WWE Wrestlemania XXVIII Discussion Thread

[Shane O' Mac Version 2]

The opener really soured me, not because I'm a ROH-bot or anything else, but because I think, by-and-large, Wrestlemania should be the finale of the story. Making it just a (shit) chapter in a feud makes it seem like just another PPV.

 

Orton and Kane did well, but shocked at the victory by Kane. I thought the perfect finish would be chokeslam into the RKO from WM21. I suppose they needed to rebuild Kane after the Cena feud.

 

Show vs Rhodes was quick and painless. Good babyface redemption for Show, and it worked well considering that Cody really isn't a physical threat to Show, and doesn't use the slimy tactics of a Daniel Bryan to convincingly chop down the big man.

 

Divas were a pleasant surprise. Eve is ball strainingly hot, Kelly worked hard (nice Molly Go Round) and Maria had guts. Beth is a bit player, which is sad.

 

HIAC- As an emotional, dramatic match, few matches in history beat it. As a HIAC match... eh. It was just a No DQ match inside a cell, which was barely used.

 

Team Teddy vs. Team Johnny- good comedown match, lots of craziness. The Ryder-Eve plot could be seen coming a mile away. Good to see the Miz burial had a slight payoff with the win here.

 

Punk vs. Jericho. Pretty good match that jumped several notches in the last 5 minutes. Earlier in the match, I could hear a "this match sucks" chant, which was harsh and nowhere near true.

 

Brodus... The fuck.

 

Rock vs Cena. Hogan vs Rock with athletic skill. The crossbody/AA near fall was well done, but the minute Cena tried the People's Elbow, I knew the Rock Bottom was coming. Rock still has it, great to see him win.

 

Enjoyed it overall, expected a bit more from Orton/Kane, Punk/Jericho and obviously Bryan/Sheamus, but HHH vs Taker and Rock vs. Cena certainly delivered.

 

Now, bring on Raw is Brock

[patiirc]

#unpronounacblecackedherpants

 

 

Least thats what it looked like

 

Will post more when I can see

[SpiritOfTheForest]

Yeah there was no excuse to have Brodus Clay and the subsequent shit on the show at all. Take that out and Sheamus-Bryan could at least have had a fun 5 minute match before AJ somehow cost Bryan the belt.

 

On a more positive note though, I was delighted they got JR back to call the Hell in a Cell. He added so much with his brilliant commentary to an already great match. It just would not have been the same had it just been Cole and Lawler.

[Adam South]

Loved HHH/Taker, with special mentions for HBK and JR, who added a heck of a lot to proceedings. Rest of the card felt a bit meh, but I was turned off after they jobbed Daniel Bryan. Dunno what the point was, it did nothing for either Seamus, Bryan or the title (Is Smackdown's belt now considered as or less important than the WWECW, given the comparison between this match and Chavo/Kane from a couple of years ago?) and left the card flat for me until the HIAC. And after that... to be honest even Rock/Cena didn't do a lot for me, though admittedly I was losing the fight against sleep by that point (though I've woken up enough now to type this!!!).

 

Final thing on Triple H/Undertaker- get the point about the cell not really being used that much, but given the two guys involved I don't think it was ever likely to be. I certainly didn't expect any crazy, Foley-like bumps (I was getting a vision of a Tombstone on the top of the cage being the finisher at one point though!) and if you take that aspect away there's not an awful lot else you can do with this match format, especially now there's the clampdown on blood. I actually think the cell was there (apart from the obvious idea of it being a feud ender and establishing the idea that the better man has to win) to deliberately restrict things. Particularly the Undertaker, as it effectively stopped him from doing the over the top rope dive that's nearly killed or crippled him for the last couple of Manias.

 

So, overall, not mightily impressed. Not enough really happened, although it'll be interesting to see where they take Cena from here. One thing I can fairly confidently predict is that there'll be a Punk/Jericho submission match somewhere down the line....

[Mattyc]

As good as the Rock/John Cena match was it was easily Undertaker/Triple H that delivered the match of the night. I had high expectations going into that match and both men met and surpassed them, credit has to go to Shawn Michaels too who added so much to it all.

