Much like the WrestleMania version of this, the attempt is to review every match before the bell rings on the next match (based entirely on what’s airing on my stream). As with then, I reserve the right to tap out and to come back in the future to update some of these with additional thoughts.


Every stadium suffers from an aging bald man haunting its halls. Wearing a suit straining to fit his bloated body, this man wheels his carcass out to greet the lively hoards, leeching off the energy and the vitality they bring him. The process of it keeps him alive, but only in the most technical sense. For him, life comes down only to motion, physicality unaided by the soul or spirit behind any other human. Beware the Triple H’s that haunt your stadiums, the ones leeching off seas of humanity if only to extend their own grotesque existence.

Funnily enough, it’s The Miz that’s the official host of WWE SummerSlam 2024. He doesn’t get an entrance, but Hunter does. I actually can’t tell if this is a fair trade off.

Liv Morgan vs. Rhea Ripley

WWE

Oh my good God, there’s a ref cam. Once again, the legacy of 1990s WCW lives on.

One must appreciate the wonders of pantomime and selling. Just a little bit of commitment to both can’t help to trick the eye. For a little bit there, it really does feel like Rhea Ripley’s shoulder popped out of its socket, with only the bluntness of WWE production granting me the certainty that it’s a work. And to her credit, the bump Rhea makes to initiate the arm work and her proceeding attack on the arm are pretty decent too. It’s a straightforward idea to play off a real injury and make it the narrative focus of the match.

It’s a shame then that the overproduced nature of the WWE take a lot away from that narrative. For example, Rhea does two classic “pop the shoulder” back in spots. The first of them is by the announce table, complete with announce team reaction shot. The second, more traditionally, sees Rhea use the turnbuckle to get her arm back in place. The first suffers from feeling inorganic, the second from diminishing returns.

There’s all the other issues too. Lack of urgency from what should be a big grudge match and action suffering in the in-between moments such that it feels like a match built around bullet points. The bullet points aren’t so bad even if the big turn might be one of the most telegraphed possible twists (the only kind Triple H knows how to do as it at least lets him claim long term storytelling, which what’s all that worth when the story being told sucks and gets stretched over months).

Rating: **1/2

Sami Zayn vs. Bron Breakker

WWE

Bron has apparently usurped Orton as the “built in a lab wrestler.” We had a beautiful run, Randy.

For the second match in a row, the big muscle worker sustains an early shoulder injury that stunts their momentum throughout the match. Luckily for us all, Bron’s take on it feels a lot more restrained and all the better for it. It stops him in small ways like making him incapable of doing the military press slam or hurting him when he nails the first Spear. It’s not something that Sami ever gets to exploit or work over but it’s a fan little wrinkle to the match.

There’s cool stuff like Sami’s early shine and how it’s cut off, and his brief attempts at a comeback Steamboat-style, but this never has the time to develop. Just solid and good stuff to crown a dominant new champion. Feels weird to run this as the rematch and not just commit to it the first go around, but it’s pretty good still. Big, decisive win for a new champion.

Rating: ***

Logan Paul vs. LA Knight

WWE

The insufferable and the bland collide. I believe we’re meant to be rooting for the bland.

Anyway, this actually isn’t so bad. Good enough even. Keeping it a singles match means this gets to have a lot more structure than something like Paul’s match at WrestleMania. They’re also smart enough to keep things real direct and moving at an energetic pace. Logan Paul, thankfully, never makes LA Knight have to think about a limb, for example. All of Paul’s offense feels stolen and there’s a real shitty vibe about his performance (and being) that makes it easy to root for him when placed in something as neatly put together as this.

Perhaps the only real issue I have with any of this would be that the match still forces itself around spots meant to display Logan Paul’s athleticism. Even when most of this feels very straightforward and correct, things like still having to prove that Paul’s a true worker get in the way of things. Luckily, the best spot of the match is Logan Paul almost dying on a genuinely gross avalanche brainbuster. Like holy shit, gruesome landing on that. On top of that, he mostly pays for all his shenanigans including the brass knucks from MGK, and it all works out well enough.

