WRESTLEMANIA 34 Pre-Show/Live Show Thread (Spoilers)

briany

Brock should just be the champion until he signs off the company's books, whenever that will be. There's no-one on their roster more legitimate, and everyone knows it. It's a problem WWE helped create by making him unbeatable for so much of his return. Anyone you could possibly paint as a competitor to him like Undertaker, Roman or Samoa Joe, Brock has been shown to beat and beat well. To try to put someone over him clean, especially in a long-form match, would just not be bought into at all. It would come across as very forced. It's sad that WWE might be banking on audience relief at there being a new champion to get his successor over.

Cianan2

Very underwhelming show for me, I feel like they're trying too hard to force too many WrestleMania moments now instead of letting things organically happen for the superstars.

HandsomeBob

Lord TSC wrote: »

Not had a chance to read things yet, other people's thoughts, etc.

I enjoyed it. Not amazing, but enough "Wrestlemania Moments" that entertained me.

I was perfectly fine with how the streak ended. It HAD to end eventually, and I'll happily take a loss to Charlotte, one of the most protected women on the roster, at Mania. It solves a lot of problems they have with Asuka tbh.

I really enjoyed the Mixed Tag. Probably my match of the night.

I adored Brawn choosing the kid, but am suspecting a lot of hate heading that way. I just loved it though, and smiled my way through the match.

I marked harder for Brock beating Roman than I did Brock beating Taker :pac: Delighted. Wonder if he'll just win it tonight though.

Rest of the card was grand, though probably not very memorable.

I'm a fan of Charlotte and am on record here saying she's the most gifted in the division, so I'm glad it was her too, but the execution was abysmal.

Losing clean and quickly to the first attempt at Natural Selection that she couldn't even lock in properly was such a mess that it's hard to put into words.

I also thought Asuka losing the streak would be a good thing for her but the post match stuff was just soft. When NXT teased Ember Moon being the one to end her streak it brought out heel tactics in Asuka, and a psychotic Asuka. But all they did here was have her blub and congratulate Charlotte when it should have sent her over the edge. What Nak did to AJ would have been better placed here.

PTH2009

Should of put a bet on Charlotte at 4/1

DM_7

Have not watched main event yet.

My gripe with the rest of the event is the build and overall there was a lack of importance in who won the bouts. Bryan and Ronda bouts the exception.

Hit:
Ronda, she moves so well. Interactions with HHH were great.

Bryan, great to see him back and looking great.

IC title match, good showing, personally would have preferred Finn v Seth in a grudge match but they did well. Seth winning for grand slam is nice for him. The call backs to previous bouts was good and it was a nice change to have Miz send his pals to the back.

Taker in his legends appearance. They did a great job in he end and it was good to see him nack looking good instead of his weaknesses exposed in a fuller match.

Charlotte and Asuka until the post match was good. Not every bout has to be an end to a feud so Charlotte winning like that could have set off Asuke to go to the dark side, assume she is going back to RAW now with that result.

Aidan English. Limelight stealing.

Cruisers. Great to see Ali who was only an alternate for the classic in a single's bout. Nice little story of healthy competition. Like the count out spot with Cedric not taking an easy 10 count. Later Alexander reluctance to deliver more final blows was done well.

Miss:
Steph so competitive. Should of had one of the NXT grads in to do that. 3 on 2, have Ronda overcome the odds of HHH, a full timer and Steph sneaking around before eventually getting caught by Ronda.

US title match. Why oh why could they not just pop the crowd.

Post bell of Smackdown women. While the hug helped out the heel turn later in mens bout, it made little sense. Should have been about Charlotte escaping and maybe an Eddie Guerrero or Edge style win would have made more sense if the streak was to end. Asuka tapping out without a real fight wasn a bit much and with how they booked Steph made it look really bad

Use of tag teams at a big show. Please stop wasting the showcase to make important talent look below average. That kid from the crowd is pre show or live event stuff, not Mania for a team like Cesaro and Sheamus. It basically became the traditional **** break diva match

Nia v Bliss. What a horrible storyline. Sorry but having a large body is not an achievement, it is not to be sneered at either. It is worth building a storyline around if the person is made out to be super strong because of their size and a very difficult opponent. Also a **** story to have Bliss in with her battle as a young person with anorexia. Imagine Adam Cole 'bullying' Killian Dain.

