BRM Reviews the 8/7/2020 Smackdown (bad... but the end was hilariously so)

[Big Red Machine]

The show opened with a recap of the Swamp Fight, and then The Fiend’s attack on Alexa Bliss! last week. This reminded me that no one has seen or heard from Braun Strowman in weeks now, and no one on Smackdown seems particularly concerned.

FIREFLY FUNHOUSE- uch
Bray says that people shouldn’t blame him for The Fiend attacking Alexa last week, but rather should blame Braun, asking Braun “how could you let something so horrific happen to someone you claim to care so much about?” Um… I don’t think Braun ever has claimed to care about Alexa, and if so, it certainly wasn’t recently.
Bray said that this wouldn’t have happened if Braun had just given The Fiend what he wants, which seems to me to imply that Bray knows that Braun is alive and well enough to surrender the title to The Fiend (as opposed to being locked up in some extra-dimensional prison or something), which makes me wonder why we haven’t been given any update on Braun yet, either from WWE or, if WWE doesn’t know, why both us and WWE haven’t gotten an update from Braun himself.
Bray says that The Fiend will show up tonight “with someone special,” and if Braun doesn’t give The Fiend what he wants “she’ll find out what he’s truly capable of.”

Do you think WWE understands that a ransom is not the same thing as a bounty? And that the phrase “king’s ransom” just means a lot of money? There has been this, there has been “under siege,” and I’m sure a bunch of other situations like this (“25th Anniversary of WrestleMania,” for one) where WWE clearly just hears something they think sounds cool and don’t actually know what it means but they use it anyway. “Look a word or phrase up to make sure you’re using it right” is such a basic principle of writing that they don’t bother teaching it Writing 101 because they assume you know it already!

MATT RIDDLE vs. SHEAMUS- 6/10
Based on the video package, I assumed we were going to get Riddle vs. Gable. On the bright side, maybe they’re saving that for PPV? I can hope.
If I were running a wrestling company, any time an announcer referred to someone as “very physical” or “the most physical” or something like that, they’d be fined $500. It’s a f*cking combat sport. Everything every wrestler does is physical!
They were having a fine match until Gable ran in to cause a DQ.

POST-MATCH SEGMENT- TERRIBLE!
Despite jumping Riddle from behind and the fact that Riddle had been wrestling for almost twelve minutes already, Gable got his ass kicked in about thirty seconds. Riddle left, and then Sheamus beat Gable up for costing him a match. Chad Gable is currently located somewhere near Jimmy Hoffa. For all of you youngsters out there, that means he has been buried so deep that no one will ever find his body. The only part about this that didn’t make me angry was the fact that Sheamus actually used the word “bounty” instead of saying “King’s Ransom™.”

BARON CORBIN & SHEAMUS BACKSTAGE- curious
This started with Corbin hitting on member of the backstage crew who he had never met before. This wouldn’t have leapt out to me if it wasn’t in the middle of a pandemic and they’re all supposedly living in a bubble, so why is there someone new in the building?
They argued because Gable cost Sheamus his match. They made sure to keep this “Sarah” in the frame the whole time, and she walked off with Corbin. Also, she was dressed more like she was supposed to look… let’s say “eye-catching” and not in the plain manner we see from all other backstage crewmembers, so something is definitely up with her. It’s possible she’s a worker and I just don’t recognize her, as I’ve become a lot more familiar with the women’s scene in Europe than here on my own continent in the past few years.
I bring this all up because if I knew she was a worker, I would immediately be suspicious that she is part of the much-hyped new group of masked people who like throwing Molotov cocktails at power generators.

