By Shane McKinley, Torch specialist

"It go uptown, uptown operation shut down
Wake up to polices, go to sleep to the gun sounds
And you're not a gorilla, you're a dead monkey
Cuz I got a banana clip in these Red Monkeys
What you said, don't be afraid to say it twice
And they say life is cheap, until you pay the price"
-"I'm Raw" by Lil' Wayne

Bewildered. That's how I felt as I sat down to write this Absurdity report after watching Monday Night Raw. The show itself? A horrific waste of time. It was 2 hours and 50 minutes of largely filler. But the saving grace of the show was the NXT Invasion and the Rookies demolishing everything. The rest of the show? Yikes. If we put aside the NXT Invasion, WWE is in one of those weird, funky periods. Here is what is going down...

(1) Randy Orton still has to advance his storyline with Edge even with a injured shoulder.

(2) C.M. Punk is wrestling as Frank The Furry Gimp

(3) Gumshoe Kane is on the case to find out who turned his brother into a vegetable.

(4) WWE is hyping up a 2010 PPV that focuses on...a standard fatal-four way match.

There are much other peculiar things, but the general consensus from viewers regarding the WWE product is that it is not looking so hot. So, heck, I'll take the NXT boys as a motorcycle gang causing havoc and raising hell. What else in the WWE product do I have to get excited about?

-The show opens cold with Mr. Excitement himself Bret Hart and Teddy Long telling viewers how we're gonna have a grand ol' night. But before that, up first is Big Show demolishing that loser Chris Jericho. The theme of the night was some really gah-awful matches. Sure, people got to vote on the stipulations, but the matches were largely stinkers. Big Show vs. Jericho served no point. Jack Swagger, World Champion and everything, was already a ghost by the time the show ended.

-The Hart Dynasty is going to face (a) The Usos, (b) The Dudebusters, or ... (c) Khali & Hornswoggle. As soon as the camera panned to them, you knew it was Answer C. Usos and Dudebusters must have been practicing their promos in catering all afternoon. But, all Khali and Horny have to do is raise the arms and people go nuts.

-After the match, Jerry Lawler gets up from the announce table looking for something. Maybe it's a script for a better show. Mikey Cole chides Lawler and then talks solemnly about how now the legendary Undertaker is now a legendary zucchini.

-Bradley Cooper comes out and tells us how super-excited he is (and the rest of the A-team, which at this point are M.I.A.). Wooo! Let's get this party started! Come on, guys! Three stupid skits and then we're out of here! The things we actors have to do to promote our movie.

Backstage, Rampage Jackson and Copley meet with Lawler to talk about Lawler's missing crown. Right about then, I lost interest. Will Lawler find his crown? Does anybody care? Stay tuned.

-Hooray, the Moscow Mauler Kozlov can dance. Get yourself prepared for the hilarious hi-jinks of Kozlov and Santino. Sure, nobody will accept Kozlov as a credible guy anymore, but the sounds of people's eyes blinking were louder than the reaction to Kozlov.

-WWE Universe reaction to the proposed Divas Champion vs. Women's Champion match: "Screw titles. More bewbs." Maybe there will be a day where the women's division has a 50-Divas battle royal to encourage people to care.

Talking about Divas, I saw on Facebook that one Maryse is reportedly engaged to The Miz. Awww. May they get married and populate the world with beautiful and annoying kids. Also on Facebook, I saw that Batista gave a shout-out to Maryse. Oooh. Will Maryse ditch Miz for Batista? And will Kane ever find the secret formula to make Undertaker no longer be a Brussels sprout? Stay tuned.

-So they're doing what they usually do with mysteries: said investigator (Kane) goes around and asks everybody on the roster if they committed the heinous crime. Many feel that the culprit who turned Undertaker into an artichoke is...Kane himself. Hey, I would love a young pup (say Dolph Ziggler) or a hot free agent to be the mystery man. But, typically, the payoff in these situations is a let-down. Meanwhile, have fun watching Kane get nowhere in his investigation.

-While Evan Bourne didn't get a whole lot of love from the fans on the vote to face Sheamus -Kane got like a whopping 80 percent and Bourne got 9 percent - Bourne got some love from WWE champ John Cena. That's fine and all, but hopefully next week Mr. Bourne doesn't become just another mid-card dude. Capitalize on the last show. Maybe it was Bourne who turned Undertaker into a cabbage!

