Welcome to Sunday Afternoon Smackdown!  Since nothing happened on February 10th edition, I decided to hold off and include the next episode as well as some TNA fun as well.  However this will not include the latest episode of Impact because, well, I don’t want to hurt you like that.  

Sunday Afternoon Smackdown Twists your Fate in our traditional WOO! vs BOO! format.  Everything WOO! was better than Bully Ray’s calves.  Everything BOO! deserves to be breathed on heavily as well as drooled upon by The Big Show.

WOO!

THE EXECUTIVE VICE PRESIDENT OF TALENT RELATIONS AND THE INTERIM GENERAL MANAGER OF RAW MAKING APPEARENCES ON FRIDAY NIGHT SMACKDOWN

Having Mister Excitement on the phone for Smackdown was brilliant.  Somehow, his voice sounds even better over the phone.  WWE.com could make a killing selling Johnny Ace recording personalized outgoing messages for people.  Just 5 minutes of boring before the beep. 

Then he shows up again next week, bringing Otunga’s Thermos with him and shows Teddy Long how a real general manager works.  You never see people destroying Mr. Laurinaitis’ office, do you?  You never see him getting run over in videogames, do you?  I didn’t think so.

RANDY ORTON: MAKING PEACE WITH THE INTERNET

Randy Orton used to be loved by the internet back when he was a terrible shitty wrestler.  It was pretty much based on three things: 1) cutters are cool, 2) large gesturing taunts are cool 3)getting thrown in thumbtacks is cool.  Then he started winning matches and everybody got super jaded about him.  In the last year or so, Randy has been having good to great matches with internet darlings like Christian, The Artist Formally Known As CM Punk and now Daniel Brian Danielson Bryantson.  Their match on Smackdown was certainly an example of that. 

And sure, it looked like Danielson was really pulling his punches in that match, and understandably so because Randy Orton was born with glass bones and paper skin.  But Randy actually let Danielson look like  a legitimate contender.  Even being dominated in certain parts, which makes perfect sense if it was their first match.  Then the toss to the apron into the DDT was smart, instead of having the dude just wait out there for an eon, and finally Randy attacks Big Show by jumping a table like Randy Savage while Danielson lays in the ring dead like Ric Flair.  Everything worked, and now with Randy being taken out of the match, I only want to see them wrestle again that much more.

THREE WORDS: “CALVES AND ABS”

TNA, be smart and put that on a shirt.  Bully Ray and Bobby Roode are far and away the two best things in TNA right now, and putting them together, even for such a brief time, is something I will always cherish, like Bully cherishes his calves.  Everything about them.  From Roode screwing Bully time and time again, only to try to reform the alliance with promises of title shots, to Roode slapping Bully on the chest lightly saying “you follow my lead okay?” only to have the Bully responds with slightly harder chest slaps saying “stop hitting me”.  Natural villainous chemistry, and I hope they are given a lot more time to screw each other over. 

“Brothers don’t shake hands, brothers gotta hug”—Bobby Roode

SAMOA JOE: CHAMPION

Our boy has gold again!  After Magnus cut a pretty good promo about England on Impact, and weeks of Joe and Magnus trying to look legitimate over the dual brick shit houses, it is really great to finally be rewarded and see something kind of new happen in the tag scene in TNA that isn’t racist or Shannon Moore.  Between that and the X Division matches kicking ass, there was actually a fair amount to like on Against All Odds.  Except Gunner.

A TNA MAIN EVENT TO LIKE

I know, it’s insane.  But TNA actually put on a compelling main event match.  Bully Ray abstaining for the first portion while the good guys gave us catharsis at the expense of Roode was nothing but logical.  The teased Beer Money taunt, Bully Ray popping up from Hardy’s messed up Twist of Fate Stunner like he was the reincarnation of Scott Fucking Hall, (don’t email me saying Scott Hall is alive, we both know that’s barely true). 

And then finally, Roode  got under Sting’s skin.  He made Sting lose control.  Anytime anyone gets spit on in wrestling, I love it.  And while it was sort of telegraphed with Hardy stumbling in the background briefly, it was still cool.  And the placement was perfect, where Sting couldn’t see Storm getting to his feet in the back ground, and screaming at Jeff to get up.  I thought it was going to be Business As Usual after the ref got bumped twice, but then Sting had to have his moral crisis and it was actually really compelling.  Certainly more compelling than whatever Champ vs Authority Figure they have over in the WWE right now.  Sting made a mistake unintentionally and couldn’t do the wrong thing intentionally.  It was the perfect tone to strike for a clusterfuck TNA ending.  And sure, it could all end in Hardy winning the title at Victory Road where he stumbled through all of his 30 second match just a year before, but still.

Honorable mention: AJ Styles travels with a Nintendo 3DS

I guess Steiner’s taunts about AJ sleeping in a race car bed with Winnie the Pooh sheets actually held some water.  He plays Zelda to get over the hurt of Kaz and beats the hell out of his kids in Mario Kart.

