That John Cena Win Was Bad. WWE WrestleMania 41 Night Two Review!

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John Cena has finally done it. He has surpassed Ric Flair's made-up record, and he has won his 17th World Championship in WWE. And it was all thanks to the man who started all this back at Elimination Chamber. Grammy Award winning musical artist Travis Scott. Words, uh, history says. The streets say. He's still walking down the ramp.

at this point now. Yeah, it took a while, didn't it? Well, at least he got there. Unlike somebody. I'm Oli Davis. I'm joined by Luke Owen D.A.D. Welcome to the WrestleMania 41 Night 2 Review Podcast. If you haven't already, please super kick that subscribe button. Give us a thumbs up. Leave a comment down below with what you thought of this pay-per-view, PLE. I think we all thought something similar, which is, huh, night one.

Bit of a middling show and an all-time fantastic main event, night two. Wow, what a really good first two thirds of the show. And then what the hell were they doing? In the main event. Well, and slightly before that as well. Like, I think that it fell off the rail somewhat with the Logan boy. Only somewhat, though. Yeah.

But also getting your thoughts to wrestletalk.com forward slash support or read out every single one of them over five US dollars before the end of the show. So just do a recap of what happened in the main event. It was about 45 minutes left of the broadcast. I knew that because I was watching with the full time duration bar complete. But you...

had no idea when the show was going to end. No, we took an educated guess because the post-show was scheduled to start at 4.45. So I was like, well, it'll probably end at 4.45 then. You know, it's currently four o'clock now. do that it ended no it ended a bit earlier than that yeah the match was a lot shorter than I was expecting I don't think John Cena's got a 40 minute match in him

He has if it's like AJ Styles. How much was that? How long was that match? The Royal Rumble? It's certainly not 40 minutes. I think it's probably about 20. And it's just 20 minutes of Styles Clash AA. Styles Clash AA. So, John Cena had his entrance. There was no Ballyhoo, no special entrance, and all the Trons just had his name in white against the black screen. Yeah, it was white aryale text on a black background, and it was...

Yeah, it was like if we were to edit something and we're waiting for Lee usually or James Pepper to finish the full graphics, we'll just have a placeholder of NRB title series.

in that font but here it was just John's full thing and he was in a black t-shirt no big colourful John Cena design and he didn't do any pomp and circumstance with the entrance he like none of this he literally just walked to the ring this is his first we've seen heel entrances but this is his first one for a wrestling match and it was just

just walked to the ring and he looked annoyed at the fans because he had to be here to wrestle in front of them i think you're uh you're you're missing a bit of his entrance because he did have something With the drumstick, it's America's favourite... sundae ice cream sundae i think i missed i was so uh enamored with the dude wipe sponsorship of the of the intercontinental championship fatal four-way i missed the cone zone oh my god the cone zone

They're in the ringside area. They're all just really hyped up on Sunday sugar. Because the live chat kept going on about drumsticks. And I'm like, have I missed something? I hear drumsticks. I think chicken. I think Dominic Mysterio, I think Tendi.

Or drummers. Or drummers. Oh yeah, I guess. That's what I think of, because that's what I used to do. I never, this is probably a US versus UK thing, I never once think ice cream when I hear drumstick. I've never thought of an ice cream drumstick. No. Even now, even though I've seen it with the Cornetto and the wafer, I still can't not think of it as breaded chicken with ice cream inside. Ice cream.

Are you typing in the cone zone? Ice cream drumstick. Yeah, there it is. Oh, like one of those. Oh, I see. Yeah, it's America's favourite Sunday. Is it really? Yeah, okay. I get it. I sort of see what it is. But they cut to that after Cody had just said hi to Brandy and his daughter at ringside. So it did kind of look like they were John Cena's family. That was my... That was my kayfabe working of the situation. But Cody Rhodes, in contrast, came out with all the pump and say.

He did. He had an Iron Man mask. Had a Cody Vader. Yeah, it popped up automatically. jumped out of my seat. It really made me laugh. It was awesome. But yeah, as far as the headgear at WrestleMania goes, that was pretty good. Well, he's the new Triple H now. He's the new guy that gets the big creative entrances and he's already better.

And he had all those... I was like, what the hell are those things? Velociraptors? They were going so fast? Yeah, little motocross bikes, you know, they just drove past him. You know, Vegas, and... bikes yeah i know yeah you know cody roads and he's always talking about bikes well Maybe this is just a misremembering something. I swear there's something with an American flag and an eagle and a motorbike and Cody Rhodes' face on.

Seems like the sort of thing they would do. Anyway, that's like the entrances. And, you know, let's be honest, that's the second most important thing to this match apart from the finish. This was all about entrances because, my God, the actual in-ring match. You and I have been quite vocal in our concern. Yes.

of what happens when the bell rings and John Cena has to be the aggressor and do the working over. Hey, I don't like him when he's a baby. Because Cena's match layout... when he was a babyface is the heel works him over so he doesn't have to do what he just has to sell which he's not great at no he just goes to sleep but he just has to sell and do his weird punches and his weird bumps and then he can make the babyface come

The one time that we have had to see John Cena on offense for the majority of the match was the first match with The Rock, and he was really quite bad at it there. So now you've got to watch him do that. But because this is a new heel Cena character, there's part of it that I quite like. This idea of doing your moveset, the shoulder tackles, the five knuckle shuffle, doing the six moves of doom.

but really slowly and disdainfully. I quite liked, and I think there's something that's quite fun about it, and I got a bit of a pop out of it. I totally agree. I'm really glad you said this. I mean, maybe it's because me and you have been expecting a pretty naff in-ring match, and everyone else might have got one. Thanks very much, guys. Cody and John, you hit it out of the park.

But I think everybody else might have got carried away with John Cena's heel turn suddenly making him being able to wrestle, which doesn't usually come from a change of character. That's usually something you would have worked on a lot longer. uh and probably at a younger age like he's what 48 yeah late late 40s so i am

I agree. I think he really slowed everything down. I do think there's an argument to be made that he made his floor a feature. Yes. I'm not very good at wrestling. I've got a very... Very limited move set. So I'm just going to milk every single move for what it's worth. And that has been John's.

best bit since turning the heel he'll sit there and he'll milk every single crowd reaction out of every line or out of every little movement he's getting as much out of each of those four teats as he possibly can And I quite liked it. I got a bit of a kick out of it. This idea of the slow shoulder tackles, the double axe handles. Can I just go back to that shoulder tackle? He hit a shoulder tackle. He stands up and he clearly, not even...

Yeah, I was going to say. He was calling spots so visibly. It was vintage Cena all along. He hid his signature moves. He called spots really loudly. He's trying to communicate everything to the back row of the stadium. so he has to shout the next spot as loud so they can also hear it. Yeah. That's what they paid to see. They paid to see a John Cena match and part of a John Cena match is him loudly shouting what they're going to do next. Is being bad at wrestling.

well part of the story is you can't wrestle and he is leaning into you can't wrestle The problem I have with this is twofold. It means that your babyface has to sell bad wrestling. Uh-huh. And that does not make your babyface look particularly good. If this whole meta thing of I am ruining wrestling by having bad matches, your babyface has to sell for bad wrestling and bad matches.

i don't think that works for anyone number two and this is the one that i fear the most this is the rest of the year This is the new John Cena match layout. Every John Cena match we're going to get this year is going to be this match. But here's... I don't mind that. I was quite freakishly enjoying the in-ring work.

I think, yeah, like I said, there's an argument to be made that the performance elements were really, really good. But I enjoyed it more as like this historical what-if odyssey. I didn't feel like I was watching current-day WWE. I felt like I'd... picked up some Mark Miller one shot that was all about, well, what if Superman was born in Russia? Yeah. That's what it felt like. And this is the first time we've seen John Cena.

discount the early part of his career wrestle as a heel and it was i found it fascinating yeah very interesting it was bad but it was historically fascinating but i don't care as long as you have

all the nonsense and soap opera shenanigans at the end. So if the rest of the year is these slow 15-minute John Cena opening first and middle segments of matches... i don't care i'll get quite a kick out of them but you need a big finish to make the rest of it work yeah i would agree with that because i i kind of was i was watching and i was thinking to myself my word this is boring like this is

this is so dull it's so unbelievably unbelievably boring as a wrestling match but it's on purpose like it is it is bad on purpose it is boring on purpose So I kind of, but I was getting a bit of a kick out of it, but I was in the back of my mind thinking like, my word, this is dull. And this is not making me excited to see Randy Orton have to do this magic in St. Louis next month.

in three weeks time so like oh man there's something you know we've got to kind of like prepare ourselves for but also in the back of my mind was but this is just the first act Because then we're going to have all the pyro and ballyhoo and all the run-ins and all the wackiness and all the interference and that will be oh well it's okay that the first third is boring because the second two thirds are really really exciting

This is just warming the crowd up because then we're going to hit a fever pitch when we get into the second half. Look at night one of WrestleMania. A boring first six matches, an amazing final match, and everyone's like, bloody good show that was. It is often about how you leave them, particularly this style of match. So the ending. Yeah. We have all the stuff. There's an STF. Michael Cole called it the STFU. We got a couple of AAs. The old school. I mean, and also...

What an STF as well. It's almost like he's gotten worse at doing them. I'm going to leave even more of a gap for you to be able to get out of. We've got a couple of crossroads. Then there's a ref bump. And Cena exposes the turnbuckle. The referee's been bumped. We get a visual pin. Cody goes into the exposed turnbuckle twice. AA. One. Two. All the kick out. And then.

I just thought they were starring in a WrestleMania advert again. That freaking music. I don't want to ever hear that song again. Oh, it is dreadful. Like, I still quite like the, give me the green light. Yeah. I feel like that is something that can get you excited for WrestleMania. But there's me. me me song is it does not do it for me i actually think this is the biggest heel thing that he's done it's not a rupturing cody's eardrum it's releasing this song

So then Travis Scott comes out. And I really can't get over to you, US viewers or younger viewers. how little i know who this man is i said i never heard this man's name until elimination chamber and it's the only name i ever hear now when i'm talking about wrestling Travis Scott. I really, really wish Hank from Breaking Bad, who was in the audience, could have just had this spot. Because he would have been a much better...

performer. Also, it is an age thing because I jumped out of my seat when I saw Flavor Flav in the crowd. I'm like, oh, that's a rapper that I know because he was a rapper when I was a child. So, yeah, Travis Scott's music hits, and okay, he walks out, he's got his really, not lame because it's a hardcore title, but it is cringey and lame that he's wearing it like this. It makes him look like a fat, which he is, a fat.

And he stands there, and I'm like, oh, okay, it's the Silver Surfer to herald Galactica. Have you seen the new Fantastic Four trailer? Yes. What's up with it? Oh, I thought the Silver Surfer looked a bit... a bit like they've done it they you know mocap that's good They've done it with the cheapest studio that they can find. Yeah. Do it cheaply and quickly. That's the Marvel way. Because I was like, oh, maybe that's just what computer graphics are now.

I know, I re-watched Guardians over the weekend as well. I was like, but all of these look good. Well, yes, because they used to spend money back in the day. Why does the tree man look better than Silver Surfer, who looks more humanoid? Because they spent money and gave it time to get good.

special effects, but now the argument is do it quickly and do it cheaply. I think the thing looks good, though. Yeah, but I think that's mostly, like, prosthetics. Oh, okay. Sorry, slight deviation there. So, this is meant to be the... The announcement of Galactus coming in, the final boss, the Rock. So I'm just waiting for that of the Thunderbolts.

It doesn't happen. See, I wasn't expecting Rock here because I thought looking at last year's WrestleMania, the template is someone comes down, you do a spot. Someone comes down, you do a spot. Someone comes down, you do a spot. And maybe this is just that WrestleMania 40 has set these unrealistic expectations in our mind that that is what the WrestleMania main event is.

