RAW LD, February 25th 2019 - Superman Returns

[klunderbunker]

Monday Night Raw
Date: February 25, 2019
Location: State Farm Arena, Atlanta, Georgia
Commentators: Michael Cole, Corey Graves, Renee Young

It’s another big show this week with a double shot of huge. First up, we have the return of Roman Reigns, who will be making some sort of a major announcement. It’s the first time he’s been on television in months, having vacated the Universal Title in October due to leukemia. In addition to that, it’s Ric Flair’s 70th birthday and there is going to be a celebration, which of course means a lot of guest stars. Did I mention it’s Wrestlemania season? Let’s get to it.

Click on the link below for the full review.

Story Over Here, Story Over There

[Storm Trooper]

I love the finish to RAW but the execution is ridiculous.

Management: "Hey roster, lets celebrate Ric Flair, everyone is to stand on the ramp."

Everyone: "Sure we like Ric Flair we'll do that.

We see Batista beat down Ric Flair and stand over his body.

Everyone: we're just gonna stand here. The guy we respect is being disrespected by a former superstar but I'm not getting involved.

Legends specifically invited to the event to stand in the ring: I'm not gonna go help the guy I love and respect enough that I specifically flew from various parts of the country.


As soon as Batista ran into that room clearly with ill intent the entire horde of superstars should have been running to help Ric.

[FunKay]

Really enjoyed that episode. Batista is one of my all time favourites so I'm all in on him versus Haitch, especially with heel-Tista, and that angle at the end was grand anyway!

[Jeff Deliverer of Mail]

I love the finish to RAW but the execution is ridiculous.

Management: "Hey roster, lets celebrate Ric Flair, everyone is to stand on the ramp."

Everyone: "Sure we like Ric Flair we'll do that.

We see Batista beat down Ric Flair and stand over his body.

Everyone: we're just gonna stand here. The guy we respect is being disrespected by a former superstar but I'm not getting involved.

Legends specifically invited to the event to stand in the ring: I'm not gonna go help the guy I love and respect enough that I specifically flew from various parts of the country.


As soon as Batista ran into that room clearly with ill intent the entire horde of superstars should have been running to help Ric.

That would have looked hilarious. Batista decimated by 50 wrestlers immediately before HHH can even get half way up the ramp, angle ruined.

[Jack-Hammer]

Overall good storytelling and storyline progression for last night's show. The wrestling, for the most part, wasn't all that much to speak of but WrestleMania this year already seems more interesting to me than last year.

Roman Reigns is the healthiest looking cancer patient I've ever seen. I don't know what sort of treatments he underwent, couldn't have been chemo or he wouldn't have any hair, but they must've found the cancer extremely early and I wouldn't be at all surprised if he undergoes several screenings a year. I'm not going to pretend that Reigns is a favorite wrestler of mine or anything, but I'm glad he's in remission. It looks like Vince might finally have fans accepting Reigns as the babyface he wants, it just took a life threatening illness.

Becky Lynch showing up was a lot of fun, she's really found the character that she should spend the rest of her career playing, with a few tweaks here and there to keep it fresh. I also liked how they used some reality with Ronda's interaction with Stephanie last night where they didn't try to pretend that Ronda needs WWE, it's something I wish they'd do more often rather than do the whole "your job is in jeopardy" angles with some stars at times who people have long since known have managed their finances well. Ronda Rousey was set for life before she signed with WWE, she was making some $3 million per fight towards the end of her MMA career, not counting the various endorsement deals, so it's nice to see WWE not insulting the collective intelligence of fans here and it's something I wish they did more often.

It's fun seeing Aleister Black and Ricochet do their thing but the Revival might be worse off now than they were a month ago. When they were being jobbed out a month ago, they weren't the Raw Tag Team Champions; I just simply do not understand the logic of having what's supposed to be your top tag team jobbing out when there are plenty of teams like the Ascension, the Singh Brothers, Ryder & Hawkins and a few others primed for the roles of jobbing out to make others look good.

The IC title and no DQ matches were pretty fun, nice to see Lio Rush get a chance to show some of what he can do. The no DQ match actually protected Dean Ambrose a bit by having Elias come out with a guitar shot towards the end, a nice little piece of continuity considering Ambrose embarrassing him earlier in the night. I can honestly say, however, that I'm really bored with Elias as he does the same thing week after week, he's nothing special in the ring and he just seems to be permanently mired in the mid-card doldrums.

The final segment felt like it was extremely rushed, though it probably didn't have to be if Vince wasn't so gung-ho about cramming in as much content as is humanly possible. It was nice seeing the Big Gold Belt on WWE TV again, I just wish they'd bring it back or some variation or something as the Big Logo titles just don't remotely have the pizzazz a World Championship should. As far as Batista showing up, it was a cool surprise but I can honestly say that I am not interested in Triple H vs. Batista to any degree at WrestleMania. I was never a huge fan of Batista in the first place and I'm just not interested watching a copule of 50 year olds rehash a feud from 15 years ago.

[SSJPhenom]

That was the best Raw in a long long time. It's almost like someone who is great at writing wrestling angles is back in the company................(Bruce Prichard anyone?)