BOO!

SHEAMUS: IN GENERAL

I can’t remember the last time I forgot somebody won the Royal Rumble within a month.  How am I supposed to remember?  He comes into the Rumble with only months of beating up Muhammad Hassan and his only narrative in the match is “OYM GONNA WIN THE ROYAL RUMBLE…MATCH”, which is a far cry from the Ric Flairs and Shawn Michaelses before him.  Then he wins it, and all he does after is say “OY WON THE ROYAL RUMBLE…MATCH!” and goes back to beating up dudes like he’s the general manager’s hired gun. 

Not to mention his Great Shite shirt makes me uncomfortable, aside from it being washed out and terrible.

Then he cuts this promo, which I guess is supposed to be his Hate Me Now thing.  Is it just me, or does it seem like Sheamus learned a fair amount of his moveset from beating up his childhood bullies?  Also, was it JBL that told him his skin was too pale?  Did they haze him?  Did Bradshaw hog tie him in the shower and let Randy Orton rub tanning oil all over him?  I hope we get all these answers and more in his autobiography It’s Not Easy Being White…It’s Not Easy Being Red.

TED DIBIASE IS A CLASSIST JERK

Seriously, if he would have just gotten over his hate for his gardeners, we wouldn’t have to watch the same kind of boring match every week.  All bullies really just want to be loved and accepted, not beaten up and made to look like fools covered in silly string, (or poop if you’re bullying DX or Eddie Guerrero).

On a side note, Ted wears his tights way too tightly.  I can see his bank rolls.

But bless Hunico for trying to turn shit into Shinola.  He came in as Earth 3 Sin Cara and now is trying to tell Ted that he has an evil plan to ruin his bbqs by breaking his wrist.  “NO MORE BURGER FLIPPIN FOR YOU ESE, YOU’LL NEVER BE ABLE TO HOLD SOLID FOOD AGAIN”

ERIC BISCHOFF IS STILL NOT IN THE ELIMINATION CHAMBER VIDEOS

This has been bothering me for awhile, and is almost as big a travesty as nixing “THE WORLD IS WATHCHING” and trying to retcon Jim Ross out of continuity. 

But seriously, the soundbyte of him saying “THE ELIMINATION CHAYMBURRRRR” has to be in the top ten best things that Easy E ever did.  Right before getting on his knees to propose to Hulk Hogan and right after getting on his knees to blow Hulk Hogan.

SPEAKING OF HULK HOGAN: HULK HOGAN SPEAKING

I’m only going to provide a part of the exhaustion infused quote that Hogan gave during one of the U.K. events.

“If I gotta be the hood ornament that you put on front of the ship to bust through the ice cubes, to see through the fog, to feel through the darkness of the night.  I can be the guy because I smell the greatness already.  And if they don’t smell it, I’m going to take everybody in TNA and stuff their heads in it because greatness is their destiny.”

I expect Garrett Bischoff to have the Hall of Fame ring by this summer.  I guess that’s what “Hulkamania stroke” really is: lateral nepotism.  Or at least that’s what it will be until Hogan has his first stroke.  Damn that Jeff Jarrett!  New Blood 4 Life!

By the way, who is even in Immortal now?  Horrace Hogan?

JEFF HARDY IS CLEARLY STILL ON DRUGS

There is no way a person can possibly be this delusional.  How can he stand there with his Worst Birthday Ever facepaint and say that the odds are always against him?

I don’t even have to say it do I?  On no less than 3 separate occasions have you been on a meteoric path of stardom, chance after chance to “GO FOR THE GOLD KID” and “MAKE YOURSELF FAMOUS” and you squandered it to smoke and make horrible videos with your Never Was brother. 

Also, stop calling your fans enigmas, I know exactly who they are, from their kid size chewing tobacco to their hot topic rewards cards.

WWE’S OBSESSION WITH SMELL

Natalya cost herself a match last Friday because she apparently farted in the ring and the ref couldn’t make the count because his eyes were screaming or something.  Just when I thought we were past this.  What is with the writers these days, it’s all bad breath and bad farts and lawyer stink. 

TEDDY LONG IS A RACIST, DREW MAC GOT SCREWED, AND SOMEBODY SHOULD START A PETITION TO SUSPEND BIG SHOW

So let me get this straight:

Mark Henry is taken out of the Chamber match because he wrinkled Teddy Long’s tie, and then is replaced with The Great Kahli off screen because they have to keep up a weight/chamber ratio, then Randy Orton gets taken out because he’s FRAGILE, so they need a replacement, then Mark Henry shows up despite being suspended indefinitely, so Big Show kills him after killing Kahli and destroys Teddy’s office and somehow DOESN’T get suspended OR taken out of the chamber, so then they have a battle royal featuring the J.O.B. Squad and Mark Henry is still not in it, I guess because he’s seeing little Big Shows flying around his head.   They eliminate Drew Mac and David Otunga, the only two people who could go into the chamber with some semblance of a story and put Santino in it, who has only been jobbing to farts in the last few weeks, am I getting this?  Am I understanding this correctly?