-Ted DiBiase, Jr. is racking up quite an impressive number of dumbass skits. Seemingly every week now, whenever there's Ted, there's stupidity. Like an evil mastermind, he teams together with I.R.S. and Virgil. I.R.S. took Lawler's crown because Lawler didn't pay back taxes or something and I.R.S. has apparently nothing better to do with his time. What is he, the Hamburgler?

Then the cameraman farts in the room and everyone dies a slow, excruciating death. Only if. These bits were way too long and no reason to care about it. These WWE mysteries ("Who did Ashton Kutcher hire to take out Zack Ryder and "What the hell are they doing with the A-Team?")...augh, this hurts my head. The star of the night so far: the fog machine for the A-Team backstage skit. Some fine puffs, little buddy.

-The show was dead to me when Truth & Morrison faced off against Miz and ... Zack Ryder? Well, to be fair, the other choices were crap and smellier crap. (Sorry, Dolph, but it's hard to be your fan nowadays.)

-When Kane was bellowing about whether Bret turned The Undertaker into an onion, I bet Bret wanted to laugh. He always looks like he's gonna have a big chuckle. I'm going to bet he'll blows a serious angle with him guffawing.

-Murdock is in the back, babbling and apparently gone insane from the gas attack. (You know a bit is bad when even "Teddy Long's cheesy limo ride of doom" looks better.) Suddenly, out of nowhere, appears...Mean Gene Okerlund. The savior of crap segments! Gene should be in every WWE comedy/guest host sketch from now on. "Ladies and gentlemen, you're about to witness...some lame-brain comedy rip-off from shows that aired in the '70s. Enjoy!"

-Matt Hardy vs. Edge...er...Drew McIntyre was...interesting. Interesting in that it's now Matt Hardy who looks to be favored after this feud ends. Who knows where Drew will end up. I don't mind Drew, but maybe he did squander his opportunity. So, Matt beats the holy hell out of Drew and then grabs Drew by the hair as the Scot tries to leave the ring. Matt pulls out some of Drew's hair and holds it in his hand. Matt has a crazed look in his eye. And then Matt Hardy puts Drew's hair in his mouth.

What.

-Backstage, that chump Rampage Jackson is tied to a chair. Ted and his evil goons talk about how they're going to wheel Rampage out to the middle of the ring and hold him hostage for money. If WWE doesn't pay up, they're going to blow Rampage's brains out on live TV. Actually, the real answer is way more stupider.

For you see, Roddy Piper wants some payback against Mr. T. Because...look, how does one make sense out of nonsense? You're just supposed to go, "Hey, it's Piper! Hey, Piper!" Same reason why Dusty Rhodes burned rubber to the ring in his golf cart. "Man, I can't believe I still watch this crap...hey, it's Dusty! Hey Dusty!"

Anyways, there's supposed to be some A-Team ending or some baloney, but like most of you, I lost interest. The only thing I remember was Okerlund, Piper, and Dusty in the ring. And Rampage Jackson looking like a clown. Hey, MMA, we've got two words for ya: Rampage Jackson. Look what we did to your boy. We'll put Brock Lesnar in a tutu. Have Shogun Rua pee himself. We don't care!




-As mentioned before, the saving grace was the NXT division causing havoc. The show would have easily gotten a "stinking pile of absurdity (NUKE)" rating. I even heard some "NXT" chants.

I had a feeling they weren't going to let these NXT guys go (or ship them back down to FCW). They invested time and money into these guys, and hopefully with this NXT invasion is where the investment pays off. Wade Barrett as the leader of NXT...I like it. It was a heck of a sight to see Justin Gabriel a/k/a Justin Bieber with the cold stare toward a fallen John Cena. NXT: The bad boys of wrestling. Lock up your daughters. Call the National Guard. They're gonna destroy the world.

Then, maybe in the future, the NXT Season 2 guys can start their own gang. NXT 1 and NXT 2 will square off against each other. NXT 4 Life. Too sweet! The Wolfpac!

-The show was easily the worst Raw of the year. The NXT invasion was much-needed, but people had to sit through nearly three hours of raw sewage to get there. If you recorded Raw and haven't watched it yet, skip to the end. You'll be glad you did.

That's it for me. I hope that Kane finds whoever turned Undertaker into a cucumber. Man, I love a Kane storyline.

Raw's Absurd Verdict: It's So Absurd It Makes Me Want To Cry

Email is mckinley.torch@gmail.com

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