We’ve had a very short build up to “Hell in a Cell” and we’re already in the home stretch. We open with The Miz and Alex Reilly. Daniel Bryan has challenged them to a tag match. Miz says every Monday night Daniel Bryan gets a beat down. He comes out, to Flight of the Valkyries again, and reveals his partner, John Morrison. We go straight to the match. Reilly is still pretty limited, but he holds his own here. The match isn’t long enough to warrant a commercial break and Miz gets a clean win on Bryan with a Skull Crushing Finale. What’s interesting is a brawl breaks out and Bryan and Morrison end up going after each other as well as Miz and Reilly. The anonymous General Manager speaks through his mouthpiece Michael Cole to announce a Triple Threat for the US Title between Bryan, Miz and Morrison in a new Submissions Count Anywhere match.
We get a women’s Battle Royale to determine a #1 contender with LayCool on commentary. LayCool are getting repetitive and annoying again after their brief stint of being entertaining while they were on NXT. The good news is Natalya wins this match so at least she’s getting pushed more than her male Hart Dynasty compatriots. Maryse and/or Ted Dibiase still have a stalker, but he or she promises something happens next week.
Sheamus gives us a lesson in Irish folklore then issues an open challenge. The Great Khali, arguably the worst wrestler on the roster, answers the call. Unable to manhandle his opponent Sheamus is reduced to strikes before he quickly gets disqualified for throwing an announce chair on Khali. Sheamus’s pale white chest is marked with a huge red handprint from Khali’s chop, but the Irishman comes out on top of the post match beat down.
Somehow, Edge is going to interview the GM on his talk show segment The Cutting Edge. E-GM uses a bad computer voice. It’s a terrible segment best ignored, but it sets up Edge to face John Cena. It’s a decent little match and Edge spears Cena for the win. The E-GM rightfully points out Cena’s foot was under the bottom rope and restarts the match. Of course, Cena wins this time. Edge goes 2001 on the talking laptop and destroys it.
Heath Slater and Justin Gabriel barely beat Evan Bourne and Mark Henry. So their stock looks to be dropping. Or course all five of Nexus beat them down afterwards. The GM has ruled if the rest of Nexus interfere in the match at HiaC then Cena automatically wins and Nexus is disbanded. Nexus plans to invade Smackdown on Friday. So the WWE bigwigs think Nexus will draw viewers to the SyFy premiere… yet they still plan to break up the group? Ah, Cena is going too. That makes more sense.
The tag champs, the chosen one Drew McIntyre and “Dashing” Cody Rhodes, and the Hart Dynasty mix it up again, in another title match. It’s a short match and the Harts get buried again. Now they’re teasing a break up.
Our main event is Chris Jericho versus Randy Orton. This seems like such a forgone conclusion I’m tempted to just go to bed early. Jericho starts off on the stick. He’s giving a lengthy and impressive list of people he’s beaten that has to be cut off by a commercial. He’s still going after the commercial, remember this is live, and he’s even naming TNA guys! Funaki was in there! Orton finally interrupts them and Cole points out this is their first one-on-one match in the history of RAW. It ends up being a pretty good match, but it’s ultimately meaningless as Sheamus interferes and gives Orton the DQ win. Orton sets up Sheamus for the punt to the head, but Jericho ambushes Orton with a Codebreaker. Jericho goes for a chair and that gives Orton time to recover and RKO Jericho. The crowd are chanting “Punt!” That’s the coolest thing a crowd has done in a long time. Orton doesn’t let them down as he delivers one hell of a kick to Jericho’s head. Did he just knock him off contract?
Word has come down that NXT is to become a web only show. In other words WWE couldn’t find a single TV network willing to pick it up. In the 500 channel universe that’s sad. However, the show will continue to air outside the US. That includes Canada, lucky me. So I’ll be recapping the remaining episodes of this season, but I don’t see any chance of there being another.
They have a wheelbarrow race as the first challenge. Just in case that didn’t suck enough, Hornswoggle shows up to be the passenger. Kaytln wins. You can tell there’s a PPV Sunday because this show is packed with recaps. We’re at the three quarters mark and we’ve had no matches and one challenge. We’re ending with a challenge, called Dis the Diva, which means no matches. Seriously, no matches? The last time this show will be on US TV and they show no matches? Was there any doubt this show is considered a joke now? AJ wins. AJ at least has a likable character but she has the chest of a 10-year old so I don’t see WWE letting her win.
The live Smackdown better be good. Because I was set to get the PPV and now I’m having second thoughts…