Rating: ***

Bayley vs. Nia Jax

WWE

There’s a weird subtext to this whole feud where Bayley parrots a lot of the common internet criticism of Nia back to her. “Clumsy” and “reckless” here basically being code for Nia being a botch queen, unsafe worker. Neither is a criticism I really agree with and I’ve been a big fan of Nia’s work this year, so what results is a situation where Nia feels like a situational babyface here. I want the queen to prove the haters wrong, basically.

And you know what, she does!

This isn’t a great match, sadly, but it is the best of the night so far. The first third or so is a little slower than I’d prefer, but still scrappy in a way that only Nia Jax matches feel like in the women’s division. But there’s also a fun little narrative told with the action here where Nia overcomes some of her past failures. She gets out of the guillotine choke that defeated her in London, she kicks out of the Bayley-to-Belly, overcoming these past elements of Bayley’s work as a champion. Smartly, they protect Bayley here by keeping Nia from having to kick out of the Rose Plant, and instead she loses by having to fight off the distraction of Tiffany Stratton as well as a sharpened Nia Jax.

The final stretch of this match might be the most invested that the crowd has been for anything in the night so far. Nia really turns up the heat with the scrappiness, the headbutts, and just thrashing Bayley around the ring in a way that feels malicious and mean. On the opposite end, an honest to god pop for Bayley powerbombing Nia. True babyface power there. Ah but then, the wonder of Nia really applying the pressure with her own powerbombs and the wonderful Annialators (spelling?) to get the win.

Long live the queen, keep owning the doubters.

Rating: ***1/2

CM Punk vs. Drew McIntyre

WWE

It ain’t always about me but it’s never about you.

If only.

As with so much in WWE history, Seth Rollins is the worst part of this. There’s something to be said about how, even with how awful both Triple H and Shawn Michaels could be in their respective careers, they found a way to make their imitators even more noxious and grating.

On the opposite side of that coin, of course CM Punk is the best part of it. He achieves this by being the only one in the whole thing that acts like a real person. The only real break in that sense is when Punk fixates on the friendship bracelet, and even then his performance feels a lot more natural than so many other people in the WWE system. Beyond that though, he’s just so good in this. Real sense of hatred and pent up energy from even before the bell, someone who honest to goodness looks like he can’t wait to whip somebody’s ass. Then focusing on real solid punches and simple offense that gets the message across nicely. Things like repeatedly ramming Drew’s head into the steel steps, this very visceral feeling that he wants to harm Drew here. Even on the sell too, there’s such wonderful details like his paranoia over Seth’s refereeing conveyed via a refusal to keep his shoulders down on the mat. On top of that (and this may just be a cardio problem if you want to be mean about it, I guess), the general sense of being worn down and beaten by Drew’s offense here.

Drew’s not perfect–especially when he has to deal with Seth–but he does a good job here more than not. His shots land solid and there’s a snap to everything here. He dips into some classics of Punk’s playbook and hurls Punk into the announce table. In a perfect world, something here leads to a good bladejob, but we don’t live in that world.

It’s a shame both dudes lower themselves to having to deal with Seth’s bullshit because all the other stuff here leads me to think that a great match is honestly possible between these two. A good match though, and a mostly promising sign of what Punk’s capable of even after all the injuries. Seth just brings out the worst in everyone though, I guess.

Rating: ***1/4

Damien Priest vs. Gunther

WWE

Lol Finn’s face.

This is whatever, man. I just don’t really have any kind of investment in Damien so it’s hard for me to buy into any of the drama around him. The match asks me to buy into his early babyface shine which is decently put together, and Gunther’s decent enough on the bumping and the sell to get across that it’s a surprising stumbling block for him. I’ll even give Damien the credit for having cool things to bust out like that top rope rana and that big Broken Arrow on the challenger.

Then all the Finn stuff which just, who cares? I’m sure some people do and god bless them, I hope they got the drama they wanted out of this. I just don’t give a fuck. Finn’s stupid face for the last ten minutes looks dumb as fuck and I can’t stop laughing at it.

Gunther got that belt on quick, that’s a man that knows what it’s like to hold gold. Right guy won at least. Of course, Hunter books a guy who called his opponent poor trash win a belt though. Stay on brand there, Hunter.

Rating: **1/2

Cody Rhodes vs. Solo Sikoa

WWE

Arn still a draw, hell yeah.

House show version of the Mania main event which means it’s both more boring and less offensive.

Roman the best worker of the match. Welcome home, Big Dog.

Rating: **

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