 

Undertaker/Triple H/Shawn Michaels told a wonderful story tonight that I feel will go down as one of the all time best Wrestlemania matches, it was magical. The storytelling and drama in the ring was so good at times I found myself forgetting it was a Hell in a Cell match, the Cell wasn

[CoreyVandal]

Hell of a Wrestlemania. Watched it at a packed pub in Cov on a projector and had a damn good night. Quality-wise I think that may have been the best mania of recent memory.

 

Hell In A Cell was a hell of a match (no pun intended), and loved the whole get-absolutely-murdered-but-still-not-give-up-then-rinse-repeat structure, and the AJPW style psychology of working off spots from their previous match, but I still think last year was an overall better match. I was slightly disappointed by how little the Cell came into play, as I think they could have easily done exactly the same match with a street fight gimmick, but at the same time it was nice to have as big a gimmick as Hell In A Cell on the so-called 'biggest stage of them all'.

 

Punk vs Jericho was everything I hoped it would be, and they totally made the most out of the fact either of them could have won. I was completely convinced it could have gone either way. Shame about Jericho's jacket fucking up, but probably better the Jericho-curse hit the entrance rather than the match.

 

Cena vs Rock was a hell of a spectacle. Not quite Rock/Hogan standards, but loved the psychology of Cena losing the moment he threw sportsmanship out the window. Despite the fact it was in Miami I totally expected Cena to win considering how the build up put so much emphasis on how he had to win, but I think it was a great finish in contrast to last years. I do think in a lot of ways WWE is trying to make Wrestlemania almost feel like it has a separate continuity to the rest of the product, and you're meant to enter the show with the previous Mania in mind rather than the past 12 months of TV (as most casual fans probably are), but as long as it makes Wrestlemania feel like more than just another PPV it's fine by me. I feel in a lot of ways tonights overall match psychology felt very different to most PPVs and Raw/Smackdowns. People didn't seem to be going for moves in their arsenal that didnt end matches, there were just all constantly struggling for the win, and hitting a stream of false finishes, which for me gave the impression of everyone desperately striving for wrestlemania win like it was more important than anything they'd done thus far (as it should do).

 

Still quite sore about the opener. It's the 2nd year in a row that the rumble winner has been the curtain jerker, but even beyond that I dont think even the casual fans enjoyed it, and it just stank of Vince & the boys giving a big 'fuck you' to anyone that likes non-WWE wrestling. I know I'm a biased mark, but considering how much time was given to Brodus/those nobody rappers it just needlessly delayed the start of the action.

 

Orton vs Kane was probably the best it could have been. Both guys strung their quite limited movesets together in a very entertaining an innovative way, and although on many levels it wasn't much more than your average Raw main event I think it was exactly what was called for at that point in the evening.

 

Everything else was filler, but served it's purpose. Still not quite sure why they went for that random Brodus bullshit rather than having the HoF segment/women's match at that point, it was excruciatingly embarrassing being with non-wrestling fans for that, exactly the sort of shit you dread coming up. Didn't like the way those shitty rappers were integrated into the main event intro's rather than another overproduced-but-still-entertaining Cena 'mania entrance, but I'm willing to believe that they're popular enough in the US to warrant such a prominent position, despite my person dislike (or at the very least they're important enough celebs to garner WWE some more mainstream coverage).

 

Overall I enjoyed the hell out of it, but that could be partly due to atmosphere as I came home last year thinking I'd seen a great show, but yeah, I think I got everything I wanted out of that show, which is a rare feeling for a jaded 90's wrestling fan.

 

 

Edit: Everyone in the pub I was in decided to drown out Lillian Garcia with their own rendition of God Save The Queen, which was so beautiful it almost eclipsed the excitement of seeing Coventry City flags in the crowd right at the start of the show.

[IronSheik]

The bit when Taker sat up and scared the living shit out of Helmsley was cool. HHH has now lost three times to Taker at Mania - thought he was meant to be a prick?

[PunkStep]

The opener really soured me, not because I'm a ROH-bot or anything else, but because I think, by-and-large, Wrestlemania should be the finale of the story.

