I haven’t done one of these in a long time, but wrestling is something I want to get writing about again; it’s an interest of mine, and this is a place for my interests, so it makes sense to me.
Anyway, best to jump right into things I think, with my as-live show notes from the most recent WWE pay-per-view, Over the Limit:
- What’s this? A cold open with a battle royal joined in progress? That’s unusual for a pay-per-view, but I’m down with it. Those intro video packages are too long and boring anyway, I usually skip ’em to get straight to the action.
- Battle royals these days are normally a mess (if they ever weren’t) and they’re never given enough time, but this one was better than it had any right to be. Big face pop for Christian too, which is weird because the last few times on TV he’s played a chickenshit heel. His win gets him an IC title shot against Cody Rhodes later so we’ll see how that works out…
- Tag title match up next, and it’s pretty good for a ‘let’s just throw four guys together’ kinda deal. Also, I forgot Kofi Kingston and R Truth are the champions now. Pretty unimaginative to stick your two top black guys in a team together. Isn’t that a little bit racist?
- Cut to backstage, where they’re doing an angle about confiscating signs from the crowd. “What about freedom of speech?” says Jerry Lawler. Oh the irony!
- Beth Phoenix is back in long pants, it seems. Much better look for her. Really sells her at the bad-ass she’s supposed to be.
- “Shucky-ducky quack-quack”? I love you, Booker T.
- Are Trace knee pads still a thing? I’m just looking at Layla’s kneepads and I expected to see the Trace branding but there’s some different unidentifiable logo on there.
- Another surprise for this card: a decent Divas match! Hardly on the level of the joshi greats, but I didn’t notice any major botches, and they both sold like pros. More of this, please.
- Fatal Four-Way for the World title now. Every time I see Chris Jericho in his light-up jacket I think Dynamo from The Running Man.
- Loving Alberto Del Rio’s high-waisted shorts. They’re like Man Spanx.
- Sheamus’ new finisher (which is basically CIMA’s Schwein) is called White Noise? I like the name, but it doesn’t go with the move.
- Okay, so is Christian a face now or what? The crowd seems into it, but I’m not convinced. I can’t go on appearances alone; if that were the case then John Cena and Randy Orton would be the biggest heels on the roster.
- The Miz is quite good on the mic, but he’s upper mid-card though and through. There’s nothing wrong with that, but it’s a position that’s been missing for a while. WWE wrestlers today are either stars, or jobbers to the stars – there’s no in-between. There should be.
- How the hell did they botch the entrance music there? They must have the tunes queued up on separate players or something. And the sound guy must have been taking a break since it was a good 20 seconds before someone noticed.
- Haters gonna hate, but I like these short mid-card filler matches. They’re like palate cleansers before the good stuff.
- CM Punk does a great impression of Vince McMahon.
- All the talk on Twitter about this match was ‘Will Punk and Daniel Bryan go an hour?’ Considering there’s only an hour left in the PPV, and at least two matches to go, I think we all know the answer to that one.
- If CM Punk wasn’t straight edge, I’d say he had a bit of a beer belly on him.
- Seriously, though, that was a genuinely great match, lots of solid psychology and Strong Style elements, only let down by a commentary team hopelessly ill-prepared to call it. Even ‘Good Ol’ JR’ wouldn’t have done it justice.
- Another mid-card filler! Ryback might be just Goldberg in RVD’s singlet, but the sheer lack of response from the crowd (beyond the initial ‘Goldberg’ chanting) is very curious. He needs a more dramatic finisher, yes, but he’s not that bad.
- Main event time, and I’m really annoyed. Whether it’s John Cena politicking behind the scenes or the bookers just not having a clue, there’s no excuse in this day and age for headlining a PPV with a comedy match – even with The Big Show’s surprise appearance and swerve turn at the end. This should have been in the middle of the card, with either Punk/Bryan or the Fatal Four-Way headlining. A crappy end to a decent show.