Survivor Series 2024 - November 30th

[Hannibal Scorch]

 

[Mr Butternut Squash]

I'm probably the biggest Nia Jax fan on the internet but even I thought the decision to have her start the Wargames match was insane. Did she headbutt her locker door on the way out? She spent the entire match on another planet. I didn't get any better either, the most contrived, business exposing dogshit you'll see all year. It couldn't be more obvious how badly they need to reshuffle the key players in the division.

It could only get better from there.

Nak/Knight was a 2024 Nakamura match. Actually, it was quite refreshing to see a trim ten minute PPV match with a definitive ending. Shinsuke cruising for the win after Carmelo and Andrade wrestled each other a billion times for a singles title opportunity that never came was very funny. His new look could do with some tinkering but the entrance is cool.

Great triple threat match. Breaker is fast becoming must watch wrestling television. Always guaranteed to do something brutal/stupid/breathtaking. You knew it was coming, but that spear on Ludwig was still an incredible, punch-the-air moment. Sheamus getting the well deserved legends pop always warms my heart. I'm all aboard the Sheamus for the Intercontinental belt at Wrestlemania train.

World title match was the usual excellent Gunther match. Priest had a good showing too and it pops me how over he's become. Great selling of the shoulder throughout, and with a show sandwiched by Wargames matches it brought a nice bit of variety to the ring work. Shit finish.

Against my better judgement I had a blast with the main event. Just about the best you're gonna get out of these tired and flawed Wargames matches. Just a feel good popcorn match, with a bunch of well defined heroes overcoming the dastardly villains. Punk set the tone immediately when he swung for the caged heels during his entrance. He gets it on a level frighteningly few others do now. They continue to find new, intriguing layers to this Bloodline dynamic. All these years later and they're still squeezing out exciting possibilities. And fuck me. Roman/Punk feels like the biggest match in history. Every time they shared the screen together it was electric. I'm sure Seth Rollins will make a fine Wrestlemania host.

Shout out to Bronson Reed, who has fit like a glove in New Bloodline. Apparently he blew both ankles on his cage dive. Shitty timing for him if true. Hopefully Jacob is okay too. Looked like he fucked it but I can never tell when I'm being worked by him

Edited December 1, 2024 by Mr Butternut Squash

[AndyUK]

Good show.

Those Nia chairshots were hilarious. To be fair, those aside, I didn't dislike the womens one quite as much as what seems to be the general consensus I don't think.  It did suffer from there being no real story, but a lot of these War Games matches are similar. The mens one was very good once it got going, but that still had the slow first half an hour or so and a couple of awkward looking moments too. I would love to see Reigns v Punk at Mania feuding over their friendship with Heyman but feel like the whole favour thing means it will be saved for later. It will be epic when it does happen though. 

Despite all the talk about The Rock, he's not particularly involved with the Bloodline at the moment so I guess it shouldn't really be a surprise he didn't turn up. Whatever he's going to do next is clearly going to involve Cody, whenever that may be. 

Other than that, Gunther/Priest was good again but not quite as good as their excellent Summerslam match, Nakamura winning was a surprise and the triple threat IC Title match was possibly up there with match of the night. That false finish was great and you've got another Wrestlemania moment there with Sheamus finally winning the belt. 

Edited December 1, 2024 by AndyUK

[Arch Stanton]

I was fast forwarding through that women's War Games match within about thirty seconds of it starting. Awful, plodding slow motion action inside the cage, then a timer pops up on the screen to tell you that it's three minutes before anything remotely interesting might, but probably won't, happen. Repeat that seven more times, then the match starts?! Haha, yeah right. Atrocious match format given the talent in the match. This one would have been way better as a traditional Survivor Series match, could have been over and done with inside fifteen minutes.

[FUM]

I hope we’re somehow dodging Punk v Rollins at Mania and Punks favour will be the Mania main event v Roman. Cody v Rock doesn’t need the strap, have Roman take it back at the Rumble or the Netflix main event then Punk cash in his favour.

That’s your two nights main events sorted.

[Snitsky's back acne]

Annoying thing is, the one time WWE could justify doing a proper, old school bloody, intense War Games match is with the Bloodline lot but it didn't quite work in my opinion.

Other than that, go back to the old school Survivor Series format. As has been said, it was great and allowed for so much more storytelling if done properly. 

The women's match would definitely have benefitted from being a regular Survivor Series match. Hopefully WWE realises this for next year but I doubt it. 

 

[DavidB6937]

The worst thing about the women's one is how everyone kept getting confused about where the weapons were. Every damn time they'd run down, look under that side, realise there's nothing and then go round. How? You just saw however many women do the same fucking thing before you.

[Merzbow]

Is there a thing now that says Wargames must have weapons? It's Lethal Lockdown all over again

[Devon Malcolm]

I just felt so sorry for Bayley during that opening match. She's desperately trying to guide Nia Jax to doing one thing right (even audibly yelling "ELBOWS!" at one point) and it just didn't happen. A terrible match, briefly enlivened by Tiffany Stratton rising above it all and even Candice LeRae suggesting she's too good for it. The stuff with the baseball bat, only for Rhea to be on her feet 30 seconds later, was appalling.

There's good women in this match but the layout and execution of it was terrible, and Jax just dragging it down with one of the all-time worst individual performances. Like @Supremo said, she has looked slightly better since returning and she had a genuinely cracking match with Naomi a couple of weeks ago. But this was the dark old days again. Embarrassing. An entire Botchamania all by herself.

Also, anybody chanting "We want tables!" should immediately be placed on the sex offenders register for life.

