Instant Feedback: Super Dud

It appears brand extension has ended with a whimper rather than a bang, or at least it's been put on hold. Funny, but it makes almost total sense for it to end this way, because it seems some old habits are hard to break. Tonight's show seemed like a placeholder in every sense of the word, but instead of those places being held being current, they felt like they were out of a RAW from last year rather than this year. I understand that it's not really feasible to expect them to launch it out of the park every week, but tonight more than any other show between Money in the Bank and now felt like regression.

For one the sense of dread that I had when CM Punk and Kevin Nash were officially announced to have a match at Night of Champions actually materialized. I thought I'd be alright with it, but really, Kevin Nash wrestling in 2011 is just a losing proposition anymore. So you'd think I'd be alright with them switching out to Punk/Triple H, right? Well, only slightly. From a match quality standpoint, it works, but I don't know. I'm starting to get flashbacks to late 2010 with them rushing the story again. Punk/Trips feels like something that could be stretched out a bit, but then again, I get the feeling that after Night of Champions, the two are going to be aligned. Call me crazy...

Also, no Alberto del Rio on the show? C'mon now. I want to know how you're going to have a supershow and not have the WWE Champion. I don't know. I really don't know about most of this show. IT was just so confusingly and befuddlingly boring and uneventful. Like, how am I going to comment on something that felt so warmed over? Then again, at least the wrestling was good. It's a big saving grace, and I'm glad that they are really focusing on providing a decent in-ring product. That being said, if you make me feel like I'm wasting my time out of the ring, then it's just so draining as a fan. Ugh.

Instant Feedback: Skinny Fat Asses

Well, that was interesting. For the first time in over a month, RAW, especially the ending, felt flat. The first hour was good, and the wrestling was pretty awesome, well, at least the two headline matches. The tag match, despite having R-Truth, who's passable as a worker and John Morrison who's average on his best night, was really good. Shows how good both Miz and especially Rey Mysterio are. I want to see a prolonged feud between those two guys. It'll produce some really keen matches, and it'll definitely help Miz develop as a prime worker. Alberto del Rio and Evan Bourne also had a really fun, albeit predictably finished, match, baaaaaht chu already knew that.

The out of ring stuff dominated, and it went from good to lame over the course of two-plus hours. There were sparks in the first segment, as Trips and Punk definitely have a decent rapport in promos, despite the fact that Trips had the non-sequitur flub of all flubs. "Skinny fat-ass?" That's this year's SummerFest. The only difference is that you expect that from a douche like Piven. From Triple H? Wait, don't answer that... Anyway, I wasn't a fan of Trips going all "NBD" later on when asked about Punk talking shit about his wife. Funny Hunter treads a fine line for me, but when he goes from mocking to no-selling, I think that's where the line exists. It was a big reason why Shawn Michaels really didn't resonate with me in character all the time, because unless it was against Trips or Ric Flair or Undertaker, he was all "NBD". I mean, selling isn't just something you do in the wrestling ring. If this is the tone Trips is going to take all the time, then his goodwill with me in character is going to run out, like halfway through the next telecast of Smackdown.

And don't even get me started on that final segment. For as much as I defended last week's segment (and I still will, at least as a standalone), they really dropped the ball on it this week. They have two weeks until SummerSlam, and their build into a big unification match is dueling theme music and title raising? No thanks. That was beyond lame. I swear, if they end up with Punk fulfilling every pessimistic smark prophecy and ending up as just another WWE wrestler, I will start kicking people in the nuts. They have two weeks to salvage this. Granted, it was one bad week in the last two months, so I'm not going to totally kill them, but we've been down this road before.

I will say this though; I really enjoyed seeing Beth Phoenix killify the Bella Twins and then Kelly Kelly. I also liked Miz all night long, not just in the ring. Just the main angle felt so flat after that first segment. There've been better weeks.