But partly of that, I think there's an element of that, but also John Cena is part of a faction with The Rock and Travis Scott. So surely the other members of his faction are going to come down at some point in this match.

And when Travis Scott came down, you can literally go back and watch my live reactions to this. And there's a clip of it we've got posted up on the channel. I say, right, now the match begins. We've gone through this 15 minutes boring nonsense of John Cena slowly working over Cody Rhodes.

on purpose but fascinating on purpose fascinating dull but fascinating and it is on purpose but now here is travis scott here is when the shenanigans happen here is when the calamity begins and we can get into all the fun stuff eight minutes later the match

Yeah. It's literally eight minutes after... Is it that long? Well, so our clip... How long it takes walking down. Our clip that we posted is eight minutes, and that goes from... It's actually less than that. It's probably about sort of like... maybe seven minutes, seven and a half minutes.

Because the clip's only eight minutes long that we posted. And that's from Travis Scott ending to us reacting and giving a little bit of post-match analysis. I think because if you said, oh, and then the match goes eight to ten minutes, I'd be like, oh yeah, okay, that is a final third to this length match. But what happens, yeah, Travis Scott comes down. It takes forever to walk down this ramp. The referee is now fully recovered because he took that bump. He should be stopping this.

But Cody comes back. He hits a crossroads on John Cena. Travis Scott pulls the referee out to stop that count. So it's another visible pin from Cody. Cody now hits the crossroads on Travis Scott, kicks him out the ring. Take that for busting my eardrum. And then Cena goes to use the championship belt. Cody stops him, but hesitates on using it on Cena. Cena kicks him in the dick, hits him with the title belt.

and pins him and that's it i think from travis scott's music hitting there's probably only four minutes yeah it's probably about four or five minutes maybe maybe you're right yeah because there's eight minutes in total and that includes post-match analysis I was stunned when the match ended because I thought we have hit the midpoint of the match and now we're going to go into its final third and hit that next gear and we're going to get the drama and stuff.

I know a lot of people don't like the finish in that it was a low blow and a title belt shot. I actually like that. Yeah. Because that's how the heel turn started. The heel turn started with a low blow and a belt shot. Great. And it's the 17th world title. It's all about the title. Finish it with the title. And he ruined wrestling. So I like that as a finish.

the match had not got to the dramatic crescendo yet it had not reached they had not got the crowd whipped up into that fever pitch where they're you know reacting to all of the near falls stuff they're not reacting to the near falls prior to this because they know they're not the finish of the match the rock hasn't shown But they didn't do it afterwards either. So we just went to a finish. And I don't think anyone thought that was going to be the three.

Yeah, I really recommend everyone to watch the clip of Luke, Dan and Adrian reacting to the finish because, you know, you're like, oh, OK, there's the title shot. One, two, what, three? Like you, you were not prepared for that to be the finish. I wasn't either. I don't think the crowd were. Because the crowd just go.

yeah and then they start to pop because they've seen a title and they've seen this historic title yeah and that's when you start to get uh the the huffing of copium uh running wild through our live chats uh with some people being like no no He's ruined wrestling. It's a bad finish on purpose. It's a bad match on purpose. It's bad timing on purpose because he's ruining wrestling.

And as a meta bit of commentary, it's certainly a choice. It's certainly a choice to put on a purposefully bad WrestleMania main event. But I don't think that's the case completely. No. I think this is just, that's where the match ended. And I think it's laid out poorly for the match to end here.

I think everyone should apologize to Dave Meltzer. But they won't. No one will. No one will apologize to Dave. No one will apologize to Sean, who have been for the last eight months saying The Rock's not going to be at WrestleMania. Yeah, because The Rock obviously wasn't at WrestleMania. And I feel like we had a moment at the end of Chamber. We had John Cena turning heel on Cody's side and with The Rock.

And that is, it's a great moment. It's an all-time heel turn angle because John Cena, in his retirement year, the man we never thought would turn heel, turned heel. The execution, the staging was all really good, but really, it's the moment of Cena turning heel. That's the angle. If you delay that till WrestleMania, the build won't be as interesting because it will just be babyface Cena going up against babyface Cody. I want to win my 17th world title.

But for the story, and I'm pretty confident now having seen it all unfold, Levesque probably thought, oh, no, Cena turns heel at WrestleMania. You know, he keeps trying to beat Cody, keeps trying to beat him, but he can't do it. So he has to cheat to win the 17th world title. And WrestleMania 42 ends with John Cena having turned heel for the first time.

41, sorry, because me and Luke are working on booking WrestleMania 42 right now and WrestleMania 52. I cannot remember the actual card anymore because I've been booking Oberfemi in the main event. But yeah, a 41. And that is a fantastic end to the two nights. Yeah. But we didn't get that because The Rock shows up in mid-February. He swings his dick around. He makes all these changes, which, yeah, did make it really exciting.

For a couple of weeks. But then it was stuck in this, oh, but actually we don't know what we're doing now because these are late change plans. Yeah, and you're not here. And ultimately... We did get that heel-turn moment. It was fantastic. It was an all-timer. But it was a moment. It was at the expense of a longer-term story, which is where Levesque...

And his strengths lie on what his creative vision originally entailed. And you can't, you know, the thing about long-term booking, if it gets suddenly derailed by someone else pulling rank... It's very difficult to swerve it back into a direction that makes... totally like logical and narratively fulfilling sense yeah i i don't think i can comfortably have people try to defend uh to me that this was the plan all along. No.

From Bad Blood onwards, you know, the reports that came out there, there was no creative plan following Bad Blood. He told them at the start of the week. Oh, actually, I can be at the show. So they had to flip around. Hell in a Cell was supposed to main event Bad Blood. They flipped it around so it opened Bad Blood so they could close with the tag match because The Rock was going to be there. There was no creative plan for that.

then it came out it was actually Cena that he wanted to be the one to turn heel and Cena turned oh sorry the Cody to be the one to turn heel and Cody turned down that creative pitch this has not been a long-term plan this has been something they've been doing by the seat of their pants and just doing for moments and doing it for so when you know rock

you know had a go at Meltzer on Instagram being like oh yeah don't believe anything those people report turns out they were right all along and you're just making and if you just decide you're going to be at the show you'd have been there yeah but you decided not to be at the show this is not your priority

And there's the old adage is, and we've used this adage quite a lot in this show, when you are hot, you can do nothing wrong. When you're cold, you can do nothing right. AEW at the moment, cold product.

despite the fact they're doing very good shows yeah it's starting to click a lot it's starting to click a lot more but they had a whole year where they could just do nothing right they were trying a bunch of stuff and none of it was working because they just could not do anything right cold product you can't do it I think we're now starting to see that pendulum shift.

And now the cracks are starting to show people like, actually, hang on. I think it is bad that Bailey wasn't on this show. Actually, no, I think it is bad that you pinned the TNA world champion in three minutes. Actually, no, I think it is bad that The Rock has not been... You do this stuff last year, people aren't noticing those cracks. But I think the cracks are now starting to become a bit more focused. I keep getting your head on my shoulder going.

this will be the year that Triple H's booking goes down the toilet. That's not quite what I said. You said Triple H is past it. He's cooked. No longer cooking. The said was, I leant into the theory that bookers have a shelf. And that this could be Triple H's last year of that shelf life. Because every book has this. Every book has five years. And I think that maybe this is his last year where people are willing to just let him...

They're willing to let it play out. The trust in trips thing that guerrilla position often preach, often correctly so. I think that is where people are going to start losing that fact. And there was all about WrestleMania, you know, like they said, it was a sold out show, not a sold out show because tickets are so expensive and you can charge those prices because there's such a demand for it.

but if you start doing shows that people aren't getting on with that demand won't be there and those ticket prices those high ticket prices are going to be even more focused And you're not going to be doing these 15 straight sellout weeks you used to talk about. Lots of big shows coming up in a condensed period of time as well. So the burnout is a risk.

With Rock last year, Rock and Triple H's approaches to the business are very interesting. Rock is this force of chaos. He comes in. Usually his ideas involve me. let's make me do the thing and everything revolve around me. And Triple H is more like, whoa, let's let this pay off, like, often. Way too late. Yeah, I'm thinking WrestleMania 43. Yeah, this is a good two-year story right here. It's going to be meat in the middle. And just through...

Like, tranquility, both sides just matched together perfectly last year, and everything played off. Rock's impulsive tendencies just so happened to fall in line with what Triple H had been booking for a year plus. mania got the worst ends of both guys where a lot of feuds were built for way too long and the main feud lacked the Rock's presence that he needed to be there because he had impulsively kicked off a direction he couldn't commit to six weeks prior.

I gave them a lot of rope and a lot of road in front of them because I was like, oh yeah, The Rock's not going to be on these shows. But it's WrestleMania is actually where it matters that The Rock shows up. But that just means that we have had this six-week build between Elimination Chamber and WrestleMania where The Rock was not there. Cena was only there for half of it.

And then The Rock wasn't there for any of it whatsoever. And Travis Scott. And Travis Scott wasn't there. He wasn't there the whole time. So this has been actually a really bad build with a really bad payoff.

and it's you know this will be one of those things that you maybe you look back in a year's time because i think i don't think you can jump to these conclusions now you're not going to roll the mat out and jump to conclusions on things but this could be one of those goes down to be like oh actually that's one of the worst Because it's a dreadful match. It is a bad match with a bad finish at the wrong time.

It could be, I was like, man, that's one of the worst WrestleMania main events of all time. Just one other thing. Just another reason why I didn't like it. Because it's not just that The Rock wasn't there. the senior work rate in the ring and Travis Scott being there for no reason oh yeah that's on that actually Last year, you had all these big wrestlers helping get involved in the match. Travis Scott, who's not a wrestler.

played such a pivotal role in this. I just left a really bad taste in my mouth. Can I give you my conspiracy theory on this? This is an accident. Here's my big brain conspiracy theory. Travis Scott was there for the angle elimination chamber, but that was just so you can get the headlines of Travis Scott was there. it got so over online because everyone was like, why is Travis Scott here? It's like, oh no, he is now part of the faction.

I don't think there was ever any plan for Travis Scott to be involved in the main event of WrestleMania 41 until it became a thing online that Travis Scott was there at Elimination Chamber. Wasn't he already training in January and he writes the theme tune and sing the things of the theme tune? I think there could have been.

it just seems so weird that he is part of this that it just feels like that's the rock though it feels like it's such an accident that you are part of this but it's all that's i can see the rock going like hey travis scott he's a big deal well i guess maybe come out yeah i mean you can't say grammy because every woman's a grammy it's the joke of the grammy even the music industry doesn't think the grammy means But maybe I'm jumping to my own conclusions.

It just seems so weird that he's part of this. Why? There are no wrestlers part of this angle. There's a contestant on the Beast Games that says Grammy Award winning artist. I'm like, what the hell? How? And it's because he won like an international. Is it called like the International Grammy? I'm not supposed to. All I know is that the Simpsons won a Grammy and then made fun of the fact that they won.

was Cody looking lame. Not because Travis came out there or because Cena beat him. I think Cena beat him in is the right choice. It is. It's that Cena... goes to hit him with the title belt, Cody gets the title belt off him, the referee's down, and Cody goes, should i use it should i use it on john and john that is doing some fantastic heel work he's like no please no he's properly begging off in this really like just gross way I'm like, you suck.

You suck right now. You're too virtuous. But it's not even a virtuosity that I believe. It's not even the Dionna Perrazzo virtuoso that I can believe in. Because he told this character. back at the Royal Rumble against Kevin Owens, where he went too far to beat up the guy who was going to try and end his career. And for the last, so we've already had that part of Cody's personality move forward.

