Out of all the holiday themed shows over the years, I wouldn’t say this one was the best, but with a few exceptions. Smackdown’s role over the last few years has been to extend feuds in the long run. Even short term feuds like the main event tonight.
The first show of the night was a Divas Costume battle royal. One good thing I will say about Divas in costumes after the change into PG is that WWE nixed overemphasized sexy costumes. Not that there was anything wrong with some, just they were doing it to death. Seeing something like Paige dressed as & mocking Summer Rae was a breath of fresh air.
The battle royal itself was forgettable. Nikki Bella winning makes sense since she can focus on another goal while Brie Bella continues to serve the remaining days of forced labor under her sister. It’s weird that it’s only 30 days as opposed to indefinitely since Brie will just beat up Nikki when her time is up. Only time will tell. Seeing Brie dressed as her husband for Halloween, I thought it was her own choice actually, but no, I guess that’s part of the extortion. This storyline is plain stupid and hopefully AJ Lee can add flavor to it.
I thought the part of the show with The Authority ganging up on Dolph Ziggler was a good show of progress. I get a feeling John Cena will say something about this on Monday. Forcing Ziggler to fight Seth Rollins after Kane beat him was some pretty good material. I wish Cena would appear on Smackdown more, specially since the roster is low on faces as it is.
Ryback seems to be getting a renewed push. I’m curious to where he’ll go from here. He could have been a champion but I think they booked him for the WWE Title too early and that hurt his career. Heath Slater’s costume was hilarious & fitting for his character.
The Miz TV segment didn’t really add much to the feud with Big Show & Mark Henry. Henry didn’t give much detail on why he turned on Show. I really don’t want another Giant vs. Giant conceptual feud with these two.
Gold & Stardust seem to be moving on from The Usos. While I admit I don’t particularly care for Los Matadores the gimmick, Primo & Epic as wrestlers are a great tag team and I know they can pull off at least thinking they’ll be the next Tag Team Champions.
Rusev vs. The Great Khali was a surprise for me. Seeing Rusev delivering the Camel Clutch on the big man looked incredible. A US Title shot is is a good idea for Rusev. We need a good patriotic feud with that belt and the unstoppable Russian vs. Sheamus would be a good program.
Dean Ambrose vs. Cesaro was a great main event. The Halloween theme was clever and I liked the finish with the pumpkin. I look forward to Bray Wyatt talking more about Ambrose. They are very much two sides of the same coin. It will be interesting how well Wyatt does on his own.