I just don’t see how this isn’t the worst chamber match ever.  That is, unless the Cobra gets caught in the chains while Daniel and Cody take turns kicking Santino in the kidneys until he vomits on the front row.

Honorable Mention: Wade Barrett’s music sucks because it sounds like the first song some garage band wrote, and then they got big somehow and decided to give it a proper recording because their girlfriends liked it.

Logan Stallings (also known as Garcian Smith) is a Psychology student at the University of Florida.  He’s working on an English minor.  In his spare time he likes writing prose and poetry, as well as fantasizing about wrestling Chris Jericho and stealing all of Raven’s gimmicks.

Welcome to Sunday Afternoon Smackdown on Sunday After Friday!  It’s our two week anniversary, and like a psychotic romantic partner, I ask you where is my present? Say you love me!

Sunday Afternoon Smackdown downs the smack in our trademark WOO! vs BOO! format.  Everything “WOO!” made me hear voices in my head in the voice of Ric Flair, while everything “BOO!” filled my head with the sound of WRESTLER DELETED reciting poetry to Raven.  

WOO!

SHEAMUS EXERCISES HIS BULLY DEMONS/THE NEAR ASSASSINATION OF THEODORE LONG BY THE COWARD MARK HENRY

Bully demons is a fun concept all on it’s own.  It sounds like what Kane would be if he stalked Zack Ryder to stuff him into various lockers instead of trying to fist his mouth.

Sheamus certainly has a score to settle with Mark Henry, and like Triple H before him, he wrapped up months of history with one finisher. He didn’t talk too much, he didn’t break out a bunch of green blarney stones, he just kicked that dude in the face.  Those are the best Sheamus moments. When I saw Sheamus kick Lucky Cannon in the face.  When he kicked John Cena in the face.  When he kicked Hornswoggle in the face.  

My only regret is that Mark Henry didn’t eat Teddy right there in the ring.  Seriously, it needed to rain pain.  Not only can he not understand mathematics, keeping him on par with Scott Steiner, but he’s out of the Elimination Chamber!  

Sheamus looks like a beast right now.  Henry exploded on that kick, I thought stuffing was going to burst from his face.  

Stuffing is blood in the PGverse.

So who is going to be in the Chamber Match now?  The Great Kahli.  That’s the best Smackdown can do right now.  Seriously.  The next guy on the rung would be Ted DiBiase.  Can Christian come back from injury and take his spot please?  ONE MORE MATCH!

I had to take a look at the roster pages to make sure I was right on about the problem on Smackdown.  Also, looking at RAW, it seems we’re still paying Mason Ryan money.  He should really be moved to Smackdown to confuse Booker T.  Or maybe…ugh, you know, it’s easier to just say Mason Ryan sucks.

In all seriousness, Sheamus is going to have to become an actually interesting and likable character outside of bicycle kicks and lifting Finlay’s moveset, (celtic cross now!), because I just watched Edge/Jericho Mania 26 again, and there aren’t many ways to build a good program around a finishing move.

Also, I’m pretty sure most people don’t know what Brogue means.

TEDDY LONG DOESN’T WATCH HIS OWN SHOW

This is a minor WOO! for Teddy, because he mentioned to Drew Mac that predictable television is no good.

I feel like this is a low hanging fruit, but I’ll take a shot anyway.  Let’s try to work through all the predictable things in WWE right now and maybe we’ll have a clear understanding of how The Character Teddy Long feels about WWE TV.

• John Cena: Winning
• (4 Superstars + Opening Segment) X Teddy Long = TAG MATCH PLAYA
• KEVIN NASH is going to EXPLAIN HIS ACTIONS and BE OLD and TAKE THE PROGRAM NOWHERE
• People wrestling
• YOU PEOPLE
• Longest Running Weekly Episodic
• Something racist
• Something sexist
• Sugar
• Spice
• Everything Nice
• These are the ingredients to create the perfect little girls

Seriously, you can make a bingo board.  It gets so repetitive, it tampers with your memory.  2002/2003, in my head, feels like Groundhog Day, where I wake up every day expecting Triple H to lose the title only to see that he’s in the ring again talking about his dick and genes for thirty minutes.

EPICO Y PRIMO LLEVAN PONCHOS

Those ponchos are awesome.  Like, not really, because they have their names in Bad Tattoo Font, but the fact that they would rather people see their names and merch over those science museum souvenir belts says a lot for their characters.  Which is great, they should do more things like that, because their spokesperson is Rosa Mendes, who can’t say anything.  I mean, her hips always tell the truth, but it’s nothing I can understand.

Also, that backstabber variant is sick.  I really hope Primo has a nice, tidy little career.  And you know, doesn’t get on drugs or hire a guy to stab John Cena.  

Also, Rosa should blow more kisses.  In a Maryse-free world, I am missing the one taunt that causes me to say uncomfortably perverted things outloud to people reading me on the internet.