And I do feel like that's what WWE were doing. You are losing all your friends, Cody. There's no more Sammy. There's no more Seth. There's no more Kevin Owens. So by the time you get to facing Cena at WrestleMania, he has nobody. But whatever happened, they changed massively from that direction. Which means all that work that Cody did to like, oh, actually now I realize I have to be more vicious to protect the title in a more tweener or badass babyface kind of way.

For some reason, they just go over that bit here. Even though Cena has been clearly saying, I'm going to ruin wrestling. I'm going to ruin it for all these fans. I'm going to ruin WWE and the legacy of that belt. And Cody, when it matters, despite telling all of us, I'm going to save you from John Cena. It's like, oh, but should.

It's really, really damaging to Cody's character. But it was set up on TV, and it was set up on this show as well, and the pre-show, the three-hour pre-show that they did. I'm sorry I didn't watch the pre-show. But it was on TV as well. It's like, after everything that you've done, you're still my hero. but Cody was like he was like 20 when Cena he didn't grow up watching Cena I know but the character of Cody Rhodes and probably the real life person of Cody Rhodes as well

loves and respects John Cena and is his hero. So he's conflicted in that moment of like, can I really? Hit my hero. A man that I know deep down is a good guy with this title belt because he doesn't believe that this is the real John Cena. He did that on TV as well. This is not the real John Cena. I don't want to face this John Cena at WrestleMania. And so he's there and he's convicted. I know it makes him look so lame.

And there's clearly a new internet buzzword that I've not been privy to because Adrian said it on last night's reactions. He was like, oh, it's dumb baby-facing. And I was like, I've never heard anyone say that before. And then I listened to Fightful's post-review, and both of them were like, I wrote down in my notes, this is dumb babyface syndrome. So it's clearly like a new internet thing of people talking about. Like a wrestling term, dumb babyface syndrome.

And that's, they said that's what... DBFS. That's what Cody has. He's got DBFS. And it was on full display here. It made him look dumb, but I will give it the little bit of credit that they did set it up on television that he is dumb. What makes a good bet? At Virgin Bet we think it's... A simple bet. A responsible bet.

A last minute winner when you're down to 10 men kind of bet. With generous offers. A bet that puts sport first. Sound like your kind of bet? Then you're ready to get started. Sign up and get £20 in free bets when you bet £10 on sports. Virgin Bet. A good bet. Acast recommends Beth, Ruchera and Anoni here from Everything is Content. We are pop culture devotees and we are Chronically Online. And every week we get together to deep dive into the topical stories that are igniting the discourse.

How is everybody doing? I just think if there's one question to ask right now, it's not that question. Wait, are women not baby girls? Oh, we're default baby girls. Oh, okay. like oh my god ai is going to take over the world but it keeps just making art listen to everything is content wherever you get your podcasts acas is the home of podcasting including such shows as the girls bathroom the magnus archives and the one you're listening to Let's see what you'll think in the...

Chat Gables, we have six pages of thoughts already. So, unsurprisingly, bit of a controversial... And they're not controversial. It's bad. Ben Vlerick writes, by the way, did you know the real reason Dwayne didn't show up has been revealed? It's been reported that apparently it was due to a big time celebrity in the audience who strongly objected. There was no rock.

Because Jesus Christ, their minerals were excellent. Ben Flerick, I did not know where you were going with that. Do you get the joke? I've not seen Breaking Bad. Breaking Bad has Hank. Hank was in the crowd. Hank, you know, he's sort of suffering from panic attacks and PTSD from his job. He's a DA agent. So he gets really into collecting rocks.

And he's got a whole collection in his garage. And his wife, Marie, is like, oh, you having fun with your rocks? Or like whatever. She calls them rocks. And Hank just goes, Jesus Christ, Marie, they're minerals. Ben, that's my favourite thing that's happened. Actually, that's my third favourite thing that's happened all weekend. What are your other two? Do you want to guess? Is it Joe? No. Oh, is Bret Hart rolling his eyes and dribbling? And is it Stone Cold on the 18th? Yes!

poor woman it was so funny though because Steve at the end of his team comes in and you can just see Nick Khan be like seriously no are you okay and Austin goes to get his ATV and Nick Khan's like don't you dag it on that ATV It's a crime scene now. And he sort of walks off like... And they're like, uh-oh, I done messed up. God, audiences don't know how to take bumps anymore. Back in my day.

Brian K002. Hello, guys. Am I the only one tired with Dwayne? The rock character ended in 2002 when he went to Hollywood. Since 2011, it's not the same guy always smiling. Anyways, thoughts on Tiffy Time and Genius of the Sky? WrestleMania 42 will be Tiffy vs. Jade. What I've been saying since our great Rock vs. John Cena series on Patreon.com forward slash WrestleTalk, The Rock stopped playing The Rock.

in that feud. And he became Dwayne Johnson playing the character of The Rock. Yes, and I agree. And that's how it is now. Yeah, it's very frustrating. I think that the bloom has come off the rose somewhat with the rock. Last year, people very much enjoyed the chaos that he brought. Looking at the way that our comments have gone on videos and our live chats and the ultra chats that we've been getting, I think this year people have not enjoyed the chaos that The Rock has brought this year.

And The Rock, I think, was probably resting on the laurels of, well, the fans really enjoyed what I did last year, so we'll just do it again this year. And it's not been the same reaction. No, because he just shows up and is like, everything's cool, guys. I'm great. Oh, yeah. Goosebumps. My mum's friends with this person. Look at my daughter. She's the boss of NXT. I'm blinking.

And Tiffy versus Io Sky next year. Tiffy versus Jade. I don't know if... I don't know. Jade's not really impressed me in the WWE run so far. I think next year it's still going to be... Heb Z writes, what I wanted from the main event is Rock, Heyman and Seth helping Cena and creating a new faction. I think that's faction overdrive. Yeah. But definitely.

Junior West, that main event was nothing more than a calamity. Honestly, if The Rock cannot follow through on very important S-word, then I don't care to see him back. His absence has completely killed the Cena heel turn. The match was also very effing lame. Travis Scott. I feel like Cena's heel turn wasn't killed by it. I feel like Cena should have been... Yeah, but he's got his own commitments to do as well. And they hadn't planned the heel turn to happen then? No.

Kurt Krauser, Cena said he'd ruin wrestling for all of us. Turns out he didn't need to. Travis Scott did, up there with the worst WrestleMania mains of all time. uh gents thank you forever for sharing your love of the squared circle with us heathens online much love kk kiss jam that jam thank you very much um i uh yeah i think it's up there I think Rock but Cena Miz is by far the worst

Main events? Yeah. And Roman Triple H. Triple H, Roman. Yeah. Sid and Taker. Sid and Taker. Sid does s*** himself. Triple H and Orton. Ben Vlaric has a bunch here. Once again, near 50-year-old, never been good in ring, crap actor in wrestling, part-time, can't bump too much to protect Hollywood career, and hasn't worked here in over 20 years. We that surprised it sucked? It's cold. It's cold. It's damn cold, yet true.

It needed to be shorter, needed more better smoke and mirrors. Whoa. It needed, especially needed The Rock, or at least not Trevor Scott. It went over like a fart in a church. If Cody Rhodes couldn't get a good match out of him, geez, I worry for the other matches. Now I get it, and even agree with the decision to make him the champ. It's his last year, and he's finally a heel. But I'm just being honest.

Story-wise, it should be good. Match-wise, eh, maybe it doesn't matter. It's big business anyway. Rapidoo, fellas! Least I got to enjoy you two laughing over how much John Cena sucks. It's always hilarious on WrestleTalk Extra slash Patreon. John, I respect you. Thanks for everything. Wish you the best, but you're still not very good. I ain't mad at you. Never change, silly man.

Maybe I'm also not enjoying this because I didn't get to have any wacky sea nacelles. Well, there was a bit when he started to do the... The head turns to the crown. Leo S. Hello, gents. Do you think there's a potential worry that Cena's will to ruin wrestling could backfire and turn into a Jon Moxley situation where the fans will revolt against the title reign and want it to end as soon as possible?

Thanks as always. To the point I did make earlier, I did have this crushing realisation when I woke up this morning. I was like, oh, this is going to be every match that John Skinner's going to have for the rest of this year. slow, slow, boring scene of wrestling. And that is interesting in the first instance.

Ask me again in November if I still think it's interesting. Yeah, you get that a lot in wrestling where you're like, oh man, this thing's so hot, let's put the title on them. And then the first title defense afterwards, you're like... Oh, there's no gas in this tank, but the tank looks so good from the outside. Kevin, thanks to Luke, Dan and Adrian for being there so I didn't go through this painful main event alone. Also, hi, Ollie.

I was really pissed yesterday at Cody for hesitating, but it made a bit of sense after Cena's promo on SmackDown. He still looked like an idiot, though. That's it. It was set up on TV, does not diminish the fact that it made him look a bit dumb. Have you seen Cena's press conference? Oh, I actually watched it a bit of a live while I was editing the reaction video.

so funny but it is well because alex is the first person to ask a question because alex mccarthy first and he's like alex mccarthy from the daily mail uh and he asked this question john cena goes sounds like a clickbait headline um and i'm not gonna answer that do better

You see, I watched that right after I finished the main event. I thought... you know what actually maybe i will enjoy the scene of heel turn still i enjoyed that bit of it though because and then he gave and it was the same cadence every single time i've been like That's clickbait headline. I just think you should do better. I once did an interview with him where I got him to identify fire threats. That's right! And honestly, that's how his comedy brain works because it's the same cadence.

and he does the same joke over and over again, and he makes it funnier. Look, the promo work, the character work, the entrances are going to be fantastic. The in-ring work is going to be shoddy as all hell. So you've got to make the finishes good. Yeah. I forgot you did that video with him. What was that film called? He's a firefighter and then kids become the firefighters as well. I think it's hot kids. Is it? Is that? Two consecutive WrestleMania night reviews and I've...

Italian Josh. Hi, lads. I don't care what people say. I'm joking. I accidentally wrote it twice yesterday. When John got out of the ring for the third time at the start, I screamed at the TV. John, it's 4.15 a.m. here. Get in the effing ring. Would have loved to join you live, but watched with a friend, big Cena fan. During the pin, I stood up to get a beer and told him, he'll kick out, of course, you want a beer? After the pin, he looked at me and said,

That's it. In Italian, of course. That's it. Overall, amazing show and EO deserves the world lots of love. Do you want me to take over for a bit? I quite enjoyed John's stalling. I love a stalling heel. Badger Sprite here said Cody Cena was the first five minutes of a bog standard match where the heel gets the heat on the baby face wrestled at a glacially slow place for 20 minutes.

Cammy Whammy here said, hmm, I wonder how heel Cena will wrestle. Oh, God, it's so much slower. They're going to announce the greatest wrestling match ever, part two, Cena versus Orson, and it's going to be two. Hannah of the NRB Discord. This was such a disappointing main event because you had the expectations it would be good. After last year, this feels like such a step down. From one of the best WrestleMania main events of all time to one of the worst. That's a huge...

I think there is a part of that in the discussion is, were our expectations set too high because of what happened last year? And is it our fault in a way that we expected another big... you know, shenanigans showdown with lots of run-ins and interference. We weren't, but we weren't saying that. We're just saying The Rock, who is a really fundamental part of this story, be involved. Yeah, I agree. I'm not there being like, where was The Undertaker? Steve Austin's right there.

Well, you know, he had to be interviewed by the police, so he couldn't come down for the main event segment. Lolok Yamaguchi here said, or Yagami rather, uh the travis got bs was so bad literally gave my doc a nightmare he started whimpering then growled after that shiz happened my wife super casual fan even said why is this happening this is stupid thanks

That's worrying that NOM fans are looking at that and going, well, that's a bit rubbish. Yeah. After like the last year where I feel like a lot of people have been going, oh, what is this? The lead singer of my old band got in touch with me recently. He's gotten back into wrestling.

