By Chris Newth

WWE Friday Night Smackdown
November 30, 2007
Upcoming PPV: Armageddon (third-to-last episode before PPV)

SMACKDOWN STORYLINES AND FEUDS

Welcome to the fourteenth edition of Smackdown Storylines and Feuds.

For those wondering about the Intrigue Level system that I employ, you can refer to the numbers as follows:

10 (excellent), 9 (great), 8-6 (very good, good, pretty good), 5 (decent; has its good and bad qualities), 4-3 (needs work, poor), 2 (bad), 1 (terrible)

This week we are looking for storyline ideas from PWTorch.com readers! If you have an interesting idea to spice up any ongoing WWE feud, let us hear about it. A winner for Raw, ECW, and Smackdown will be chosen, and their idea will be posted on next week's Storylines and Feuds columns. Please be sure to not surpass 600 words (although you can be as brief as you wish).

How would you structure the Ric Flair storyline? How about the Edge-Vickie angle? How could you make the Jericho-Orton feud as exciting as it should be? Let us know. We are accepting emails to newthtorch@hotmail.com until this Friday (for Raw ideas), Saturday (for ECW ideas), and Monday (for Smackdown ideas).

Smackdown in general has vastly improved within the last two weeks with a surge of interest emanating from the Edge-Vickie storyline. The upper-midcard feud between Mysterio and MVP is also carrying some weight, while Jamie Noble provides the light comedy that's akin to that which can be found in Santino's segments on Raw. It's a well-balanced brand with interesting storylines and solid workers.

This week, Smackdown's special guest was none other than the ECW Champion himself, C.M. Punk. His role on this episode was to participate in a matchup against Kenny Dykstra, who had faced Punk on ECW last week. The conclusion of the bout saw Kenny once again fall victim to the Straightedge Superstar's Go 2 Sleep finisher.

Beyond this segment, Smackdown featured many established feuds. Let's start with the main event.

EDGE & Smackdown GM VICKIE GUERRERO vs. World Hvt. Champion BATISTA vs. THE UNDERTAKER (2 weeks)

In what has become the driving force behind the entire brand, the storyline featuring Edge, Vickie Guerrero, The Undertaker, and Batista underwent a steady continuation this week. Edge opened the show with a really strong promo detailing the situation and providing a logical, step-by-step reasoning behind everything that has occurred as of late. That's pretty rare.

Edge began the story back when he was injured (without mentioning Kane by name). He said that he didn't get any letters, emails, phone calls, or text messages from fans while he was recovering. So he almost considered retirement. Then, Vickie Guerrero, looking out for the best interest of her brand, went to talk to Edge. She gave him the attention he wanted, and a relationship began to form. The two eventually fell in love. She even helped him set up an elaborate return at Survivor Series when he dressed as a cameraman and hid beneath the ring so that he could screw up the match finish and take out Undertaker from title contention.

He went on to say that Vickie is watching from her own recovery bed after the cruel Tombstone her neck absorbed last week on Smackdown. He ended by saying that he was going to win the World Heavyweight Championship for both Vickie and himself.

What a great segment! Edge explained everything we needed to know. The series of events within his anecdote were logical and interesting. This is the kind of strong promo that Smackdown has been missing in recent months. With Batista much better with short sound bites and Undertaker having to adhere to the silence of his character, the main event landscape has been woefully in need of a strong talker. Now they've got one.

Vickie's character arc still needs to be mentioned, though. We should be able to find out soon whether one of two things happened. On the one hand, Vickie may have indeed been a good, moral babyface General Manager that fell in love with Edge, becoming infatuated as the months passed.

On the other hand, she may have been a heel in disguise the entire time. Remember that it was months ago that she and Kristal were talking backstage before Kristal started flirting with Teddy Long. It was obvious at that time that Vickie and her friend were up to no good; after all, she was still a heel back then. Later the two began to act like babyfaces so that Teddy would appoint Vickie his assistant. If Kristal never left the company, I'm sure WWE would be replaying old footage of Vickie and Kristal scheming in the back months ago. Perhaps it would have been done in Edge's promo this week. Then again, if Kristal were still there, the storyline would be quite different.

The World Heavyweight Title match was hyped all night. Smackdown, more than any other WWE brand, seems to best piece together recap videos that provide more context for big matchups or events. This week, they showed clips of Edge originally winning the World Title on Smackdown when he cashed in his Money in the Bank briefcase, Edge's victory over Batista via roll-up at Judgment Day, and the Steel Cage Match where Edge beat Batista at One Night Stand. It was a nice little stroll down memory lane since Edge's arrival on the blue brand.

