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Let’s begin by being complimentary. It’s a brand new factor for me however I’m getting outdated and making an attempt to evolve earlier than my ldl cholesterol depend will get me. Due to the work that Sami Zayn and Roman Reigns have put in over the previous six months, what’s often a run-of-the-mill PLE, Elimination Chamber, rose to the extent of a must-see occasion. It was some of the anticipated reveals WWE has run in fairly a while, and the primary occasion generated buzz {that a} good portion of their Wrestlemania predominant occasions lately have didn’t do. It’s the factor that solely WWE can do. A form of story that spreads out farther than simply the wrestling world. Possibly that is the primary time that’s occurred since Bryan Danielson’s run in 2014. Or perhaps Becky Lynch’s to the primary girls’s predominant occasion. However neither of these culminated at one thing else aside from Mania. To get this stage of present to that stage of anticipation and pleasure is a credit score to Reigns and Zayn.
Secondly, the construct and even the primary half of the particular match harkened again to wrestling’s roots within the territory days. Right here we now have the native face, as you’ll not discover a extra beloved determine than Zayn in Montreal, and the invading, intimidating pressure (Reigns) introduced in to problem him and lift his hero standing. It’s the quintessential wrestling story, what the entire enterprise stems from earlier than it turned such a giant enterprise.
And it’s a task that Reigns performs extraordinarily effectively. Not simply the best way he carries himself as a heel, or the fixed trash-talking to each opponent and crowd, or the best way every certainly one of his strikes has a menacing edge to them throughout “the warmth” of a match. However the best way he grounds it in paranoia and insecurity we all know is there from earlier work. The cracks have been there for some time now, and Reigns hasn’t been afraid to play into that. It’s not his fault that WWE reserving trots him down the identical goddamn path each match.
Which made final night time’s ending so disappointing, mixed with the truth that everyone knows that is what they do and but we maintain psyching ourselves into considering that the corporate will at some point do one thing totally different. Sure, a part of being a wrestling fan is being sucked in and imagining any risk. However that will get tougher and tougher to get pleasure from while you maintain being delivered to the identical conclusion.
Even with a crowd as vociferous as any since CM Punk walked into the Rosemont Horizon in 2011, even with so many angles to play with that might have led to any variety of intriguing story paths, we acquired the identical Roman Reigns match we’ve been expecting at the very least the final two years. Face comes again, ref bump, interference, false end, then distraction, spear, Reigns wins (LOL). Not even the slightest variance from the identical routine. You could possibly have simply run a tape of matches with Danielson or Edge or Kevin Owens or AJ Types or Drew McIntyre. We’ve seen all of it earlier than.
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And you know that deep down, WWE thought it was kind of lame by running the post-match angle where Owens saves Sami from an attack and they get the last shot at Reigns, so everyone gets to cheer at the end instead of raining (pun somewhat intended) down boos to end the show. It’s the half-assed 50/50 booking that New York has specialized in for most of the last decade, and what we thought would change under Triple H but hasn’t. It’s spineless. “We won’t take the titles off Roman even though that’s where this has led, but we’ll give this crowd a morsel afterward so they can feel good about cheering their guy.” It’s pawing at anything meaningful.
They couldn’t even bring themselves to do anything with Jey Uso, who has a layered past with both Zayn and his cousin Reigns. He came in, and teased both helping Reigns or Zayn, and ended up doing nothing. And the same old lament from the WWE-pilled spills out afterward, “Let’s see what they do with this.” Well, most of us are tired of seeing and then just being left with the same thing.
All the Rhodes they could have taken
There is a great story to be told that Roman’s hold on the entire company can only be taken down from within. From someone who was under him at one point, someone he once trusted but someone who truly knows what he really is. Jey Uso, or Zayn, or Seth Rollins. They’ve toyed with all of this in the recent past. Jey is the family member who has seen through the facade. Zayn, the one they brought in who eventually was removed just enough to see the emperor had no clothes. Rollins is the former partner that Reigns has never been able to solve and has always been one step behind. Reigns has cut such a powerful force over the past three years that only those who really know where the weak points are could be a threat. Any of these would be great stories to tell.
Instead, we’ll get Cody Rhodes parachuted in with his spruced-up George Carlin “My Daddy” routine. WWE is so targeted on its “moments,” and the moments they’ve visualized, and so they have the right automobile in Rhodes who can also be solely involved with moments with none of the scaffolding underneath them to make them really matter, that it might’t see when it has a greater one with a superior basis to it staring it within the face.
WWE will say giving Zayn this type of match in Montreal is best than having him main-event Mania. Horseshit. Zayn is so proficient and so cherished that he may flip any enviornment or stadium into Montreal behind him. They’ll say he’ll come out an even bigger star after this and a predominant occasion participant for a protracted whereas now. Possibly, he’s that good, however who else has that labored out for? The place are any of Reigns’s earlier feuds now? Danielson is in one other firm, McIntyre is within the Intercontinental scene, Types is on hiatus, Owens bounces out and in of the primary occasion scene. Rollins is having to place up with Logan Paul now after having spent months utilizing his appreciable skills to make Austin Concept look in any means viable.
Certain, there are a couple of methods they might go to save lots of this. Add Sami to the Rhodes-Reigns match. Have him intrude. Fuck, have him flip again to fuck over Rhodes (the least possible however something that screws Cody!). However they gained’t do any of it. As a result of sufficient folks imagine within the “let’s see the place they go together with it” that they’ll simply maintain seeing despite the fact that it by no means ends, it by no means pays off.
WWE acquired again to the quintessential wrestling story final night time, however that story at all times ends with the face overcoming the heel. That’s the deal. You make investments folks into his journey and his chase and his problem, after which at some point all of it comes collectively for the catharsis. There couldn’t have been an even bigger catharsis than Sami in Montreal. WWE forgot, or willfully ignored, rule one. Additional proof they don’t care what the followers need, they solely care what they need. Which doesn’t make it storytelling in any respect.
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