wwe 2021: BURNED TO A CRISP

Last years Rumble was great iirc, with Brock going cray and then Drew eliminating him.

I’ve not watched a show since Mania I think, not even nxt, but fuck, it’s the rumble, it should always be fun! Also maybe I should find a YouTube comp of all the best bits of Roman reigns tribal chief, I know people love it.

I still can't quite get my head around the fact that Drew Mac Rumble was less than a year ago

I loved last year's rumble, honestly. Both men's and women's. Got to see some of my favorite women (Bianca, Mercedes, Shotzi, Dakota) and men (Keith Lee, MVP) and the return of FREAKIN' EDGE!

Props to Ricochet with the assist by low blowing Lesnar.

I felt so bad for Drew, honestly. Won the rumble only to have a Wrestlemania win with zero people in attendance. No pop. No chants. Just silence. It must be weird and surreal to have a Wrestlemania moment like that.

Ah yeah Bianca looked like a boss, didn’t she? Honestly though I can’t remember who won it? Was it Bazler? She fought Becky for the title, but that doesn’t seem right

Charlotte won and challenged Rhea Ripley for the NXT Women's title. I still say she should have gone for Kay Lee Ray and the NXT UK Women's title, since that was the only belt that she had not won.

Ok lol I was actually gonna watch the rumble today but I forgot to not check social media beforehand...

I’m gonna pass.

Vince really needs to leave (the 90s behind)

the last five minutes of the women's were really fun

Just watch the entrances for #8 and #24 in the men's rumble. That was the best part.

The women's rumble was pretty good overall. Definitely benefited from having less entrants announced (even though they announced who #30 was going to be).

Their latest batch of signings is huge!

Notable standouts: Priscilla Kelly & Elayna Black (who debuted as Gigi Dolin & Cora Jade in the Women's Dusty Tag Classic), Christian Casanova, Blake Christian (who was as standout in NJPW's December Super J-Cup), Lacey Ryan (who debuted as Zoey Stark, and had a pretty good match against Io Shirai last night) and TAYA freakin' VALKYRIE.

Notably, Eli Drake debuted at their last Takeover, I believe, as L.A. Knight.

I'm still waiting on that Alex Zayne debut, though. I really hoped it would be at Rumble, but that was way too ambitious of me.

ASIDE FROM THAT: Who do people think Bianca Belair will challenge at Mania. I know before Rumble she had mentioned that if she won, she would want to fight Sasha Banks, but who knows?

Also, The Miz as WWE World Heavyweight Champion in 2021. Thoughts? Do we feel like John Morrison might have a change of heart in supporting his friend now that his wife is in the WWE?

Eli Drake is the guy who does The Rock cosplay promos right?

The Miz as champion, after Edge won the Rumble... wasn’t 2009 a really bad time to like WWE? Put Cole in a Perspex cube and have a laptop as GM, let’s all be really mediocre with 10 years on the bump card so matches are worse! I guess I’m 2 years they’ll pay Punk an obscene amount of money to say he thinks wwe is shit and be powerbombed by a 65 year old diesel

I'm not going to lie: I would pop for that. I still love CM Punk, but man, Diesel hitting him with the jackknife powerbomb would be a pretty cool one-off.

I feel guilty for being underwhelmed by Edge winning the Rumble, and also feel like it will lead to a sort of passing of the torch to Reigns as far as the spear goes. I don't know who I would have preferred it to be, and I get that there could be some pretty dope storytelling, but I was just really...deflated by it. Elimination Chamber as well, even though the Smackdown Men's match was actually pretty fun. Honestly bummed that there was only the one women's match, as they cut Asuka's match against Lacey Evans right before airing.

At least Rhea Ripley is confirmed to be joining RAW soon. That will be exciting! She's really won me over in the last two years.

ANYWAY, on the NXT side, I really enjoyed Santos Escobar vs. Karrion Kross. I love Legado Del Fantasma (have always loved all 3 of those guys separately), and am glad to see them featured more! Hope they can take over as THE faction, since it looks like Undisputed Era is officially breaking up. Excited for MSK to go after Lorcan and Burch soon. Still stings a little that Trey Miguel is not with them, but always excited to see that Hot Fire Flame!

