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WWE Raw Review 8/9/2021: What the Hell is On Randy Orton's Face?
Randy Orton made his long-awaited return to WWE Raw this week, and we now finally know why he was out for so long. Terrible facial hair like that doesn't just spring up overnight. It must be cultivated slowly and carefully over the course of a month. Randy. The mustache isn't working, brother. Go back to the full stubble look, please. Here's what we thought of WWE Raw this week.
WWE Raw Review 8/9/2021
As promised, Randy Orton opened WWE Raw, debuting his new facial hair, which consists of an entirely clean-shaven head except for the mustache, goatee, and soul patch. Please, please never appear like this again, Randy. Riddle, AJ Styles, and Omos came out to drag out the only interesting drama on Raw, which is Orton and RIddle's unlikely friendship. Orton rejected Riddle. He tried and failed to RKO both Styles and Omos. Riddle tried to RKO Omos too and got chokeslammed for his trouble.
Drew McIntyre murdered poor Baron Corbin, fighting at the behest of Jinder Mahal, in a match after taunting him about his financial misfortune. How is McIntyre the babyface in this situation? Does WWE think that its fans are rich and look down on people with financial hardship? If so, they would command higher advertising rates.
Backstage, WWE writers butchered the "Surely you can't be serious" joke by having Riddle say to Orton, "Bro, you can't be serious," and having Orton reply, "Of course I'm serious, and don't call me bro." The whole point of that god damn forty-year-old joke is that "Surely" sounds like "Shirley." It's a pun. This just an extremely outdated reference to a movie that came out in 1980.
Karrion Kross finally got his rematch against Jeff Hardy and choked him out. So let's follow this booking logic. Jeff Hardy, a jobber, beat Karrion Kross. Then Karrion Kross, a guy who lost to a jobber, beat Keith Lee. Now Karrion Kross beats Jeff Hardy. So everyone's a jobber then, including the NXT champ? Thank goodness for 50/50 bo0king.
Alexa Bliss beat Doudrop via rollup thanks to a distraction from an evil magic doll. The less said about any of this the better.
Backstage, Sheamus, Morrison, and Miz discussed strategy for their upcoming matches.
Ricochet lost to Sheamus after dumbly trying to hit Sheamus in his steel facemask with a flying headbutt. Should I bother complaining about how the steel facemask thing makes no sense because it ought to hurt Sheamus as much as it hurts his opponents? No. I shouldn't bother.
Damian Priest came out to chase Sheamus from the ring, leading into a match with Johnny Drip Drip, which Priest won with Crossroads. Normally I would complain about how stupid Miz and Morrison's gimmick is, but instead, I'm actually going to applaud WWE for managing to find a way to not have Sheamus and Priest face each other over and over again every week until SummerSlam while still advancing their feud.
Backstage, Mansoor gives Mustafa Ali a jacket. Ali says he's going to teach Mansoor how to wrestle in his singles match with T-Bar.
Mustafa Ali lost to T-Bar, because if Vince McMahon knows anything about wrestling at all, it's that the way to get your babyfaces over is to have them lose every week to jobbers. Mansoor made the save after the match when Mace and T-Bar tried to chokeslam Ali again. Ali and Mansoor have natural charisma and I want to like them, but WWE is booking them like losers. Mace and T-Bar have impressive physiques, but WWE books them like goobers. Has Vince McMahon considered firing himself in the next round of cuts?
Reggie tries to do a photoshoot backstage when both Akira Tozawa and R-Truth interrupt in disguise and try to win the 24/7 title. Reggie escapes with gymnastics, since he has the exact same gimmick everyone with the 24/7 title has had since its inception, except with more flips. Retire this title and just make R-Truth the GM of Raw or something. Reggie is going to blow out his knees sooner than later.
Bobby Lashley and MVP cut a promo on Goldberg. Well, MVP cut a good promo on Goldberg, and then Lashley copied the same promo but made it awkward because he sucks on the mic. Just leave the talking to MVP, Lashley.
Nikki ASH tried to follow up her win over Charlotte Flair last week by beating Rhea Ripley, but Charlotte interrupted by taking out Nikki so the match ended in disqualification. For good measure, Charlotte hit Natural Selection on Ripley as well. I'm not sure where this storyline goes after SummerSlam, but I'm guessing Charlotte has to have the belt and feud with a returning Becky Lynch because neither Nikki ASH nor Rhea Ripley have any credibility.
In a video, Elias tossed his guitar in a fire and said, "WWE used to stand for Walk with Elias… but Elias is dead." I give this character reboot a month tops before he goes back to the guitar gimmick with no explanation.
Finally, in the main event, Randy Orton beat AJ Styles by turning a Phenomenal Forearm into an RKO after Riddle took out Omos to prevent interference. After the match, Orton gave Riddle a hug, but then RKO'd him. He gently stroked Riddle's hair afterward though, so maybe that's just how he shows affection.
Vince McMahon is creatively bankrupt. He has nothing let in the tank. Raw has one decent storyline, which is the Riddle/Orton friendship, and they're dragging that out for all its worth, but the rest of the show is a wasteland of misused talent, poorly mixed fake crowd noise and chants, and out-of-touch booking. The worst sin of all, however, is how boring spending three hours watching Raw is.
WWE Raw 8/9/2021
1.5/10
Vince McMahon is creatively bankrupt. He has nothing let in the tank. Raw has one decent storyline, which is the Riddle/Orton friendship, and they're dragging that out for all its worth, but the rest of the show is a wasteland of misused talent, poorly mixed fake crowd noise and chants, and out-of-touch booking. The worst sin of all, however, is how boring spending three hours watching Raw is.
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