Monday, February 28, 2011

02/25/11 SMACKDOWN REVIEW: NO RUMBLE! NO CHAMBER!

Cody Rhodes was a quote machine on Friday. I'm pretty sure whenever I'm upset about something from now on, I'm going to exclaim "NO RUMBLE NO CHAMBER!" and then kick the ropes and do a back bump.

Here are my thoughts from this past Friday's SmackDown. You can find these pretty much exact same words over at Fair To Flair, where you can also find the inaugural Fair To Flair Show, which features me and the rest of the FTF guys (Jason Mann of Wrestlespective, Razor of Kick-Out!! and K. Sawyer Paul of Footnotes of Wrestling) talking about what we want out of the new site, what offends you in pro wrestling, WrestleMania XXVII, and a lot more, including the words "boobies" and "dink" as being said by me, burned into the Internet forever.

SMACKDOWN 02/25/11
LIKED
Photo - WWE.com

THE FATHER/SON SET-UP

Don't you love seeing a father and son bonding over a Rey Mysterio beatdown? I know I do! There's too many things I liked about this to mention BUT HERE I GO ANYWAY:


- Dusty's forehead looking like a quilt after decades of blading.

- Cody Rhodes looking like Horace Grant with his protective mask.

- Dusty calling his son by his full name.

- Cody saying "… everyone is staring at me."


ALL AMAZING. And then there's the attack itself, which went on way longer than I expected. Cody beat the crap out of Rey Mysterio to the point where he may need surgery five times on his left knee. Rubbing his face on the grate was good. Chucking him into the digital mirror was great. Unmasking him and kicking him in his BARE FACE was awesome. This is my favourite angle on SmackDown right now, with the Kelly Kelly/Drew McIntyre "will they won't they" relationship as a close second.


VICKIE GUERRERO NEEDS YOUR HELP

When I watched Edge raise the roof and Teddy Long do his Tom Cruise dance and everyone laugh and point at Vickie Guerrero for being fired, I tried to picture how I'd feel if I was watching this as a 12-year old, and I'm pretty sure I'd be doing a jig around my living room (until my dad saw me, which at that point I'd change the channel and talk about hockey). Vickie begging everyone for help and just getting laughed at was awesome. I hope she comes back somehow. Maybe not as an authority figure of some kind, because that's pretty much run it's course. But if she could come back and make Kelly Kelly cry again, I'd be up for that.


BIG SHOW… ANGRYYYY

My favourite kind of Big Show: angry babyface who chucks jobbers around like one of those pet monkeys who escaped it's owner and ripped the neighbours' hands and faces off. He also gets a plus for wearing the kind of jacket that every dad in my hometown wears. And the Pam Beasley scream he let out wasn't so bad either. Either way, I prefer my Big Show mad and dominating as opposed to goofy or heel and slow.


Honourable Mention: Wrestling. I wasn't glued to the action or anything, but it was all mostly pretty fun. Kane and Rey had a good opener that led to the angle of the night, Swagger and Kofi had a short, but solid match, and Vickie Guerrero got speared by Kelly Kelly. Kelly Kelly also kicked her match off with a Kenny Omega-like step dance. I've talked a lot about Kelly Kelly. Next time I'll talk this much about Kevin Kelly.


SMACKDOWN 02/25/11
DISLIKED
Photo - WWE.com

NARRATIVE OF CONVENIENCE

The WWE love to change the rules to fit whatever finish they've concocted up. And I, being the nerd that I am, am going to whine about it on the internet.


Fellow Fair To Flair contributor K. Sawyer Paul likes to call this the "Narrative of Convenience." Let me explain: Barrett and Show are on the outside and the count is around seven. Barrett slides back in the ring, halfway under the bottom rope, until Show grabs his leg and pulls him back out. Normally, that would break the count. But this time, Big Show just slid back in the ring and won by countout a second later. It's weird that they could've done this any number of ways without ignoring rules that have been in place for fucking ever (citation needed), and I'm left writing a paragraph about it like a sweaty dork.


WADE BARRETT'S PUNCHES

For a guy who's gimmick is a "bare-knuckle brawler," Barrett's punches look like the front crawl or something. They're really big and lumbering and make me not think he could actually win a "bare-knuckle brawl." Maybe a Brawl For All.


LAST MINUTE DEL RIO APPEARANCE

I wonder if this feud will ever become more than what it is right now. As it stands, I feel like I've seen the same clip a few weeks in a row, with Del Rio attacking Edge and slapping on the armbar. That's cool and all, and I love simple feuds where a guy just straight-up wants something another guy has, whether it's a title, a briefcase or Terri Runnels as your personal slave. But part of me feels like this could get a little more heat behind it. Having Del Rio attack Edge just before the credits roll, after not appearing on the entire show before that, doesn't seem like the best way.


Honourable Mention: I'm still mad about Tough Enough, stop reminding me that I'll be seeing Miss USA instead of Austin Aries and Joey Ryan.


Hey WWE, you might want to stock up on guys like Aries and Ryan. These are the kind of guys who have the same kind of dedication, talent and experience as guys like Chris Jericho, Shawn Michaels, The Undertaker, and SO ON do, who are all dropping like flies. But no. You went with Rima Fakih. Thanks for that one.


And while I'm at it, I sure wish SmackDown would create some of it's own "can't miss" awesome moments like The Rock calling John Cena a kind of cereal or Triple H politely asking The Undertaker to suck him, instead of just replaying ones that happen on Raw for me to see. I'm definitely not taking away how sweet both of those moments were, and I completely understand why they get replayed on all the other shows… but let's get Del Rio doing something besides working Edge's arm for a series of weeks, and I'll be happy.

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