Nah, that's not exclusively what Wrestlemania has been about for the past 10+ years. Take Backlash for example- for many years it was used as a re-run of Wrestlemania, continuing the feuds. In many cases, most feuds begin (in-ring, anyway) at Wrestlemania. Look at The Miz VS Cena last year- they spread their feud over the title across the spring and that began with their Wrestlemania match. Same with Big Dave & Cena the year before etc. Of course on occasion Mania has been the climax to a big feud, but more often than not it kick-starts feuds. Looking at last nights card, I expect most feuds will continue and the two I think perhaps won't, are the two that you could argue they started to build around the time of last years' Wrestlemania (Rock/Cena & Taker/HHH).

[Retro Red]

The opener really soured me, not because I'm a ROH-bot or anything else, but because I think, by-and-large, Wrestlemania should be the finale of the story.

Nah, that's not exclusively what Wrestlemania has been about for the past 10+ years. Take Backlash for example- for many years it was used as a re-run of Wrestlemania, continuing the feuds. In many cases, most feuds begin (in-ring, anyway) at Wrestlemania. Look at The Miz VS Cena last year- they spread their feud over the title across the spring and that began with their Wrestlemania match. Same with Big Dave & Cena the year before etc. Of course on occasion Mania has been the climax to a big feud, but more often than not it kick-starts feuds. Looking at last nights card, I expect most feuds will continue and the two I think perhaps won't, are the two that you could argue they started to build around the time of last years' Wrestlemania (Rock/Cena & Taker/HHH).

 

I was always of the opinion that Bryan/Sheamus wasn't going to end at WM, and I'm not disappointed at the match now having seen the overall event. I'm actually looking forward to seeing how Bryan reacts to this, and the next couple of months of storylines from him and the big ginge.

 

Plus, if they wanted the match to go some time, then they'd have put them on after it got dark. No way Sheamus was standing up to that much sunlight, he'd burn to a crisp out there!

[ravishing1]

I ordered box office using my remote so was able to record it on my sky + box, but still have trouble recording it on to my dvd recorder, any ideas?????

[wwffan2]

I watched it @ rileys, was such a good night and the atmosphere was electric,

I still can not believe The Rock won, the only disapointment was Lesnar not showing up and the majority

of the predictable results,

I could not believe Orton did the job, I thought the ending of Mania was a bit boring and feel that Taker vs HHH should have been last on the card,

One last thing what the hell was Brodus Clay doing in that spot ?

I expect Lord Tenshai to debut on Raw tonight.

[Mr Posh]

I have to say if you didn

[CurryAngel]

Well, I just didn't enjoy the show very much.

 

Bryan/Sheamus I feel was the wrong result. There is so much more mileage in my man D Bry holding the belt rather than Sheamus who, for me, is just dull.

 

Kane/Orton was a basic upper midcard match from a B PPV. The result was a surprise though.

 

If anything the Big Show/Cody match should have lasted 18 seconds.The match was just dull.

 

Now I really didn't like Hell in a Cell. The cell was pointless, HBK really didn't need to be there and I'm sick to death of seeing him and his wonky eyes doing a sad face all the time. The first 10 minutes was boring as hell, the "end it!", "don't stop the match" malarky was tedious to say the least and the traditional finishers sequence felt like a rehash of the past few Taker WM matches.

 

I didn't mind Punk/Jericho once Jericho stopped his shit acting and got on with actually wrestling. Was great to see a proper Liontamer if only for a few seconds. Even though his return has been a complete flop I feel Jericho should have picked up a cheap win with Punk getting the belt back next month in Chicago.

 

Brodus Clay needs to fuck off and never return.

 

The 6 man tag match was inoffensive filler but was fun seeing Zach Ryder made to look like such a bitch. Future endevours on the horizon?

 

Main event was fun. There attempt at mimicking the Rock/Hogan bit at the start didn't work too well but apart from that it was decent. Rock seemed a bit off but after 9 years that is to be expected. Be interesting to see Cena tonight lamenting on costing himself the match by trying to showboat.

 

Overall, wouldn't bother watching it again if I'm honest.

[windoesnot]

My take on Mania.