And because he saw that I was doing some stuff, so he wanted to say, oh, you know, what's Luke doing? Go check that out. But his main reason was Rhea Ripley. He's like, she's so cool. I just want to watch, like, when she is on, I want to see what she's doing. he messaged me this morning to be like can't believe that she was robbed like she should have won that match He is a casual fan who is kind of falling back in love with wrestling. Particularly one person. But see how long it will last for.

Kieran here says, I'm happy for Cena. It's poetic that he wins his last world title at WrestleMania 20 years after he won his first one at 21. I think he'll hold on to the belt to his very last match in December. Looking forward to Super Cena 2.0. Very curious to see how this year unfolds. There's a lot of fun things they could do. Yeah. Danny G, much better night two, but bafflingly bad finish. Rock no show. Bless you.

Could have been booked around, but T.S.? But Travis Scott slowly walk into the ring, blatantly interfere. Then Cody not taking the shot makes him look weak. reminded me of bailey versus alexa justice for bailey by the way yeah the infamously bad kendo stick match where bailey got the kendo stick and sort of hesitated yeah um

I feel like our air con's making us sneeze. Is it making you sneeze as well? Well, we both sneezed within a couple of minutes there. Maybe I just felt jealous and I wanted to join in. Cameron here said, Hi both. Just want to say love WrestleTalk. You're half the reason I watch WWE. Sadly, the other half is Cody. And seeing his reign end like that after finishing the story is deflating. It also taints everything Roman did with the belt do.

Damn you, Travis. Yeah, it is disappointing that's the way Cody's title reign ended. But I don't think it will taint the legacy because it's Cena. It's Cena as a heel and he's laughing. Big Ticket said, man, that main event was disappointing to end the show. Hopefully Ric Flair wins Money in the Bank and we can reset this whole thing. It's Kai, says John Cena, graduate of the Randy Orton School of Glacial Graps and Stomp Attacks, class of 2025. Put that on the team.

one of those cool gym ones where it goes over the top of the circle kuzu here said i'm surprisingly not at upset about this show as i thought i'd be it was a mediocre show completely but i'm kind of just neutral i guess i've lost the f's to give Curious where Cody goes from here. He's finally got notably booed after a whole year. I think this is an edge case because it's WrestleMania. It's the travel.

They just wanted to cheer John Cena winning the title. What was odd, actually, Alfred's pointed this out, is that when the show started and Cody came out, I was like, well, of course they're booing Cody. because they want to cheer Cena. And then they were booing Cena in the match. It's like, well, now they're just booing both guys. But they're really into the match still. Yeah.

It's not like where they were boo Roman and Triple H at 32. Actually, they were just cheering Triple H in that one. Kenny here said, John Cena wanted to destroy wrestling and he did destroy the main event and doesn't give us a nice ending of a match.

I think that could be an interesting angle, and I bet it's The Rock's fault for the angle because he was, quote unquote, busy by the way dom as icy champ is great yeah love the dom stuff but biggest pop of the night yeah really uh yeah i again i don't uh agree with this idea that the meta side of it is oh well i'm not giving the fans what you want i'm giving you a bad story

Hey, Luke and Ollie, just to give you some preface for Travis Scott, he is one of the most streamed artists in the world. His debut album is rated higher on music sites than Pinkerton. He's had concerts that have caused earthquakes in Brazil and Italy.

Jam that jam. Well, yes, because once he starts playing that me, me, everyone starts running away from the building and the crowd really starts to shake then. Charlie, I don't think people, I don't think people are talking about this enough that Cena wanted Travis to be hit.

Cody in plain view of the ref, what was his plan? It just makes Cody look even more of an idiot for not letting it happen. Hated this match, just boring with a terrible end. Yeah, that's the other thing, Mike. So Cena turned heel. What did he get in return? Travis Scott? This was my issue with him winning the chamber. He turned here and was like, but you got what you wanted.

Because, like, it made more sense to me if Cena kept failing. He cut that promo in January, where he was like, I haven't won a match in three years, or however long it was. and then he lost the Royal Rumble. So then he loses the Elimination Chamber, and in his desperation moment, has to sell his soul to The Rock to get his WrestleMania main event.

But he already had it. He won the Elimination Chamber clean. He won it by himself. You know, like Seth Rollins stomped the punk. But he won it on his own. So why did he sell his soul? He didn't need to. He had the WrestleMania main event. I don't get it. Well, it's because Rock just showed up once. I guess so. Said in a promo, I want your hole, Cody. I'm like, oh God, we gotta...

Figure out what to do with this. Eric Metzlov. I think one of the most frustrating parts of the main event was how little offense Cody got in. Disaster kick and the Cody cutter almost felt like hope spots that went nowhere. It just feels like a bad way to have Cody losing after a year.

Win or loser. Somehow in the story where Cena sells his soul to The Rock, Travis Scott is around more than the final boss. I really don't want to go on about the end of Triple H's good booking, but surely he has to carry some of the blame for this along with Dwayne. Partly, yeah, but The Rock is his boss. Yeah, but it does kind of stop with Triple H as well.

Hawkman Cometh, I understand the criticisms and not just being contradictory, but shortly after the feed ended, I said to my friends, well, thank God we've reached a point where a WWE show being just fine is noteworthy. That said, the main event should have been bigger. I'd still take this all the time over the Vince era where it was so much worse. Darth Rixi, what the hell was the point of the heel turn? There was no change in Cena's presentation.

I think he explained that. The crowd still cheer him and boo the biggest baby face in the company. And the main event of WrestleMania gets ruined by a celebrity. The turn wasn't worth it. I think also WrestleMania, it's an edge. It's a traveling crowd who want to see John Cena win the 17th world title. Let's see where we're at in three.

Aaron. Hi, folks. In retrospect, the turn should have been done at Mania for Cena and The Rock needs to step away for his legacy's sake. Unfortunately, I think Triple H's hands are tied if The Rock wants to be involved in a feud, even if he has no plans to finish. Camimo03.

to me the finish is bailey versus alexa's kendo stick level stupid babyface booking makes cody look like a total idiot i don't care he didn't use the belt but why turn away and basically invite the kick to the knob be on lane for me Bad weekend for dicks. Yeah. But at least Cena didn't leave his leg there and rub his shin around. T Robertson, 88, says Sina is right.

But thanks for your very generous pledge there. And anonymous for now, last year we had the Avengers build. Cody beat Jimmy, Solo, Roman, and Dwayne. Obviously he had help, but to just have Travis, where's Rob? Travis equals Thanos confirmed. In reality, I think if they just added five more minutes of sequences, it'll be tolerable. That I think is where I'm always going to fall down on this, is that the ending...

felt like it came out of nowhere. And it didn't feel like it was at the crescendo and the high point of the drama of the... It's the right winner and it's the right finish, the dick kick and the belt shot. Wrong point in the... And before we get on with the rest of our play-by-play review... Do we have a Patreon promo to play? We might do.

It's viscera! Do you want more WrestleTalk videos? From $6.50 a month, you can get exclusive series of Monday Night War. You can imagine a sacrifice being made at the top of this WrestleMania stage. and chairs, WrestleTalk Extra, and more. I just don't want anyone to get at it. Uh-oh. Oh, what's the end of that sentence? Get all that by joining us over at Patreon. Yeah, go over to patreon.com forward slash WrestleTalk because this Friday, Luke and I are going to be predicting WrestleMania 52.

ludicrously too far in advance. I know everyone's ages now. I'm going to have a cutoff point at 50. I'm not going to book anyone, which means my roster is thin as applicable people. Right, so this night, too, began with Stephanie McMahon opening the show, saying that we're all part of her family. The host of Steph's Places and the other podcast that she... Yeah. Yeah. But the opening match was excellent. Io Sky versus Rhea Ripley versus Bianca Belair. Io didn't really get a big entrance.

And she came out first as the defending champion. I hate champs coming out first. That's my weird bugbear in wrestling. I do not like the champ coming out first. But then I was like, probably means she's losing, right? Because, you know, even though the storyline has been... They keep ignoring Io. I thought, well, they're just doing it and Bianca's going to win the setup. Bianca versus Rhea for WrestleMania 42.

But no, Io ended up retaining at the end of a really, really good 16-minute non-stop match. Yeah, this match was excellent. This match was so, so great. The right winner, the surprising pin E, I would say. Because she pinned Bianca Belair to retain the title, which ends Bianca Belair's WrestleMania streak.

And, you know, Dan Layton was saying on the live reaction last night, I was like, you know, well, the Undertaker streak was next, and I don't think we need to be forcing this one. I was like, well, you had something, though. Like, you could have really built up this idea that she's never been pinned or submitted to WrestleMania 2.

give someone the oh man you finally broke the streak and you pinned Bianca Belair but I was surprised they just ended it and just like you know just got the almost like as if it was an albatross it was like we need to get rid of this this stipulation before it starts to hurt us later down the line But the match itself was so, so great. Yeah, it was just non-stop.

three person sequences and it kind of like because the the the close of night one was so good also a trip They had like double the length of time. And they probably had the same amount of moves. But then they also had all the drama and the soap opera spots and Paul Heyman crying around.

This was just move, move, move, move, move. Yeah, it was really, really exciting. A great way to start a pay-per-view. Yeah. Because it's almost like what you used to do back in the day. Pop on a cruiserweight match, get the crowd really into it. Crowd are chanting, this is awesome. Yeah, I mean, my favorite sequence, apart from the end, was Rhea getting her boots up on the EO moonsault. And EO, like, hitting that and going straight into a KOD.

Bianca makes the pin and Rhea just gets across in time to break up the count. It was so beautifully timed throughout and everyone came out of it looking great. The story of this match leading up to it was that this is a match between Rhea and Bianca, and Io is annoyingly there, and she's the world champion, and they're not taking her seriously.

So I was saying, like, EO has to win because otherwise the story is right and that EO shouldn't be here. They should have just been Rhea and Bianca. So I'm glad that EO won because I think that is the right decision. It does a lot for... So I thought the ending itself was great. And yeah, everyone came out of this looking better than when they went in. Yeah, Ripley did a Alabama slam. Off the top rope, but not into the ring, onto the ring post.

Oh, awesome. Yeah, so good. And then Rhea gets a KOD hit on her by Bianca, and that's when Io hits the moonsault, pinning Bianca Belair. I agree. I think I would have gone for pinning Rhea. Because not only do you protect Bianca's unpinned streak at wrestling, which, you know, doesn't sound as good as undefeated. But you also have this thing that Io always has Rhea's number. Yes. And I feel like Rhea could just be the next contender for Bianca's...

as EO's title afterwards. Yeah, and they probably will run that back. They've had two terrific matches on Raw leading up to this. So I can see them doing this again. Like, you know, these three, maybe even Bianca goes back off to SmackDown now to get with the Jade and Naomi stuff, even if they're going to continue on with Naomi over there. And we can just go to Rhea and Io and sort of like, you know, she's always got your number. Yeah, I've never beaten.

uh when we head towards backlash and beyond i i i love rio sorry rio eo She's one of my favorite wrestlers in the company. And I really didn't believe she was winning this match. I was so happily surprised. One of my favourite spots in wrestling at the moment is when Io does a move and then she just points to herself and be like, that was me! I did that!

Flavor Flav's in the crowd. Yes, he was. Yeah, boy. And then the set, I wrote every single person shown in the crowd on the first night and I saw Flavor Flav. Because the next one was a UFC fighter with a long name. He's already off screen. I can't write that name down. And then some guy called Rich the Kid. Okay. Unless there's any Stars of Breaking Bad, I'm not going to take any notice. Stars of Breaking Bad or Charlie Brooker. I'm not noting anyone down.