BIG IS A FAILURE WHO RAN OVER DANIELSON’S MEAT FLAVORED GIRLFRIEND

It’s really hard to do SD reviews because nothing happens.  You can literally never watch Smackdown ever and never miss anything except Randy Orton doing jumping splits and making weirder faces than Hacksaw Jim Duggan, and if you’re on tumblr you don’t even miss that.  Cody Rhodes and Wade Barrett are spinning wheels and everyone else is just sort of punching each other.

So in a world of nothing, Daniel Bryan has finally made himself out to be a something.  He makes Smackdown, at least his parts, must see TV.  And sure, nothing is still happening, but it’s like Austin Aries on WCW Thunder, he just says amazing things and then has a great match sometimes.  Danielson has been so on fire that for once his wrestling is secondary.  He’s almost at a point now where if he wanted to, he could just get beat up the whole match like a Flair/Hennig fusion monster and not lose a step.  He just keeps poking the bear, he knows he’s right, and he doesn’t care what happens to him as long as he has the strap.  

The other best part is that Danielson made it more than clear that Big Show is the only person he’s really concerned about right now.   And then, to top it all off, AJ came out.  Now I have this really great feeling that AJ can become Daniel’s villainous hench-wife.  We can dress her up like Talia al Ghul and she can drop kick people in the balls.  

BOO!

IN ADDITION TO BEING BAD AT HIS JOB, BOOKER T IS ALSO SEXIST

I’m tired of all this nonsense about Michael Cole being eliminated “by a girl”.  Kong is a female, yes, but she’s also bigger than most guys.  Bigger than me at least.  She mashes her own potatoes with her fist.  She can stop speeding bullets with a headbutt.  She was in a match a month after giving birth to a baby that will probably be choking snake’s to death in it’s crib like god damn Hercules and all you guys can do is sit behind your desk and go “lol women”.  

Also, major kudos go to Ziggler for making the effort to make everyone look good, including a “Diva”.  Probably because Ziggler does business.  I was going to call him professional, but he models his life after pornstars and makes obnoxious twitter posts.  Still, he never called anybody by any slurs on Twitter like a certain person who is undefeated at WrestleMania.

Not Taker of course.  Taker’s in character twitter feed would probably be a lot of ellipsis.   It will read like the script of a brooding Final Fantasy character.

PHYSICAL COMEDY IS RUINING MY LIFE

I’m not sure why this is happening with Nattie.   It’s telegraphed now.  She says that she feels it in her gut, and then boom.  Fart.  I’m not sure if this is actually a gimmick.  I guess it could be in the same why “eye twitching” and “lisping” and “murdering fetuses” is a gimmick.  You have to understand, I already said that like 4 things happen on Smackdown, and when one of those things is farting, it leaves me with little else to work with.  The RAW review wasn’t up, so I posted unopposed, and I still lose in quality comparison.  

I’m not against physical comedy, but there is no precedent in the character or appearance of Nattie for it to be happening.  Chris Farley was fat and oafish, so he would fall on tables.  Unless I’m missing something about Nattie’s connection to her father, there is no reason we should be having 90 second diva matches, farting capable wrestlers and women who think it’s cool to wear a whole fox carcass on their head.

This is the Special 1^st Edition Edition with Holofoil  FairToFlair Trading Card featuring Mitch and KSP riding a Pikachu themed roller coaster together.

This feature will normally appear on Sundays.

Sunday Night Smackdown smacks you down in our trademark WOO! Vs BOO! format.  Everything “WOO!” was froot and reeked of awesomeness, while everything “BOO!” was teamed up with Santino to do racial humor on Martin Luther King Day.

WOO!

NAME DROPPING WHEN IT IS HISTORICALLY RELEVENT

A lot of great things were happening.  Daniel Bryan has been having great appreciation for his girlfriend and Big Show was outed as a sinning freak.  Great things were really happening when Daniel Bryan was smacking The Bully Show in the face with a arguments and philosophy textbook.  He was saying everything short of “you should just kill yourself you big ugly jerk, nobody will go to prom with you” because I guess he has to Be A Star or whatever. 

In the mist of crocodile tears and offhanded references to “genetic freaks”, which could mean The Hulk but I prefer to think of Scott Steiner, Bryan name dropped Andre The Giant.  Now that’s certainly something that Big Show invites as a comparison, because how many other giants are there on the planet Earth?   There have to be more than there are Funkasauruses.  Bryan told Big Show to his face that he will never be Andre.  Which is a fair thing to say.

1. Big Show and Andre the Giant are different people, and can’t be the same person until science catches up with our language.
2. Andre only needed to be in one really good movie to be remembered fondly by the whole world, where as only a few people on tumblr and whatever fans 10 years from now who were young now and like to blog about nostalgia on whatever site they’ll have then about the really tall guy that went poo poo on da bus. 
3. Andre transcended championships.