I just don’t know... they have actually spent 5 years trying to be post-cena and still make these decisions that make me not wanna watch. I actually really like the miz, I hate that I think of him as part of that hate I have of nostalgia-core. I just don’t think I could ever watch them while they don’t get that they have basically the best roster in history and still have Goldberg for a main event for a main title. Daniel Bryan has basically said he can’t make it passed this contract... so what they did was have someone who is 10 years older than him win the rumble! It’s such a slap in the face to someone like Big E that it just makes me annoyed.

And it’s wrestling. You can make a tv show where it’s about people are 40+ trying to run a company or something, and make it compelling. But we aren’t watching Succession or Breaking Bad, and since the New Generation we have been conditioned to want to support the up and comer. The Miz, real world contestant, being champion seems so at odds with why I should care.

This also makes it confusing for the women’s part of the show, where it didn’t exist 5 years ago and any new talent is exciting but feels like it gets painted with the same brush. I feel like I should be really excited by someone like Bianca, or Tribal Chief Roman, but knowing it can all get thrown in the toilet for people were relevant 10-25 years ago makes it all redundant. Even if Edge puts over Roman.

Tried to half heartedly explain to someone how even though I don’t like Limp Bizkit, they are still a thing I’ll always appreciate because of *that* Wrestlemania promo and yeah, never gonna feel like wrestling is a thing I should never bring up in public. Love this shit. Kinda wanna take tomorrow off work even though it’s gonna be the biggest week I’ve had in years* because it’s my birthday and I wanna watch WM17

*Moving out of a shop early that can’t make money post covid and starting a new studio and paying a 1/3rd of the rent, so we can actually start an online business properly, so fuck a birthday

We all gotta do what we gotta do, my dude. Hope you took the day off! Wish you all the best in that future endeavor!

I have to say that I am a sucker for nostalgia pops, but right now, it just makes me really tired. Maybe it's the pandemic making me feel like I'm slipping backwards and the nostalgia is adding to it.

Anyway, excited for the eventual debuts of the new signees. I'm hoping for something to breathe new life into some of the more stagnant parts of WWE programming.

Thanks dude.

Woof, some interesting developments on RAW last night. More of the road to Wrestlemania is beginning to coalesce. I'm just a little bit more excited about it now.

Well, Fastlane sure was, uhm, interesting.

andrade/la sombra is free

^ the extent in which i engage with this company in 2021

I am DYING for him to be ingobernable once again.

thraed tilte delivers

You right, you right.

In other news, Rhea Ripley has called her shot of fighting Asuka for Wrestlemania. Glad that I won't have to watch Asuka lose to Charlotte again. Sad that I will now likely have to watch her lose to Rhea Ripley, instead.

Hoooooooo boy, did night 1 of NXT Takeover hit me about 75% as hard as Sakura Genesis. Good tag finish, painful main event finish. Some pretty good matches, though, with the gauntlet, as well as Ciampa vs. WALTER, and KUSHIDA vs. Dunne.

Does anyone else think that Io shows up at Mania, then?

I have genuinely not paid attention to WWE in years at this point but I heard the Walter match is a must see?

Bad bunny is in WWE now. Is he bad WWE fans?

a hoy hoy: I liked the match, but then again, I really like WALTER, and I LOVE Ciampa, so I will acknowledge my biases.

Bad Bunny is okay; he's not doing any crazy spots in the ring, but you can tell that he has a love and appreciation for wrestling, and that he's enjoying participating. He also got my man Damien Priest into his WM match and turned it into a tag, so I'm glad for that push.

What the fuck happened to Vince’s voice? He can’t say WWE anymore.

