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411’s Instant Analysis 05.14.12: WWE Monday Night Raw

May 14, 2012 | Posted by Sat

Welcome to this week’s Instant Analysis of Monday Night Raw. I’m your humble reviewer, Chad Nevett and it’s time once again for the longest running weekly serialized show in TV history. Or something like that. It’s the go home show before Over the Limit, which means John Cena and John Laurinaitis will probably confront one another! CM Punk and Daniel Bryan will exchange violence! Randy Orton will RKO three other guys right in a row! Paul Heyman will talk! It should be fun. Let’s get to it…

SEGMENT ONE: Triple H Spins and Paul Heyman Sues

This was a solid opening segment. Triple H’s interpretation of Brock Lesnar’s history isn’t a new one and is definitely one I’ve come across many times online. One thing that I liked was attacking the idea of Lesnar giving the WWE ‘legitimacy.’ Then again, I don’t see why fiction needs ‘legitimacy.’ It’s fiction. But, this is also a business where people are upset that an actor doesn’t ‘sell’ an injury in real life that happened during a TV show… so my view is almost certainly in the minority. Heyman was obnoxious in that way that only Heyman can be and that plays well against Triple H. Pretty simple story that suffers a bit from the whole lawsuit business — those almost always come off horribly.

Rating: 7.0 out of 10

SEGMENT TWO: CM Punk & Santino Marella vs. Cody Rhodes & Daniel Bryan
Match Result: CM Punk pinned Cody Rhodes
Match Length: Just over 11 minutes

One of these things is not like the others… I wonder if CM Punk had flashbacks to tagging with Colt Cabana? I enjoyed this match. Santino’s attempt to dive out of the ring was funny and, then, he played the ‘face partner who gets beat down by the heels’ role well. CM Punk’s focus on Daniel Bryan sold their feud in places where not many other guys would. Cody Rhodes eating the pin isn’t surprising since pins are clearly his favorite food, but it is a little disappointing. Still, a fun match.

Rating: 7.0 out of 10

SEGMENT THREE: Beth Phoenix vs. Alicia Fox
Match Result: Beth Phoenix pinned Alicia Fox
Match Length: A little under a minute and a half

Who doesn’t love Beth Phoenix squashing someone only to get punked out by someone in dangly earrings? Wait… me. I don’t.

Rating: 4.0 out of 10

SEGMENT FOUR: The Big Show vs. Kane
Match Result: Kane pinned the Big Show
Match Length: A little over four minutes

The match here was one we’ve all seen many, many times before. It’s Kane fighting the Big Show. Nothing new there. The follow-up was just about one of the least entertaining things I’ve seen on this show in a long time. I liked the Big Show’s passion, but it was so ill-served in this cheap attempt to make John Laurinaitis seem more evil than he already is. All I kept thinking about was what Larry and Steve said on this week’s podcast about everyone who’s been screwed with by Laurinaitis since last week must hate John Cena for not letting the Board of Directors fire the Johnny. I also kept waiting for Big Show to realize that it wasn’t worth it, lay Laurinaitis out with his knockout punch, say “Have fun on Sunday, Johnny” and walk away. Instead, we got another segment of someone embarrassing themselves for no reason other than it probably amused someone in the back. This really was not a segment that I enjoyed in any way.

Rating: 2.0 out of 10

SEGMENT FIVE: Brodus Clay, Kofi Kingston & R-Truth vs. the Miz, Dolph Ziggler & Jack Swagger
Match Result: Brodus Clay pinned the Miz
Match Length: A little over six and a half minutes

Who loves the taste of pins more: Cody Rhodes or the Miz? Because they each seem to eat a big steaming bowlful every week… After the faces won the earlier tag match, I’m a little surprised that they won here, too. But, it was a Funkasaurus match, so I shouldn’t be surprised. Your typical match of this sorts and that’s fine, I guess. One big plus was Ziggler doing his headstand while keeping a hold on. That’s always impressive.

Rating: 6.0 out of 10

SEGMENT SIX: Chris Jericho vs. Randy Orton
Match Result: Chris Jericho win via disqualification
Match Length: A little under eight and a half minutes

I’ve been enjoying the build to the Fatal Fourway on Sunday. It makes sense to have a series of DQ finishes when you have four guys involved in the build-up and the DQ finish here worked well. Jericho goaded Sheamus and Sheamus responded. Pretty simple and also served the purpose of playing up the tension between Sheamus and Orton. I do wish we’d gotten a longer match, because I rather like Jericho and Orton in the ring together. I’m curious about what they could do together in a longer program. The lack of RKOs was disappointing, I must admit.

Rating: 6.5 out of 10

SEGMENT SEVEN: The Two Johns

Well, that was 15 minutes of meandering filler with two minutes of interesting tacked on at the end. John Cena was in rare form of doing lame puns, Jim Carrey impressions, and generally doing everything he can to make me not take his feud with John Laurinaitis seriously in any way. What bugs me is that it didn’t really serve a purpose except to make this the length of a ‘main event promo’ when all they really had were some insults and the announcement of the stipulations of Sunday’s match which seem to guarantee a ‘fair fight’ between Cena and Laurinaitis, but will probably do something stupid like have the Big Show earn his job back by helping ‘Big Johnny’ beat Cena. I kept waiting for this to end and it seemed like it never would, much like the Laurinaitis/Big Show segment. I hope Cena wins for the sole reason of getting this guy off my TV.

Rating: 3.5 out of 10

FINAL THOUGHTS

Segment of the Night: Triple H and Paul Heyman

Trash Segment of the Night: The Big Show Gets Fired

Final Analysis: If you look at the segments from tonight’s show, you’d think this was a wrestling-heavy show and, yet, it didn’t really feel like one. It felt like a show where everything was stretched out and used to fill time because they didn’t really know what else to do. Nothing stood out as great and a few things stood out as pretty awful. At best, this was a mediocre, forgettable show.

Verdict: 5.0

411 RATINGS SCALE:
0 – 0.9: Torture
1 – 1.9: Extremely Horrendous
2 – 2.9: Very Bad
3 – 3.9: Bad
4 – 4.9: Poor
5 – 5.9: Not So Good
6 – 6.9: Average
7 – 7.9: Good
8 – 8.9: Very Good
9 – 9.9: Amazing
10: Virtually Perfect