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Sunday, April 30, 2006

Dean Simon's Thoughts On Backlash 2006

Backlash? Not a bad pay-per-view, if I do say so myself. Here's the breakdown.

Chris Masters vs Carlito: What do you do when you have two adequate tag teams in a match at Wrestlemania? You break them both up and have them feud at the following ppv. Not a bad opener with Carlito working the crowd playing the face that cheats to win that Eddie was great at and what John Cena should be doing. I still think a face turn is too soon for him but as long as he doesn't do anything different with his character, I'm cool with it. Haha, that was a pun. If you couldn't tell from this match, Chris Masters is mid-card at best with not kicking out of a 3 count and missing Carlito's moonsault. He's not horrible but the thing which got him the job, his amazing physique, has loss mass since the wellness program went into effect. Coincidence? Put him on Heat until he learns the ropes and bring him back.

Umaga vs Ric Flair: I blinked and miss this match. Haha, I'm so witty. Seriously though, Flair should retire before his name doesn't mean anything anymore (see Mick Foley). I give props to WWE for managing to stereotype to races at once with Umaga and Estrada. But I can't help but wonder if this was the gimmick Samoa Joe would have been saddled with if he signed with the company. Umaga has a nice standing headbutt but other than that, he's weak, and was better off being Jamal. Estrada is nice, though.

Shelton Benjamin vs Rob Van Dam: The match I paid money to see. Sure, it was a title vs world title shot match but it didn't need any stipulations to make me happy. This is the match I've been waiting to see since they ruined Benjamin vs Angle by giving it away for free. And I wasn't disappointed. Obviously the best match of the night and helped to make RVD look stronger for his title shot while not completely burying Benjamin. Put Shelton in a feud with Michaels after this to make up for him losing the title. Speaking of which, what does RVD need with the Intercontinental Championship? They should hold a tournament. I love tournaments. Also, if RVD faces JBL at ECW as it is rumored, this means the Intercontinental Champion will be facing the US Champion for the World Heavyweight Championship. Is a title unification on the horizon? The answer is no.

Mickie James vs Trish Stratus: The rematch from Wrestlemania that I was looking forward to. They stole the show and put on the best womens match I've ever seen in my life (and this includes joshi puroresu). Unfortunately, it sounds like Trish suffered a legit injury during the match which had to be ended short with Mickie saving the ending by disqualifying herself. Her save made up for the botched finish of their last match. Too bad there's no other women in the division and it has nowhere to go.

Speaking of women, Maria did a fair share of backstage segments tonight and I don't care if she messed up a bunch of times. She's hot as hell and I don't care if she knows nothing about wrestling. And Shane and Vince and God angles are comedy gold, apparently.

Big Show vs Kane: The thing about two big guys facing each other is their entire moveset is composed of power moves. When a big guy does a power move to another big guy, it's not impressive. Instead, it looks sloppy and weak. This match had everyone in the theater booing which I expected.

Vince and Shane McMahon vs Shawn Michaels and God: Besides the pyrotechnics from the ringposts, this feud hasn't been disappointing. Vince comes off as a mega heel using the mocking of Shawn's religion to get to it. You can call it blasphemous but the majority of fans call it humorous and the use of the spotlight during God's entrance was perfect. Anybody who wanted someone to show up as "God" (Mick Foley, JBL, Mordecai, etc.) or wanted a special effect at the end of the match is and idiot. It was a simple handicap match that played on Shawn's emotions to make it more dramatic and entertaining and should have happened before Wrestlemania. A good match with a nice spot of Shawn jumping off a huge ladder onto the Spirit Squad. Great camera work.

This is where the show can come to a halt to have Matt Striker come out and talk about being a teacher and how everyone is stupid, the same thing he's been doing for months now, and call out Eugene to pick his nose and put it in Striker's mouth. Not a horrible segment but it ran long and could have easily been on Raw. Actually, it should have been on Raw. In fact, why the hell was this on Backlash?

Triple H vs Edge vs John Cena: Give Smackdown two months to plan a triple threat main event title match at Wrestlemania and they fall on their face. Give Raw three weeks and they pull it off. Except for Styles being surprised that Edge beat Triple H on Raw (which made Edge look like an underdog instead of a viable threat), the build up worked and had people excited and guessing who was going to win. All three men had a shot and all three men pulled off a great match that included several nice spots (though I would have liked the see the double FU). HHH bled like a motherfucker and got pinned by Cena. Good match by all three wrestlers and I'm not so disappointed with the outcome as no one tapped out to an STFU.

1 Comments:

Blogger GreatOne said...

Nice review, Dean. I look forward to more reviews from you in the future. And I will be getting back to my wrestling school updates as this Sunday I will be returning to Buddy and Colonels school.

Mon May 01, 10:40:00 PM PDT  

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