Raw Recap 9th May, 2016 - WHERE'S DEAN AMBROSE?

It's my birthday so I don't have to think of a real intro! 

Segment #1 - Chris Jericho's Highlight Reel

Dadicho is still on his best run in years and proves it by kicking off Raw and getting the crowd to chant for a dead potted plant. Jericho rants and raves about Dean Ambrose and how he's a loser like all the fans and he can't relate to that. SAWFT's music hits, and Big Cass walks out by himself, the delay between the music hitting and the actual entrance keeps getting people excited to see Enzo again, he should get a pretty sweet pop whenever he does come back.

Cass has been holding up well in these segments considering he doesn't necessarily seem to be a natural on the mic and he's leant on Enzo to hold these things together for years. He challenges Jericho to a match, Jericho walks away, Cass does his SAWFT catchphrase (no member of the roster is allowed near a microphone unless they say at least 3 things that could potentially be put on a T-Shirt) Jericho runs back towards and ring and eats a big boot for it.

Nice to see the show started with wrestlers pushing their own angles, as opposed to momma or pappa McMahon generically talking about how "big" the show's going to be and throwing random matches together between whoever interrupts them.

Jericho talks to Stephanie backstage, these two always have great chemistry. Stephanie puts Jericho in a match with Cass and tells him not to try and cause drama between her and Shane.

Segment #2 - Baron Corbin Vs Dolph Ziggler

This feud needs to be wrapped up pretty soon, not that it's been awful, but extended feuds with Dolph Ziggler are never exactly momentum builders. 

JBL: "Dolph Ziggler has fought them all and BEAT them all!!" ????

There's a great spot where Ziggler sandbags Corbin and appears to be hurt just enough to draw concerned silence from the crowd, only for him to leap up and hit a Fame Asser for a big pop. Then Ziggler takes the DAMNEST Deep Six you'll ever seen and it looks so disgusting it was borderline criminal that he kicked out of it. Corbin gets the win anyway off the End of Days. Good match between these two, pretty much what it needed to be...although I hope we don't see more of it for now.

Backstage Charlotte and Ric are sucking up to Shane McMahon to try and reverse Stephanie's Extreme Rules decision. Shane says it stands AND bans Ric from ringside for tonight. Ric looks like he wants blood...although in fairness I can't imagine he has that much left.

"THE CLUB" are interviewed by Jojo, I guess WWE don't want to risk infringing New Japan's trademarks so they're taking Sega's. AJ says THE CLUB is officially back together again.

Segment #3 - R-Truth Vs Fandango

again

fuck you

Backstage, Kevin Owens, Miz and Cesaro are bickering to Shane and Stephanie about the Intercontinental Championship. Stephanie says it'll be a triple threat at Extreme Rules, Sami Zayn says he has a problem with that. Shane makes a match between Miz and Sami, if Sami wins it's a fatal four way.

Segment #4 - Charlotte Vs Paige

Kind of a shame Paige has probably been the biggest casualty of all the new DIvas introduced to the main roster. Natalya is on commentary and does a miserable job at it, making bad jokes, ignoring questions asking about her potentially losing to Charlotte, talking about having respect while coming off extremely arrogant and talking about her famous uncle Bret. If you hadn't seen a Raw in a few months and heard her performance as she talks smack about Ric Flair you'd definitely assume she was heel.

Charlotte tries to cheat in the match, Natalya hops up on the apron, I think she was supposed to throw Charlotte's feet off the ropes but they screwed up on the timing. Ric comes out, Shane comes out (with music, because it's really important to get rid of Ric so there's no distractions) with referees to escort him away. In the commotion Paige rolls up Charlotte for the win. A decent match and a decent finish idea but it fell apart in execution somewhat.

Segment #5 - Sami Zayn Vs The Miz

Here's your mandatory Smackdown rematch of the week, Sami is dominant for much of the early portion of the match but dumps Zayn over the top rope face first onto the steps to gain the advantage. That leads us into QUICK CUTS to Kevin Owens and Cesaro watching different TVs in different rooms, so I guess the Raw backstage team have two separate crews dedicated to "DUDES WATCHING TV AT A WEIRD ANGLE" cams.

It's weird to me Miz still uses the figure four leg lock now he's back in full "Hollywood douche" mode, he first started using that move in 2012 when he was a workhorse babyfa...HAHAHAHAHAHA oh yea they actually tried that with him.

Miz is underrated but you know he's working with someone great when his matches start kicking off "This is Awesome" chants. Sami brings so much energy and emotion to his matches he made beating Miz in a non-title match feel like a moment. We now have a fatal four way for the title at Extreme Rules.

Becky Lynch is interviewed about her match with Emma last week, Emma gets in her face and tells Becky to watch her back as Becky is attacked by...Dana Brooke? Surprised she's getting called up of all people. 

They replay the Darren Young/Bob Backlund promo from Smackdown, maybe they played it on Smackdown first to see what the reaction would be because it...sure is an idea. 

New Day, Sasha Banks and Dolph Ziggler jerk off over some pizza together.

Zack Ryder is talking to Shane McMahon until Kevin Owens interrupts him (again). I wonder if a Shane Vs Owens match is on an idea blackboard buried in Titan Towers somewhere. Shane makes a match between Ryder and Owens with the winner getting the spot at Extreme Rules. I still hate this trope of the owners throwing together random matches on the fly every single week, but at least these segments are taking place backstage where they belong and not in the same identical opening promo

The Usos and Reigns are interviewed...CHRIST...is this TNA Impact 2010? Why are there so many non-wrestling segments in a row. Reigns says he'll eliminate AJ in the tag match later.