Surprised to see Nakamura beat LA Knight clean. Knight fucked up the top rope jump again. What an idiot. Hopefully this is the start of seeing the back of him. What's Eli Drake doing in the Impact Zone etc.

There should be an IC title triple threat every PPV. Would have been the first post in an on-topic 'Things You Know Will Be Good' thread. Perhaps the best thing about it is that Kaiser looked like he belonged. His mannerisms are funny as fuck. One of the best matches of the year by some distance, and Breakker didn't do anything that was life-threatening.

Priest vs Gunther was in a tough spot on the card and for a largely technical match, they really won the crowd over after a while. Maybe went a bit long but this was excellent. But now Priest's going to be wrestling fucking Balor and I'm sad all over again. When does Balor's contract run out ffs.

The War Games match featured all the requisite melodrama and no discernible Tonga Loa fuck-ups so it did its job. The decisive ending suggests the new Bloodline goes away now, doesn't it?

Decent show, anyway, and no Dwayne so I'm pleased.

[d-d-d-dAz]

20 minutes ago, Devon Malcolm said:

The War Games match featured all the requisite melodrama and no discernible Tonga Loa fuck-ups so it did its job. The decisive ending suggests the new Bloodline goes away now, doesn't it?

Oh, Devvers.

If you want to see inside Papa Paul's heart, you have to listen to Michael Cole's mouth.

"The Bloodline may have won tonight, but this isn't over. Solo Sikoa still has the ula fala... Solo Sikoa is still the Tribal Chief!"

Alas, I think we're probably getting Solo/Roman at the Rumble and just as the Uso's or whoever go to put the ula fala round Roman's neck... yep... I suspect that's when we'll be smelling what The Rock is cooking.

Still, good show. And by good show I mean good main event and at least one good undercard match.

Opener? Shite. 

Nakamura/LA Knight? Shite. Two wrestlers who are similar in their own way. Heaps of promise that absolutely crumbles once the bell rings. Nakamura's promise comes from the fact that historically people said he had good matches in Japan, whereas Knight's promise comes from someone on Twitter who reckons he's the new Austin or something. Absolute arse the pair of them. It makes you nostalgic for The Miz singles matches. If you're going to do by-the-numbers, WWE-dark-days, house-match-style matches on PPV, at least don't fuck so many things up and try and make it look neat. Shite.

The real hope is that this is them starting to give up on Knight. The worry is Cody actually is going to Netflix in a few weeks and Knight is being lined up as a first feud for new champion KO.

Triple Threat Match? Tremendous. Ludwig Kaiser is great, even if he does have a slightly strange face and look like a young, toned Jasper Carrot. Sheamus is honestly brilliant, and they should do more with him. I don't know what to make of Breaker particularly, but he's very fun. He does a lot of exciting things, but seems to struggle to pick up basic cues in the ring and looks a bit lost between his big, flashy moments. Really good fun this.

World title match? Yep, solid. Bit long. Presumably a bit of filler for Gunther en route to Punk dethroning him, which I've convinced myself is happening.

I thought the main event was great. Well put together, lots of stories within the stories, and Roman is absolutely majestic once he gets going. He's easily got the best look/presentation of any main eventer they've had, and whilst a lot of his matches are far too slow for 70% of their run time, when he does hit those higher gears there's nothing quite like it. What a guy.

Probably the end of the Punk/Roman dream for now. Still, we'll always have that exceptional timing on the Tsunami save from Punk.

Leave the memories alone...

Edited December 1, 2024 by d-d-d-dAz

[Lion_of_the_Midlands]

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

historically people said he had good matches in Japan

Sounding the Albert Alarm through the Tensai Tannoy there Dazzler, though I do feel that "Good in Japan" shouldn't be applied to Japanese wrestlers. 

Nothing to add about the show that hasn't been said. LA Shite continues to be shite. If you are cosplaying a mix of Rock and Austin stopp doing top rope stuff, they didn't. 

Shamoo, Steiner Minor and the Kaiser Chief had a banger. Sheamus continues to shine in what must be the twilight of his career. Bron must be a future world champion and Kaiser continues to impress. 

[Hannibal Scorch]

@d-d-d-dAz Nakamura’s debut in NXT was an all timer for the brand. And his run there I remember being decent. But his main roster run has been pretty shocking and not sure why. Remember we all thought that Mania match vs AJ was going to be a banger and was an absolute snore fest.

[Dr. Alan Grant]

1 hour ago, d-d-d-dAz said:

Alas, I think we're probably getting Solo/Roman at the Rumble and just as the Uso's or whoever go to put the ula fala round Roman's neck...

Didn’t Roman already get the ula fala back on Smackdown a few months ago? I definitely remember seeing him pick it up off the ring mat and the crowd went berserk when he put it on. No idea how or when Solo got it back, unless the whole thing was a Bloodline fever dream I had.

[d-d-d-dAz]

17 minutes ago, Hannibal Scorch said:

@d-d-d-dAz Nakamura’s debut in NXT was an all timer for the brand. And his run there I remember being decent. But his main roster run has been pretty shocking and not sure why. Remember we all thought that Mania match vs AJ was going to be a banger and was an absolute snore fest.

This is true, but Sami Zayn was in it too and history is trying to teach us that it might just be that Sami Zayn is brilliant.

[Merzbow]

I think a lot of people saw one very good AJ Styles match at Wrestle Kingdom and thought Nakamura was god's gift to wrestling off the back of it and that tale trickled down before his debut, not saying he was shite in NJPW as he was far from it but he was never in contention for being the best "superworker" there.