The Ultimate Thrill Ride is now behind us and it's time for me to share my 5 cents about everything that happened throughout it. OK actually not everything because there were matches I skipped to get a break, or was unaware were happening (I swear Pre-Show only had two matches!).
I did watch the opener between Austin Aries and Adrian Neville for the Cruiserweight Championship (only wrestlers 205 pounds are below are eligible to compete for it). Former happens to be one of my low-key favorite wrestlers today and I have nothing but respect for Nevilles ability. Unfortunately, the match was pretty much baseline for what I expected. No memorable spots or interesting storytelling, the guys just wrestled an average match in their comfort zones. Which is still good, but I was really hoping they would try to steal the show, and instead they just filled 20 minutes. After that an underwhelming Battle Royale happened. The most interesting spot was when a football player was supposed to intervene in the match and one security guard was not aware this was part of the show and tried to stop him (and then refs ran to tell her it's part of the show, and then spread out and acted shocked when he entered the ring). Then the match I missed and finally, the proper show started.
Boss's son, Shane McMahon versus a man widely considered to be the best performer today and one of the best of all time, AJ Styles. He's athletic and makes his own moves look good, he's a good actor so he makes others' moves look good. But perhaps most importantly, he's a great storyteller. His matches always have impeccable pacing and great flow, letting the good moments breathe but never drawing them out for too long. And add one more thing to that. Because of his reputation, his opponents always seem to bring their A+ game. And it was no different in this case. Probably the two most memorable moments of the match were when Shane showed mat grappling proficiency, putting AJ into several submissions, and when he did a Shooting Star Press. Although I must say, the match didn't leave me necessarily speechless, just suprised. Although it is the one match from the show I actually want to rewatch.
For some reason I can't say the same about the match between Kevin Owens and Chris Jericho. Interestingly enough, the two were the only consistent positive of the weekly tv show Raw for months. This match was the culmination of a long storyline of their friendship and eventual betrayal and they obviously referenced it throughout the match, but it didn't really feel like one. I didn't feel the passion or emotions, neither cold shoulder from Kevin nor desire for revenge from Chris. Jericho is a wrestling legend at this point and he's a great actor, but I can't say I've enjoyed his in-ring work over the past year. Don't get me wrong, it was a good back-and-forth with interesting spots and cool moments, but it just didn't leave much of an impression.
I skipped the Raw women match because I'm not a big fan. Next was a tag team ladder match with suprise last-minute entrants - Hardy Boyz, who happen to be veterans of that type of match (were even in another one just a night earlier). Together with Cesaro, Anderson and Gallows, there was enough talent in that match to do something great. And they did - for just 10 minutes. The match was fun, intense and centered around cool spots, but when it ended, I just wasn't satisfied. I wanted more. I suppose this plays up to one of this business' maxims, "always leave the audience wanting more" and in fact I do want to see more of those tag teams competing against each other. But could giving this match 5 more minutes really hurt?
The next match was interesting. Miz and Maryse vs John Cena and Nikki Bella. Under WWE rules, intergender matches force the competitors of same gender to be in the ring, so if one pair changes, the other has to as well. It didn't really matter in this case though. Basically, the crowd loved the Miz (who plays an asshole, douche, delusional loser) and hated Cena (who plays a good, strong guy who stands up for what he believes in). Crowds at big shows tend to be more "hardcore", which usually means they cheer performers they like no matter whether they play good or bad character. I wonder if the structure of the match was decided beforehand or if they improvised due to the crowd reaction, but basically, 90% of the match was Miz dominating Cena, keeping him grounded with kicks and stomps while playing up to the crowd the entire time. Eventually Cena was able to dodge one of the attacks and mount a comeback along with Nikki, and a minute later they won. Funnily enough the match received a lot of buildup with good promos and reality tv parody viginettes, and it built up to an important moment as John proposed to his long time gf Nikki. But the match's story was essentially "John and Nikki could finish it in a minute, Miz just got a lucky shot at the start, but it only allowed him to delay the inevitable". Lame.
