GOALS AND ACCOMPLISMENTS – LOOKING AT SMACKDOWN 11/29/11
By Revin Samuel on 11/30/2011 9:42 AM
SMACKDOWN – 29/11/11
What the goals for this week’s show should be?
•Maybe we can start hyping TLC? Hopefully they don’t feel the need to wait till Raw
•WWE needs to resist the temptation to have Mark Henry squash Daniel Bryan. I have no doubt Bryan will lose and should lose, but let’s hope they can avoid burying him completely
•The continual push of the undercard. Smackdown the last couple weeks has been great at character development with Fox, Dibiase, AJ and Hunico; this is a chance in front of a potentially larger audience to keep that going
•Move along stories with Cody-Booker and Randy-Wade hopefully leading to matches at TLC
Show Breakdown
1. Why is WWE doing a Santa Clause thing with Christmas Music on November 29th? This isn’t a retail store
2. Ah the weight jokes, Vince McMahon at his best
3. I like that Foley for Raw GM sign in the crowd
4. Mick Foley says Daniel Bryan’s name and it gets a tepid to no reaction. Quality booking by WWE creative created that one! Good thing Bryan can win the crowd over with his work
5. Another promise by WWE goes unfulfilled as Michael Cole arrives
6. This opening segment is WWE at their worst showcasing that they are a variety show and not understanding the core audience at all. I assume Vince thinks kids love this and when they grow up they’ll have a loyalty to the product, but no, they’ll just outgrow it, move on to something else and feel stupid for ever watching the program
7. The fact that there is not a third chair by the commentator’s table tells me Booker probably isn’t doing commentary. I guess it’s too much for WWE to pay attention to the minor detail of putting the chair on set so they don’t foreshadow too much
8. WWE giving Cody and Booker away already? Hopefully this is just an angle. Good to see Booker at least showing some apprehension about the match
9. Ah the divas, just another cog in the machine
10. Give a kiss to any superstar of their choice? WWE really is lost sometimes. I suspect they’ll forget about this storyline
11. In my goals I mentioned that WWE should give time on this show to the lower tier characters they have been trying to build in the last couple weeks like Dibiase, Hunico, AJ and Alicia Fox. Well Fox and AJ just showed they are a part of the cog and now we get to see Gabriel vs Mahal in the battle of the guy who lost last week against the guy who loses every week.
12. This is not a match I would have chosen to showcase on a Live Smackdown. I’d have probably given that nonsense Divas segment more time than this
13. This show so far seems to be more about the creative team than about the talent.
14. Two positives of this Gabriel-Mahal segment is the forwarding of the Dibiase-Mahal program and Gabriel getting a win
15. This is the material they gave Foley, Piper, and Dusty for a backstage segment. It looks like Vince McMahon brought his Creative Touch to Smackdown this week. On another note just two weeks ago you debuted Bateman and Maxine on Smackdown and on this week’s Smackdown we show Maxine in a backstage segment and show other Smackdown lower card talent, but Bateman is nowhere to be found. Perhaps WWE could pay attention to detail and have Bateman be by Maxine’s side to further solidify that pairing. Of course this company doesn’t take themselves seriously enough to pay attention to those details
16. There’s been alot of time wasted to Creative variety hour nonsense when they could be promoting a pay per view. This company is so out to lunch sometimes. I just don’t know why it’s so hard to deliver a consistent product
17. I do like the in show advertising for WWE 12. That’s good synergy!
18. Finally a solid segment with the Cody backstage attack on Booker
19. Kofi Kingston-Tyson Kidd? No offense to the talent involved, but so far match wise this has been a Superstars line up that being said Kofi needs to get a win so hopefully he gets it here
20. This Smackdown seems like it’s meant for five year old with that Kofi Kingston-Tyson Kidd finish. I guess WWE was extra paranoid about starting at 8:00pm and decided to make this show specifically for Vince McMa, I mean children
21. WWE looks to be turning Sheamus into John Cena two with the bad comedy, just pure trash. I think I’ll be sending in a complaint that will go unheard after this garbage. I guess one positive is they gave Kaitlyn a line to play up her developing heel turn
22. Just like I might be the only person who likes Ted Dibiase’s music, I think I also might be the only one who likes David Otunga.
