C--- o- P----------

Cult of Personality.


FUCK. YES.


Discuss.....

Ok, I guess I should explain more than this, in case you havn't seen it yet, you want the spoilers and are wondering what this post is about....

So, SPOILERS BELOW......





















































Major things:

Jim Ross is BACK. John Morrison is BACK.

and, then....

Mysterio wins the tournament and becomes the champion, and Alberto Del Rio comes to cash in... Alberto fails to win it, and then backs off like it never happened and runs away.

Triple H comes out and says that John Cena is getting his rematch.. uh oh..... Looks like Raw is taking a turn for the predictable and lame, again....

But hey look, Jim Ross is back. Still, a feeling of unease is around the corner...

Anyway, it gets to the end, the match starts, besides 1 or 2 small surprises, Raw is turning out fairly forgettable and a bit stale as usual... that goes on, but the dreaded moment feels like it's coming. Looks liek Mysterio is going to be buried and John Cena is going to rocket over him.

More Super Cena bullshit, *sigh*... that's what it's looking like, right? You'd think so....

Indeed, Mysterio and Cena have their match... Mysterio locks on Cena's devestating super move of doom, the STFU!!! OH WOW, MAYBE HE CAN--

No, everyone else taps to the STFU like a bitch immediatly, but of course Super Cena powers out of it like it's no big deal and oh, look at that...

Your new WWE Champion, John Cena.... *yawn*. Same old, same old. Dammit. But...

Wait.

Waaait.

WHAT? WHAT IS THIS?

WHAT'S THAT SONG?

CULT OF PERSONALITY?? CM PUNK'S ROH THEME??? AND--OH WOW.

Yes. That happens. CM Punk returns with a new Titantron and using his old ROH Music now, wearing a T-Shirt with "BEST IN THE WORLD" on it.

He gets in the ring with the WWE title. Cena is in the ring with the WWE title.

Both men have a WWE title. Cena raises his title up.

CM Punk raises his title just that much higher....

CENA BACKS DOWN AND WALKS AWAY LIKE A HURT DOG.

Crowd goes ballistic.

So, that's what happened. Now, in my opinion, I think this night aside from the few small bits like JR coming back and Morrison's return was predictable and stale......

But am I saying that like it's a bad thing? NO.

Because... now this just may be my theory, but I think that was intentional to make the last 5 minutes of the show be that much more awesome.

I think this Raw was intentionally boring, and intentionally building up to be set up like the familiar, tired, irritating old Super Cena steamrolling bullshit all over again, just so they could throw in that curveball at the end and SHOCK EVERYBODY.

So, I must say.... Well played.

I think this was a genius Raw in that regard. Just genius. Played with the people's expectations all the way through, and then WHAM hit you with that.

I love how Punk is now becoming this anti-authority figure much like Stone Cold used to be, but in an entirely new way, now.

CM Punk's "new" music, represents this, I think.

Wrestling fans have had this perception of the WWE for a long time now as being stuck in a bubble, with no perception or respect or understanding of the outside world. That there's the WWE and then there's the mysterious Indies that real wrestling fans appreciate and WWE want's nothing to do with...

And CM Punk's character, I now believe, is that contingent of the Indie wrestling business old school, tradition mentality.. much like ROH's mentality in a nutshell, let's say. And CM Punk is now representing that outside world, coming invading the WWE and bringing that "real world" sense into a cartoon land, so to speak.

Using a piece of old music, that's not new, not used to promote a new band, not a new hot single. Living Colour's "Cult Of Personality" is that kind of music that breaks from WWE's perception as the mainstream.

CM Punk's character in a nutshell.

And I think CM Punk's crashing of what was INTENTIONALLY made to be a rather boring, predictable Raw was to not only put the surprise over, but to give this sense that two worlds are clashing and things will never be the same after this. That change is coming and CM Punk is the one to bring it.


Think about it. This is perfect.

I can see they're leading to the WWE Title unification between the WWE corporate mentality of Cena and the Indie mentality of CM Punk.

But more than that, it's two completely different schools of thought clashing to prove superiority over the other. Is it Cena and WWE's way that is the best? Or is it CM Punk's way that is the best?

This is clearly what they're doing with this, and I couldn't be more pleased. It makes the whole thing feel, for the first time, like WWE's structure may be in jeopardy for CM Punk and what he represents to capitalize on it.

That's what it feels like the story is here, and I just think this is marvelous.