I thought one of the great strengths of Night 2 compared to Night 1 was the match order. And I said after the Gunther Jeyuso opener on night one, that to go into that War Raiders New Day match was just a bit... it brought the crowd down yeah it's pedestrian and i feel like making that a weapons match or a hardcore stipulation would have helped And that's exactly what they did here. Damian Priest drew McIntyre in a Sin City street fight.

We had steel steps. Whoa, whoa, whoa. You're going to skip the best thing of this match. Let me finish. We had steel steps. We had tables. And yes, we had in the entrances a giant rock thing.

because it was sponsored by doom the dark ages so he came out dressed like he had doom guy inspired gear which by the way it looked like he hated you know when the war raiders came out looking like absolute dweebs because they were promoting clash of clans like drew comes out with this like doom and spy gear and he was like desperate to get these things off his arm he was like i hate wearing this corporate nonsense get it off of me i do i do feel like this was quite a

Sponsor heavy show. And a WWE. I know. WrestleMania. I just really noticed it this time. Yeah? This time? I... Like in the women's match in the opener, and they spent so long on the Minute Maid people above the entrance ramp, and then the drumstick thing after the entrances had happened. And I went on their web WWE's website and I found an article when they announced the partnership.

with the drumstick company. And in that article on WWE's own website, it was like, and don't worry, the drumstick will have a presence at WrestleMania. Just in case you were concerned, it will be a part. And then the rock's not there, but the freaking drumstick gets a spot. Again, I feel like you're going to skip over the biggest bit of this. Yes, you can now say what. I think Kerry King of Slayers showed up and it was awesome and it panned back and I was like,

There had been a report that Slayer were going to do something. In the end, it was not all of Slayer. They did not do a full set or anything, which is, I think, a disappointment. But Kerry King came out to play Damien Priest's entrance.

and never has there been more of a this is a triple h wrestlemania than kerry king was there to play like they had machine heads on night one like that's part of and now you got uh kerry king out here doing an entrance theme this triple h is such a little metalhead

And this is just him being like, oh, I've got Kerry King on WrestleMania. And Kerry was awesome. What would you prefer if you could make the choice? The rest of Slayer playing Damian Priest out or The Rock showing up in the main event? Oh, I mean, it's tough. You know, what are they playing? If they're playing South of Heaven, you know, which would be sort of very in keeping with... They're playing a CFO Money original.

then, I mean, they'll make it pretty good, I suppose. But I think I will pick The Rock in this instance. This match really enjoyed. Good back and forth action. I think it only went 10 minutes. Most matches only went 10 minutes. Yeah, you're saving time for the main event. Yeah, but when TV matches routinely go 15-20, it does feel... a bit nothing for the biggest show of the year. But how are we going to know about Minute Maid? You got me there!

I thought in the end, Drew won pretty easily and clean. Yeah, he did. This felt like it was all Drew and then Drew won. Because all my notes are like, oh, that's cool from Drew. Oh, he's taking a selfie with Damien Priest. Oh, he just knocked him through some tables. Oh, and he's won. Yeah. I thought, did Damien get any offensive? He did do some moves. He got a razor's edge through a table in the ring. Yeah. That was one of the only things I've known.

Yes. But it was, I thought the story they might tell of this match is that it's once again, Drew's arrogance cost him. Like it's Drew not taking this seriously enough and that's what, he's his own worst enemy. But in the end, he just won. Yeah. I do feel like this is building Drew for a big thing.

Because Priest isn't a nobody. It feels like he's definitely slipped down the card. He's a former World Heavyweight Champion just six, seven months ago. I think it's Drew and Cena at some point. Maybe it's even that SummerSlam match is Drew and Cena. Then we got the four-way of Bron Breaker, Finn Balor, Penta and Dominic Mysterio. Again, something totally different. You've got four guys in there now. Bron is just hitting the craziest move.

one after the other. Yeah, this felt like a real showcase for Bronn. It was just like, now he's got three people he can hit moves on. Yeah, and like, I thought Penton might get more of a showing. But it's just... What do you want Bron to hit you with? He was like, Penta ended up being the fourth most interesting thing in this match, and certainly the fourth most focused on thing in this match.

Yeah, I'm surprised. I'm not against it, but I thought Penta... you know obviously Dom won but I thought Penta might just be about to win. It's good for the AAA ownership. The big drama was the combustion of the judges. Oh, really? Judgment Day? Judgment Day drama? First off, Finn Balor and Dom were working together, and then there's this great moment where Finn is draped on the ropes, facing the hard cam, and Dom looks...

And the whole crowd had already decided, Dom's our guy. Yeah, this crowd wanted to see Dom win. And they went ballistic when he went for Finn. Finn blocked the 619, but then the rest of the match was... sort of based around them. Bron Spears Carlito threw a table outside. And then it was, you know, you said how Belair took the pin. That was quite shocking in the opener. Bron taking the pin here.

Oh my god, I've done it again. I've done it again. I did this in the... Did it in the edited review. And I said, don't do that again in the podcast. Yeah, he pinned Balor. Pinned Balor again. I'm surprised it was Breaker as well.

I'll tell you what doesn't make sense is this is the exact same finish that was the women's match and it was two matches earlier yeah no no no there's four guys in this one there were three women there was those reports that came out recently from alvarez they were like oh yeah they don't have production meetings in aew that's why some things end up being a bit of a mess and i was like oh how do you know that's why oh match finishes the same

Mate, this is the exact same finish as a match that came just two prior. And it's not even just a little bit alike. It's the exact same finish. It's not with different moves. It's the exact same finish. EO was the only one on the top rope. So Dom was the only one on the top rope. Finn hit the coup de grace. He was off the top rope. So yeah, Dom...

Dom was going to hit the splash on Bron, but then Finn hit the coup de grace on Bron instead. He pushed Dom off. Huge boos from the crowd because they were fully behind Dom. but then Dom hit the splash on Finn, you say? Well, it was both of them, because Finn hit the coup de grace and had, in the same way that Bianca Belair hit the KOD and had the pin on Rhea, and then Io hit a move on them to break the pin.

Finn hit the coup de grace and was pinning Bron. Dom broke it up with a frog splash and pinned the person who was the instigator of the original move. The first one Bianco and this one Finn. Pretty big oversight. But yeah, Dom won the title. The crowd explode. Finn's just there looking angrily at him. Dom starts to make his way up the ramp. And then runs back down in this wonderful moment of glee. And past Finn as well. He was like, what are you doing? Poses again. Crowd are still going.

This was a lot of fun. Really fun match and really fun outcome. The journey of Dominic Mysterio has been so wonderful to watch over the last few years. You know, he was just this... literal baby-faced child with terrible gear that everyone was like, I think it's Dominic Mysterio.

well he's cracked up to be then he kicked his dad in the nuts and went on this heel turn that became like it you would go to shows to boo dominic mysterio so he couldn't do the promo was so much fun the partnership you had with Rhea Ripley got actually not only him over I think got Rhea Ripley over as well because people got into them as a duo

And then you had the live stuff as well that people have enjoyed and still enjoyed to a degree, maybe to a lesser extent than the real one, but they are still very much into it. but he's gone over as a baby face now be like it was We cheated because we hated him. Then it became fun to boo him. Now it's fun to cheer him because he's got a gross mullet and a dirty mustache and he eats chicken tenders and makes Logan Paul look stupid on his podcast. And he's really... He seems like a nice guy.

And I think it's been a wonderful journey to watch play out in real time. I watched a video clip of... different WWE wrestlers, maybe on the Hall of Fame being arsed. Who would they least want their child to go out with from the roster? And they all said Dominic Mysterio. Well, you've seen the state of his hair. Yeah, it was lovely. And looking forward to seeing what happens now. Dominic Mysterio with this incredibly stacked roster of stars.

is the Intercontinental Champion. You say what's going to happen next. It's Judgment Day. Oh, yeah. On Raw tonight, they'll have a scene in the den. Yep. Three back-to-back PLEs with Finn versus Dom. Then Dean Norris from Breaking Bad was in the crowd. Best bit of the show. But then Randy Orden comes out that there's a video package of his mania legacy. This is his 20th mania, which means what did we see in the video package?

The Cube from WrestleMania 29? No, 27. Yeah, 27's The Cube. And yeah, it was like he now has no opponent for his 20th Mania because KO's injured. And Auden comes down. The crowd is singing his song. Everyone's in such a good mood. This is like the everything has just been building really well throughout the night.

And he cuts a promo saying, I've got an open challenge. Who's it going to be? And I'm now like, is it going to be Rusev? Yeah. Is it going to be... Nick Aldis. Nick Aldis. Who's the fella from New Japan? Hiroshi Tanahashi? No. Oh, Jeff Cobb. Jeff Cobb. I said at the start of the stream, and I think I said it on yesterday's podcast as well, I was like, Aldous makes the most sense, Rusev is the most fun choice.

When the live chat, like when we started the live stream, everyone was like, I think it'll be Joe Hendrix. And I kind of, I didn't dismiss it. I did dismiss it, but my reason was, it's like, I think that people are really overstating what this WWE TNA partnership is. which is just a feeder system for NXT. It is not a like-for-like partnership. Case in point, the Worlds Collide thing has already been downgraded from what it was yesterday.

Because it was like, oh, we're doing a cross show. It's WWE and it's AAA. No, it's a AAA and NXT show in the afternoon before Money in the Bank. So it's like it is not an equal partnership. It's a real outside choice, but I don't think it'll be Joe. And then lo and bloody behold, Joe Hendry walks out onto the stage.

it was so crazy awesome his tron his giant face yeah on those enormous screens everyone's singing along he walks down and i was like wow what a surprise this is mad he's going to get beaten so far Yeah, when the match started, I was like, this will be an RKO and we're done.

I didn't think three minutes faster when I wrote that. I thought maybe five, six minutes. But yeah, RKO attempt right at the start, blocked. They look at each other. Joe gets a bit of offense. Randy hits his usual sequence of moves. Joe reverses something into a full away slam. He does his turnaround look. And that's when Randy brilliant.

Yeah. One, two, three for the win. A great RKO from out of nowhere. This is one of those, and I think you might have said this in your answer, review as well this is one of those matches where it's like there are two very right opinions on this i feel one of which is That was so much fun. It was so awesome to see Joe Hendry. The crowd was so into it. I feel so happy for Joe as well. You want to talk about a guy who has made it himself.

He has, he bet on himself and he has made his own successes in this professional wrestling world. Every single thing has not been a creative thing. It has been Joe that has made this happen. Joe got himself into WrestleMania position. At the same time, he's the TNA world champion and was jumped out in three minutes and it makes TNA look so bush league and only TNA could agree to this as a creative pick.

Only TNA could have any other wrestling promotion would have said like, he's our world champion. And TNA would be like, no, we will do that. Thank you very much. You want to beat him quicker? Because we can do that. Do you want to beat one of our other champions? We've got some more. He's not paid by the hour. One move, just beat him right away.

Yeah, and reportedly, Ariel Schnurner, who was the head of creative, who got released last month, had turned down the creative that Joe Hendry would lose a match to The Miz in WWE. Because he's the world champion. Yeah, it makes TNA look absolutely... Like they've got no self-respect. He looks so desperate to you.

And I love you for it. Like, of course you will. You're TNA. But don't expect me to ever treat you seriously. One of my favorite TNA stories is when Ric Flair was under contract and WWE wanted to put him in the Hall of Fame. And TNA had but one request, which is, can you introduce him as TNA star Ric Flair? And WWE said, no. And TNA went, oh, okay. You can still have him.

