The Official UKFF RAW thread (part 2)...

[d-d-d-dAz]

1 minute ago, LaGoosh said:

CM Punk's promo was so carny it almost made me like him again. Just the phoniest, most soulless load of obvious bullshit and arse kissing ever. Absolutely hilarious to watch.

I don’t know man, I think maybe people are guilty of creating an impossible game for him.

So many people said ‘it’ll be terrible, it’ll be shoot stuff about AEW, snarky insidery stuff that makes me hate wrestling’. And then it wasn’t that, and the same people are saying ‘fuck me that was phoney, soulless bullshit’.

I don’t think there was a lane for him last night that sceptics would have enjoyed as he either does the grievance promo with all the insidery shit people claim to not want in 2023, or he does what he did which was just ‘clean slate, let’s wrestle’.

It was just fine, and probably exactly what it needed to be to set the stall for what his run is going to hopefully be; a wrestling storytelling run, not a snark fest.

[The Gaffer]

Rampage opened in 2021 with the entire building roaring for Punk in unison before the show's title sequence even played on the screens. The fans last night - back outside of Chicago - were happy to just let the Raw they usually already enjoy play out. Rollins was just about able to tease a Punk chant out of them. 

That's why you'll have WWE top brass telling Punk "We need to re-introduce you to our audience" and the rest of the internet can roll their eyes all they want, but they'd be right. 

This is the big leagues. They're going to be trying to sell this guy as a top level star in markets that don't have AEW and probably didn't have WWE either last time he was around. They're not going to play to people who were waiting for Observer radio to drop the hours after All In because that's not really an audience to go for. You either already have them or the remaining scraps are nothing compared to your other revenue streams. 

So yeah it was boring. But it made sense. My hope is that it was so one-dimensional goody-two-shoes that it plants seeds for the rest of them to go "You're not really buying this are you?" sometime later. 

Easier to start as a face, have it fuck up, and turn heel if needed right? 

Edited November 28, 2023 by Gay as FOOK

[RedRooster]

19 minutes ago, air_raid said:

Because nothing says “restore credibility of the belt with a long reign” quite like not actually losing it in the ring. You can have the next champ look a big deal for finally slaying Gunther, or you can make it clear he’s outgrown it and the vacancy is filled by having two chumps that couldn’t beat him wrestling each other. Might as well be Miz vs Barrett with the the winner earning the right to lose non title to Kofi every week.

Or you can give the equity of this long run to Gunther himself. I would argue that this is much more important than the title, at this point. At the end of the day, it's the Intercontinental title. Once Gunther loses it, it's not quite back to square one with the belt - but it's not far off it. It's unlikely that the IC title is going to become a draw, just because Gunther held it. For me, he's the asset here. If he doesn't lose the belt, he's still unbeaten - and it makes the prospect of a World Heavyweight title match - or even a WWE title match - all the more intriguing. It also sets Gunther up as a top tier wrestler for years to come, rather than another Rusev or (in the context of the unbeaten streak, not ability) Ryback. You could argue that his IC title run has already done that, and maybe it has - but I'm firmly of the opinion that there's more to be gained from continuing to build his mystique, rather than that of the title. 

 

[LaGoosh]

25 minutes ago, d-d-d-dAz said:

So many people said ‘it’ll be terrible, it’ll be shoot stuff about AEW, snarky insidery stuff that makes me hate wrestling’. And then it wasn’t that, and the same people are saying ‘fuck me that was phoney, soulless bullshit’.

I don’t think there was a lane for him last night that sceptics would have enjoyed as he either does the grievance promo with all the insidery shit people claim to not want in 2023, or he does what he did which was just ‘clean slate, let’s wrestle’.

I think there's probably more options for his promo than just those two. But his "I've changed" and "I'm home" stuff...c'mon, absolute carny stuff. I think I enjoy carny Punk more than his "pipe bomb" stuff, it feels more honest. Going full carny/bullshitter would actually be an interesting character reinvention for him if he went down that road.

Edited November 28, 2023 by LaGoosh

[garynysmon]

For those of you playing at home, you can tick off the “its great to come back home to WWE” box.

They always have to get that one in somewhere.

[The Gaffer]

It's going to be the final "AEW will struggle to shift tickets at Wembley" and "CM Punk will never be back in WWE" piece to the insanity that has been 2023. I'm nailing myself to it now. The exact words he used, the complete anodyne nature of the delivery. This will play into something. 

[d-d-d-dAz]

3 minutes ago, LaGoosh said:

I think there's probably more options for his promo than just those two. But his "I've changed" and "I'm home" stuff...c'mon, absolute carny stuff. I think I enjoy carny Punk more than his "pipe bomb" stuff, it feels more honest. Going full carny/bullshitter would actually be an interesting character reinvention for him if he went down that road.

I genuinely can’t think of another road.

He’s just made a return he didn’t have to make, how do you play ‘don’t really want to be here actually’?

‘It’s home, and where I can prove I am still the best in the world’ is the only way you can play it, besides an awful ‘I got fired by children so I’m forced to work with adults that hate me’.