It’s that last one that is the most important for Daniel’s character arch.  When Andre won the WWE championship, he pawned it off to The Million Dollar Man in like 6 seconds like it was Ric Flair’s Hall of Fame watch.  He didn’t need it.  It wouldn’t fit, it was a trinket and he just liked beating up people and grinding their bones to make his bread. 

Daniel Bryan clearly doesn’t subscribe to this idea.  Neither does Henry.  Neither does Show.  They all need that big gold hunk of implied intrinsic value in order to validate all of the torment they’ve put themselves through.  Yes, I am equating Daniel Bryan losing most of the vision in his eye to Mark Henry having to cover Mae Young’s fake deflated-blimp boobs.  They all did what they had to do and no struggle is any more valid than the other.  The Big Show of course double teamed Hogan with a mummy while Jimmy Heart acted as the voyeur. They aren’t like Andre, they need this belt.

It’s a cleaver way to get us to associate Bryan with guys like Show and Henry.  Clearly the belt isn’t enough because it still has lingering Swagger stink on it, but now he seems like them in motive.  Daniel Bryan isn’t like Andre because he wasn’t given the same gifts.  Big Show has some of those gifts, but squanders them to high five The WWE Universe and kill 95 pound girls. 

Honorable Mention: Mark Henry going full Scorpion and barking at Daniel Bryan to “GET OVER HERE”.  How in the hell is Mark Henry the strongest actor on the roster right now?  He’s so fleshed out, especially last week when he was getting upset over silly things in wrestling despite being a silly thing in wrestling.

GOOD MATCHES ON TELEVISION FOR YOU

Smackdown has a bad habit of being on Fridays, (it’s like, every week or something with these guys) so I generally have to watch it later.  Despite being someone who writes about wrestling, I actually have a pretty full life, (how do ya like thatLawlernerds, huh? ) so I have to watch it later.  This affords me the luxury of having the option to fast forward or skip things all together if it’s too much farting and RAW rebounds.  It’s nice not to move up to 1.5 speed because I actually sort of like what’s happening in the ring.

Specifically, Justin Gabriel and Cody Rhodes having a fun few minutes of jumping and rolling.  It was great, somebody would roll, then somebody would jump.   It was like Mario and the barrels in Donkey Kong manifested their properties into people, which is oddly appropriate because the beginning of Justin Gabriel’s theme sounds like a menu screen in Ape Escape.  I’m not really a fan of J-Gabe outside of That One Match He Had With John Cena, but I have been missing a time when Smackdown was a strong wrestling show in lieu of RAW trying to shove all these verbal narratives down our throats, or alternatively up our (candy/monkey) asses if the Rock is there.

They bounced around, Justin made one mistake and it was in line with Justin being over eager and a risk taker to Cody’s calculating serial killer style, eventually leading Cody to say “Aww Funk It” and leave Justin at the crossroads.  Bonus WOO! For the way Cody backs off his opponents almost immediately as if he can’t stand to touch them for more than the 3 seconds he’s pinning them for.  I can’t say I blame him, Justin looks like a goof in those Kid Icarus boots he was wearing.

As much fun as I had with that match, I still would love to see these two in a Vegas Showgirls Match.

THE UNEARTHING OF THE FUNKASAURUS HAS BROUGHT OUT THE REST OF EARTH 2

Brodus Clay sheeplexing WWE’s C-Team has been a great way to remind us that these people are still employed.  Sure, we have to deal with seeing Alex Riley’s goofy living-in-the-past-erman jacket, but we also got to see Yoshi Tatsu come out and cut people in half with his hands.  Sure, he was sans Kabuki and risks becoming a permanent half of Racial Team 2k12 ver 1.0, but he’s still better than Koslov.  His chops sound like shotgun blasts.  He hands are scaled down Kenta Kobashis.   And yeah, Trent Barreta had to deal with Randy Orton working through his backed up of voices, but we still see them, and maybe, just maybe it will lead to Drew McIntyre winning a freaking match.  Speaking of which.

BOO!

LET DREW MAC HAVE ONE

Okay, well, we’ve been doing this for awhile now.  Drew MacIntyre is wrestling every week, Randy Orton doesn’t even do that, and at this point it just seems like Terry Long is still mad about Drew running his MLK picture party.

Think about it.  Drew takes one for the team, he stays down for the cobra, when did we stop living in the world of “Pin Me Pay Me?”  What about all those goofs that Randy Orton Randall Keith Orton’d in the ring.  How does he afford those guys?  Do they get paid in Fleer trading cards? 

And then you put him against Sheamus?  Why?  So I can be reminded how much better these guys deserve?  Sheamus has almost completely assimilated Fit Finlay’s moveset and is one Actual Celtic Cross away from pile driving Regal on top of a car.

And how does it make sense for Teddy to care anyway?  Does he know that everyone can’t be winners all the time?  That was the hardest part of GM Mode in SvR, making sure everyone was happy and didn’t have broken necks and stuff.    If Drew’s stock lowers, doesn’t somebody else’s rise?  KSP and I still want to believe that wrestlers that win matches get a sack of money from Mr. McMahon, complete with hokey dollar sign on the bag.