So they weren't done there, though. Randy, you know, put him over afterwards, pointing to him and then hit him with another RKO. But then really, you know, this was still great. Randy did Joe's turnaround pose with his arms up in the round. So much fun. So there were ways to do... I feel like you didn't have to do the second one, the second RKO. You could just put him over. But I think this was a wrestling observer pitch. Have like a tag. This is me. Austin Theory and Grayson Waller came.

We're going to fight you, Randy Orton. Randy Orton said, well, you know, it's only fair that I get an open challenge partner. And that's when Joe Hendry comes out. And Joe and Randy work together to be. Theory and Waller in three minutes. Yeah. And then Randy gives him an RKO at the end. Because he's Randy Orton. Yeah. And he's a viper. And TNA don't look crap. TNA probably looked at that and was like, can you pin our guy? Give him the rub. Come on.

I guarantee you Triple H was saying that to the team. He was like, actually, we'll get a massive rub by being in the ring with Randy Orton. Absolutely shocking. If he takes two RKs, he'll be more over on impact. It's double rub. So this, honestly, as much as I criticise it and it is... Objectively bad for TNA.

Really fun to watch. Loved it. At this point, WrestleMania has just been peaking, peaking, peaking. And then Logan Paul came out. Someone who does generally elicit strong emotions and reactions. you know you see him in matches and you go wow that is really good i hate myself for cheering you on

But all my interests sort of evaporated. I said bloom off the rose earlier when I was talking about The Rock and people's interest in The Rock. I think it's already happened with Logan Paul. I was talking to a wrestler a little while back about Logan Paul. we were just you know having a conversation about sort of wrestling and stuff and i was like you know what he does like in the ring is incredible because he is a youtuber and he's what he he's taking it to like a duck to war

And the wrestler said to me, he doesn't do wrestling, he does spots. He's not a wrestler, he just does spots. He does spots very well, but he doesn't do wrestling. And since then I was like, oh yeah, what he does is impressive, but that doesn't mean that he puts on great wrestling matches. He just does spots within wrestling matches and a wrestler does the other stuff around it.

I think that's unfair. I think he's got a good sense of timing and sort of work in the crowd as well. But I don't think he can tell a story in a match. And, you know, they didn't tell a story in this match. I don't think you could look at any Logan Paul match and be like, oh, the story of this match was...

But you would say like, hey, he did a buckshot Larry that's pretty good. Or, you know, he did a frog splash that's really... He did a lion's soul in this match that was like three quarters away across the ring. Like, what he does athletically is very impressive, but he doesn't tell a story. And I think where the bloom has come off is that this is now like three, four years into this Logan Paul rut.

And you can't just rely on, oh, but I'm a YouTuber and I can do a really nice frog splash. So I can just get by on doing that. By this point, you need to be doing something else. if you're going to keep coming back to do these spots. You can't just do the celebrity match every single year because it's diminishing return. But he had the drone. He did do something else. He had Laserbeak.

Yeah, so he had this drone. I thought it was, this was the most amazing move of the night for me. He picked up the drone, it flew around, it filmed him as he did, I think a frog splash, and then it landed back. And he did that in his entrance as well. I do disagree. I think Logan Paul can work. can wrestle. I think he's got really good crowd control. You know, all the stuff you say, oh yeah, that's psychology. Moves, crowd reactions, facials, timing. I do think he has an innate sense.

The feud. It's not an interesting story. And AJ is at a weird point in his career where if he has the right opponent and story, it's career best stuff. Look at the programmer Cody last year. But if it's anything less than that... It's also kind of just moves. This was so incredibly nothing. It was both long and short. It was both loads of stuff and nothing at all.

It was not very good. It was very good. I don't think it was. All the moves were very well executed. But there was nothing in between. It was just... a series of spots and then it ended and it ended with logan paul winning which suggests that we're going to do more of this Yeah, the finish was Karrion Kross coming down. Well, first it was one of Logan's minions. He tried to hand Logan the brass knucks. The bitch's lobber or something. I don't know what his mates were called.

Oh my God, that was 18 minutes. Yeah, you see what I mean? It was both long and it was... Holy hell. That's what I mean. And nothing happened in it. They did loads of stuff, but nothing actually happened. That's the third longest match of the weekend. No, fourth longest. That's obscene. I thought it was going to be another 10 minutes. Not that it...

Not that it flew by, just that nothing happened. Oh, wow. But yeah, so the, what do you call him? The jizz gobber? The jizz lobber. I thought I assumed. But Karrion Kross stopped him. And he tried to give the brass knucks to AJ. Use the brass knucks, AJ, on Logan. And Logan was like, isn't this the spot for the main event? Isn't Cody going to also wrestle over his morality? Twats cross on the face and gets in the ring and Logan hits a pulverizer to win.

Yeah. I don't care to see more of it. WWE then announced that Unreal Doc will be coming to your Netflix screens this summer on The Writer's Room. Yeah. So, Triple H did two sit-down interviews on the pre-show with Pete Rosenberg. where he was talking very openly about the creative process of, and it goes back to that Netflix debut where he did that narration piece where it was like, I am literally writing the script of this wrestling show because none of this is actually real.

And it is more of that. And Triple H, when he was criticising dirt sheets in the press this week, and what you know it's like i hate that they report on things that are going to happen And the person who was interviewing was like, yeah, but you openly talk about the creative process. And he was like, yeah, but I do it after it's happened. So I'm not spoiling anything for you.

I don't mind very much opening the doors and letting you see how the sausage is made. I just don't want you in there watching the sausage get made or finding out that I'm making a sausage in the first. So, yeah, the sausage inside the factory, inside the sausage factory happens in summer. Oh, you can now. Paddy McGuinness is doing it. Are you telling me? I can't do a sort of, where's he from? Like a northern accent? He's from Bolton.

Our final match we're going to talk about because the main event we've already covered was Liv and Raquel versus Lyra and a mystery tag team partner because Bayley was taken out in kayfabe. The previous day? It was a card subject to change WrestleMania, wasn't it? Three different matches had a card subject to change on it. Yeah. What was the third one? Ray.

oh yeah i forgot this match was happening and i was uh you know i was like oh well you know styles pull whatever we can get on to the main event now and then this happened i was like Ah, yeah, Becky's coming back, isn't she? Which is weird. That should be a big deal. But Becky Lynch comes back. She's the surprise one, a tag team partner of Lyra, who is now literally a bird. Yeah, she's a bird lady. She had these bird arms and...

And in her hair, there were all these feathers. Those feathers were not attached very nicely because they were going all over. Every move that she did was shedding along the way. she grew up watching Home Alone 2 and she's like that's going to be my idol I'm going to base my entire wrestling character around her But yeah, Becky came out. They cut to a person in the crowd who was crying. It obviously meant a lot to some people, but it didn't mean anything to me.

So why? Because I thought it was a cool moment. It's Becky's first time back in just under a year. She'd said on Wednesday, I'm retired from wrestling now and I think I'll be doing it much more. And this was a WrestleMania moment in that Becky returned. She does mean a lot to a lot of people. It means a lot to Lyra as well. She seemed like genuine. You could tell it was Becky before it came out because Lyra was already crying. I thought it was a nice moment. I feel bad for Bailey.

but I am also willing to give it the opportunity that this is part of a larger piece that it is going to lead to some stuff down the line. But even with that said, we literally just did that story with Jade Cargill and Naomi and Bianca Belair over the women's tag team titles as well. So it kind of feels a little bit control C, control V. That said, I'm willing to give it some. I said that yesterday. I was like, well, Bailey can, you know, Bailey's run out and let's see how it plays out.

Maybe down the line, Bayley will turn on Becky or Becky will turn on Bayley for Becky taking this spot at WrestleMania from her. But then when I watched it play out in practice, I was like, I don't know. Maybe it's the placement on the card. Maybe it's just because I had a far better, for me, like genuine surprise reveal with Joe Hendry. Because you can go two routes, can't you? You can have like the...

the genuine surprise reveal where you're like, whoa, Joe Hendry, I didn't think it was going to be him. Or you can have the one where everyone knows what's going to happen. And they're just waiting for it. So Cody Rhodes at WrestleMania 38. CM Punk when he made his AEW debut. This was neither. It was just Becky Lynch. She comes out like, oh, yeah, I guess it was going to be Becky Lynch.

yeah um the storyline is absolutely wank like there's nothing there this was thrown together anyway three weeks out with the sort of bailey Lyra tag team act and then they're going to go for the tag belt and then Bailey just gets. taken out in kayfabe and now backing his enemy. But apparently this is a long-term plan. Yeah. Why did you...

If you had that much time, why did you book it to be so we- well and becky had said in interviews that she was only going to come back if it was a really good creative pitch that she could almost sink her teeth into which makes me think that there is something of substance to come from this

But the actual build to get here has been exceptionally poor. Yeah. Because if you were going to do this storyline, you should have established the relationship between Lyra and Bailey much earlier on, as opposed to doing it...

three weeks out from WrestleMania, then they're winning a gauntlet match like the night before WrestleMania to get into this spot, and then they just take her out of it. It's the same with the New Day and War Raiders. If your plan was for New Day to win the tag titles from the War Raiders... Set that up way further in advance, or give New Day some wins on the way, build them up as a credible tag team.

But you opted not to do that in the same way you opted not to put some actual effort into the story of this because... really that doesn't matter what matters is becky lynch came back and that's a wrestlemania moment and that's what wrestlemania is there for it's to create moments and we got a moment

Yeah, because Lyra's the IC champion. Doesn't matter. In the background, Bayley was having that feud with Roxanne Perez. Doesn't matter. Never built into anything. I just thought this was, this was, yeah. Cool moment. Becky's back. Excited to see what Becky does. But really, I think this is really symptomatic of all the stuff we've been complaining about for, well, the years under Triple H, which is...

most of the time, he doesn't care about the rest of the women's division. It's remarkable that we even get top women's programs. with actual stories and characters. And I even joked earlier that we've literally just done the women's tag team champions are involved in a storyline where someone gets attacked backstage and we have a backstage attack reveal.

They've also, they did it with Becky Lynch when she was tagging with Lita and Trish Stratus attacked Lita to replace her as the women's tag team champion. They literally have like, they have one story for the women's tag titles and they've now done it three times. Yeah, and I can look over in the live chat there and people saying it's Becky Hogan and all this stuff. I don't buy into any of that. I think there is a feeling, maybe that's what I'm feeling as well.

I'm just not as into Becky as I used to be. I don't think I'm as into Becky as I used to be, but I'm not into this Becky Hogan thing of that she's walking around backstage demanding that she gets put into these sort of title pictures and win titles and things like that and the other. What I find funny about that is that this came up this morning when I was doing a bit of research.

um becky gets accused of this so you know being becky hogan uh bianca gets as well when she was like super bianca and getting the johnson oh she's always just winning she's always in title matches at wrestle sick of her, why she always in time matches, why Becky was in time. rhea ripley has had six wrestlemanias and all of them have been title matches she does not get those complaints from people online oh she was she was for a bit um before oh yeah okay yeah people were getting a bit like

But people like her. I think it doesn't matter if people are into the character. So we'll see where it goes. This was a bog standard WWE tag match. Was it? A WWE tag team match for tag titles? Sub nine minutes. Lyra gets worked over. Becky gets the hot tag. Becky gets the win with a man handle slam. This would have been a much better match as a main event of Raw. But what a moment. Which we've said about so many different... things on this Wrestlemania weekend got the moment

And then, yeah, the last thing we'll talk about is the segment that came after that, but before the main event. Stone Cold Steve Austin rides down on his Doom buggy to announce the official made-up attendance of...