Later in the night, Batista was "interviewed" by Anastacia. On a side note, why don't they allow more of an interview style format for some of these backstage scenes? Basically, the "interviewer" is only allowed to introduce the wrestler for a promo, sometimes managing to recap a little history or ask a question. It would be refreshing to hear a short back-and-forth between the interviewer and the interviewee.

Anyway, Anastacia asked, "How has the fact that you've never beaten Edge in a World Title match affected your preparation for the match this evening?" To which Batista replied, "Honestly, I haven't even thought about it. But I'm not thinking about what I did four or five months ago; I'm thinking about tonight. I'm focused on tonight." That response seemed genuine and logical, yet allowed the philosophy to be up for debate. Nice job.

And then came the World Heavyweight Title match itself, which lasted quite a bit of time, although two commercial breaks seemed to come up very close together, making it difficult to really get into the action. In the end, as Batista and Edge began a finishing sequence, the lights went out to a familiar sound. Undertaker appeared in center ring to seek revenge on Edge for what he did at Survivor Series. The Rated-R Superstar, however, managed to slip out of the ring after getting speared by Batista. In response, Undertaker delivered a surprising Chokeslam to an unsuspecting victim in Batista.

Suddenly, Theodore R. Long's music hit, and he walked up to a prone Edge on the entrance ramp. Smackdown's babyface General Manager used Vickie's exact speech to Edge last week to emphasize his point this week. He granted Edge a rematch for the World Title at Armageddon; however, the match would also include The Deadman. It's a Triple Threat Match for the title.

Teddy Long's return was certainly surprising, but it may have been too early. Edge came in with only one week of being on top in terms of having the advantage. Now Long has returned and has the power to book matches, while Batista and Undertaker both stand in Edge's way of obtaining the World Title. Furthermore, it was a little convenient for Long to have that sheet of paper with Vickie's speech to quote her verbatim; although, if he had planned the situation or knew ahead of time what Undertaker was going to do, then it made sense.

Overall, this feud is heating up nicely. Smackdown's previous main event (featuring Undertaker vs. Batista) topped the last PPV. The addition of Edge only adds more star power to that main event. And as far as the Edge-Vickie storyline goes, some things need to be cleared up because this week—despite having answered many questions—left viewers even more perplexed. Does Vickie Guerrero still hold a General Manager position on Smackdown or was it only supposed to run until Teddy Long returned? Will there be a fight somehow between Long and Vickie where one is deemed the true GM, or will they have to coexist as two bickering authority figures on one show? Hmm, intriguing.

Intrigue Level (out of 10): 9 [up 1.5 from last week]

Previous Feuds
Edge: Batista
Undertaker: Mark Henry, Batista
Batista: Edge, The Great Khali, Undertaker
Vickie Guerrero: n/a

REY MYSTERIO vs. United States Champion MVP (2 weeks)

This week the Mysterio-MVP feud rode alongside the Kane-Big Daddy V rivalry in what became an interesting mid-card Smackdown tag team matchup. The result saw Rey Mysterio land a splash off the top rope following his patented 619 on Montel Vontavious Porter for the team victory.

Since so much storyline development was rolling in the main event feud, it was nice to have the Mysterio-MVP segment rely on nothing but a simple, yet solid wrestling match. And the combination of this rivalry with that of Kane and Big Daddy V really added a lot of spice to the latter, which will be discussed in their section of this article.

Overall, however, both Rey Mysterio and MVP are playing their roles nicely. Now each owns a victory over the other, and this win may have earned Mysterio a United States Title match, especially now that Teddy Long is back. Something tells me that next week when Mr. Long is back working the full show, one of his first decisions since returning will be granting Rey that match for Armageddon.

Intrigue Level (out of 10): 6.5 [up 0.5 from last week]

Previous Feuds
MVP: Ric Flair
Rey Mysterio: Chavo Guerrero, Finlay

FINLAY vs. MR. McMAHON (2 weeks)

This Finlay-McMahon feud (if that's even what you can consider it) has become more and more difficult to actually detect. No actual meeting between the two took place this week. In fact, Mr. McMahon's only role on the show as to have Ranjin Singh do various impressions, the last of which was The Great Khali, who happened to walk in at that very inauspicious moment. McMahon left as Singh was forced to explain himself to the giant he manages. It would be interesting to see a gradually increasing tension existent between Khali and his manager, but this was most likely just a simple isolated segment aimed at filling time and getting Khali on television.

As for Finlay, he and Hornswoggle teamed up again, this time facing former WWE Tag Team Champions Deuce 'N' Domino. That match ended when cheating attempts by Deuce and Domino distracted the referee long enough to allow Finlay to cheat himself (with a shillelagh shot to Deuce's skull).

