FAST LANE 2016

Mr.Nice Guy

I'd love to know what the story was with that gong botch. Was Taker meant to appear and after it went off Vince had a freaker and postponed it until Raw tomorrow?

Anyway, the show did what most of us thought with the exception of the Wyatt interference.

As long as Super Hunter loses the belt in a month's time that the's main thing for me.

Angron

If it wasn't for NXT and the big back catalogue, I'm pretty sure I'd have cancelled my network sub. It's not worth it for the PPVs at this point.

Ruu

Amazing how Reigns is overcoming these odds time and time again! How? HOW!?!?

join8x

Thanks you

CSF

The stupidest thing they ever did was put back in question (via the Royal Rumble) whether Reigns was going to be in the Main Event. He was never going to be over against any passable face. Keep him against the League of Nations at Rumble until HHH makes his return for revenge with some sort of tag match at Fastlane and then the big one that nobody wanted at Mania.

They only inflamed the situation by giving the fans hope to cling to that it wasn't going to be Reigns vs HHH.

Moneymaker

I don't even have the energy or the interest to rant anymore. That ending just had me speechless.

They just don't have a clue. Booed out of the building. In Cleveland.

Just admit you were wrong. You stubborn old man.

Angron

Ruu wrote: »

Amazing how Reigns is overcoming these odds time and time again! How? HOW!?!?

Last year at Fastlane Reigns beat one superstar infinitely more popular than him. This year it was two. I wonder will that be the theme of the PPV going forward, him beating incrementing numbers of more likable people.

Rock Lesnar

I dont even care anymore that he won, because we all knew he was going to win, and what will happen at mania, its the fact that they had him do it by making a former ufc champion submission hold look so f*cking pointless.

Loughc

I'm not one bit shocked, miffed or surprised they went with that ending, WWE have been doing it for years, HHH in 2002-2005, Cena 2005-2013 and now Reigns.

Vince will push guys wither the fans want it or not, and they will continue to win and people will continue to tune in to each event hanging onto the glimmer of hope that they will lose.

They've been doing it for years and will continue to do it.

SlickRic

Loughc wrote: »

I'm not one bit shocked, miffed or surprised they went with that ending, WWE have been doing it for years, HHH in 2002-2005, Cena 2005-2013 and now Reigns.

Vince will push guys wither the fans want it or not, and they will continue to win and people will continue to tune in to each event hanging onto the glimmer of hope that they will lose.

They've been doing it for years and will continue to do it.

With HHH, he at least had a track record from a couple of years previously.

With Cena, he was popular as hell in 2005/6, and at least garnered a reaction every time he performed. He drew those who loved him, and drew those who wanted him to be kicked off the top.

Reigns is neither.

The difference here is the guy isn't over. At all.

ERG89

No real surprises on the show. Didn't watch it thankfully
18 hours of Raw before WrestleMania. Lucky us

sky88

SlickRic wrote: »

With HHH, he at least had a track record from a couple of years previously.

With Cena, he was popular as hell in 2005/6, and at least garnered a reaction every time he performed. He drew those who loved him, and drew those who wanted him to be kicked off the top.

Reigns is neither.

The difference here is the guy isn't over. At all.

I think youve it the nail on the head there, reigns has never been that over even with kids and causal fans and wwe have only themselves to blame for it. Cena was a hugely over at the time before he got the rocket strapped to him. Theres been nothing organic about reigns push at all, he was getting over near the royal rumble 13 as the shields enforcer but then they tried to hard to make him the guy.

While i dont think reigns is as bad as everyone says but hes nowhere near main event level at this stage.

I think the only reason hes in the main event is so they can get the rock involved without wrestling but i dont think that will help reigns not get booed out of the building. HHH will be the face of the match easily with a mania crowd. The only way i think he wont is if he goes on back to his 2002-2003 ways and buries everybody.

