Blog Archives
Notes In Observance – WWE Raw 2/6/17: Wild Samoans
Photo courtesy of Wikipedia.
By Nicholas Jason Lopez
“Notes In Observance” features random thoughts and analysis on television shows. Quick results can be found at the bottom of the post.
(Aired 2/6/17)
Wild Samoans
– One week after Samoa Joe’s riveting debut that involved a sideline beatdown of Seth Rollins, it was probably no secret that the angle would be the focus to open the show. It’s funny how the Rollins-Triple H storyline mulls along through the months, but with big happenings, it heats up. At this time, Rollins was likely to miss WrestleMania, which actually put more heat on Joe and rather than ignore that, they used it to their advantage. The opening video delved into all that, with sleek editing that actually brought meaning to Trips’ promo on Rollins last week and set up the moment well for Joe to attack. We’ll guess Joe will be branded as “The Destroyer” from hereon out. The key as always is the followup.
Notes In Observance – WWE SmackDown Live 1/31/17: Chamber Music
Photo courtesy of Wikipedia.
By Nicholas Jason Lopez
“Notes In Observance” features random thoughts and analysis on recent television shows. Quick results can be found at the bottom of the post.
(Aired 1/31/17)
Chamber Music
– Given that the Royal Rumble was won by a SmackDown guy (that’s Randy Orton, The Wyatt Family-Friendly version in case you didn’t know), the opening video gladly reminded us of all that jazz. WWE took it upon themselves to quote various media outlets with the most generic sentences on planet Earth. We’ll give an example. “That was a Rumble!” – Forbes. No kidding. You’d also be crazy if they didn’t sprinkle in footage of the epic rematch between WWE World Heavyweight Champion John Cena and AJ Styles where history was made and such. However, the Rumble madness is over and thanks to WWE’s killer Pay-Per-View schedule, we’ve got Elimination Chamber in a mere two weeks.
WWE Elimination Chamber 2015 Reaction
By Nicholas Jason Lopez
* Graphic by Emmanuel Gonzalez *
With Elimination Chamber all said and done in the record books, it’ll go down in WWE history as a show not remembered by its namesake, but rather one match.
One moment.
Yes – NXT Champion Kevin Owens cleanly pinning WWE United States Champion John Cena after 20 minutes of grueling back-and-forth action that shattered already-high expectations for Owens’ in-ring main roster debut.
That’s what we’ll walk away from this night with carrying the most relevancy.
Let’s get through the rest of the card now, why don’t we?
WWE Elimination Chamber 2015 Preview/Predictions
By Nicholas Jason Lopez
Give WWE credit where it’s due.
Coming out of the gates of Payback with another “Network-exclusive” PPV just two weeks later was a risk of talent overexposure, but quite frankly, WWE shelled out a card even better than its predecessor.
NXT Champion Kevin Owens marched into the main roster by laying out John Cena, stepping on his prestigious United States Championship in the process. Add that with his mic work that gets better by the segment and stand off with Samoa Joe, he’s damn near broken the Internet. If that didn’t, the announcement of him against Cena on this show probably did. The entire community will hold their collective breaths on this one, but it’s arguably the real seller of the card.
As for the rest of it, it’s what we’d consider above-average on paper, though nothing mind-blowing, and we’ll get to that slightly below.
Notes In Observance – WWE Raw 5/25/15: Nassau’s Last Hurrah
By Nicholas Jason Lopez
“Notes In Observance” features random thoughts and analysis on recent television shows. Quick results can be found at the bottom of the post.
(Aired 5/25/15)
Nassau’s Last Hurrah
– After the classy-as-ever 10-bell salute, the show started off lukewarm at best in terms of the first segment with The Authority, Dean Ambrose and Roman Reigns. The main highlight here was the promo exchange between Ambrose and Rollins that was actually pretty strong enough on its own to make us want to see them go at Elimination Chamber. The tone of this episode though, was making us believe it wouldn’t happen at all. Triple H and Stephanie McMahon using last week’s deal as a “verbal agreement” was an obvious way to gain advantage this week, making it appear so hard to sign a piece of paper. Ambrose’s responses here were at least quirky and whimsical enough to get fans behind him, while Rollins’ comparison of Ambrose to a cockroach was fitting from his point of view. On that note, how could The Authority not see Ambrose calling for Reigns’ help? This at least set the opening tag match on a good note.
Notes In Observance – WWE Smackdown 5/21/15: Self-Reflection
By Nicholas Jason Lopez
“Notes In Observance” features random thoughts and analysis on recent television shows. Quick results can be found at the bottom of the post.
(Aired 5/21/15)
Self-Reflection
– The opening video highlighted Dean Ambrose crashing Seth Rollins’ “Architect of a Dream” segment on Raw to get another shot at the WWE World Heavyweight Championship at Elimination Chamber with some cold cinder block Justice, though Rollins got the last laugh, delivering a much-smoother Pedigree.
Notes In Observance – WWE Raw 5/18/15: Debut Owens Debut
By Nicholas Jason Lopez
“Notes In Observance” features random thoughts and analysis on recent television shows. Quick results can be found at the bottom of the post.
(Aired 5/18/15)
Debut Owens Debut
– Given Stephanie McMahon’s return and building off the momentum from Payback’s stellar main event that saw Seth Rollins retain the WWE World Heavyweight Championship, it made sense for The Authority to open up the show with what we assumed would be a gloating promo, but the result was actually a nice change. Obviously, they put Rollins’ victory over and set the tone for the rest of the show in celebrating him, but the focus here was on the Elimination Chamber match for the vacant Intercontinental Championship at Elimination Chamber. Sheamus coming out to compliment The Authority fit his character, as did giving him the unofficial “title” of ending Daniel Bryan’s career with his last television match. You’d think Sheamus would benefit as an Authority henchman, but having him do his own thing also works. Ryback also fit in this segment well by standing up to Sheamus and defending Bryan to the crowd. This also effectively set up the opening contest, which was an obvious giveaway of these two being in the IC Chamber match.
