheamus. I wonder if they were Irish? Lots of finishers and counters in this one, with the highlight being the double suspended DDT from Orton on Sheamus and Cena. Everything else was pretty standard until the inevitable happened and the NXT guys showed up. With no Bret to give them an answer, they attacked Bret's family along with Evan Bourne and R-Truth backstage, and then came to the ring and attacked anyone they could get their hands on. The end result was Sheamus covering Cena in the middle of the ring andn stealing the title. He ran like the dickens as soon as he got the 3 count, and the NXT guys cotinued their assault on Cena. When Sheamus went to gloat on the stage, the NXT guys chased after him into the back, effectively ending the live broadcast. Those of us in the audience did not realize that, and especially given that it was 10:30, we felt like more was coming.
What we got next was something I originally thought was on the broadcast and was shocked to see. After selling the beating for about 5 minutes, John Cena slowly got up and grabbed a mic. He talked about how serious these NXT attacks are, putting over the angle as having realism. What really struck me was that, through a chorus of boos, Cena actually addressed the crowd's disdain for him and held out the mic to let them chant "you can't wrestle" at him again. He said that you can question his abilities to wrestle, but you can't question his ability to fight. He ends by saying that he'll be at Raw tomorrow and hopes those "sorry sons of bitches" show up so he can kick their asses. I was very surprised to hear Cena use such languauge, and that should have clued me into the fact that the broadcast was over. At the same time though, plenty of kids were in the audience, so it's not as though thousands of them weren't exposed to it. Of course, every single one of them are probably exposed to that language at home on a daily basis, but that's another story.
It was definitely a fun show to be at, and despite some of the flaws, I came away very impressed. Had I been watching it at home, I might have thought a bit less of the show, but being there live allows you to truly appreciate what these guys do. Unfortunately, Pete Gas was not there this time from what I saw, but we upgraded and met Matt Striker after the show. As far as the performances, the best match was Jericho/Bourne, followed closely by the WWE title match and Kofi/Drew. The added excitement of having huge stories develop made for a great show. This is a fantastic time to be a WWE fan, and I can proudly say that I attended a show in the midst of this exciting time.
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