Saturday, August 31, 2024

WWE BASH IN BERLIN

Berlin, Germany



CODY RHODES vs. KEVIN OWENS (26:10): The WWE's been having a lot of international shows lately, right? Do they make more money doing those or something? I'd think just flying everyone there would cost a lot. In May they had PPV's in France and Saudi Arabia. Then their June PPV was in Scotland. Now they're in Germany. Maybe this has something to do with pushing their RAW to Netflix deal, which starts in January. Who knows? The crowd in Germany was good but nothing like that raucous Lyon, France crowd. It didn't help that this felt like a forgettable house show. The WWE PPV's have not been that great this year, although the big ones like 'Mania and Summerslam were pretty good. This first match was kind of pointless because who the hell thought Kevin Owens, who's a babyface, anyway, had a chance to win the title? Granted, AEW is having Bryan Danielson defend the title against Jack Perry next week at All Out, and that match seems just as pointless. The work in this match was fine. It was decent. The story had Kevin Owens refusing to “go for the kill” and thus ending up losing. So they made him look pathetic. I'm guessing this means he will turn heel, otherwise, what's the point of making him look like a pathetic loser who doesn't want to win? **

BIANCA BeLAIR & JADE CARGILL vs. THE UNHOLY UNION (ALBA FYRE & ISLA DAWN) (12:02): Bianca and Jade won the tag titles in this match. Bianca used to be a big, main event star, so I'm not entirely sure why she's now suddenly slumming it in the tag team division. Jade doesn't seem to have become the big WWE star they thought she would, although that's kind of their fault for not giving her anything to do and putting her in a tag team. The crowd was mostly silent for this. *1/2

CM PUNK vs. DREW McINTYRE “STRAP MATCH” (19:15): Punk was bleeding a little bit and they still decided to shoehorn the friendship bracelet story into this match. To win you had to touch each corner and they had a confusing red and green light on each corner. Eventually I figured out that the green light was for Punk and Drew's was red. Match was good but nothing spectacular. They really built this feud up into being this blood feud for the ages and then delivered two average matches. **1/2

THE TERROR TWINS (RHEA RIPLEY & DAMIAN PRIEST) vs. THE JUDGMENT DAY (DOMINIK MYSTERIO & LIV MORGAN) (14:20): They probably should have had the heels win, otherwise the feud is kind of over, right? Nope! They did have Liv attack Rhea on RAW and Rhea was on crutches by the end of the show. The fans really loved the whole Dominik/Rhea dynamic, so I think that was stupid to break them up. This match would have really been better if the men and women could wrestle each other. They did do some of the women doing moves on the men, but God forbid a man hit a woman even though they've done men vs. women in some Japan promotions like DDT and in U.S. indie companies like GCW and PWG. I don't get why they won't do that, as Dominik vs. Rhea would be fucking huge. Match was entertaining. The other Judgment Day members interfered. It was fine. **1/2

GUNTHER vs. RANDY ORTON (34:28): Jesus. 34 minutes? What is this? Pro Wrestling Noah? Because of that epic length, this match was pretty boring. I don't even think Orton delivered an RKO. Orton did put Gunther through the announce table, but did it in the dumbest way possible. He put the stairs next to the table then climbed up and dropped Gunther onto the table. Gunther choked out Orton. The crowd was hot early but got bored. Roman Reigns and the whole Bloodline gang weren't on this show for some reason. Considering that's been the hot angle on TV, it made this show feel kind of weak without them. *


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