WWE KING & QUEEN OF THE RING

Jeddah, Saudi Arabia

BIANCA BeLAIR & JADE CARGIL vs. CANDICE LeRAE & INDI HARTWELL (8:03): This was the pre-show match. They've seemingly already gave up on Jade Cargil as a singles wrestler. Funny, because I thought she was looking better in WWE so far than she ever looked in AEW. I think this was for the women's tag team titles. Do they have 2 sets of titles or just 1? Match was decent. I actually really enjoy watching Candice wrestle. They used to have that amusing NXT group with Gargano, Theory, Candice and Indi. They should reunite them. They were a blast. **

LIV MORGAN vs. BECKY LYNCH (15:23): AEW's Double or Nothing had 11 matches. This show had 5. I'd say you got your money's worth buying the AEW show because it was $50. This show, and all WWE PPV's, are on Peacock now. I have no idea how much Peacock is because I get it free as part of my Comcast subscription. Is that the reason the WWE doesn't even seem to be trying anymore with their PPV's? This show was totally forgettable. I wouldn't say it was short, as there were, like, 20 minutes of commercials between every match. I can't say I've ever liked these Saudi Arabia shows anyway. One reason is Saudi Arabia beheaded a Washington Post journalist just for bad mouthing the country. The other reason is they treat women like slaves. Oh, and also gay people, pornography, and alcohol are illegal. Would I change my tune if suddenly Saudi Arabia paid me $5 million dollars? Because it seems like paying people makes them care less about the evils of that country. Anyway, there was a show. The WWE is actually having 3 straight PPV's in foreign countries, thus having 3 straight PPV's on at 1 PM on a Saturday afternoon. Maybe they should do this in winter when people don't want to go outside at 1 PM on a Saturday. The WWE doesn't really seem to care about their fans, do they? Just ask Sami Zayn and the fans in Montreal. Drew McIntyre and the fans in Cardiff. I suppose I could go on. I am also completely baffled as to why the WWE is more popular than AEW. AEW had their 5 year anniversary this week and the one thing that Dave Meltzer noted was that he was surprised about how much internet vitriol there's been against AEW. It is odd. If you look at comments posted online after an AEW show there's always a bunch of trolls spewing ridiculous negative things for, really, no logical reason. I don't get why some people still want AEW to fail or mock the ratings or crowd sizes. I would understand if AEW was terrible or something...but it's far from it. Eh...there was a match here. Liv Morgan won the title from Becky Lynch. Dominik Mysterio threw a chair in the ring to help Becky but Liv used it when the ref wasn't looking to win. Because Rhea Ripley is out with an injury, I guess they figured they'd do something with Liv and Dominik. On RAW, Liv kissed Dominik but he didn't kiss her back. The intrigue! Becky's deal is up, so of course there's speculation she might go to AEW. Considering her husband, Seth Rollins, is in WWE, I highly doubt that. Match was okay. Liv had that cool, red latex suit on. Women aren't allowed to show the skin of their arms or legs. The head and hands are okay, though! & wearing a fucking S&M latex suit is okay! Makes sense! This fucking country. I give up. **

SAMI ZAYN vs. BRONSON REED vs. CHAD GABLE (13:39): I will admit that the crowd was great tonight. If you can't drink alcohol or watch porn...you've gotta be pent up with aggression, though, right? I bet everyone drinks and watches porn, though. C'mon. It can't be that hard to do that, right? If everyone was drinking in the U.S. during prohibition (supposedly), I'm sure they do it over there. I also wonder if the porn they watch is weird. Like...do they get turned on seeing a woman's bare leg like people used to in the 1800's? Anyway...the crowd was super into two wrestlers on this show: Sami Zayn and Randy Orton. Sami Zayn wasn't allowed to go to Saudi Arabia until last year because his family is from Syria. He also must be a Muslim because in the video package they showed up visiting Mecca. Mecca is literally just a giant box with a black tarp over it. It's literally the stupidest thing ever. Hopefully no Muslim is reading this. They couldn't make it, like, a giant gold statue or something remotely cool looking? What's in the box, anyway? Who came up with that? Someone put a giant box in a square and just said, "Hey, this is Mecca." And people were okay with that? It had to have started off with a bunch of doubters saying, "Yo! That's just a stupid box. What the fuck?" I guess I should, like, read into that. Anyway, the crowd loved Sami. Sami retained the IC title. Match was decent. They teased Otis turning on Gable but they're dragging that out. **1/2

NIA JAX vs. LYRA VALKYRIA (9:38): Nia won and is the Queen of the Ring. The King of the Ring, for whatever reason, just never turned into anything remotely intriguing. It used to try to be one of the big PPV's, happening every June, but even that fizzled out and they started doing it on RAW for a while. Lyra is from NXT. Her name is quite the mouthful, right? Who's the genius that came out with that name? There's too many syllables. She's a pretty good wrestler. She came out with all in black with black wings. Remember Vince fired Nia but HHH re-hired her? HHH must be her friend because he came out to crown her but he didn't come out to crown Gunther. *

GUNTHER vs. RANDY ORTON (21:50): The crowd loved Randy Orton. I guess because he's been around a long time and they know who he is. Usually Gunther is in great matches but this wasn't one of them. It was average. The KOTR winners get title shots at Summerslam. I guess that means Cody vs. Gunther, which should be a good one. **

CODY RHODES vs. LOGAN PAUL (24:15): Logan did a top rope splash onto Cody on the announce table. That was cool. I like Logan Paul, but he seems to be getting less exciting/daring with every match. Remember he used to do a ton of top rope stuff and crazy moves? He's settled down a bit and thus gotten less entertaining. He's still great and playing to the crowd, though. Match was good but nothing special. It was also way too long. Hopefully Clash at the Castle next month will be better. CM Punk vs. Drew should be the main event and for the title but, oh wait, they stupidly took the title off Drew and gave it to a guy not even on this show (Damian Priest). Is he banned from Saudi Arabia, too? Maybe he made fun of that box. **1/2