What is Drew even worried about?  Do “Cena Things” not happen on Smackdown?   Can people not just pull an Office Space and show up for work anyway and still get paid? 

I hope this leads to Drew Being Something and doesn’t backfire on him.  If he goes psycho killer with an ax Braveheart on everybody, then great, I take it back, but I feel like we’re on a one way path to Christian Cry Baby jobber.  WWE doesn’t do losing streak stories differently too often.

Also, why laugh at his job being in jeopardy Booker?  This guy has rent to pay.  Speaking of Booker.

BOOKER T’S COMMENTARY DAWG RIGHT THERE MAN YEAH BABY

Booker T gave me one good moment where he repeated Batista’s name in a way that made me wonder if he still thought Batista was down. 

And does Booker not understand basic merit based contendership?  He seemed so shocked and appalled that Cody doesn’t just hand out title shots.  The guy wrestles every week, he can’t go full 100% every week, that’s insanity and it’s how you get injuries in real sports. 

Is he still trapped mentally in WCW?  You either just demanded a title shot from The Powers That Be and got it, but it might have been the 3^rd match for that particular title that night, or you have to beat Miss Elizabeth multiple times in a 67 person tournament that will be invalidated by a title vacation the next night anyway.

Also, it’s not a pterodactyl.  Pick up a children’s book.

HAW HAW WHO FARTED WAS THAT AKSANA’S SAX?

Seriously, why did Nattie have to fart in a way that nobody does?  What does that add to her character?  Are we going to make fun of her now?  Will she see the error of her bully ways and start crying when we call her terrible names?  Here are a few for reference.

• Nattie Neidfart

That’s all you need.

At least Santino isn’t a hypocrite who wont sell smell when he expect others to sell getting touched in the throat by his fingertips +/- sock snake.

JOHN CENA IS GOING TO ROCK YOUR ROCKS OFF

This has gone too far.

Honorable Mention: Michael Cole said “Shiggy Diggy Wiggy”.  God, it’s like when your parents pretend to like Pokémon.

Logan Stallings (better known by his ring name, Garcian Smith) is a psych student at the University of Florida who has dreams of writing, wrestling and writing about wrestling. In his spare time, he performs spoken word and catches Pokémon.

This Raw review comes to you in our trademark WOO! vs. BOO! format. Everything “WOO!” was awesome, while everything “BOO!” was hit in the knee with a lead pipe, carted out of the arena, and continuously carted through big, swinging double-doors that say “TNA”. I also picture the EMTs that carted him through the doors to come back through dusting their hands off enthusiastically. 

WOO!

RODDY PIPER IS JOHN CENA’S SPLINTER

I love that once a year, Roddy Piper has to come and literally slap some sense into John Cena. 

Last year, right around this time, Piper showed up and essentially shook John Cena until he finally displayed an emotion other than “lofl”. This year (er, yesterday), he conducted a pro wrestler litmus test on Cena and managed to draw both a white hot reaction from the crowd and an emotional, real promo out of Cena, which almost… almost blew the John Cena character wide open. 

Roddy Piper seems to be the only person who can tap into John Cena and bring out the best in him. He offers wisdom on the psyche of a pro wrestler (“when you cheered me I did good things, when you booed me I did bad things”). When he talks, people shut up, take a knee and listen. He sees the good in bad people and the flaws in good people. He likes pizza (I assume). He can make a funny. He’s John Cena’s Splinter.

John Cena wants to impress Piper. He wants to prove to him that he can figure shit out on his own and go all Raphael through the Foot on a rooftop without the help of a super-powered Hall Of Fame ring (I wonder if because Hogan’s ring gave Abyss “Hogan-powers” and he had the red and yellow and Abyssamania [actual word said by Hulk Hogan], then if Cena used Piper’s ring, he’d get “Piper-powers” and start being funny for real and not win any more World Titles and wear a kilt so The Rock could show up and go “HAHA GAY” and pass out laughing because John Cena is in a dress and that is like catnip for Rocky).

Just like Splinter teaching the Turtles how the real world won’t understand or accept them, Piper is trying to teach Cena to deal with the fans that boo him so when he shows up at WrestleMania, expecting to win, but he loses and everyone cheers, he doesn’t have a nervous breakdown. Piper is trying to turn Cena. 

WWE.com is trying to turn Cena. The Rock is trying to turn Cena. It seems that everyone is trying to get John Cena to freak the fuck out and start chucking people through barber shop windows and legdrop Randy Savage and blow smoke over John Morrison’s sparkly abs, but, as David Shoemaker and Brandon Stroud have been saying all along, he’s already heel. Turning him heel would only turn him face. 

The John Cena character can’t change. Everything around him can, because there will always be a million ways to orchestrate both a scenario where he’s booed out of the building (i.e. Punk, Rock, ECW, etc.), and a scenario where he assembles a team of SuperFriends to take out the Nexus and get cheers that bring the building down. Y’know?

