WWE Week in Review: Inaugural UK Champion crowned, Mickie James returns

WWE Monday Night RAW

There’s only ONE word to describe this episode of WWE Monday Night RAW and I’m gonna spell it out for you. F-I-L-L-E-R…FILLER!!!

With that being said, it was a decent filler episode at that. With the Royal Rumble just two weeks away, it’s obviously pointless to get anything new going so I understand the logic here. It’s not as if this isn’t what happens every single year leading up to the Rumble and I wasn’t expecting much this week. I’ll tell you what I was happy about and that was that there was no sign of either Mick Foley or Stephanie McMahon here. Don’t get me wrong, I’m all for the authority figures doing their thing when it’s necessary but it was kind of nice to go through a whole show without them, don’t you think?

The opening segment in the ring was decent and it showed how everybody’s tense right now leading into one of the biggest shows of the year and it was also a good way to bring Brock Lesnar back into the fold. By attacking everyone in the ring, it somewhat took away from his humiliating defeat at Survivor Series, but he did look a little more vulnerable. I don’t know if this was a planned thing or not but watching him actually get knocked down by Roman Reigns was a bit surprising. Over the last few years, getting Lesnar off of his feet was an actual … well, feat. Sure, Lesnar got the upper hand in the end and had a very fun staredown with Braun Strowman but he’s not invincible anymore. And that’s probably better anyway. Or maybe I’m just reading too much into that. Who knows? The obvious six-man tag for later in the night was set up here as well.

Things certainly went downhill from there for a while. I just can’t get into this feud with Enzo & Cass taking on Rusev and Jinder Mahal. It’s doing nothing for any of these guys and was just here to fill time, as was the cruiserweight match between Ariya Daivari and Lince Dorado. I know it was there to plug the “I Forfeit” match the next night on 205 Live, and Gallagher is funny on commentary, but the match itself did nothing for me. Thankfully, Cedric Alexander and Brian Kendrick put on a better match later in the night and Neville attacking Rich Swann before his match only added fuel to that feud which could result in a show-stealing match at the Royal Rumble. Two out of three ain’t bad for the cruiserweights this week.

I did like the segment with Nia Jax attacking Sasha Banks. I thought it was staged perfectly and it looked real. Since I’m talking about the ladies, I might as well get into the Charlotte and Bayley promo. Maybe I’m wrong on this one but Charlotte may be the best heel in the company. Her “I’m better than you” attitude is still over and stronger than ever and that was on full display on Monday night. The use of the old footage, pictures and poems of Bayley was amazing but that was as good as the segment got. Bayley almost ruined the entire thing the second she got on the microphone. You could tell that the crowd was almost ready to turn on Bayley when she started with those dreadful poems and she simply can’t hang with Charlotte. I know that she’s the ultimate babyface but people are going to turn on her if she doesn’t step it up soon. I get the point she’s trying to make but she’s not doing it well at all. I’m not really into the grading thing like some other people do but Charlotte got an A++ here and Bayley got a D-.

I really enjoyed the tag team title match between Anderson & Gallows and Cesaro & Sheamus … up until the ending anyway. It’s a little strange seeing the heels screwed out of the titles, especially in that ridiculous fashion, but I guess that’s where we are right now. It looks as if they’re going to go with this program a little longer and I’m okay with that. The match had a very quick pace to it, which is great considering the size of the guys involved here. I don’t know if they’ll take this all the way to WrestleMania but I expect Anderson & Gallows to win the belts at some point.

The six-man tag match main event that saw Braun Strowman team up with Kevin Owens and Chris Jericho to take on Seth Rollins, Roman Reigns and Sami Zayn was pretty good. I thought there was a nice mix of technical wrestling, high-flying spots and brawling here and everybody seemed to come out of this match looking good. Well, Zayn still can’t quite find his place yet but putting him with Rollins and Reigns was a good idea. Their backstage promo earlier in the night was very entertaining and the “he’s crazier than Ambrose” line from Reigns was gold. Strowman got the pin here, which wasn’t surprising as they continue to build him up heading towards San Antonio. Owens and Jericho looked very strong at the end of the night by taking out the former Shield members, which probably means things will go the opposite direction next week.

Overall, this wasn’t a bad episode. Yes, it was a filler episode but that’s what it was meant to be. We got some good matches and segments out of it, one of which was not with The New Day and Titus. If you’re thinking that I forgot about going along there, it really wasn’t that. It’s just that it’s not entertaining in the slightest. Goldberg returns next week for the go-home show and we’re off to the Rumble from there.