This is gonna take me about three weeks to watch. Lol at this boobie woman geetar America the beautiful

If no one jumps off the boat over the two days, I’m never watching again

Most WWE start possible with the first shot of the crowd having a guy wear his face mask pulled down to his chin, mouth and nose exposed

Skipped all the rained off promos. About to start Lashers-Drew. Why don’t they do fancy entrances anymore? Rusev had a tank and Triple H had terminators at wm31. The best the world title has is a sword

gotta save that money for drones

and i don’t mean wwe diehards ayooo

The promos were great, man. Some of them were really worthwhile.

I'm convinced Kevin Owens jumps off the pirate ship.

Aw man.

Holy fuck what is John Morrison’s mullet

Awww yeah good stuff on this week's NXT on Tuesday!

.@WWERomanReigns battles @WWEDanielBryan in a #UniversalTitle Match with Bryan's #SmackDown future hanging in the balance! Plus, @WWEApollo clashes with @WWEBigE in an #ICTitle Rematch.

Tonight at 8/7 C on @FOXTV! https://t.co/2yuxktc3sJ

— WWE (@WWE) April 30, 2021

Am I the only person who thinks that this will mean that Daniel Bryan will go to RAW? Everyone's saying that he'll get an indie run, and...I just don't think that's going to happen unless he leaves the company for real. I would not mind being proven wrong, though.

i think he’ll go to nxt

Definitely would be cool for him to go to NXT, especially if NXT call-ups happen. NXT is starting to feel a little crowded, but definitely full of dream matches that I would be grateful to get...but I am hesitant to hope too much.

raw is so bad

Man, I know it isn't going to happen, but I really want Mercedes Martinez to get that gold. I just love her so much.

So, uh, I guess The Miz got eaten by zombies and technically Roman "retired" Daniel Bryan (I think I remember hearing commentary say something likt that last night)?

Triple H has been rushed to the hospital with a possible heart attack. I know I can slag him and his family off but he’s been pretty much the only thing backstage keeping WWE going for the past ten years for most fans. Then having been demoted from his own show and this, you have to feel for him.

Oh wait, I read some misreported story. He had it last week and had successful surgery.

i still don't watch wwe but i'm so thrilled that big e won the belt

Yeah I love him and glad he won! Still never gonna watch again

So the Plane Ride From Hell seems to finally making the sleaze thread and some chickens come home to roast. Should we have a new thread or is here fine?

Fuck them all.

I think there needs to be a whole episode on JBL’s bullying too.

This company has a history of toxic, disturbing and downright illegal behaiviour and if it takes a Vice documentary to really push people to talk about it, I’m all for it. I wonder what it does to Brock’s future career, most probably nothing but some slight malaise with fans but still big bookings.

WWE has a really weird history in trying to forget and edit out Benoit’s career but even with his history of locker room bullying, no one expected murder. Flair is basically the history of televised wrestling… I presume they just ignore this like they have made light of it for the past 20 years. But fans are flocking away to competition for the first time in a real way? Who knows?

Doubt it affects most of them, unfortunately. I think a lot of the general details have been known for some time, haven’t they?

WWE certainly won’t do anything differently, because of course they won’t. Looking the other way on everything from murder, rape, sexually grooming young ringboys, the pimping out of young female wrestlers, overt racism, right down to the hazing and workplace bullying, that’s always been their approach. Which is why fuck WWE and the McMahon family forever, irrespective of whatever they’re doing on their tv shows.

Flair will be the interesting one - he’d been drifting pretty steadily towards AEW but I would imagine TK will be rethinking that in a hurry. I hope so, anyway.

Yeah Andrade gonna have to find a different new manager

I wonder if they'll do anything to start distancing Charlotte from her father's name.

Another culling of talent just cut Keith Lee, B-Fab (who JUST debuted on Smackdown with Hit Row), and DBS Jr. who JUST returned earlier this year, I believe.

LIST: 2020 + 2021 WWE Releases.

Again sorry in advance if I forgot anyone. pic.twitter.com/pwaROuhKkj

— Denise Salcedo (@_denisesalcedo) November 5, 2021

If I were an NXT performer I would be petrified at getting a call-up.

Well, Survivor Series was weird. So weird that I didn't think to talk about it until now...a week later.