Middle:
Bryan taken out, it was a call back to his mania winning world title but did they need to do it?

Aj v Nak. Heel turn in a god moment but he match with no heat leading in so did it really matter who won?

Not sure about the pre show Battle's.

B.A._Baracus

Looking back it was what it was. Only my opinion, but there hasn't been a true great wrestlemania in years.

They have a unique ability to hype up mania each year but can never deliver. How could they they are amazing at hyping things. That's not to say this mania or any are ever truly bad. They are what they are.

That said it's a bad idea having a 7 hour show. After the pre-show ended it was already two hours and that's a decent length of a wresting show if you want to get technical.

Nxt takeover the night before seems to always be a better show.

HandsomeBob

Think you kind of missed the point PTH2009 on bullying. Small people can bully big people if they are mentally stronger so to use your example, if Killian Dain was a big soft teddy bear then yes Adam Cole bullying him would be believable.

I didn't think Nia and Alexa was a great storyline myself but given they're such good friends I doubt Alexa had to do anything she was uncomfortable with.

Agent Coulson

I think I agree with let Brock keep the title and hand it back when his contract is up.


Then have a tournament leading up to crowning a new champ at Summerslam.

HandsomeBob

Agent Coulson wrote: »

I think I agree with let Brock keep the title and hand it back when his contract is up.


Then have a tournament leading up to crowning a new champ at Summerslam.

There's ****ting on the roster and then there's ****ting on the roster!! Surely they wouldn't have that unless it's in Brocks contract that no one beats him.

briany

I thought the whole card was very good. Minor gripe that some matches seemed out of place in the billing they got, like Bliss v. Jax, but overall it's hard to complain.

In terms of raw presentation, Wrestlemanias of the last few years are unsurpassed. If you look at a lot of Wrestlemanias from the 90s and early 2000s, they look positively dingy & dinky in comparison.

Also, I found the 'This is awful' chants smarky and not-called-for. When fans are calling that awful, it reminds me that there are two types of wrestling fan in this world - Those who have seen Al Snow v. Big Boss Man, Kennel From Hell, and those who haven't :pac: . The former have a better sense of perspective.

DM_7

HandsomeBob wrote: »

Think you kind of missed the point PTH2009 on bullying. Small people can bully big people if they are mentally stronger so to use your example, if Killian Dain was a big soft teddy bear then yes Adam Cole bullying him would be believable.

I didn't think Nia and Alexa was a great storyline myself but given they're such good friends I doubt Alexa had to do anything she was uncomfortable with.

Nia could be like Dain or Sullivan though. A strong, tough, ass kicker. Instead because she is big they make an issue of her body size. Why not just have her win because she is capable of dominance. It bugs me that they focus on her size in that way.

J. Marston

This is probably throwing stuff at the wall and seeing what sticks this early on but I'm all for it. Reigns can't be given another main event...

https://twitter.com/pwstream/status/983356325705986048?s=21

HandsomeBob

All for an all women's main event as before the finish Charlotte and Asuka were having a MOTN, dunno why Asuka had to be sacrificed for it prematurely and so weakly though.

spiralism

Went to bed after the AJ/Naka bout, assumed i'd seen all i'd wanted to see and was knackered. Judging by the reaction to what i missed, thank christ for that.

Had its moments as a PPV (Taker squash at the end of an entertaining segment, Bryan) but also showed why i gave up watching WWE on the regular a couple of years ago. Vince needs to step the **** away at this stage especially given the job HHH is doing booking NXT. AJ and Naka had no reason to be paced like a match between two big men and yet that's what were were served up.

Reigns being booked as this generations Cena with every bit of the invincibility and none of the personality is going nowhere and Lesnar squashing all and sundry got old years ago. Putting them in a main event was guaranteed to bomb and i valued my sleep more than watching the apparent worst match of the year candidate served up last night. Vince made a huge mistake having those two go over Taker in recent years, imo WWE jumped the shark with that.

The best match on the card had no right to be Olympians vs McMahons yet it was, that says a lot for HHH and for the booking of the rest of the event. Rousey looked great though, it's obvious she's wanted to do this since she was a kid because she took to it like a natural.

In all, and i recall saying this the last time i tuned in some time ago, this had the potential to be so much better only for Vince's booking.

