Leave us your feedback and any questions for Wai Ting and myself on Rewind-A-Raw tonight.
Really interested in everyone’s thoughts on the format for Raw tonight featuring the Gauntlet Match and how effective the final build was for Elimination Chamber.
RATE TONIGHT’S EPISODE OF RAW:
0 voters
Mj
Whoever came up with the idea to just run gauntlet match for nearly 2 hours deserves a raise. This was honestly more enjoyable to watch than half the filler they toss in week to week. The roster is loaded with in ring talent. Let them work
Shaun from Manchester, England
The gauntlet match was great(apart from Elias being in there too long) in particular Seth was fantastic.
People will complain about it but two hours of wrestling is a much better way to start the show than a 25 minute Authority promo.
Vish from Victoria
First, great round table with, Damian “deep in Iran”. It’s sad that WWE still has to romanticize the attitude era. IMO that era was only popular to the masses because a zuffa based UFC was just finding it’s licencing and it was the only period of time WWE was forced to market to non-children. Soon after they purchased their competition and went public they abandoned that audience and didn’t look back. I also agree it’s become a “nerd” culture used to spending disposable income on the product…WWE better hope those Nerds get their kids to watch the product!
I also love that you guys are doing video versions of the show and Wai’s mention of my “wild fantasy booking” of Dolph from last weeks smackdown review… I still think he’ll win at Fastlane, but maybe I’m putting too much faith in creative to make his absence and relinquishing the US title have some sort of payoff. Since they know the hardcore fans will tune in anyway and the casual fans aren’t sticking around long enough to require long term story I’m not holding my breath though.
Thoughts re tonight’s Raw:
A 2 hour gauntlet match on the go home show? With no stakes? WTF? I don’t necessarily like 30 min opening promos but this is an extreme alternative for TV…Guess they’re trying to get the best ROI on the talent…but is the roster (and creative) really that thin? Rollins was great and the match was a good showcase of talent… but it was too long…It was so boring at times I had to fast forward through most of it… Liked the Braun post match mic/monster work though
Asaka should have a mouthpiece (Heyman) /translator for interview… seems obvious.
Ronda (for her next appearance) needs to act like less of a mark who admires everyone and more like a heel like she did in her weigh in / fight with Miesha.
My god is Mandy Rose is green…her work with Bayley was hard to watch and she should still be in NXT.
Any update/incite on Paige’s career being over? Seems like that news was premature and she’s valeting until she heals or she is just being super professional.
Happy to see JJ go into the hall of fame… surprised, but happy.
Do you think this is the year X-Pac or Chyna will go in? Cause I doubt both will go in the same year. No post mortem additions yet so I think Chyna has a shot.
Other thoughts:
RAW and Smackdown (especially last week) are obviously written for children. Forgetting the fact that the show airs later than any child should be watching TV, I wonder how much longer WWE can even market their product to kids.
My first recollection of WWF was seeing Savage hit Steamboat with a ring bell on Superstars and Steamboat being taken out on a stretcher. That was Saturday morning in the 80s. Today friends of mine disagree with their kids seeing violence in general and specifically the jumping of people unprovoked in the back and using violence other than whatever looks fantastical.
How much longer do you guys think WWE will be able to justify marketing this product to kids in today’s social culture? Do you think that WWE cares if the work looks realistic? I don’t, and to the contrary I think they encourage the video game (multi finish attempts, lucha style acrobatics) as a mechanism to sell the product as more cirque de sol than a product like we grew up with that could make a kid believe someone was going to the hospital with a crushed throat.
Brandon From Oshawa
Coachman called the gauntlet match, one of the greatest matches, he’s ever seen. I wonder if it ranks up there, with the 5 star classic that he witnessed last week.
I’m not sure how to feel about this Raw. I liked the different feel, but 2 hours straight of wrestling may have been a little much for me. I feel they should have booked it the complete opposite, with the Rollins/Reigns & Cena matches, coming at the end of the match, instead of the beginning, giving Rollins the win. It just feels like that 1 hour and 5 mins is largely forgotten about, once the match ended.
On a side note…I’m not one to care or pay too much attention to their theme song choices for PPVs, but this one (M.O.M by Will Roush) just got totally ridiculous by the end of the night. It played during every single commercial almost. I’m almost looking forward to the inevitable Pitbull or Flo Rida Wrestlemania song.