63,226. He was... flying down to the ring on that atv isn't it weird as well how they had a sellout show yesterday of 61 000 and yet somehow had a sold out show of 63 000 tonight it's amazing it's weird how that happens i think they i think you count the drum the the cone zone The cone zone is 2,000 strong. And then they have the goal, which, you know, they've done many, many years to be like, so combined, that is a WrestleMania total of...

121,000. Oh yeah, because it is 60,000 people individually on both nights, isn't it? I think they're cowards. I think they should clearly make the overall number greater than the sum of both nights. Only by 40. Yeah. Like an insignificant, but just a screw with Meltzer. So, yeah, what Steve Austin did is he went round the ring and he went round the corner.

And then he went straight into the barricade. Because he was like... and it's not a it's a long ramp but it's not a wide ramp and it was about the width of that atv and he just bombed it down there and we were like on the live stream like bloody hell he is not slowing down at all and he didn't slow down around the corners couple of stabilizers

i've lost control and then he looked around and then bam he crashed into the barricade and knocked some poor woman down yeah this woman took a bump apparently she was for like, I don't know how long, but a while after. And yeah, WWE president Nick Khan sprinted over there to try and smooth things over. And you could see him as well. When Steve gets out of the ring, Nick Khan is talking to the person.

of who he's just crashed into. It's brilliant. She'll be the new green t-shirt guy. She'll be in front row of every show for the rest of the year. You're just going to get a lifetime ticket. That's my WrestleMania moment. That and Bret Hart's eye roll. So overall, I thought this was... They really were the WrestleMania iconic moments of the year. I actually ended up giving... 70% compared to yesterday's 75%. Which I don't know if it's fair now I've sat on it for about nine hours or so.

because this was a better show overall with the matches. But I loved last night's main event so much. Shows how much value I put on how a show or even a match finishes. But yeah, that was my review. It's kind of the same with AEW Revolution. An incredible show that had such a duff main event. Duffman.

sort of retrospectively were like, oh, actually, the whole show was bad. But actually, the whole show was tremendous, but it had a really bad main event. And I think the same thing here. This was a really, really good night of WrestleMania, but the Logan Paul match... and the Becky reveal, which I think is probably split opinions, and this Duff main event has really made people be like, night two wasn't very good idea.

I think this is not one of the worst WrestleManias in history. It's not one of the best WrestleManias in history. It's just one of the WrestleManias in history. But weirdly, if you combine... most of night two with the main event of night one, you do have one of the best manias in history. And if you combine the main event of night two with the rest of night one, you have one of the worst. Yeah, it's weird, isn't it?

There's not much in between on this show. Someone said in our chat yesterday, it was like, do you think because all these WrestleMania night one and night two have been so uneven, and I was like, have you seen the amount of money that they're making doing two nights? We're going to get two nights out of everything eventually. It's not for me. You know, I'll watch it. I'll enjoy it. But really, I don't like the two. And I still don't buy into the idea that there are two main events.

They will do it until it stops making them a lot of money. And then once it stops making them a lot of money, you know, AEW just sold out. Well, not sold out, but they did incredible numbers at Wembley Stadium that first year. They did not the second year, so they did not go back for a third. You can keep doing these things in a while. It makes you money. Well, the poll is now live in the chat, so please... Cast your votes and we'll get an overall number by the end of the show.

Miguel says, I actually feel so bad for both Cena and Cody. They did a good work together and I was enjoying this match. It was being fun while slow, but man, it's crazy how WWE fumbled this epic historical moment. The Rock, I hope Cena, heel run kick. I think it was F The Rock. Ah, yes. I hope the Senior Hill run kicks in.

Wrote Senpai, what was the point of Travis? Even he barely even showed up during this feud. He almost caused the DQ, which would have been Vince Russo booking bad, and Cena winning without a finisher felt just bad. So, so bad from everyone involved. Not enough planning. Again, I don't mind the finish because that's how the heel turn started. Jaded writes, please discuss why Cena is wrong. He has a point.

So I think that that comes in from that ultra chat we had in earlier, which is that Cena is right. Cena's point is that wrestling fans are fickle and you actually don't know what you want. And now here in the main event of WrestleMania, you're booing this guy who's supposedly saving wrestling from me. I literally told you I'm going to ruin wrestling and yet you cheered me winning the title at WrestleMania.

you do not know what you want. Yeah, that part's right. And I really hope he says that in his promo. Is he on Raw After Mania? He's on Raw Tonight, yeah. Yeah, because he said that in the press conference. What I think we were disagreeing with was this idea that did the finish was bad on purpose as a meta commentary yeah

In regards to the Bailey getting written out as injured, my current headcanon is that Paul and Seth planned it to allow for Becky to come back slash return. And it's leading to a Seth, Paul, Becky and TBD faction. Thanks for the work this weekend, guys. A Seth Rollins, Paul Heyman and Becky Lynch faction. The first Paul Heyman girl. The Heyman. Okay, well now you're selling me on it.

Rafael Garcia. So with Becky back as a tag champ, what do you think the tag name is? Is it obvious like the man and her bird lady? Man, bird, bird, man. Irish last bird kickers. Or half is. Will the gap in Cena's SDF get any bigger? Who is Byron Saxton? Find out on Dragon Ball Z. I'm not sure if the gap can get any bigger. JDC from night one. But since the story with Seth and Roman is so personal and Seth has said he wants the world title back.

Will he go after Jay and take it too far, especially since Jay wanted Heyman out of the bloodline, set up Roman versus Seth to elevate world title? And it does need some elevation. I think Seth will definitely be going after Jay. 100%. That feels right.

Real Double J. I missed the main event due to my daughter surprising me with ghost tickets. Love you, Munchkin. So apologies for being late to the discourse of the tribal chief being beaten again by the visionary. It was a good run of 169 days, but Ollie finally paid loot. That's the same length as Jinder Mabal's run as the WWE Champion. I'll always recognize you as my paper chief, Oli. P-T-C.

OPC? I just wish I didn't buy this Honkometer off eBay from Santino to commit to the bit, but all hail the bathroom visionary that is Luca. Very good stuff there. Bruce Willis! Cody eventually gets fed up and decides to join Seth and Heyman, aligning with their goal going against those part-timers and celebrities and saying they aren't welcome there. Thus they form a new faction called Knights.

That doesn't sound like a heel thing to do to be like, we're going to be the pro wrestlers going up against celebrities. I don't think Cody Everton's here. I said this yesterday as well, when there were a lot of these pictures of like, oh, actually the main event's going to have Seth and Heyman and they're going to form like a brand new corporation, a new authority with The Rock and Cena and Travis Scott.

And I was like, I think they're just separate. I don't think Seth's getting a faction. I think he is just being managed by Paul Heyman. Can I hot tag to you? Of course you can. Username404 said, quick math here, Dynasty had less than eight minutes more of actual wrestling than both Mania Nights together. Wow. Say what you want about the Moxley match, at least it has a third act. Whole event peaked in between the Seth and Dom matches. Hendry was a great surprise.

Victoria here said accepted that last year's night two main event was not for me with all the silly run-ins, but this was just miserable. No excuses. Sorry. Women absolutely tore it down at the start of the show. Io being undefeated to Bianca and Ripley is a great start to build on.

Christopher Hines here said, This weekend is giving me three perfect examples of why I love triple threats when done well. I also think Seth should beat Jay for the title on Raw for the rematch at Backlash. Shout out to Karrion Kross as well for his shoot promo. Strap the rocket to him. Oh, I haven't seen the shoot promo from Cross. I haven't seen the Cross promo at all.

I was Adrian. I said, when do you think Jay should lose the title? I was like, oh, tonight on the Rafter Mania set to just beam for the world title. We had the WrestleMania moment. What more do we want? Lengthy Jay run.

Wild Darnell said, I'm 21, and the late 2000s, early 2010s is my nostalgia. So this builds off what we were talking about on the stream yesterday. We were talking about how my nostalgia is very different to what... adult nostalgia is now if you were 10 years old when you got into wrestling and you're now 20 your first year is 2015 like whoa Yeah. I thought you were going to say 2010 for some reason. It's after Yeslemania. That's not even your childhood nostalgia.

It's not even really John Cena because it's a US title run. It's babyface Roman Reigns. Yeah. Maybe he's your childhood hero. League of Champions. League of Nations. League of Nations. Yeah. I think this is stemming from the conversation we're having here. punk's video package took me back in the best way and made me tear up seen as wrestling took me back in the worst way might as well end this heel turn with him running over santa can i get a yes please now that's how you make a baby face

Winception here said, Night 2 summed up, starting with arguably the best WrestleMania opener of all time with the quality of the show steadily declining until arguably the most disappointing WrestleMania main event of all time. Yeah, the MyGM drama curve was all over the place.

Jabroni here said random thought but do you think the War Raiders versus New Day match was only put on the card to fit in the Clash of Clans sponsorship because Eric and Ivar looked like the character I think that's a really good observation you've nailed it I think that's exactly right

Otherwise, it'll be the TLC match. Yeah, but none of them look like Clash of Pan characters. But that doesn't fit in with the sponsor, the branded integration. Yeah. Hey, I'd do it. It's better paying that much money. Mr. Pooh Man! I think this is the year that WWE will push their luck hosting two-night WrestleMania main events, two-night pay-per-views. Also, I wish it was a Cornetto sponsorship instead of the drumstick with Edgar Wright involved. Slim that, Jim.

You could have a really good Edgar Wright-directed whip-pan commercial. Yeah, let's see what the two nights do because we've got two-night Royal Rumble next year in Saudi Arabia. It's all the bad ideas combined. Is it a two-night rumble next year? I believe so. Let me double check. There's two-night SummerSlam this year. And I think they have talked about doing two-night rumbles in the future. I think we'll probably end up looking down the barrel of two-night money in the banks.

We will have, I said this earlier, we will have two nights WrestleManias until they struggle to sell both days. Then they will probably look to move back to night one. I must have nightmare dreamed it up. One night. It's still one night. There have been reports that they do want to do two night Royal Rumbles. Because business is up. Lord Knight Jagon here said, afternoon, you guys. Welp, I think that menu was pretty much meh overall. Not really any blown away matches. Some good ones, sure.

I'm happy for Dom, EO, Tiffany, and Jacob. I wish Gunther just crushed Jay, but whatever. Yeet, I guess. And this is part two of my Ultra Chat. but as for the other matches i just don't really care for uh for it personally and my god last night main event oh my god last night's main event could have been on a b-level ple in my opinion because it just felt bland a blessed day guys jam that jam Welcome to Rome, he said. Seriously, I know that every WrestleMania can't be 40, but OMG, this was so...

So poor. I frankly think people are making the positive to amazing remarks just in pure cope mode. This was pure rubbish. Fantasy booking? Keep Cody off until after SummerSlam and have him become the MAGA heel.

Yeah, I don't think Cody's turning heel. I also don't see many people... making positive to amazing remarks about this it is there we were getting it last night in the live chat and in the ultra chat so being like no no you're all being worked by scene this is actually genius but for how like can we end the poll now and just that's just realistically see because those are the loud voices it is it's currently a mid at the moment uh it's mid with uh 30 on thumbs up but mid is at 52 currently

Texas Goose here said, Cross just dropped his own pipe bomb promo on the WrestleMania recap. Work shoot on the state of the celebrity appearances and viral moments and being left off the card. Really worth a watch. Also makes me think that The Rock is politicking, not showing up until after blowing things up a chamber, only to turn around and be able to say, see, you need me to be involved, you need my creative ideas, after the criticism he has had about blowing things up.

But yeah, well, if you're The Rock, you'd be like, well, I left you the book. I left you like the greatest heel turn in the history of mankind. And you completely bothered. That I told you about the night before. You needed me here to guide your ship. Hiko here said, so Vegas doesn't get to host WrestleMania anymore, right? Two Manias, two awful finishes.