I've only watched fragments of Triple H vs Seth Rollins which seemed like a cool, old-school brawl playing up to an injury, but somehow I just couldn't get interested in it for more than a minute at time. With that out of the way, something that seems like should've been the main event - the WWE Championship match, with Randy Orton challenging Bray Wyatt. The storyline leading up to this took almost half a year. Bray choose Randy as his target, to which Orton responded "if you can't beat them, join them" (only after beating Bray but realising he won't give up on assaulting and haunting him). Together they won the tag team championships, then Randy won a title shot at Wrestlemania, and Bray won the championship. At first Randy claimed he wouldn't take the opportunity as long as Wyatt is his master, but it turned out to be a ruse. You see, Randy is a "snake", a "viper". And like one, he doesn't attack instantly. He lays in the grass, waiting, and only once the opponent lets his guard down, he strikes. This story also involved burning the remains of a witch and smearing her ashes to respectively remove and gain her powers.
And then the match sucked. No way to sugarcoat it. Bray is a really cool, unique wrestler. He has a good look, good charisma and cool moves. But he's not exactly the best storyteller. He needs some people in there with him who will keep the pace of the match, or at least play off of his stuff and give him something to play off of in reverse. Randy happens to be the guy who had a couple of cool matches and moments in the past and has been coasting on this forever. He's athletic, charismatic and has great sense of timing, but he refuses to do anything interesting or unique in his matches. They always have the same structure, similar spots and a lot of filler, no matter the opponent. This match even had some promise of interesting stuff with some spooky graphics displayed on the ring and an RKO on the outside, but the finish was just so flat and unimaginative. There was no sense of momentum, nor of a turnaround, one guy just decided to hit his finisher and that was it. Easily the biggest disappointment of the night.
The next match was a nice suprise. Two guys built up as unstoppable monsters, both able to dismantle any opponent in mere minutes. Goldberg and Brock Lesnar. The former was on his nostalgia-run of sorts, returning after many years to beat Brock, and win the championship. Brock believed their previous encounter was a fluke and this time he wouldn't give him a chance. Goldberg has reputation for having very short matches and using pretty much exclusively two moves - a spear and a jackhammer, one of the most protected finishers in the business (meaning that if he does the move, then he will win the match). Brock is actually a talented wrestler with a wide arsenal, but in later years he also turned pretty much into someone who does only german suplexes and an F5. So the story of the match was essentially - who's two moves are better? There was no filler, they just went on a relentless sprint hitting each other with their best moves until finally, one was unable to continue. This very unique type of match helped to convey that these two are really on completely another level, that we're witnessing a battle of beasts, not men.
As per tradition, second-to-last match is usually something low-profile, to give the fans a chance to get a break before the main event. In this case it was a match for Smackdown Womens championship. I was actually somewhat looking forward to it as there were rumors of suprise participants, either debuts from the developmental brand, or from wrestlers who recently finished recovering from an injury and weren't used on tv yet. Sadly neither was a case and it was a very typical match for this timeslot, Every participant did their thing and then the match ended. Again, short and unimaginative.
And finally, the showmatch between Roman Reigns and Undertaker. A symbolic passing of the torch between one of the most iconic characters in wrestling and a young guy chosen to be the face of the company. Not gonna sugarcoat it, this was awful. Roman is effectively dead weight, good wrestlers can put on good matches with him much like they could with a broom, a blowup doll or an invisible wrestlers (all actual things that happened). But if he's with someone average or bad, it will show. Taker is a legend, but he's old and destroyed. He can't do some of his moves, some of those he still can do look bad, he gets tired fast and can't keep up with his former pace. Between two of them, there was no one to "carry" the match. They were uncoordinated and neither guy was capable of taking charge and doing something cool. It was just bad.
And, well, that was the show. I haven't even mentioned the storylines which I mostly didn't like (as in, didn't like which guy won, or in what fashion). Most of the matches were kinda OK though, even those I couldn't get invested in. I might not remember Mania 33 very fondly, but after last year's trainwreck of a show, I'm just glad things got better, even if just slightly.
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