It was an action packed post-Elimination Chamber Raw with three huge returns.
Hulk Hogan returns.
There wasn’t much to Hogan’s return. He was there to announce his return and hosting gig at WrestleMania 30 and to also make fans aware of the WWE Network, though he screwed up the promo initially and called it the WWE Universe. He quickly righted his wrong, but it made him seem a bit out of touch.
And unless you watched the WWE Network postgame show, that’s really all you would’ve seen of Hulk Hogan.
Brock Lesnar vs. The Undertaker is set.
In the main event segment, Brock Lesnar and Paul Heyman came out. Heyman was bothered that Lesnar wasn’t given a title shot. Paul blamed the Authority for holding Brock back. The Authority gave him an open contract to face anyone else in the company at WrestleMania. That’s when the Undertaker’s dong went off and he walked out.
Lesnar didn’t seem to understand why Taker was coming, though made a pretty funny face when he realized Taker was coming for him. Heyman gave Brock the pen to sign the open contract and then they tried to get Taker to sign it too. Taker stabbed Lesnar’s hand with a pen and then chokeslammed him through the table as the show went off the air.
Daniel Bryan wants Triple H at WrestleMania
This was weird. Triple H and Stephanie were interviewed on the WWE App about the launch of the Network. Daniel Bryan screamed at Triple H for constantly being screwed. Triple H laughed at him and then went back to the A+ player stuff. Considering he was saying just a few weeks ago that Bryan could be the face of the company, this seemed disjointed. Bryan wants Triple H at WrestleMania. Triple H laughed at him. Steph said that Bryan had to face Kane (which was already announced before we saw the segment).
Bryan beat Kane fairly impressively with the knee. He then called out Triple H again after the match.
I don’t like that Bryan has to do the little angry man routine and that Triple H is treating him like a vanilla midget, but I guess it’s the payoff that matters.
The Wyatt Family jumps John Cena.
Cena was out at the top of the second hour to discuss the Wyatts. Cena is positioning himself these days as more of a gatekeeper or the established guy the newcomers have to go through. It’s an interesting position because he’s admitting to being the longstanding veteran. I like the idea for him.
The Wyatts want to change the current era and jumped him, hurting his knee in the process. Cena left in an ambulance.
So far, they’ve done an excellent job creating a program that didn’t look to be all that exciting in the beginning.
Roman Reigns vs. Bray Wyatt
It was the last match on the show, but I think they should’ve held this off for next week so they could’ve given it a one week build. Their match the night before was super hot and this match didn’t have any heat at all.
Before the match, Seth Rollins and Reigns interrogated Dean Ambrose for going missing at the end of their match at Elimination Chamber.
Bray won by DQ. Rowan and Harper came out during the match, but Rollins matched them and kept them outside with a dive. Then Ambrose came into the ring and attacked Bray, causing the DQ. The two teams faced off again and the Shield ran them off.
Other tidbits
– Batista lost to Alberto Del Rio after Randy Orton came out and Batista was rolled out. Orton acknowledged that Batista was being booed and Batista said it was fine that they wanted to boo. He was just being real. No matter what, he said he’s still going to beat Orton for the strap and the fans will have to deal with it.
– Big E beat Cesaro by DQ when Jack Swagger interfered. It was a fine finish until they repeated it with the Shield later in the show.
– Sheamus beat Christian.
– Emma beat Summer Rae with her Emma Lock. I feel like they are sabotaging her by placing her with Santino and also having her do her goofy schtick without it being introduced. But I have a weird feeling she’ll still get over; just more slowly.
– The Usos beat the New Age Outlaws in a match that seemed quick because of time. Road Dog tried to do his introductory spiel after the match started and he was superkicked and big splashed to lose in less than a minute in a non-title match.
It was a very fun show, but I’m surprised there wasn’t a cliff hanger segment after Raw was over that was shown on the Network. Maybe they save that for next week.
The crowd really shit on this show. I like that they booked Big E vs Cesaro and Roman Reigns vs Bray Wyatt here. It made those four guys seem like the future of the WWE. It just sucks that the crowd was so grumpy. I hope this isn’t what it’s like at Wrestlemania.
Do you think they were grumpy or just tired? They seemed exhausted at the end of the show.