[Duke]

Assuming he was told "we're going to build to work shooty stuff, don't blow your load now, be a happy warrior" (which is what it was always going to be) , and considering he was only given 8 minutes, he had limited options, as Daz says.

The initial I'm home cliche felt forced and un punk like, because it was. I assume it was either forced on him or part of a deeper storyline, only because it's where his AEW story looked to be going. The promo got better when he got onto the best in the world stuff because that's his comfort zone.

The "I'm not here to make friends, I'm here to make money" (which is a thing only knobheads say) was so incongruous with the "I'm home because of all you lovely snuggable fans" stuff that it felt like his way of working his actual character in, and I'm sure pissed a few people off.

Either way, I can't say I'm desperate to find out what he says next

 

 

[Hannibal Scorch]

45 minutes ago, Gay as FOOK said:

Rampage opened in 2021 with the entire building roaring for Punk in unison before the show's title sequence even played on the screens. The fans last night - back outside of Chicago - were happy to just let the Raw they usually already enjoy play out. Rollins was just about able to tease a Punk chant out of them. 

That's why you'll have WWE top brass telling Punk "We need to re-introduce you to our audience" and the rest of the internet can roll their eyes all they want, but they'd be right. 

This is the big leagues. They're going to be trying to sell this guy as a top level star in markets that don't have AEW and probably didn't have WWE either last time he was around. They're not going to play to people who were waiting for Observer radio to drop the hours after All In because that's not really an audience to go for. You either already have them or the remaining scraps are nothing compared to your other revenue streams. 

So yeah it was boring. But it made sense. My hope is that it was so one-dimensional goody-two-shoes that it plants seeds for the rest of them to go "You're not really buying this are you?" sometime later. 

Easier to start as a face, have it fuck up, and turn heel if needed right? 

I think that’s a fair point. Except as demonstrated in AEW, he doesn’t perform like a top guy. Most of his matches were average to good, and it wasn’t long until he was out injured for a while. That seemed to be the cycle of his run. 
 

And that’s the issue. WWE is a show aimed at kids, AEW is aimed at the lapsed fan. To a whole generation of their audience, Punk IS a nobody. And presenting him as a top guy can be possible. Until the bell rings. I’m here to make money, not friends was probably the most believable thing he said.

Edited November 28, 2023 by Hannibal Scorch

[Mr_Danger]

I’d take John Cena promo Punk promo over rehashed pipe bomb promos for now. He can’t come in and start moaning straight away, least of all because this TikTok generation audience won’t have a clue what he was going on about. Let him get back in to the game before he starts crying that it’s rigged. He’ll get them all back on the Punk train, one thing that is undeniable about One Bill Phil is his ability to connect with smelly wrestling fans.

[The King of Old School]

On the Gunther debate there is no way he should get pinned for the IC title and then win the World Title a couple of months later.

Let him win the World Title while he is IC Champion and have him vacate the latter due to "World Champion commitments".

Or it will be, "well Jey Uso beat him last month for the secondary belt how are we meant to believe him as a World Champion?"

Keeping him undefeated while he is World Champion keeps him and the belt important, and gives a huge rub to whoever dethrones him later down the line. The IC title doesn't matter in the grand scheme of things.

[FUM]

4 minutes ago, The King of Old School said:

Or it will be, "well Jey Uso beat him last month for the secondary belt how are we meant to believe him as a World Champion?"

Or you could just do a triple threat and have someone else eat the pin to Gunthers anger and dismay?

Vacating titles you don’t need to vacate is something a moron would do and I wouldn’t see him as anything less. There’s an argument to say Dolph Ziggler never even got his cult audience back after it because it’s so ridiculously stupid to do as Champion.

[GlennCullen]

People will read into that promo how they want, but as someone who's not particularly hot or cold on Punk, it was a bit shit.

Doesn't help when you have Cole hyping him up as polarising and controversial all show, and then he goes out and delivers that.

[The King of Old School]

4 minutes ago, FUM said:

Or you could just do a triple threat and have someone else eat the pin to Gunthers anger and dismay?

Vacating titles you don’t need to vacate is something a moron would do and I wouldn’t see him as anything less. There’s an argument to say Dolph Ziggler never even got his cult audience back after it because it’s so ridiculously stupid to do as Champion.

Not for me.

Think it's worked perfectly for Joe in AEW.

[BomberPat]

the promo was so bad and nakedly disingenuous that I can only assume, given the "here to make money" line afterwards, that it's by design. 

The problem isn't that he didn't do worked shoot stuff, the problem is that they signed someone who's biggest selling points are his mic work and the hold he has on the Chicago market, and he cut a dog-shit promo to crickets in Chicago. If it wasn't intentionally the start of a "sell-out Punk" angle, or at the very least a rehash of what AEW tried to do with him saying that he was happy to be there and work with upcoming talent while wrestlers who knew him called him out as a hypocrite, then it's a really bad start. If it is the start of that angle, it's still a bad promo.