TLC recap & reactions: Fatality
Kevin Owens caught us all off guard and attacked Reigns as the championship was being risen above the ring!
He tossed Reigns all over and did a frog splash to the floor. He tossed a ladder in, and then Jey Uso immediately tried to interfere and Owens put him out. He showered Jey in chair shots and injured his ankle. Reigns came back into it and grabbed the steel steps, slamming it into Owens.
Reigns made him pay with a dozen chair and ladder spots. Owens got the upper hand again but not for long, and Reigns dropped him through two chairs set up. Finally, Roman set up a ladder and started climbing, but Owens grabbed another chair and hit him. My god the violence! Jey returned on one good leg to assist again.
They put tables in the ring, but Owens showed signs of life again and hit a Stunner on Reigns! He put Jey through the announce table with the pop up powerbomb and Owens put all the pieces of the table over him. Reigns powerbombed Owens onto a ladder twice and then chokeslammed Owens through one table and gave him a Samoan drop to another on the outside.
Reigns climbed up the ladder and somehow Owens got back in the ring. (Roman’s face and laughter at the sheer craziness of Kevin’s was great!) So for his troubles, Owens got speared through another table and Owens said “You’re going to have to kill me!” Owens moved as Reigns speared himself through the barricade and then he climbed up the ladder in the ring and I almost thought Owens was grabbing the title, but Roman came back.
Owens pop up powerbombed Roman through a table! He climbed up the ladder again but Reigns low-blowed him through the ladder and grabbed the title.
Holy shit. Holy. Shit. This was unreal. I had goosebumps watching this whole thing. Did they do a great job making Jey Uso a bastard in this or what? He never gave up no matter how much Owens beat him down. He is the reason why Roman retained.
Roman and Kevin just blew me out of the water with how physically violent they were. The whole area was just bent chairs and broken tables. Unbelievably brutal. Owens is this generation’s Mick Foley. He deserves all the praise in the world. Really excited to see if they play into Jey’s role going forward.
Murder
The video package they played before this was really wonderful. They went through the whole history of Wyatt and Orton from a few years ago to a sinister creepy sounding rendition of Silent Night.
Orton started by punching and kicking the Fiend, but he just laughed at him. He dominated for the first minute and then Orton got put in the sister Abigail. The Fiend then set the ThunderDome on fire with these really cool spiral flames.
Fiend grabbed a strap and gave Orton his lashes, and then lit the strap on fire, but Orton ducked it. Fiend grabbed the rocking chair and poured gas all over it. Orton just got out of the way of being lit on fire and grabbed the steel steps to slow him down.
Orton hit the DDT on the floor and almost hit the RKO but Fiend put the Mandible Claw on the Fiend and Orton reversed it and lit Fiend on fire. Orton RKO’d a lit Fiend in the ring and then looked concerned when he laid motionless. Quickly he snapped out of that and grabbed the gas tank and poured gas on the motionless Fiend.
Randall Keith Orton committed a murder, y’all. What’s worse, he reveled in it and did the pose! Randy Orton is more sinister than the Fiend.
While the visual was exciting and horrifying, it showed us that The Fiend was actually the… babyface? Really? I’m torn on that. I don’t like that. Plus, this probably won’t lead to the Fiend actually being gone.
The main question is will Randy get arrested for… yeah I know he isn’t going to get arrested. Oh! What if the Fiend gets reincarnated into Alexa’s body? That’s a weird and strange potential idea I just had. Could be… fun?
Unsuccessful cash in
Styles really bumped and sold his ass off throughout this bout. McIntyre was getting the upper hand for most of the start, until he finally set up a ladder in the ring and Styles slammed his back with a chair twice. Styles tried to do a Styles Clash onto the ladder but was unsuccessful.
What was successful however, was the Calf Crusher through the ladder! Ow! And if you thought that was bad, Styles did another Calf Crusher through a steel chair. McIntyre had the wherewithal to crawl to the ladder and slam Styles’ head against it. Styles hit McIntyre with a ladder in the face and man Drew was so close to not getting his hands up in time.
Styles set him up on a table and went to the top rope, and McIntyre threw a chair at him and then threw a table into the ring. He really sold the worked over knee well and made sure to favor it while carrying things and walking around. Styles was sent into the ladder in the classic powerbomb/overhead belly to belly spot we see in these matches.
And then as Drew climbed up the ladder, Miz came down and cashed in his MITB contract, but Omos climbed into the ring and picked Miz off of the ladder and through a table on the floor. Morrison hit Omos with a chair and the chair literally broke into pieces and I loved that spot. He chased Morrison off and ladders were set up together and all three men were up. Drew fought off the other men and got the title for the win.