Michael Cole did a nice job underscoring the disadvantage Finlay and Hornswoggle had since they were battling former champions, but JBL, who's never slow to find some type of argument against whatever Cole is saying, quickly touted Finlay's fighting style and his ability to beat anyone.

Overall, I'm not quite sure about this feud. It seems like WWE is just having Khali wait for Finlay until Armageddon. He's being treated like a looming threat for Finlay's (and Hornswoggle's) future. In the meantime, although McMahon and Finlay seemed to be growing some type of tension, this week gave the impression that the tension was fading and unimportant.

Intrigue Level (out of 10): 5.5 [same as on Raw]

Previous Feuds
Finlay: Kane, Rey Mysterio
Mr. McMahon: Bobby Lashley, Triple H, Hornswoggle

BIG DADDY V (w/ Matt Striker) vs. KANE (7 weeks w/ 2 weeks hiatus)

As mentioned before, Big Daddy V and Kane participated in a tag team contest this week. As Michael Cole put it, "two huge rivalries collide in one match." Of course, neither Big Daddy V nor Kane were involved in the decision, but that's probably a good thing.

The match had a lot of strong points, and it was interesting to see all four of these competitors—each with different sizes and abilities—work together to put on a decent showing. This is exactly what Kane and Big Daddy V needed for their feud. For the last month and a half, they have been battling it out one-on-one, which has given fans very few interesting moments.

This week's ECW attempted to add some kick to the storyline by featuring an Extreme Rules Match in the main event. And now Smackdown changed things for the better too. It proved that even Big Daddy V can play some kind of role effectively without it overwhelming the audience because of trite booking practices. Hopefully, this leads to a greater effort by WWE to mix it up when it comes to feuds that can easily become stale due to limitations by the participants as well as formulaic storytelling.

Intrigue Level (out of 10): 4 [up 1 since ECW]

Previous Feuds
Big Daddy V: Tommy Dreamer
Kane: MVP, Finlay

CHUCK PALUMBO (w/ Michelle McCool) vs. JAMIE NOBLE (2 weeks)

This week, Noble met Michelle McCool in the back again. The second attempt to seduce her saw about the same result as the first; she looked disgusted and repulsed. Noble touted his win over Chuck Palumbo last week. He was extremely confident about having beaten McCool's "friend."

Viewers are starting to get the impression that Noble is now under the skin of Palumbo. But more importantly, we get the sense that Noble knows how to beat The Motorcycle Enthusiast (even if it requires some cheap tactics), and he's taking full advantage of the situation. That is to say that he's not surprised himself that he's getting these wins.

Overall, WWE is doing a nice job with this storyline. The wrestling program of an underdog getting a series of wins over a better-pushed wrestler has been done multiple times before, but a few features distinguish this specific feud from those of the past. First, Noble is playing the underdog as a comedic heel character, which he's really been growing into as of late. Normally, it is the babyface that serves as a strong underdog with surprise victories over stronger heels. Why? It's simple; the babyface should be overcoming challenges. If a normal heel kept getting unexpected wins over a face, there really wouldn't be too much to that story unless the heel was expected to make a face turn.

And secondly, there's a subplot here with the love angle between Michelle McCool and Jamie Noble. His win over Palumbo this week seemed to have shocked McCool less compared to last week. Trying to pick up some tells on Michelle's facial expressions may be a nice way to see where this feud is headed; there were some minor differences in this week's reaction.

WWE should be commended for their handling of this mid-card rivalry thus far. What a difference between this one and the previous two with which Chuck Palumbo was involved (against Chris Masters and Kenny Dykstra).

Intrigue Level (out of 10): 5.5 [up 0.5 from last week]

Previous Feuds
Chuck Palumbo: Chris Masters, Kenny Dykstra
Jamie Noble: Hornswoggle, Vickie Guerrero


POTENTIAL FEUDS

(1) Victoria vs. Torrie Wilson?
(2) C.M. Punk vs. Kenny Dykstra?

Don't forget to send in your storyline ideas this week!

Thanks for reading, everyone. If you have any suggestions or comments, feel free to email me at newthtorch@hotmail.com. I appreciate all the feedback I receive. Please insert a word in the subject line that deals with a wrestling topic or write something such as "WWE," "feud," or "Funaki" so that I know it's not junk mail.

We suggest these recent related articles...

10/5 WWE Raw Hits & Misses: Natalya vs. Paige, Owens vs. Cara, Stephanie McMahon, Sasha Banks, Xavier Woods

COLLECTIBLES COLUMN: The History of Foam Hands in Pro Wrestling

9/28 WWE Raw Hits & Misses: Kane's Split Personality, Divas Revolution, Heyman & Big Show, Reigns vs. Wyatt