That said, I’d still like to see John Cena tell The Rock he hates his fucking guts and then kick him in the dick.

DOLPH ZIGGLER DEF. RANDY ORTON (FT. WADE BARRETT DEF. COMMENTARY)

I think the best example of Ziggler’s new “show off” gimmick would be a weekly series called “What Can Dolph Ziggler Get A Good Match Out Of” where he wrestles different people and objects that you expect him to not be able to even wrestle, let alone get a passable match out of, but he blows everyone away when he DDTs himself and takes a nearfall from a porcelain birdbath.

This match was great. Maybe not quite as good as their last one on Raw, but still great. It was also aided by Vickie Guerrero yelling “FINISH HIM C’MON FINISH HIIIIM” from the VERY BEGINNING of the match. I love the idea that Vickie has no understanding of what goes into a wrestling match and right from the bell she’s just all “FUCKING KILL HIM ALREADY, GOD-UHHHHH”. 

I can’t remember the last bad Dolph Ziggler match I saw. All the way back to his first match as Ziggler vs. Batista was awesome. Now he’s to the point where he’s wrestling two matches every Pay-Per-View and doing headstands after beating Randy Orton. I can’t wait for the day where he spins The Undertaker on his finger and 360 dunks off a step ladder.

Side note: Wade Barrett on commentary looked and sounded as sharp as Mason Ryan’s nipples. 

DANIEL BRYAN KICKED MARK HENRY’S LEG OUT OF HIS LEG

Michael Cole brings out the best in Daniel Bryan. He’s like his Splinter.

Aside from the weak “we want Big Show” chant that made me want to heel hook my TV, this was a star-making promo from Bryan. Cole was an insufferable douche, which turned Bryan into a man of bearded conviction, which brought out Mark Henry (who is, to remind you, “half-way injured”) to get kicked in the leg.

I don’t expect Danielson to win the belt tonight. And if Mark Henry isn’t going to take the belt all the way to WrestleMania to defend it against Bryan, I could get behind him cashing in on Big Show at TLC, and turning “I’ve got ‘til 5” heel as champion.

Honourable Mention: Punk vs. Del Rio (a.k.a. wrestling, a.k.a. this is the kind of Raw people beg for after a Raw that is 97% shenanigans, a.k.a. even with Punk being wacky and saying “ass” and referencing Google searches [which incidentally brought me to a video titled “Del Rio Is A Boring Cunt”], the match itself was still great).

BOO!

THERE’S ONLY ROOM FOR ONE JOHN

There really wasn’t too much to not like about John Morrison’s send off.

He got his leg lead piped out of his leg. He was staying gangster and stunting with Alex Riley before the match. He did that thing where he wrestles like his Pajama Jeans are too tight. He was killed off and I’m pretty sure John Laurinaitis came out for a “Future Endeavoured” Ron Simmons “DAMN” type punchline while he was on the stretcher (it’d be pretty great if he kept doing that anytime someone was about to get fired - he comes out, gives a derpy look of disapproval, and buries himself in his Blackberry until JTG gets wheeled away).

But for some reason, I’m still not sold on angry, solemnly Awesome Miz. He’s been reestablishing himself for the better part of this year with IMPACTS and STATEMENTS and IMPACTFUL STATEMENTS and STATED IMPACTS and I just miss the The Miz that had more charisma than that.

CAN I BORROW SOMEONE’S DIVAS SIGN LANGUAGE DICTIONARY

Every Divas match starts with a sign language mini-game that someone needs to subtitle. I get the Bellas calling their opponents “losers” by making an L out of their fingers and putting it on their head (that’s Divas Signing 101), but can someone decode Alicia Fox’s hand jive from last night? Even Natalya’s convoluted three-step YOU’RE GONNA CRY KELLY hand signals make some semblance of sense, but I think Alicia Fox was going off script there. Then again, pro wrestling signing typically doesn’t get more complicated than “YOU. ME. TEAM? BIG NOD” so I’m not exactly fluent.

THAT’S GOTTA BE (A CRAPPY) KANE (RETURN VIDEO)

It is crazy to me that a guy like Kane, who has tons of built-in story and imagery and fire and death and brother murder and hell and brimstone and biblical fucking shit can’t even get a good comeback video. Instead of using anything even remotely cool or creative, they decided to give Kane an HPV awareness commercial return video.

While I’m talking about video packages, I want someone to a/b that Sheamus video from last night where he was all “I’m a good lad! I like having a bit of fun I’m a nice guy!” with anything from two years ago where Michael Cole couldn’t stop yelling about how much Sheamus just loved to hurt people and how he’s a crazy Mark-Cuban-murdering asshole.

Honourable Mention: I think Jack Swagger tripped over his gigantic tongue.

Or something. I don’t know what the hayell happened right there. I think it’s karma for him abandoning his eye twitch.

Mitch is a regular contributor to Fair to Flair and the founder of PIZZABODYSLAM. He is also on Twitter, where he talks about how he watches and writes about and thinks about wrestling all-day everyday. He is also a grown-up.