 

Firstly thank god it wasnt as bad as last year.

 

Opening match left a bad taste and it wasnt until the HITC match that it left. Its ironic that the two of them, especially Shemus spoke about how upset he was being bumped off last years show, this cant have felt much better. They both knew they could have put on a good, maybe great match but again this felt like a slap in the face to the pair of them and wrestling fans. I didnt mind that they went on first. The idea of your opening match is to get the crowd going and to set a good tone and given a few minutes they could have easily done so (cheap plug, the Preston City Wrestling show last week did this perfectly, Mania did the complete opposite). Sure there is a story that they can go from it into the coming weeks and no doubt a rematch at the next PPV but it just devalues the title even more and both guys in the match. Bryan is super over too with the fan reaction and the amount of 'YES' signs in the crowd before the match did make me laugh.

 

Orton - Kane was was about as generic as it could have been although the finish spot was quite cool and I was surprised that Kane won. Again would expect a rematch at the next PPV.

 

Rhodes - Show was again nothing special and surprised me with the winner. That spear that Cody took near the end looked a little botched and painful.

 

Divas match. If whats her face was as injured as they were putting over then fair play, shes a tough cookie. However I just cannot get into a match at all when the main face of the match (Kelly Kelly) cant even run the ropes properly and thats been the case for years. Again a plug for PCW but they had a womans match where both women in the ring could go and put on a match, in this all you had was Beth who can work and she did the job, to a 'celebrity'.........

 

HITC. Thank god this match came along as it was starting to look like WM27 all over again. This was just completely and utterly brutal, the repeated chair shots to the back from both guys looked like hell and you could see how stiff a match it was by looking at their backs afterwards. Again they had me fooled that the streak would end with the superkick into the pedigree spot, edge of the seat stuff. They didnt use the cell too much (even though it got its own entrance music???) and I feel they put the match in there purely for hype but in the end it didnt matter. This was watching 2 masters of their craft putting on one hell of a match, im not into the whole star rating of matches but this felt like a 5* match to me. And not only were HHH and Taker great but HBK was awesome too. A psychological and physical master piece.

 

Red vs Blue (anyone get the reference?). Well it served its purpose as you couldnt possibly put on a high calibre match after the HITC match. It was ok I suppose, seemed odd that Booker was getting his butt kicked for most of the time. The ending with Eve costing team blue the win was utterly predictable but god is heel Eve so much hotter than face Eve.

 

WWE title. This reminded me a little of the Edge / Taker main event from WM24 with a slowish burn start and building up momentum throughout the match and having the crowd totally into it come the end. Whilst it didnt steal the show (for me anyway), it was a dam good match. Jerichos tactics to get a DQ was great and both guys worked their butts off.

 

Funky Momma. Ok, I get the idea that there needs to be time for the crowd between big matches to cool off but surely the time that went into this garbage would have been better used for the opener. Maybe the kids enjoyed it, I sure as hell didnt and gladly used it for a piss break.

 

Cena / Rock. Well, hats off to these guys. I was expecting another Hogan / Rock WM18 type of match and thats what we got but the execution of it was as good as it could have been. They had the crowd in the palm of their hands the whole time without ever having to do anything flashy or over the top. In technical terms it wasnt a great match but as sports entertainment it was great. Going into the match my heart was with Rock but my head was always saying Cena to win, again they surprised me and the ending with Cena trying the peoples elbow and running into the rock bottom was the perfect way to end it, I popped for Rockys win big time. Well have to wait until Raw to find out where they go from here with Cena, lets hope they do something good out of it all.

 

Overall there was 3 awesome matches, 3 that wouldnt have been out of place on Raw and 2 stinkers (opener and Divas). Far, far better than last year and whilst certainly not in the top 5 or so Manias of all time was good enough. I just wish they would put more time into the matches that deserve it and less into skits and 'comedy'.

[Retro Red]

The 6 man tag match was inoffensive filler but was fun seeing Zach Ryder made to look like such a bitch. Future endevours on the horizon?

 

Yes, because the last person to get kicked in the balls by a Diva at WrestleMania didn't do much afterwards.