Raw Review - 30 April, 2012

Right, where to start? Between the rampages, whining and brutality, it really has been a pretty hectic few days.

I guess I'll start where it all started. Cena beat Lesnar at Extreme Rules. I didn't mind the outcome that much. A lot of people didn't like it, especially when Cena cut a promo afterwards. One of those people being Lesnar, who apparently threw a tantrum backstage after finding out that Cena did such a thing. This is where it gets a bit messy.

Turns out this backstage commotion was way way to “play” the dirt sheets. Well, sort of. Apparently Lesnar was still pretty upset at the fact that Cena wasn't brought out on a stretcher, but the full extent of his hissy fit was taken out of proportion. Maybe Lesnar never really minded the promo, maybe not.

Apart from him though, a lot of fans seem to be angry at Cena's post-match promo, which in my mind doesn't seem like that big a deal. To those that say he no sold his beatdown, you're wrong. He sold the shit out of that beatdown. Just because he cut a promo afterwards doesn’t mean that he didn't sell it.

Think of it this way, how many times do you see UFC fighters get interview after a fight, even though they're battered and bruised? Exactly.

Now, even though the post-match promo was fine in my eyes, I have to admit that I was disappointed to see him on Raw on Monday. He said he was going to be out for a while, so why not have him sell those injuries and give him a well deserved rest? Instead, he's been thrown into a storyline with Johnny, even though their little feud blew over a couple of months ago.

And then there's the case with Lesnar. While I expected him to come out and say that it was a fluke victory at Extreme Rules, he just brushed it aside completely. I stuck up for the Cena win because I thought Lesnar would go on a rampage, going through everyone in his sight. But, it just doesn't seem to be going that way.

The Triple H addition is something I'm looking forward to however. Yes, already at this early stage of the Lesnar storyline the booking is a bit all over the place, but even still, having a rampant Lesnar attack the COO was good enough to further his run in the WWE.

Is Triple H a prime opponent? Probably not, but lets remember that Lesnar still has another year on his contract, so there's still a lot of other people for him to feud with in the future. I may be a little biased because Triple H is my favourite wrestler, and I love the way he like, buries people and stuff, but nonetheless I think this Triple H/Lesnar feud will be pretty damn entertaining.

Its already gone off to a good start with Lesnar applying that vicious Kimura on the COO. The beatdown looked realistic once again, and the way Lesnar applied that Kimura was very well done.

I think that about everything in that department. Really all thats left to talk about (thats worth talking about) is the Beat the Clock Challenge (which actually isn't worth talking about that much but I'll do it anyway).

Beat the Clock Challenge

I don't like Beat the Clock Challenges. I find them a lazy way of picking a number one contender for whatever title. The matches are also pretty poor, because they generally all last below 4 minutes.

Raw has done a good job of putting on at least one good match in the past couple of weeks, but this week nothing special happened in terms of match quality.

The first match wasn't anything great, as The Miz defeated Santino Marella to set the time. If I didn't already find out that Bryan won the challenge I would have thought that Miz would go on to challenge Punk for the WWE title, but thankfully it didn't happen.

Next up was Jericho vs. Big Show, which wasn't half bad. These two work pretty well together so a decent 4 minute match was kind of expected of them. Its just a shame that the ref messed it all up. Seriously, he really shouldn't have turned his back to the clock completely. Rookie mistake.

Randy Orton set the new time when he defeated Swagger in a bleh match. Yes, I'm too lazy to think of another word other than bleh. Deal with it.

I pretty much skipped the whole Kane/Khali match because well, lest face it, it was never going to be good anyway was it?

Lastly, it was Daniel Bryan who won the Beat the Clock Challenge when he defeated Jerry Lawler. I have no idea how Lawler got picked for such a big opportunity, but I was just too delighted to see Bryan win.

I seriously can't wait for this match at Over the Limit. Both men put on two very good matches on Raw and Smackdown, so it'll be great to see how they do on a PPV, where there's no ad breaks or nothing.

I particularly liked out delighted Punk looked at the prospect of facing Daniel Bryan for the WWE Title, as did Bryan for that matter. Both men seriously look like there relishing this match, and I for one am too.

Overall, this weeks Raw was pretty hit and miss, but I look forward to seeing how some of these storylines plan out.

Stray Observations:

• Eve looked mega hot in those glasses and in that assistant's dress.
• Another tag team title match, another worthless title change. I don't even know what's left to say about this division anymore.
• I said it before but I'll say it again: It's a shame to see the Bellas go. I really will miss them.
• That Laurinaitis beatdown on Cena actually came off rather well. I don't know how the match will turn out at Over the Limit, so I guess thats one thing to look forward to from this storyline.