Oh, because of the old Hogan one. Yeah. Vegas is cursed for WrestleMania. Brother Voodoo hears it. Well, at least it wasn't that, though. At least The Rock didn't come down and just pin Kobe after he retained. Brother Voodoo here said, I found both nights really stilted with long, awkward pauses that I found really distracting. And not just the adverts that couldn't be broadcast outside of the US. Production felt really badly organized.

I thought the production was spot on and seamless as always. It's just the way they've decided to produce. Mick Earleth said, I felt this whole mania was bookended by bad stuff. Jay Gunther was tepid and made Gunther look weak rather than making Jay look strong. I didn't like the women's tag and Cena wrote. Everything in between was quite entertaining in my opinion. Love you guys. I love you too.

Silly Dunn says, feels like proper expectation management for a lot of this year's Mania. New Day turn is centered on Big E. The match gets a spot on Mania. E not involved at all. The Rock is central to Cena's heel turn. Doesn't follow her through at all. setups with no payoff. Now, we've established it's on you, Cilidan, because it wasn't about Big E, it was about Clash of Clans. It wasn't about The Rock, it was about the drumsticks.

Thesaurus here said, the real reason the back half felt naff, they couldn't possibly match the emotional high of Joe Hendry. Yeah, it did peak. It was hard to follow that. Kenny Killer said, and with Dom, it was winning as well. You had Dom winning and then go straight into the Joe Hendry thing. That was the peak of the crowd. Kenny Killer, me again. As a group, we loved five to seven matches of Night 2 in the Only Stinkers with a Logan match in the main event.

By the way, AJ refused to cheat against Logan to win and literally two matches later, Cody did the exact same thing. Love you guys, you brought me back to wrestling. Oh, we're so sorry, Kenny. The Mr. Pooh Man said, Daddy Dom is getting a world title before Finn. Finn's already had one. He was universal champion. What is that? Is there like a conflict over who?

who Mr. Pooh Man is. Let's get a pretty double check. So we've got Mr. Pooh Man and now this is the Mr. Pooh Man. It is actually because the other one was Mr. Pooh Man. This is the Mr. Pooh Man. So later, the 100% truthful Mr. Pooh Man.

Agility writes, it can't just be me who thought the commentary was terrible and has been for a while. Like Luke, I can't stand Pat. Cole botches something once a match. The only one I feel like was doing a good job was Wade. Still enjoyed the show and loved your reactions. commentary yeah he's really good uh yeah i've soured on pat the last month yeah um yeah when he just kept on ragging on on scotland was it what did he do no it was on canada canada he ragged on and yeah he's just

I think he is now, he doesn't provide anything for commentary. He just shouts very loudly. And it's not adding anything to Mac. The point of commentary is to add to Mac. And Pat's not adding to matches. Simon, hot take. What if Roman Reigns becomes the savior of WWE by turning face and defeating Cena and by extension, The Rock? He beats Cena at SummerSlam or Survivor Series, and Rock faces Roman at next year's WrestleMania, and the WWE becomes his new try.

We're going to do a predicting WrestleMania 42, not a million miles away from what I might have pictured. Matt DeStasio. I'm worried that Jay is about three or four years too late to his big break. His in-ring production just feels like it's missing something. Maybe he needs a new comeback with some more electric offense. What should he add? Huge hugs and kisses. Tickle, tickle, Matt. I don't think he needs to add moves to it. Jay's about the entrance. That is his move. I, you know, no offence.

I think he's a really good upper mid guarder. I think he's a very good tag team wrestler. And he just isn't complete enough. to be a main eventer. But maybe it'll surprise me with the World Heavy. I think what we can take some solace in is that if this was under the Vince McMahon regime, the Yeet would have been his finish.

he would have like powered up and gone yeet and like bonked you on the head or something that's not a bad idea no like a power bomb yeet like give him a razor's edge no it would have been and then warming up by everyone going yeet yeet Michael here said, imagine it's Stone Cold and The Rock in a blood feud in the Astrodome and we get three minutes of Busta Rhymes entrance in the main event of WrestleMania X7.

this is all part of the plan it's bad on purpose still means it's bad tv and cena is a limited old man Sorry, I hot tagged back from you. That's all right. Big ticket. I'm getting sick of the commentary trying to put Logan Paul over as talented, but the crowd is jealous of his success. It's clear that the boos are just go away heat and the match has no clippable moments. Hope that Logan gets sick of wrestling and leaves.

Not while I got this prime sponsorship. Yeah, I think... Yeah, he's just getting go-away heat now. Did Kotai say the Rock was just angry that Meltzer found out, lol? I was trying to sign up for Rev Pro on demand yesterday and it wasn't bloody working. I actually ended up watching the Progress show from a couple of days before I watched that. And I watched Sabu's last match.

from Spring Break and crikey it was as disastrous and messy of a match as you would hope it would be it was everything I wanted from a Sabu final match I was saying on the live reactions last night was that Cena's not my guy, so I don't feel any emotional attachment to Cena having his last WrestleMania. But Sabu came out for his final match, and I was like, oh, Sabu. I'm getting to watch Sabu's final wrestling.

and it was disastrous, and it was wonderful. Vanell, Dumb Babyface Syndrome, reminds me of Lawful Dumb Paladin. what's that is that a star wars no it's a dnd thing Thesaurus again. Every fan is an armchair booker these days. Whatever happened to cheering when the person you like wins and jeering when they loses? Oh, it was all so much better in my day. Back in my day when no one complained about anything and everyone just enjoyed things.

Stop having thoughts about the show that I make. I'm afraid to break it to you, Thesaurus. That never existed. And people would boo the people you like. Paul Kendra, your Cena win 17th title reaction video notification ruined my WrestleMania main event, and I want to be acknowledged on behalf of other fans that this may happen to. I will comment until I can talk to someone as a huge fan of all things WrestleTalk.

And then if you acknowledge my complaint with your Cena wins notification banner ruined my WrestleMania vein, I will subscribe to your Patreon at the $10 tier. for as long as I'm able to financially maintain your commitment. Your move, WrestleTalk. Paul Kendrick's got us up against a wall here, Luke. He's given us money to tell us that he's going to give us more money. Yeah.

oh yeah sorry sorry i ruined it for you yeah i'm very sorry but we have this same rule on all this stuff it's a it's a live sporting event uh we can't remain spoiler free in uh things the day after especially when WWE post them yeah because if you're subscribed to us and not WWE YouTube's still going to show you WWE's videos that spoil the results. Yeah. Just turn off notifications if you're trying to avoid things. Shaggy Dudley tips, but leaves no message. Thank you very much.

Saint Rocket Industries writes, Dwayne was too busy with his crappy football league or his crappy movies or his crappy deodorant or his crappy tequila to be in the angle he started. No one's managed to ruin his legacy quite like Dwayne. I feel like other people have massively ruined their own legacies better. But I think The Rock could still turn it around.

all it's going to take is for rock to show up and do another big moment and then we were like genius he's he's back again Rapalis, in hindsight, maybe Io versus Bianca versus Rhea should have main evented both nights. Also, if I ever hear the Travis Scott song one more time, I'm going to go off the space and whatever is planned.

Danny G, I'm pretty sure Lyra's gear was a homage to the Birds of War from It's Always Sunny. I thought the exact same thing, Danny. The very credible sources inside my head have told me she wanted to come out to the ring singing her own theme, but Paul vetoed. The problem is that it's a joke about how bad this wrestling faction is. And she looks like... Kazumi, the cone zone saved the whole PLE for me. Justice for the cone zone.

Gemini, can we all agree to put a ban on giant head cutouts in the crowd? Always some clowns in the hard shot ruining good images or victories. It's every WrestleMania now. Yeah, Dan was having a go at these yesterday as well. on night one actually he hates the cut out heads but it's well what he's really saying is he's jealous that no one's done

Well, also, I think it's just I hate wrestling fans having fun. Matt29. Hi, guys. I asked last night about what you guys think about the front row of the crowds not looking excited. And why go if you don't care? Love to get Ollie's opinion. Well, I'd have to. I hate people on their phones. even not a wrestling show. I'm like, I'm having a conversation with you. Anna, we're watching the first episode of Severance. You said you wanted to watch this for months.

Why are you on your phone half an hour into this episode? Is it not second screening? Why can't we sit? That's a hypothetical example. Didn't happen last night. Good show, though. Not that I've watched it. That's, again, a hypothetical. Yeah, I... I don't think it's on the crowd to look excited. If they're just looking at their own phone, I think that's on them.

you know that the show has to get them involved i didn't notice anyone looking bored though yeah i i haven't never really noticed the reactions of the front row um obviously you see some of the same faces there It was in the crowd and stuff. But I've never noticed them looking like bored or uninterested in the radio. But if they are, then it does pose the question, why have you paid thousands of thousands of dollars to his guarantee? Although, GreenShareGuy got his own entrance.

at WrestleMania yesterday. Oh, good for him. So there was a few people who are part of that front row crew that are there for every single show. They came out with Wade Barrett. And so Wade Barrett, because he does this thing where he goes like, boom, with his entrance and he punches the camera. but he sort of like backs up and he backed into one of the lads behind him as he was like throwing a punch.

And Steve Austin was like, God damn, kid, that's a good idea. And I crashed my ATV into that woman down there. Michael Kamali. The main event was Missing the Rock. That's it. It's primarily his fault for simply dodging out. Outside of that, the work was solid and the outcome was correct. I like the event overall. It's just a shame Rocky needed to insert himself to not be.

Spider Boy Ellie, my biggest takeaway from Mania is the same takeaway I've had the last two years. Some things were great. Some things were there, but the future of wrestling is very broad. Also, do you think Stone Cold will tell the judge he did it for The Rock? And finally for now, six thick thistle sticks, right? Becky and Lyra tag team name pitch, Irish wristwatch.

We've actually got a couple of others as well. Michael is back again to say, look, honestly, the main event going over poorly is The Rock's fault. He couldn't be there. He shouldn't be in the story. The outcome is correct. And I think this mania is being overhated. I enjoyed it all.

And Ethan's says currently near the beginning. WrestleMania night two was good besides the main event. I prefer the ref bump happened later in the match and seen a win from hitting with the title and the STF leading Cody to pass out. Hyena is a good Travis song. Scott. Jam that jam from Texas. Is that what the theme was? Hyena.

i don't know or maybe it's another good song yeah it is well let's see what the overall poll is thank you very much for joining us all here today on a mere two hour uh review 52% in the middle, 29% thumbs up. Yeah, not the runaway success that last year's Mania was for sure. No, and considering like how much people are into that main, the opening. of this show with the EO match and the Joe Hendry appearance, this and the other. It's amazing to see that main event.

It is how you're leaving folks. It's really dragged down people's opinion of this whole show. Well, please do subscribe. We'll be back tomorrow with our Raw After Mania review. Maybe it'll all get good. Maybe The Rock will show up and it'll retcon everything and we'll love him again. Could you imagine if The Rock shows up tonight? And patreon.com forward slash WrestleTalk. You can go there right now and watch loads more exclusive videos and podcasts.

But for now, I've been Oli Davis. Well done, Luco, in DAD for two consecutive nights of streaming. You can go home and see your family now. I'm looking forward to seeing them as well. Jam that jam. What makes a good bet? At Virgin Bet we think it's... A simple bet. A responsible bet. A last-minute winner when you're down to 10 men, can I bet?

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Elmo tweeted, Elmo is just checking in. How is everybody doing? I just think if there's one question to ask right now, it's not that question. Wait, are women not baby girls? Oh, we're default baby girls. Oh, okay. I think. being like oh my god AI is going to take over the world but it keeps just making art listen to everything is content wherever you get your podcasts podcasting including such shows as the girls bathroom the magnus archives and the one you're listening to right