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TUCKER'S INSTANT REACTION - WWE Raw 8/6: Puzzling booking throughout Thumbs Up show; is the third hour useless?

Aug 6, 2012 - 10:45:36 PM
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Instant Reaction - WWE Raw 8/6
By Benjamin Tucker, PWTorch TV specialist

Rawnewlogo_4.jpg

Overall Score - 6.0

I thought Raw tonight was definitely a step up in quality compared to last week's replay-athon, but the third hour still feels useless. Sure, there were more matches, but even match quality is starting to fall back to 3-5-minute matches.

A good deal of the show was still repetition and fluff, and it kicked the show off with one of the worst openings to Raw I can remember in quite some time. The entire segment was filled with Cena ramblings and people with an identity crisis. Cena played up his jolly self, while A.J. cemented her sudden turn from complete psychopath to completely sane businesswoman. Except, she still twists her head like she's crazy. But, less often than before. I'm confused. More than anything, Punk's character suffered tonight. As a strong face WWE champion, turning heel opened up a world of unique routes they could take Punk. But instead of all of that, they choose to have him act like a whiny heel, which WWE has way too many of as it is. Well, most of the time. Because, while he spent over half of the opening segment whining and complaining, he used the other part to challenge people to matches. This isn't playing a tweener, it's called an identity crisis. Even when he cut a great heel promo at the end of the broadcast, all of his heat was almost immediately sucked away by Big Show. I'm fine with building up a challenger, but he feels like such a third wheel at the moment.

For example, what was the use of Show's match with Orton? Neither looked particularily strong, and it wasn't too entertaining as far as quality is concerned. Sure, it got them on TV, but it didn't amount to much. In speaking of not amounting to much, why does Daniel Bryan vs. Kane get a PPV spot? Haven't we seen it several times in the past? And, at this point, they don't really have much of a tangible issue with each other. It still seems likely that Charlie Sheen will play a role, but it still seems like an odd pairing, especially considering they didn't even confront each other this week. While Bryan had the best match of the night with Cena, with several great reversals (in fact, the only thing that marred the match at all was Cena being at his no-selling best), Kane was busy in an inconsequential encounter with The Miz, that did nothing but denigrate both Miz and the title. Again. I thought WWE had this issue with Christian?

I do have to give WWE credit for finding a way to give the Del Rio-Sheamus feud some juice. They finally did something to make the issue personal to a certain extent. Del Rio's match with Christian didn't do much (like most of the matches tonight), but at least the post-match worked well. I still don't get why the cops didn't arrest Sheamus for stealing Del Rio's car, though.

The Ryback and Divas matches were the standard fare, and I dislike that WWE is continuing to sit on their hands when it comes to getting Ryback and actual, non-Jinder Mahal feud. He has potential, but needs some direction. In speaking of direction, I love what's being done with Brodus and Sandow. Damien has done a great job attacking Brodus, and the two are polar opposites in the best of ways. Seriously, this feud has been one of the highlights of three-hour Raws.

Oh, hey, Alex Riley won a match! Please, let it be the start of something. Seriously, the Jericho-Ziggler feud is shaping up very nicely. Jericho as the cocky veteran is a treat to watch, and Ziggler is playing off of it pretty well. Not to mention Jericho was great on commentary. He's probably the first guy to actually put Alex Riley over on commentary in months.

As far as the Lesnar-HBK segment, it was okay. Brock talking nowadays is almost always a disaster, but at least Heyman and Shawn did their parts well. Personally, it seemed like a missed opportunity to have Brock destroy Shawn in his hometown. Sure, it's likely that may happen next week, but there's a difference between doing it in a random city and having it done in your hometown. That being said, it still wasn't bad.

This week's Raw was an improvement, but still a mixed bag. There were still too many recaps, the match quality sank a bit, and a lot of characters seem aimless, in random matches that seem relatively meaningless. Once again, things would be better if the show was only two hours long.

Any questions or comments? Feel free to message me on Twitter at BTuckertorch.


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