THE DIRT SHEET WITH SPECIAL GUEST SONYA DEVILLE- averages out to being pretty bad, despite Sonya’s best efforts to save it
JoMo claimed to be the most “underground” person around. I don’t know about that. I think if you stuck a mask on Ricochet he’d look pretty underground.
Their mics have an issue. The group has a name now; “RETRIBUTION” and Mizorrison say “you’re not scheduled tonight” and “I thought they were on Raw.” I know these guys are just being flippant, but hearing this said about what is supposed to be a mysterious group- and one that we know nothing about and haven’t even seen aside from a security camera shot of them doing something outside the arena and dressed in such a way that many people confused them for someone else- made this group seem so normal and dull even though they haven’t even been on screen for more than thirty seconds we know nothing about them.
Before Sonya, they had an interview with “Mandy Rose’s Hair.” This was two and a half minutes of the worst thing you’ve ever seen. Sonya came out and was great. She feels like she’s on the verge of talking herself into a violent rage.
Eventually Heavy Machinery came out to brawl with Mizzorison, but without Mandy. This was bad for three reasons. First of all, violent heel psychopath and also trained MMA fighter and pro wrestler Sonya Deville jumping out of the ring to make sure we don’t get any man-on-woman violence in an impromptu brawl was silly. Secondly, given the specifics of the situation, I just don’t buy that Sonya wouldn’t go after Otis in particular.
Thirdly- and most importantly- is the fact that Mandy’s lack of presence here seems to confirm everything Sonya said about her. That she’s supposed to be a professional combat athlete, but she was mentally broken by having someone cut her hair and smear makeup on her face. What a loser! If that’s how she’s reacting to this, then Sonya is absolutely right and she’s just a bikini model who doesn’t really belong here.

LINCÉ DORADO (w/Gran Metalik) vs. CESARO (w/Shinsuke Nakamura)- 4.5/10
Lincé Dorado cut an inset promo that in which he came off as very annoying. The match itself was TREMENDOUS for four and a half minutes. Cesaro worked the back and won clean. Also, I think these guys became the first people to use the fiberglass as more than just something to throw someone into.

Heavy Machinery vs. Mizorrison has been announced for later tonight.

HEAVY MACHERINY BACKSTAGE- Otis is angrily shaking one of those big blue boxes they have backstage. Hmm… maybe Otis was the one who knocked the box over backstage on Raw. I can totally see him wasting one of his brand-to-brand invitation appearances if someone told him there was candy in that box that Mandy wanted, or if someone told him that if he didn’t tip that box over, the world would blow up. That’s about how smart I think Otis is.

KAYLA BRAXTON INTERVIEWS HEAVY MACHINERY- great!
These two cut a pretty damn great promo to build up to tonight’s match with Miz and Morrison. Otis even got himself so worked up that as he left… he pushed that big blue box over. See! That wasn’t just me making fun of Otis and making fun of how dumb the whole “Retribution” thing on Raw was. It was me picking up on a potential clue!

THE FIEND SHOWS UP- bad and boring
He came out alone before a commercial break, and apparently he magicked Alexa Bliss! into the ring during the commercial. She’s a damsel in distress all of a sudden. There are screen effects, and screechy noises, and red light that makes my eyes hurt because it’s getting hard to tell the difference between Alexa’s skin, her hair, and the mat. Alexa is clearly terrified by this evil being, but not one is coming out to help her.
He makes like he’s going to put the Mandle Claw on Alexa, but she averts it by starting to seduce him. He pushes her away because I guess The Fiend’s secret weakness is cooties.
Then Braun Storwman’s disembodied voice calls Bray a “sadistic bastard.” Braun then appears on the TitanTron. He is up all close to the camera and tells Bray that he doesn’t care about Alexa (told you so!). All he cares about is destroying Bray. He tells us that he has let his dark side out and is now “fulfilling my destiny” as “the most evil son of a bitch the world has ever laid eyes on,” and “the thing nightmares are made of: I am THE MONSTER!”
He wants Bray at SummerSlam. This was dumb sh*t that I don’t care about and don’t see how anyone could possibly care about. It was only made worse by the fact that Braun was purposely making his voice so low that he sounded like the Black Scorpion.