Edited by K Sawyer Paul.

After fifteen years of floundering, failure, and general misuse, Mark Henry has found the pair of boots that he was destined to fill all along. He’s the monster.¹ He’s the monster because he did what other monsters have only talked about and got rid of the other monsters. He took out Big Show. He destroyed Kane. He splattered Sheamus across steal steps. For once, Mark Henry is special for the right reasons, and not just another pawn used by general managers to give people a surprise tough-guy opponent. Now he has the Big Gold Belt, which as Flair would say, makes him The Man.

Mark Henry was always the guy who was supposed to just rip the door to success of its hinges, but over time he has had trouble with that, (symbolically and literally). For years, he has had a song about breaking necks and splitting wigs, but now he’s actually doing it. More importantly, he’s the only guy doing it. He is doing everything short of lighting Jim Ross on fire to finish his monster checklist, and this time it’s actually led somewhere.

He went out and demanded opponents, destroying everybody in his path of any size, until he finally beat the fan favorite and became World Champion. To say that it was a convincing victory would be an understatement. Now, the inhuman beast holds the title and shouts down everyone that dares to even stand next to him.

The feud of Mark Henry and Randy Orton resembles, at least to me, the period where Vader met Sting for the WCW World Championship. It’s not the same belt (okay, it’s sort of the same belt, but that’s needlessly complicated), but it’s a similar story. Randy Orton and Sting both had something that the Monster wanted, and the Monster simply took it and made it look easy. This isn’t like when Kane stole the championship from a downed Rey Mysterio, this isn’t like when The Big Show stole the ECW Championship from a drugged out Rob Van Dam. This isn’t like when Sheamus stole the WWE Championship because John Cena fell on a table. This was Mark Henry blasting a healthy Randy Orton until he couldn’t breathe, beating him, and then threatening to eat the entire audience. That was Big Van Vader.²

One of the first matches Vader and Sting had for the title saw Sting win by disqualification after Vader broke some of his ribs and bruised his internal organs. Mark Henry is a much safer wrestler than Vader—who was famous for legitimately hurting his opponents—but he’s no less vicious-looking, bombing and blasting his opponents so hard that you can’t tell who’s sweat is who’s. He’s doing everything Vader did without breaking anybody’s back.

Randy Orton is effectively Sting, a capable worker with charisma to spare when he wants to display it. Orton has beaten pretty much everybody, and appears to have a firm grasp on the World Championship. He is, for better or worse, the franchise player of Smackdown. He is fresh off a long feud with Christian, who played Randy’s Ric Flair with the amount of times they battled (outside of the fact that Ric got to win a few). But because a champion is only as good as his challengers, he needed something bigger. With Christian and Sheamus having had their turns, the only man left was Mark Henry.

Mark Henry hurts people. That’s his thing. While it does sound like an assumed thing for a wrestler to be about, since hurting people is how you win matches, it’s an element some fans just don’t think about. Through this path of destruction, Henry has left an impression in the faces and minds of his opponents, in the children that watched them decimate groups of men at once, in the eyes of their next victims.

Both men, Henry and Vader, are motivated by educated delusions. Vader was physically vulnerable after a while, so his opponents simply had to wait him out, yet he constantly claimed to feel no pain. Mark Henry feels justifiably betrayed and forgotten by the people in charge, and we see these things because it’s important to remember that he’s a human being. But both men have every reason to believe in the things they believe in.

Randy Orton has two weeks before Hell in a Cell. Sting took entire months to recover, and thus we come to the point where these feuds stop being similar. Henry won’t trade off the belt with Orton, but he also won’t hold it for an entire year. Some people³ are tired of seeing Randy Orton win all the time, because after a while it strains credibility. Randy Orton the wrestler needs a different game plan: he needs to become tougher, smarter. He can’t rely on Mark Henry spring boarding into his RKOs, and the days of jumping splits are long gone. Mark Henry is a serious man that must be taken seriously.

This is the lesson I think WWE wants to convey: if you are big enough and motivated enough, you can do anything you want. It’s the maniacal flip-side of the lesson they teach in elementary school about being whatever you want to be. Mark Henry tosses backstage techs and assaults commentators, and yet he won’t be fired for his actions, unlike his fellow villains Miz and R-Truth. In Henry, we have an unstable man who has finally been poked too hard, and now everybody has to pay. Guys like Mark Henry and Vader make it personal to motivate themselves further.

If Orton is going to overcome 2011’s Mastodon, he has to become more resourceful. To believably defeat Henry, he can’t rely on his current weapons. Sting got a chance slam on Vader when he made just one error⁴. I don’t think he’s got it in him. Mark Henry is going to break him into pieces in the Hell in a Cell.

Logan Stallings, (better known by his ring name, Garcian Smith) is a psych student at the University of Florida who has dreams of writing, wrestling and writing about wrestling. In his spare time, he performs spoken word and catches Pokémon.

Edited by K Sawyer Paul.