Segment #6 - Sin Cara Vs Rusev

Crowd chants "We Want Lana" when she's right there, because wrestling fans.

Rusev is so great, he has the best facial expressions and is the perfect mix of "Saturday Morning Cartoon villain" and a real hyper masculine dude. Sin Cara gets the win via interference from Kalisto, which felt a little too easy but they're letting Kalisto get his licks in now since I suspect he may be killed to death at the Pay-Per-View.

Segment #7 - ELIMINATION TAG: Roman Reigns and The Usos Vs Styles, Gallows and Anderson

When you put this at the end of the second hour to leave the main event spot to Chris Jericho Vs Big Cass you may as well just paste DEAN AMBROSE IS COMING BACK AND A THING WILL HAPPEN on the titantron.

Jey Uso is first to be eliminated, he gets rolled up off an illegal right hand by Gallows, Anderson pulls the tights to try make it look less silly to be pinned off a single thrust but Jey sells it like he's been KOed anyway. Reigns fires up and soon after Anderson gets caught by a rollup to make it 2 vs 2. The other Uso gets eliminated during the break.

Reigns pins Gallows clean off a Superman Punch which should be banned, that crap is only justifiable as a setup signature move. That leaves us to Reigns and AJ, which is the main event of the next PPV but not the main event of Raw because DEAN AMBROSE IS DEFINITELY NOT SHOWING UP TONIGHT.

AJ is getting a lot more aggressive and beats down Reigns inside the ring, and then sets up the announce table to repay the favour from last week but gets LAUNCHED over the table into one of the announcer's chairs. Reigns is about to powerbomb AJ through the table again but Anderson and Gallows hit Reigns with a chair for the DQ. The Usos come back too but get fought off. Reigns comes back and spears both of them. Reigns looks like he's about to go nuts on both of them with a chair but gets kicked by AJ. AJ attempts to Style Clash Roman on a chair...bad choice but NO WAY in hell is that ever happening.

Roman tosses AJ over the top rope and they stare down each other, Roman offers the chair to AJ, AJ kicks it back, AJ misses a phenomenal forearm and rolls out of the ring...which gets him booed, it was a great segment apart from that. I love how this is escalating every week, two groups of guys who just want to fight each other all the time. A lot of these segments are even ending with a 50/50 crowd split between AJ and Reigns, it's making both guys look like stars.

Segment #8 - Zack Ryder Vs Kevin Owens

The crowd were too burned out from all the six man excitement to get into Ryder like they did last week, Ryder gets a short rally but it's shut down after a couple of minutes by a pop up powerbomb. Owens gets the win, retains his spot in the match, and mouths off at Cole for a bit.

For literally no reason they replay Enzo's injury from Payback, someone in the truck must love watching wrestlers getting hurt.

Cass is interviewed, Renee Young can barely hold the microphone high enough to reach his face.

Segment #9 - The New Day Vs Dudley Boyz

JBL dates himself even more than usual by talking about wrestling matches from 1917.

I'm slightly worried the New Day might be losing their momentum a little bit, their shtick is still entertaining but they've had little to work with for the last few months (they're victims of the League).

Gatch and English attack Xavier Woods on the outside which causes enough of a distraction for Kofi to get pinned by D-Von by a clothesline. Vaudevillains finish their beatdown and leave. Match was fun while it lasted, otherwise standard segment to build towards a Pay-Per-View match.

Segment #10 - Big Cass Vs Chris Jericho

Jericho is standing on the titantron making his entrance in the darkness...when SOMEONE attacks him and SOMEONE steals his jacket...I wonder who it could possibly be?!

OH MY GOD.

IT'S DEAN AMBROSE.

I said earlier that Rusev has the best facial expressions but Ambrose and Jericho are gunning for that spot in this segment. Ambrose starts ripping up the jacket and pulling out the wiring...which I'm surprised Jericho was actually willing to do since he really did pay $15,000 of his own money for that thing, I guess WWE must have reimbursed him for that.

Ambrose gets into a brawl and gets his ass handed to him AGAIN, fighting is supposed to be his entire thing WWE, I know Jericho "cheated" by raking his eyes but Ambrose still shouldn't keep coming up short in brawls. Jericho tries to leave with the remains of his jacket, but Cass cuts him off, Jericho slaps him and throws him back into the ring for Ambrose to hit Dirty Deeds and finish off his jacket.

This segment didn't really click, especially not as a main event segment, the expense of that jacket seems to be the only justification for putting this on last. Cass looked like a nerd waiting around on the outside while all this was going on, Ambrose looked like a chump and the crowd didn't care THAT much about Jericho's jacket. 

Stephanie and Shane talk about how well they got along tonight, they show slow motion replays of Ambrose ripping up the jacket...but only once because it's not as entertaining as Enzo getting a concussion. The show goes off the air.

Closing Thoughts

Mostly a collection of competently put together segments which you've got to do when you're putting together a Pay-Per-View with only three weeks of build. Reigns Vs AJ continues to be strong, Ambrose Vs Jericho continues to feel not as good as it should be, and everything else is trucking along fairly. Not too much to say about this one, nothing horrible and nothing amazing either, perhaps a little too much fluff and filler in the middle of the show, but otherwise passable.

RATING: I'm 24 today!