Angron

I think the only thing I can say was genuinely surprising about the main event was that Wyatts didn't interfere. Expected Roman to win, expected Dean to eat the pin, expected not to care about the WM main event.

Moneymaker

It's not just the main event either. That entire show was booked like a giant turd. Wyatts lost again.... Ryback nearly kills Harper(why is Ryback employed?), that horrid New Day segment, Heath Slater vs Axel ON PAY PER VIEW. AJ vs Jericho was good but what does it matter.

No follow up on Brock and the Wyatts. No angle, nothing even hinted. Reigns just no sells everything and wins. **** off.

Reigns can just **** off forever. He ****ing sucks. He has worse go-away heat from me then Bo Dallas.

sky88

Did anyone else think that the wyatts werent supposed to lose. it looked like harper was injured and couldnt get the shoulder up

Angron

I wouldn't say the whole show was awful. AJ and Jericho had a good match, it was annoying that AJ didn't win with the Styles Clash, but at least he got the win. Sasha and Becky winning was nice as well, though realistically them losing to Team B.A.D would have been just idiotic.

A lot of the matches though... It never really felt like Owens or Charlotte were ever going to lose. The matches weren't really bad in and of themselves, but there was no real tension. I'm still utterly baffled as to why R-Truth had a match against Axel on the PPV. The E&C bit was just a train wreck. If Wyatts had to lose, why have the best non-Bray member take the pin, I'm pretty sure that's what Rowan is there for.

Loughc

The Truth/Social Outcasts thing was obviously a backup in case they had time to kill. Why they couldn't have given Owen/Ziggler and Jercho/Styles more time I'll never know.

Although I do have to have he Truth match did have one of the best finishes I have seen in a long time, it was very well put together and it furthered an ongoing storyline so it wasn't a complete waste of show space.

With regards the Styles Clash, I don't mind Jericho kicking out as they were building up the feud as an even steven kind of deal and to be fair to Jericho he sold the calf killer like a champ. Now if it's a case of everyone starts kicking out of the Stlyes clash at 2 then there'll be an issue.

Loughc

PWTorch has a fantastic piece about last nights Fastlane.

Vince McMahon’s wrestling organization has almost always featured one individual as the flagbearer of the company. From 1984 until 1993, that man was Hulk Hogan. Afterwards, Shawn Michaels and Bret Hart took the mantle. Then, Steve Austin would follow during the Attitude Era. Today, the face of the WWE is John Cena. What do these individuals have in common? They weren’t the men that Vince McMahon wanted.

As early as 1987 there were reports that Vince McMahon was looking for a “new” Hulk Hogan, taking into consideration Hulk’s age at the time. When he could no longer be relied on, McMahon put his faith in the All-American Lex Luger in 1993, then Diesel in 1994 into 1995. Before John Cena became the face of the company, Vince had his eyes set on Brock Lesnar. Then Randy Orton. Then Batista.

McMahon has never been able to mold “his guy” from the ground up. He’s always had to settle for who the crowd wants, not who he thinks would be best. And while in the past he has relented by giving Bret Hart the mantle over Lex Luger, ending Diesel’s title reign two years early and making his fourth-best pick John Cena the face of his company, his attempt to “make” Roman Reigns is different.

This time may be his last shot to get “his guy.”

That’s why McMahon will not relent anymore. This is his final opportunity to make his man the way he sees fit, come hell or high water. Fastlane was the latest example of a 70-year-old man trying to come to terms with his own mortality as he rejected the crowd’s support for Dean Ambrose and Brock Lesnar to push Roman Reigns as WWE’s future. Tonight was Vince McMahon putting his foot down; Roman Reigns will lead WWE into the next decade, whether you like it or not.