I cannot begin to tell you how elated I am that the Money in the Bank stuff is finally done. Omos is a big time babyface to me now. (He’s not obviously but humor me people.) Everything was actually done very well, and we didn’t need any extra stuff besides the few moments between Omos and Morrison. That was perfect.
As a result, I loved this match. No Sheamus, no Keith Lee, no other types of stupid things but Drew, AJ, and Miz in the end without shenanigans. Thank you!
What’s to come after this though, will probably be all types of these shenanigans. But at least for now, I’m satisfied.
Prime Alexander
They really did great telling the story here.
Cedric has been the guy acting all cocky and confident, so the perfect thing to do here was have New Day be dominant over him to start the match. Kofi did a sick frog splash for a near fall, but Alexander tagged Benjamin.
New Day worked Benjamin over in classic tag team fashion but Alexander was able to isolate Woods from Kofi. They worked over his arm. Kofi was about to do the boom drop but Benjamin caught him mid-air and Alexander tagged in, Kofi hit Trouble in Paradise but Cedric actually kicked out.
Everyone collided with each other and then brilliantly, Cedric tagged himself in after Shelton was waiting for Kofi to get back up and hit his finisher. Cedric did the Lumbar Check and won.
Brilliant. Exactly how I thought it would happen, and I’m so glad. His last words before the cameras cut were PRIME ALEXANDER! I’ve been loving this story so I hope that cockiness grows from this win.
As for New Day, they’ll look great in the chase and honestly they’re really the only other tag team on Raw. But now that the MITB nonsense is done, Miz and Morrison can go back to being an actual tag team like I mentioned last Monday.
Return of the Queen
Billie Kay gave Asuka a headshot/resume and revealed that she made her own mask (out of a gold paper plate) and it was brilliant. Her comedic stuff is great.
However, it wasn’t Billie Kay. Charlotte Flair returned to stand with Asuka. Asuka started with Shayna, but Flair asked to be tagged in and she told Shayna to get out and tag in Nia. Flair tried to get Nia down, but she held her own and Asuka tagged back in. Asuka had some real fire and urgency to put Nia down but didn’t work.
Shayna worked over Asuka’s arm and both she and Nia isolated Asuka in their corner. Shayna tried to prevent Flair from tagging but it didn’t work. Flair got the famous chops in on Nia and then she took Shayna out again. Charlotte did her fantastic moonsault off the top rope to the tag champions.
Flair put Shayna in a figure 8 and Nia interfered, but Asuka hit her with the hip attack. Charlotte Flair hit Natural Selection on Shayna for the win.
This was a really good match. You can say what you want about Charlotte being in this but it did make sense, given the fact that Nia is the one that took her out in storyline over the summer. I didn’t mind this at all. Though I do think it’s not lasting too long, because we know what Charlotte really wants.
The Rest
Sasha Banks defeated Carmella – I just want to come right out and say that sommelier Reginald needs to have a pay raise for probably saving Carmella’s life in this match. Banks threw her out of the ring and Reginald was right there to make the catch, which was the spot but Carmella got caught in the ropes. Carmella kept playing mind games, talking down Banks throughout her moments of dominance. Banks hit the Three Amigos and frog splash for a near fall. Banks’ head got spiked on the mat during Carmella’s facebuster and had no way to protect her head, my goodness.
Really cool spot with a huricanrana rolled through into a pin for a near fall for Sasha. She had Carmella locked in a Bank Statement and Reginald pulled Carmella out this time, again was legal in the referee’s eyes. But Sasha took him out and locked in another Bank Statement for the win. It’s very weird how Reginald was able to interfere the same way in three separate matches and never have it lead to a DQ. The DQ company can’t DQ a blatant DQ but will go through heaven and hell to DQ other matches at random. Glad that Sasha retained, though. Don’t know where this leads to Royal Rumble, but I could see maybe one more match between these two.
Big E warns Sami Zayn – In the back, Sami confronted Big E about the Tom Cruise-esque audio that was leaked where Sami berated the production people regarding the Sami Awards segment on Friday. Sami told E that he was floundering since going solo, and then backed up and walked away as E got angry. Then it was revealed that Big E will have an Intercontinental Title match on SmackDown! I said back in July that Big E needed a run with this title, and I’m hoping we get it!
WWE did the thing where they tell phenomenal and logical stories on pay-per-view. Meanwhile, they’ve been coasting on laziness for television. Why can’t the greatness translate to TV? If the Inferno Match stuff wasn’t a bit weird with the booking, this show probably would have been an A+.
Grade: A
What were your thoughts, Cagesiders?
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