23. I will have to give the WWE production crew props, because as much as the theme for this show shouldn’t be happening right now, they do seem to have tons of decorations out and the pole wrapped like a candy cane was a clever touch
24. Naturally nobody on commentator mentions the one time alliance between Barrett and Otunga
25. This has been a fun little match with Otunga and Orton if only because the crowd seems to really be into Randy and seeing him hit the RKO
26. If this was WWE ten years ago Orton would have won the match and then gone to the back to find Barrett, but in current predictable WWE, you win, you stare, you pose, next segment
27. Mark Henry mentions TLC? My god, not that it means anything at this point. Another minor detail, but Mark tells Teddy to get out of there, but let’s the camera man stay? How about telling him to take a hike as well
28. Why doesn’t the WWE have talent appear on the show to promote their DVD’s instead of just giving us generic commercials? Amy Smart or Ethan Embry, two known actors aren’t around to promote The Reunion, Bret and Shawn weren’t on TV to promote their rivalries disk and no sign of Austin to promote this one either. This company just forgets how to do what they did best. There’s too many people involved and the main man is spread way too thin and this episode of Smackdown is showcasing that more than ever
29. The last two weeks we’ve seen Ezekiel Jackson vignettes and now he just shows up in a random battle royal? Hunico needs Primo and Epico; otherwise he’s going to be a Drew McIntyre jobber before we know it. WWE doesn’t stand by guys with his look. You know it’s bad when Hunico is the #2 guy in the battle royal after Sheamus
30. I see Yoshi Tatsu in this battle royal. Why am I not surprised that this company is too stupid to send Yoshi to Japan with the Raw team.
31. That abuse Vince McMahon says happened to him as a kid really comes through in Michael Cole’s commentary as the fat jokes on Mick Foley continue
32. I’d say someone other than Sheamus should win this battle royal, but Sheamus doesn’t belong in here with these scrubs so he should win this one. WWE giving us two battle royals on one show? No this show wasn’t written on the fly
33. I’m actually fast forwarding parts of this battle royal because I don’t have the patience to deal with guys WWE doesn’t care about like Heath Slater, Jinder Mahal and Tyler Reks. If they don’t care, why should I?
34. The end of this Battle Royal is taking far too long. I should have drank before watching this show
35. They are doing their best to turn Sheamus into John Cena two and he’s getting booed for it a little by this crowd. Sheamus should be a bad ass, but this writing team only knows one way, comedy. This character Sheamus is playing is so forced and it’s not going to turn out well for him if WWE isn’t careful. Sheamus should have brogue kicked Hornswoggle and done the bad ass babyface routine, but I guess WWE doesn’t comprehend what that is in 2011
36. Did the commentators ever say Cody-Booker wasn’t happening?
37. This show seems a tad too dedicated to burying Daniel Bryan. They keep saying Mark Henry isn’t 100% and they are really pounding it into our heads. Perhaps it’s because they don’t believe anyone takes Bryan seriously, but if he gets beat it will only make him look stupider
38. The AJ-Bryan kiss was too soon, I would have like to have seen this relationship grow and blossom a little, but as per usual with WWE storytelling things are rushed
39. I will give them some credit as the build to the Bryan-Henry match has been pretty strong
40. Pretty solid match with Henry and Bryan and I don’t think Bryan was hurt by this loss at all.
What this week’s Smackdown accomplished?
The Good
• Just like Raw, the Champion stood tall at the end, which is always a good thing
The Bad
•Lack of TLC hype. Why couldn’t they promote their pay per view? Why do I care more than they do? This show was all about WWE Creative and writing stupid skits backstage and in the ring. If this was closer to the holiday season, I might have given them a mulligan, but they choose to come up with this stupid theme on November 29th when they could have brought out a different theme such as Old School. They had Foley, Dusty, Piper and Goldust all there as it was, that would have been a much better choice than the crap they force feed us tonight.
•Lower Tier card development comes to end.
•Divas cash in a kiss? I say they are just a cog in the machine and that segment was just a cog in the machine, but this concept is just stupid. I wonder how much lower that division can go
•Rhodes-Booker, Wade-Orton. These two programs were slightly moved along, but I’m not sure I cared for the way either was developed. Rhodes beats up Booker backstage, Booker seemed hurt, but it didn’t look like he couldn’t compete. Shouldn’t they have had him come to the ring and then have Cody obliterate him? I guess that’s too violent for the holiday show. I didn’t catch it, but did the announcers even say that match wasn’t happening? Orton and Barrett – Barrett attacks Orton in his match, Orton goes on to win and doesn’t care, it’s just stare and pose time
•Backstage comedy was putrid and wretched
•The use of Sheamus. I guess this company has learned nothing from John Cena. Turning Sheamus into a comedy babyface main event player doesn’t work to its full potential.
•Why was this a holiday show? WWE treated this show like it was a show nobody would be watching, yet the holiday weekend was over and they did a hell of a job on Raw promoting this only to deliver child’s play
What needs to be accomplished on next week’s Smackdown?
• TLC Hype. Part of me feels like I just have to pretend this show never happened and so for next week’s show we’d be going off what happened last week
• Re-establish Daniel Bryan
•Back to developing the lower tier
•Orton and Sheamus need to get a little ticked off