I needed to get into the office earlt his morning, so I have only seen the first 40 minutes or so of RAW (turned it off just as Truth was talking to HHH backstage). However, I've read the full report.



RAW didn't sound boring to me, I have to say. I thought the Mysterio/Miz match was very solid (though I hated that masked rat bastard winning) and I also liked Dolph .v. Evan. The rest sounds pretty good from the spoilers, and people are saying Cena and Rey had a very good contest as well.



Plus, Zack Ryder on TV on RAW = WIN!



However, as to the angle.



Love that Rey only got an hour and a half as champ - though at the same time hot-shotting the title straight back to Cena? Couldn't they have just added him to the Miz/Rey match and made it a triple threat? Or couldn't they have gone at least a few weeks without him having the belt?



Using the ROH theme music is a great idea, and really plays well to the angle of himbeing anti-WWE, but I have two problems with it:



1) I think its too early for his return. Another couple of weeks, even another week, would have been better.



2) If he isn't officially employed, he should have come out through the crowd. If he is officially employed, why are they letting him walk around with the WWE belt?

Zack Ryder returning didn't play out nearly as well as it sounds on paper.

Because he was wrestling Micheal Cole.

That being the case, it made poor Zack Ryder look godawful, just because he was working with Cole. And Cole sucked Zack Ryder's ability out like a vaccum.

He got in exactly 3 offensive moves on Cole and all of them looked horrible. All Cole's fault through terrible selling. Micheal Cole sucked anything positive completely out of that segment with how he sold Zack's moves which all looked awkward.

Sadly, because he was working with Cole, it killed the crowd, too. They wanted Ryder... we all did. But the crowd's silence pretty much proved they didn't want him like this.

Anything with putting Ryder on TV should have put him massively over with a pop, but instead the crowd clearly felt insulted. They were completely dead for it, aside from a tiny "Let's Go Ryder" chant that lasted for 2 1/2 repeats of the chant.

It also didn't help that Ryder must have been out there for 38 seconds, tops. If the "match" went over 12 seconds, i'd be shocked. The remaining seconds were spent with Ryder's quick celebration, and the whole thing felt more like "Oh, you wanted Ryder? Here's your Ryder. 30 seconds of Ryder with Micheal Cole who can't sell. Fuck you internet. And Ryder, too."

It sounds like it was good on paper, but it was really a lifeless segment that was kind of botched, and gave Ryder more of a cameo appearance than a real one.

It's hard to express it how I mean, but just look at it on Youtube if you can find it. 12 second match, and it was painfully awkward due to Cole selling Ryder's 3 moves (or maybe it was 2) in a weird way that was kind of uncomfortable. Like a fart in church.

Which sucks because we all know Ryder is better than that, and judging by the look on his face, I think he knew he was wasted in that segment as well. Even when he won, he looked kind of unhappy.

That having been said, if they put Ryder in a match against an opponent who can work... anyone from Evan Bourne to even Great Khali would be better... I'll consider it a step up from this week's Ryder appearance.

I mean, it's been said that some guys "can make wrestling a broom look good". And that task was certainly put before Ryder. He had to wrestle an announcer.

But yeah. I would consider it redeemed if he wrestlers a wrestler next week, though. Anyone.

OH... One other thing..

I DID like Triple H's promo with R-Truth.

That was quality. I laughed my ass off. HHH's reactions were wonderful.

And the look on his face when he said "I KNOW, Right? It's like i'm INSANE!" was beautiful. I lol'd. Hard.

Raw was entertaining. Cena vs Mysterio was an excellent TV match and CM Punk's return, though sorta premature, was delivered incredibly well. Loved it.

Right, I've watched it all now.

Zack Ryder. I really don't see it the same way you do, Mike. I think giving Ryder that match worked perfectly with his underdog 'never gets a shot on TV' character. It's what actually, perversely, makes him a star.

After the ComicCon incident, to me it was HHH acknowledging Punk and giving Ryder tine on TV, but doing so grudgingly in the smallest segment he could. It worked very well for that.

As to the moves looking botched, no I don't think that reflected badly on Ryder at all. He hit his stuff, he got a win on RAW, and he got a pop. Job done I think.

Cena and Rey had an excellent little TV match that I really enjoyed. In fact, I liked most of RAW last night.

Punks return. I'd forgotten how muc I like that damn song. It works PERFECTLY for his current gimmick, and the ending was very very well done. Punk got a strong pop and was over massive when he held the belt up. It may be too soon, but it worked.