Pantoja’s WWE Survivor Series 2024 Review

WWE Survivor Series: WarGames 2024

November 30^th, 2024 | Rogers Arena in Vancouver, British Columbia

War Games: Bayley, Bianca Belair, IYO SKY, Naomi & Rhea Ripley vs. Candice LeRae, Liv Morgan, Nia Jax, Raquel Rodriguez & Tiffany Stratton

Bayley opened things for her team, while Nia started for her side. Not a hot way to start considering their singles feud was an absolute mess. The camera caught Bayley calling a spot and the rest of this section was pretty bad. Naomi entered next wearing a party hat for…reasons. She also used a colorful kendo stick as a weapon and they brought a toilet seat into play. Next in was meant to be Tiffany apparently but Candice shoved her aside to enter instead. DRAMA! She turned the tide a bit, improved the match, and hit a nice springboard moonsault onto Bayley as she lay on chairs. Bianca was next and got the table that the fans seemed to only care about. Now it was TIFFY TIME. I hate the trope of everyone stopping to grab a weapon. IYO did the same, running all the way around the ring for a Wario-colored trash can but her signature spot was interrupted by Candice. That led to a fun Tiffany/IYO exchange, especially since we’ve never seen that before. Rhea was last in for the faces and turned the tide as the heels had taken control. Her whole look with the skull mask and everything was incredible. When it came time for Liv to be the final entrant, Rhea was the only one standing in one of the rings and Liv was hesitant until she went to grab her bat. I loved the spot of Rhea removing the protective mask to face Liv (and her face paint was rad). Alas, Liv’s teammates saved her and held Rhea for some bat shots to the ribs. A big brawl broke out until IYO and Tiffany climbed the cage on opposite sides of the rings. IYO’s trash can moonsault and Tiffany’s Swanton at the same time was a cool idea but they timed it wrong so Tiffany got up there and awkwardly waited for IYO to get ready until she did her spot. Tiffany got her briefcase and had both champions down at her feet but Raquel intervened. There was also a moment of IYO and Bayley not trusting each other and I wanted that from them to be honest. In the end, Rhea got the win by hitting Liv with Riptide through a table in 38:11. I have no idea how to rate that. It was a mess but I had fun. Like when you watch a bad movie and enjoy the shit out of it for that reason. The match was awful early on but once Rhea entered, things picked up significantly at least. I’m guessing this for now but it could go lower on rewatches. [***]

WWE United States Championship: LA Knight [c] vs. Shinsuke Nakamura

Nakamura’s entrance and entire aura were so dope when he came out. Like, you kind of have to give him the title after that. I say that as someone who isn’t all “WWE RUINED SHINEUSKE,” and thinks he hasn’t done well but just as someone who knows how cool that was. For the most part, this was just a basic house show match as nothing really stood outside until we got to see an Exploder off the top which was nice. Then, kind of from out of nowhere, Nakamura hit Kinshasa to win the title in 9:43. Of all the matches I’ve seen, that was one of them. It didn’t offend me but it was pretty dull and really bland. [**]

WWE Intercontinental Championship: Bron Breakker [c] vs. Ludwig Kaiser vs. Sheamus  

On paper, this sounds like a hard-hitting banger. So I was worried when they used using weapons early. We have two War Games matches with plunder and this doesn’t need it. Anyway, Bron’s speed is frightening. The way he hits the ropes makes everything look more impactful. His shoulder block outside looked insane. He shot out like a missile and that was a lot of what went down in this match. Sheamus and Ludwig battling it out and then Bron comes in with something dope to break things up. Like his leap from the apron was also cool. They gave us the tease of a Sheamus win (I’d build this up to Mania for Sheamus) only for Kaiser to pull out the referee. They just beat the shit out of each other and it was so cool. I love that in wrestling. In the end, Sheamus took some shillelagh beatings from Ludwig but fought him off, only for Bron to hit both with a Spear and retain in 14:24. Yes, they just let those guys do what they do and it was awesome. [****¼]

World Heavyweight Championship: Gunther [c] vs. Damian Priest

Damian has been cooking Gunther in the build. That’s the idea as Damian is in Gunther’s head, making the champion tentative in the ring. They took a methodical route, having each guy try to dissect the other and pick them apart. We were around nine minutes in before Gunther was even able to connect on a chop and Priest responded by backing him down with a series of chops of his own. When Priest hit the Razor’s Edge, he could only get two because he was too damaged from the action. Gunther got his own big near fall and commentary sold the doubt that was creeping into his mind. It was as if Gunther couldn’t figure out how to keep Priest down. Unfortunately, the ending saw Finn Bálor get involved again, costing Priest the match with a Coupe de Grace off the steel steps. Then Gunther booted Finn and choked Damian out at the 19:20 mark. That was going really well until that finish. I’m so over the Finn/Priest and Liv/Rhea angles at this point. Gunther/Finn would be the most interesting path forward. [***½]

War Games: The Bloodline and Bronson Reed vs. CM Punk, Roman Reigns, Sami Zayn and The Usos

Okay, so I chose to watch this match with my wife and then come back and do the review. That was like two hours ago though so I’ll do my best with this. I thought this was laid out well. Jey starting against Tama made sense. Tama isn’t the best worker but guys like Reed, Solo, and Fatu work best in shorter bursts and Tanga is, well Tanga. They followed the classic War Games formula with the heels having the advantage and the faces getting a series of “hot tag” spots. The intrigue came from the Roman/Punk drama with Roman stopping Punk from entering and sending Sami instead and then Punk stepping in front of Roman to go in when he wanted to. Some of the spots were contrived or didn’t come off too well with the biggest being Solo locking the cage. I don’t get the idea there. You can’t win until Roman officially enters, right? So locking him out means no result and no win. Unless the match “starts” when Roman gets out of the little cage and not actually into the cage. Then Roman just simply climbed in, meaning the whole thing had no impact anyway. The spot of Punk saving Roman was cool, as was seeing The Usos do their splashes together. I do think Fatu went to the double jump moonsault spot one too many times and it lost some steam. That said, the ending where Solo got left alone to eat finishers from everyone was fantastic, and saw Roman pin Solo after 41:55. That was really good. Not in the upper-tier of War Games matches but some great stuff in there. [****]

7.5

The final score: review Good

The 411

I thought that was a good show. Kept my interest throughout, the trainwreck opener was goofy fun, and after the second match, everything ranged from really good to legitimately great.