Such a situation created one of the flattest WrestleMania stare downs in company history. The situation would not have been as dire if Reigns was presented in a more palatable manner. Instead, the flaws in his presentation were highlighted, cleanly beating his more popular partner with one finisher after receiving an F5, Dirty Deeds DDT, several chair shots, and surviving a kimura lock. Ambrose was highlighted as the scrappy underdog that won’t give up. Lesnar was portrayed as the unstoppable badass. Reigns was a punching bag that happened to get lucky. In other words, there was no opportunity to get behind Roman.

Lord TSC

The one positive I will take from that is that given how the Wyatt match ended, and given how the main event ended, Ambrose vs Lesnar looks like it could happen for Mania, and should be a fun match. Lesnar can be mad he had Reigns beat till Ambrose attacked him with the chair.

Otherwise, it was a very "Meh" PPV. We knew that Reigns would go over Ambrose (and it shocks me that, for the second year in a row, they put Reigns over the internet darling; thats outright antagonising people, not just missing the mark with what they want...), we knew Styles would probably win, Charlotte, Owens, Sasha & Becky. So basically it was a very predictable PPV with little in the way of surprises.

Glad, though, that it looks like New Day are going face now. Them against the League of Nations should be a decent Mania match, I guess.

Still....Mania really is lacking that special draw. Could see this being the most boring, predictable Mania in quiet some time...

EDIT: And after typing this up, I read Meltzer is also reporting it's Ambrose vs Lesnar now at Mania.

Angron

Ambrose vs. Brock would be the best thing to come from this sh*tshow.

CSF

Really not in favour of a face vs face match on the upper card of Wrestlemania unless it's for the title. I love Lesnar, I love Ambrose. How am I supposed to know which one I want to win? How are WWE creative supposed to convince me I'm supposed to want one of them to win?

Face vs face works for the title because there's an obvious reason for them to feud over for 6 weeks, whereas I think WWE will struggle over the next 6 weeks to put together a compelling story to make me want one of them to win and one of them to lose.

Ambrose or Lesnar vs HHH and the other vs Reigns made perfect sense but instead we're left with one match where we want to cheer them both and another where we want to cheer neither.

Gonzo

really poor form from the WWE Network last night, it was like watching a low quality illegal steam half the time and were paying 12 euro for this, not good enough.

Itssoeasy

Gonzo wrote: »

really poor form from the WWE Network last night, it was like watching a low quality illegal steam half the time and were paying 12 euro for this, not good enough.

What were you watching it on ? I was on my iPad and it was as sweet as a nut for the part I watched. It's always been good on the iPad.

Omackeral

When The New Day listed off all the teams they had beaten. I thought Edge and Christian were about to say yeah but you've never beaten E an C have you. Then Enzo and Cass come out....

Angron

Omackeral wrote: »

When The New Day listed off all the teams they had beaten. I thought Edge and Christian were about to say yeah but you've never beaten E an C have you. Then Enzo and Cass come out....

That would have been brilliant, but it would have been an odd time to debut, this close to Mania.

Rock Lesnar

Gonzo wrote: »

really poor form from the WWE Network last night, it was like watching a low quality illegal steam half the time and were paying 12 euro for this, not good enough.

I'd no problem with it, watched it on the xbox, i do however wish connection had dropped at the end though

Gonzo

Itssoeasy wrote: »

What were you watching it on ? I was on my iPad and it was as sweet as a nut for the part I watched. It's always been good on the iPad.

Was watching it on a PS4

seandotcomm

My PS4 stream was crap aswell. kept jumping and qas very pixelated. in the end I gave up and watched it on the laptop

DM_7

Triple H to turn face at Mania?

Only watching this now and its great to see Divas (Tag match) that move well in the ring, they don't look cumbersome like a lot of the Big Johnny recruits. Naomi is much better than I remember!

Moneymaker

Omackeral wrote: »

When The New Day listed off all the teams they had beaten. I thought Edge and Christian were about to say yeah but you've never beaten E an C have you. Then Enzo and Cass come out....

This is Vince McMahon and WWE. We can't have nice things. Because everyone has been clamouring for New Day vs the League of Geeks.