JEFF HARDY vs. BARON CORBIN- no rating, fine segment
They were having a decent match until Sheamus ran out attacked Jeff to get back at Corbin for Gabel costing him his earlier match. I was fine with this non-finish because it felt like a productive part of a story rather than just booking a match that they didn’t want to give a clean finish to.
When we got back from a commercial break, we were in the middle of…

SHEAMUS vs. BARON CORBIN- 4/10
I kind of figured they’d wait until next week to do something like this. Why the rush?
Oh. Okay. That’s the rush. Riddle came out and tried to get involved, which wound up distracting Corbin, allowing Sheamus to get the win, and we needed Riddle’s emotions to still be high (no Matt Riddle pot joke intended) after Gable’s attack on him earlier.
I assume Corbin will now blame Gable for costing him this match because it was Gable’s actions earlier that got Riddle angry at Corbin, and we’ll wind up with a four-way, and that’s something I would very much like to see. Not because I think the match will be great, but just because it’s been so long since we’ve seen a four-way match that was built around an interacting series of match results and the relationship between the characters due to those match results. Normally when we get four-ways (and this isn’t just a WWE complaint), they’re either thrown together to make the match spottier, or a title match with multiple challengers. It’s nice to see a four-way match being built from an actual four-way story.
That sort of Booking 201 kind of stuff is something that has been missing from wrestling over the past few years pretty much everywhere outside of wXw and NXT. ROH and AEW have shown small flashes of it, but that’s about it. Way too much of what we’ve seen over the past few years has either been extremely basic stuff or attempts at being some long, epic story- either Booking 101 or a doctoral dissertation.

SASHA AND BAYELY ARE DEFFINITELY NOT HAVING DISSENSION BACKSTAGE- We were saved from this by the announcement that Steph wants them both in the ring for a video conference. And by “saved” I mean like someone stopping you from falling over a ledge into a pit of hungry crocodiles by driving you backwards via the momentum of a gunshot to the chest.

KAYLA BRAXTON INTERVIEWS BIG E. – This was great… until the very end when he just put al of his effort into trying to make Kayla crack up.

STEPHANIE MCMAHON’S VIDEO CONFERNECE WITH SASHA BANKS & BAYLEY- terrible
Steph politely ran her mouth. Is she supposed to be a babyface? Because if she was, should have actually CARED that they found a loophole in her stipulation, but she doesn’t. She gave this absolutely horrendous polished, prepared phony-ass speech that sounded like something I assume she gives at these bullsh*t business executive conferences she goes to where executives from various fields all fly themselves to nice cities to eat expensive food while giving inane speeches and pretending to give a sh*t about what the others are doing. I almost shut the show off when she had to use the Rule of Three before giving Asuka’s nickname and then making that match Sasha booked on Raw official (Bayley vs. Asuka, where Asuka must beat Bayley to get a title shot at Sasha at SummerSlam)
Also, she announced a three-brand battle royale for the shot at Bayley’s title at SummerSlam. So is the entire roster from one show going to have to blow one of their Brand To Brand Invitational invites for this? Also, I love them randomly including NXT in the hopes that people will watch because they know that NXT is the only brand with women they haven’t killed all interest in.

KAYLA INTERVIEWS JOHN MORRISON & THE MIZ- a good promo ruined by some inept dickhead’s inability to KEEP THE F*CKING CAMERA STILL!
Sonya was also here, but Kayla was only looking to interview the other two. I was pretty sure Sonya was going to get angry about this, but instead they had her act reasonably. Cool.

HEAVY MACHINERY vs. JOHN MORRISON & THE MIZ (w/Sonya Deville)- 4.75/10
This was going along relatively well until Mandy ran out and attacked Sonya… causing a DQ. First of all three DQs on one show is too much. Secondly, neither of these two are in the match, so why is them fighting in the ring a DQ, especially when the four competitors are all on the floor? This is also the second time we’ve seen a DQ this week for someone coming out and attacking a manager. Is this yet another “secret rule” of Vince’s? Thirdly, if Mandy’s been in the building the whole time, where was she before?
The dudes full the fames apart but get loose (yes, MANDY ROSE managed to escape with OTIS AND TUCKER holding her back) so the brawl continues. Rinse and repeat until a commercial break.

