WWE RAW Coverage: Kung Pow What?

Last night wasn’t the first time The Rock was forced to save an episode of RAW.

It was also one of the first times he failed to deliver.

In a promo that dragged and lacked the same emotion as John Cena’s last week, The Rock has not increased the excitement level for a match the WWE is promoting as the biggest of all-time.

Sorry, this is not Rock-Hogan. Can’t turn the clock back there.

The promo was completely lackluster in spite of some random comedic flavorings. It’s almost as if The Rock and other superstars try to take the most unusual catch phrases and get them to trend on Twitter. Case in point: First Snicklefritz from C.M. Punk a few weeks ago and now “Kung Pow Bitch” this week? Where’s the real creativity? Where’s the intrigue? It’s not there right now.

Wrestlemania season is supposed to be entertaining- even more so than the usual offerings on the WWE’s flagship show. That was simply not the case this week on RAW, as the first 25 minutes were an absolute joke. After a boring verbal clash between CM Punk and Chris Jericho, there were two commercial breaks in just seven minutes during a champion vs. champion match. You might be able to argue the fact that the show started off slow originally, but those two commercial breaks killed the flow of that match, which was supposed to show off the two best workers in the company.

Epic fail.

The rest of the show was more promo and routine matches. Kane’s decimation of six WWE superstars and the rant of the always-beautiful Eve Torrez did nothing to spice up the vanilla show. The combination of too much promo and the trailer for Edge’s new flick put the show in a mediocre territory it couldn’t escape. Right now, although the card looks good, the excitement for Wrestlemania is just not there. Something needs to change fast.

Perhaps the return of Shawn Michaels will be a catalyst to better RAW programming.

Matches:

WWE Champion C.M. Punk vs. World Heavyweight Champion Daniel Bryan w/ A.J.: A by the numbers encounter that was marred by terrible timing of commercial breaks and had too much going on- too many people in the ring that didn’t matter. The match started off well enough and had a good pace, as the two were going “shot for shot” throughout the contest. Then things got messy. David Otunga tried to cause interference; Santino Marella got involved to even things up. When John Laurinaitis got involved, so did Teddy Long. After all this, Bryan decided to walk out of the ring and was greeted by Sheamus, who threw him back in the ring. There, Punk was waiting and caught Bryan with the GTS, but Laurinaitis called for the bell. The result? 35 minutes and no clear winner. What a waste of time. After the match, Chris Jericho took out Punk and latched on the Walls of Jericho on the entrance ramp.

Nikki Bella w/ Brie Bella vs. Kelly Kelly: A quick, but solid divas match that saw Kelly get the win with a nice rolling bridge cover.

John Cena vs. The Miz: Aside from a few moments of offense from The Miz, Cena was on the prowl throughout. Vintage Cena as an Attitude Adjustment and STFU earned him a relatively easy win.

Tag Team Triple Threat: R. Truth and Kofi Kingston vs. United States Champion Jack Swagger and Dolph Ziggler w/ Vicki Guerrero vs. WWE Tag Team Champions Epico and Primo w/ Rosa Mendes: Bets match of the night as all three teams pushed a goo pace. Epico got the win, after Primo hit the Backstabber on Swagger. After the match, Kane took out all of the competitors.

Sheamus and Big Show vs. Cody Rhodes and Mark Henry: Super fast match that saw Rhodes leave Henry in the ring to catch a Spear from Show and the Brogue Kick from Sheamus.

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About Patrick Hickey Jr. 14260 Articles
Patrick Hickey Jr. is a full-time Assistant Professor of Communication & Performing Arts and Director of the Journalism program at Kingsborough Community College and is the chairman of the City University of New York Journalism Council. He is the Founder and Editor-In-Chief of ReviewFix.com. He's also a former News Editor at NBC Local Integrated Media and National Video Games Writer at Examiner.com where his work was mentioned in National Ad campaigns by Disney, Nintendo and EA Sports. Hickey was also the Editor-In-Chief of two College Newspapers before he received his BA in Journalism from Brooklyn College. Hickey's work has been published in The New York Daily News, The New York Times, Complex, The Hockey Writers, Yahoo!, Broadway World, Examiner, NYSportScene Magazine, ProHockeyNews.com, GothamBaseball.com, The Syracuse Post-Standard, Scout.com and the official sites of the Brooklyn Aces and New York Islanders. His first book, The Minds Behind the Games: Interviews With Cult And Classic Video Game Developers was released in April 2018 and is chock full of interviews with legendary developers. His second book in the series, The Minds Behind Adventures Games, was released in December 2019. His third book, The Minds Behind Sports Games, was released in September 2020. His fourth book, The Minds Behind Shooter Games, was released in March 2021. The Minds Behind Sega Genesis Games and The Minds Behind PlayStation Games were released in 2022 and The Minds Behind PlayStation 2 was published in January 2023. Hickey is also a contracted comic book writer, currently penning his original series, "Condrey," as well as "The Job," "Brooklyn Bleeds" "Dem Gulls" and "KROOM" for Legacy Comix, where he serves as founder, owner and Editor-in-Chief. Hickey Jr. is also a voice actor, having starred in the 2018 indie hit and 2019 Switch, PS4 and Xbox One release, The Padre (also serving as English language Story Editor), from Shotgun With Glitters. The sequel, The Padre: One Shell Straight to Hell was released in February 2021- Hickey also served as a Story Editor and Lead Voiceover performer. He has also done narration and trailers for several other titles including The Kaiju Offensive, Relentless Rex and Roniu’s Tale. Hickey is also the lead voiceover performer on Mega Cat Studios’ upcoming title WrestleQuest, responsible for nearly 90 characters in the game, as well as Skybound's Renfield: Bring Your Own Blood, where he voices both Dracula and Renfield, as well as several other characters. He also stars in Ziggurat Interactive’s World Championship Boxing Manager 2, where he performs the VO of nearly every male character in the game. He also worked on the Atari VCS’s BPM Boy.

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