Vinny, just hang it up. Go play golf with the president and leave the son in law in charge, it'll be grand.

sky88

Cianan2 wrote: »

Very underwhelming show for me, I feel like they're trying too hard to force too many WrestleMania moments now instead of letting things organically happen for the superstars.

i think this is a wider problem with wwe at there minute. there overkiling stuff too much like pushing the network was free but of course they overdid it when i think anyone watching the preshow already has the network.

even the cena stuff in the crowd was really cool but then they went back to him far too much

Omackeral

Agent Coulson wrote: »

That stupid wrist **** does my head in that alone is a reason to hate him.

gerrybbadd

Mania for me, was the last PPV that I would actually stay up to watch.

After that last night, no more. I'll catch it the next day. I really hope the XFL pulls Vince away from WWE. I know it won't happen, but man, he needs to go

Insect Overlord

Just a thought, but do ye reckon they might be keeping the belt on Lesnar for another 2 months so that he'll eclipse CM Punk's long reign as champ?

PTH2009

Will Nakamura as a heel actually work

sky88

https://twitter.com/WrestlingSheet/status/983389255543152641?s=19

The Nal

Lesnar has now wrestled 6 hours since his return in 2012. An hour a year.

Agent Coulson

Just rewatched the mix tag.


Steph and Ronda MVP's of the night for me.

Agent Coulson

sky88 wrote: »

https://twitter.com/WrestlingSheet/status/983389255543152641?s=19

Waiting to see this on cctv footage on RAW tonight.

764dak

I might be misremembering but the "This is awful" chants stopped when the crowd saw blood. They went silent.

The Nal

764dak wrote: »

I might be misremembering but the "This is awful" chants stopped when the crowd saw blood. They went silent.

Yeah. They may have called that in the ring when they heard the chants.

Itssoeasy

This weekend watching nxt takeover and wrestlemania, it's clear that there are two very different philosophies going on in WWE. There is triple h and his vision of what sports entertainment/pro wrestling is and should be and that is shown on NXT and there is Vince Mcmahon's vision which you would think given who he surrounds himself with would be better but it's clearly not getting better.

His what appears to be pig headed determination with getting Roman reigns over, which is clearly not happening and the fans have been clear they don't want to cheer Roman is infuriating as a wrestling fan. This is from Vince who alledgedly gives the fans what they want, yet has shown through various booking decisions that he doesn't care. I hope that when Vince either retires(unlikely) or he dies triple h has a big hand in the creative direction, because this crap can't go on.

An example of triple H and his direction is the fact the ref in the main event at takeover didn't wear a referee shirt but an nxt shirt. It's a little detail but one that is important.

DM_7

NXT is great but it is a small part of their product and would not work stretched out to 3 hours Monday and Two hours Thursday.

The thing I used to admire about WWE was they had the variety, focus on differant things and come January the Mania road kicked in.

Everything tightened up and was more focused on creating stories. They made sure Mania, despite its variety appeal had something huge to end the night, that they built towards something memorable and satisfactory. Maybe they will move back to that but it will never be tight and focused whole year round.

Rock Lesnar

Right just watched, thoroughly enjoyed Angle/Rousey v Triple H/Steph.

Rusev getting pinned was typical WWE, we'll show Rusev for getting over on his own.

Taker Cena was what it was, Cena selling Takers big boot looked ridiculous.

Styles Nakamura was good, but not as good as i expected, i was surprised Styles retained.

The Raw tag title was just ridiculous, im sorry but if you want the titles to mean anything, you just cant pick a kid out of the crowd to be in the match.

IC match was ok, but fairly predictable.

Lesnar and Reigns was what it was, im sure some were enthralled by it, but the crowd chanting this is awful, pretty much summed it for me, i was surprised Lesnar retained but he did so thats that.

Overall, rather average, as i said my favourite match was Angle/Rousey v the McMahons, and considering the names on the rest of the card, it shouldnt have been.

nazmoalex

Watching that fella in the short stack pancake suit doing the worm then proceed to get cramps in both legs had me in stiches! That ramp wasn't too short either poor lad had to walk back up in bits! Badly needed that laugh to keep the spirits up for the rest of the show.
Enjoyed the show overall, bit disappointed with a couple of moments but nothing had me throwing stuff at the tv in rage.

Loughc

For anyone that cares Rollins is now a grand slam champion.

But it’s hard to care about anything after 7 hours of Vince-a-Mania.