SHOW-ENDING ANGLE- hilariously bad
The ladies are still yelling at each other and having to be held back backstage. This time, we’ve upgraded from a referee trying to step between them to Adam Pearce.
Then the lights went off. Then they went back on and we cut to the ring where Retribution ran through what is apparently a gap in the barricade and ran into the ring. They’ve all go metal pipes and baseball bats and the like. They just got into the ring and randomly started cheering and shouting and making noise there in their black hoodies and ski masks. It’s goofy as f*ck.
One of the finally decided to go after the announcers, and Graves had a to dodge a shot with a pipe as he ran away. They guy then went after a cameraperson and shouted “THIS IS OUR HOUSE NOW!” “YOU MIGHT WANT TO LEAVE!” Then he forced the camera to the ground and chased the cameraperson and wire-holder away. Now all of the others are being chased away, too.
These goofs finally start actually doing something, as they run into the crowd and start beating up a few of the Performance Center trainees. Instead of all fighting together, the PC trainees mostly run away. I know that that’s what I would do in a situation like this, but I’m not a professional combat athlete. They are. I know the Retribution have weapons, but you still have them outnumbered fifty to six!
I mean really! There was a point where four of them were beating up this one guy. Why didn’t the other run in and help? Or how about all of the wrestlers in the back? We’ve seen enough backstage attacks to know that the backstage area has thousands of loose metal pipes they could grab and arm themselves with. Where are Big E. and Matt Riddle and Jeff Hardy and Lucha House Party and Drew Gulak?
They started to menace a female trainee and I was shocked when they actually hit her… but, of course, moments later the two who struck the woman let their long hair pop out of their get-ups because G-d forbid we think for several moments that a male villain would beat a woman (i.e. do something villainous).
I guess Retribution is done beating people up for now, because they all decided to just run back into the ring and make more noise. Wait… two of them just tipped over the empty announcers’ desk. How violent. And now they’re spray painting the fiberglass and the steps and the ring apron. There’s a WWE logo with a cancellation sign over it.
Now one of them has a chainsaw and he cuts the ropes with it, and when the ropes snaps, one of them jumps up and down with joy. This is so bad I’m laughing my ass off. This was a riot as conceived by a suburban middle-schooler who has never seen one. Either that, or something done purposely to make Raw Underground look edgy by comparison.


There were one or two decent brothers, but otherwise, this was a really bad episode of Smackdown, in so many different ways. I’m almost eager to see how WWE tried to adjust to what I’m sure must be the lambasting the show-closing angle has gotten.

[XIV]

They took the concept of how The Nexus arrived and then somehow fucked it up to comical proportions.

[Big Red Machine]

They took the concept of how The Nexus arrived and then somehow fucked it up to comical proportions.

And not just the Nexus. They have a ground of people in masks I have absolutely no interest in finding out who is underneath them.

I feel like the best thing for them to do would be to just abort the angle by announcing at the beginning of this week's Raw that the police were called and these people have been arrested and WWE is pressing charges.

[XIV]

They took the concept of how The Nexus arrived and then somehow fucked it up to comical proportions.

And not just the Nexus. They have a ground of people in masks I have absolutely no interest in finding out who is underneath them.

I feel like the best thing for them to do would be to just abort the angle by announcing at the beginning of this week's Raw that the police were called and these people have been arrested and WWE is pressing charges.

It has not created the desired buzz at all.
I too do not care who is behind those masks.

If most people are this way, that’s an issue.

We already know the angle will be a big disappointment. History will repeat itself. It always does.

[KILLdozer]

It's WWE...I'm sure they're just your average people you see every other week anyways so it's not gonna be a crazy shock...

But...if they pull some surprise turn...Xavier Woods as leader or something is probably the best they could do.

[XIV]

I worry that Retribution will end up being like Dark Order. Where there'll be some Overlord that ends up being Vince McMahon.

[Big Red Machine]

I worry that Retribution will end up being like Dark Order. Where there'll be some Overlord that ends up being Vince McMahon.

Something like this, perhaps?

[XIV]

Something just like that!

[KILLdozer]

IT SHOULD ALWAYS BE SOMETHING JUST LIKE THAT!