Jay from Colorado here.
Wow, I really was not looking forward to the gauntlet match at the beginning of the show. It just didn’t sound fun or appealing especially with no stakes, but they proved me wrong. It was fun, exciting, and the matches werent bad at all. It made me at least feel like we may not get Roman winning on Sunday.
The writing of the Matt Hardy/Bray Wyatt feud has been among the worst I’ve seen in a long time. They just seem to have a fundamental misunderstanding of the Woken character. I heard rumors that they may be bringing the rest of the broken universe (senior Benjamin, Vanguard, etc) into the fold, any weight to those rumors?
Gotta say, there’s nothing less exciting than ending a go home show with a six person tag match.
But with that being said, all in all not a horrible edition of Raw, and I enjoyed the gauntlet match. 6 Braun nip slips out of 10.
I thought the gauntlet match was a great way to showcase the top talent on RAW. I thought the match was fun and everyone came out looking good. I wish every show had this much much wrestling. The third hour was not as strong and the expected Hardy Wyatt match leaves much to be desired but I still thought this was a decent enough edition of RAW.
7 Unnecessary Powerslams out of 10.
Joseph from Mississauga
Boy did that first hour and a half fly by. Going into the gauntlet match I didn’t know what to expect seeing as how there was no real reason for this match to be held because of the fact that all these men would be competing together in less than 6 days, but boy did I enjoy it. The fact that we just nearly got 2 hours straight of quality wrestling (barring some Elias moments) I was a happy viewer. I would much rather this instead of some useless selfie promos and some horrible screen effects coming out of nowhere. Seth Rollins was the MVP of this show and despite all of the events that occurred after the gauntlet match, which was very lacklustre to say the least. I still found myself coming out of this episode of Raw content. 7 out of 10.
The Gauntlet match was fantastic and was the best 2 hours or so of Raw I’ve watched in a while. They really gave Seth Rollins a spotlight in this match which makes me wonder what the plans are for Mania with him because hopefully they wouldn’t give him this 1 hour spot for nothing.
Braun is the biggest baby face in the company and week after week it seems like everything should be being built around him and not Roman for Mania but I can’t imagine WWE calling an audible on their year long Wrestlemania plans this late in the process.
7 out of 10.
I have to give props for WWE trying something that’s very un-WWE with the approach to that gauntlet match. It’s a shame that the match had no stakes to it, which I think is extremely problematic for a 2 hour match. Seth was unquestionably the MVP and the people they had him beat, and the struggle through his matches really helped push the idea of him trying to climb back to the top. However, once Seth lost, I think we all kinda knew the end result, wanted it and were just waiting for Braun.
Absolution seem to be making little improvements every week, and were the most interesting part of that last hour.
Braun did some thumbs up thing before his powerslams, do you think he should come up with a taunt for his finisher?
7/10
Brody from Orillia
What a refreshing and fantastic experiment that was the first 2 hours of Raw. I think this could have been the easiest 3 hours of Raw to get through in a long time, or even ever, and it will be very interesting to see how the Raw numbers fluctuated throughout the gauntlet.
Speaking of which, what a match. How nice was it to get wrestling on a wrestling program? Despite the constant reminders of Seth Rollins do or die attitude from the commentary, he truly was a superstar in this match. The sequences between he and Cena truly stood out.
Even though the last hour was bland, it was much easier to swallow because of what preceded it. Awesome episode of Raw.
8/10
Hey there both John and Wai,
I was able to attend live raw live this evening. It was a show that honestly flew by given the first match took 2 hours. The crowd was hot for most of the night and was almost a sellout from what I could see. Some of the loudest reactions would have to be Roman of course, Seth got a good pop for interrupting Reigns, Finn got a nice pop as well. Braun was a big hit and made that match ending very enjoyable for the crowd. Asuka also got a good reaction and when the crowd tried to what her I heard a lot of boos directed towards those. Also surprise to hear the reaction Bailey got but there were definitely a lot of families in the crowd. We also got a Bray Wyatt vs. Woken Matt Hardy Match as the dark main event. With it going longer than I expected but Hardy won to send the whole place home happy. All in all a good show and hope tomorrow’s smackdown follows the trend. If you need anyone or notes for that show let me know. Thanks for all the amazing content literally set up patreon to be able to support Post Wrestling.