Previously at Payback…
We head into the way back machine a whole decade to 2017. A House Of Horrors took place, we blew off The Festival Of Friendship & Austin Aries faced off with Neville for The Cruiserweight Championship (what?). Braun Strowman actually defeated Roman Reigns on that show as well. I bet he keeps that streak alive!
Despite just a week to build, WWE surprisingly had enough in the tank to put together a competent show with matches they didn’t pull the trigger on at Summerslam. Let’s see how they did.
BOTCH: The Riott Kickoff
Is Liv Morgan the dumbest person on the roster? The entire story of this preshow match revolves around if The Riott Squad can be on the same page even though they’ve had a bunch of issues with trust as a team lately. Pay no attention to them wearing matching gear & coming out together to the same music for the the first time. Halfway through the contest, Billie Kay goes to pull Liv off the apron as Ruby is about to tag her in & as she’s distracted, Peyton shoves Ruby into Liv, knocking her to the floor. If you’ve been paying attention to RAW the past few weeks (bless your little cotton socks, if so), The IIconics have pulled something similar to this in all their previous encounters. They scream at Liv that Ruby hit her on purpose & she’s not really her friend after all. And Liv believes them.
Liv, between Youtube, Hulu, Twitter, Tout, WWE Network or the never-ending recaps RAW already provides, you do realize that’s it’s impossibly easy to go back & debunk all the bullshit The IIconics are feeding you, right? Not to mention, they’re The IIconics for crying out loud & throw more shade than a solar eclipse. Smarten up. WWE does this sometimes where a team will all of a sudden have miscommunication & rather than acting like competent, rational adults, they become the most oblivious idiots. It’s extremely annoying. Even more so when there’s a library of video evidence that you can refer back to & see what actually happened. Liv does eventually snap out of it after making frowny faces on the outside for a few minutes & The Riott Squad gets the victory. Join us for the follow up where Peyton Royce puts a “Kick Me” sign on Liv’s back & blames Ruby on RAW. Probably.
POP: Business Is Boomin’
Thankfully, Payback rebounds pretty well after that. The entire show was kind of weird though. A lot of it obviously had to do with the fact that it was booked on screen in five hours & half the feuds were only introduced in that time frame. The wrestling across the board is pretty solid, but nothing felt pay per view worthy outside of the main event. You could’ve thrown any of this on regular WWE television & it wouldn’t have felt out of place. I’d also be lying if I said I’m not a little burnt out from pro graps since it’s been on everyday for WWE or AEW except this past Saturday since the Friday before last, so that could be playing a factor. Again, I liked almost all the outcomes & the wrestling was good, but I don’t feel like we’re going to be talking about Payback at any great length in the near future.
Take The United States Championship Match, for example. This was booked based on an arm wrestling segment of all things that Apollo cheated to win at. They finally get to the match they should have been doing instead of the ones with MVP & Lashley just… taps him out clean pretty easily with The Full Lashley. In case you’re wondering, I guess that’s what he’s calling his full nelson submission now.
Okay? I would have assumed they’d have The Hurt Business get involved or something for a cheap win, but nope, Lashley just takes it. I’m not really complaining since I think Lashley’s been low key pretty great since ditching the whole Lana angle, the ending was simply unexpected. I think if The Hurt Biz adds another member & makes a run at the tag straps, we could have a seriously good stable on our hands. After the match, like any good babyface, Apollo Crews jumps Lashley from behind as he celebrates his completely clean victory in the ring. Payback for Payback!
POP: The Big Beginning
Our man Big E embiggens his singles push win streak with a solid victory over Sheamus. He’s really rounding out into form & collecting a lot of signature wins these past few weeks, which I couldn’t be happier about. This match was probably the best of the bunch both from a high profile win standpoint & as an actual match. He & Sheamus worked really well together in this little hoss battle. I really liked Big E snatching Sheamus out of the air as he attempted a Brogue Kick into a powerbomb, setting up The Big Ending.
We’ve also hit the point where Kofi Kingston said he’d be back from injury & I’m wondering where they take it. They already proved with Kofi’s run last year that they can shift focus to a single member of New Day & have done well so far with Big E, but E & Woods could still function as a tag team then, so it kept them busy while Kofi was doing his thing. That can’t happen this time around with Woods on the shelf with an Achilles tear. I don’t want Kofi to just be on the sidelines the entire time since I like him a lot, but I think they might have to until at least Big E gets a championship around his waist.
And please enjoy this segment after the win & unsuccessfully try to convince me this guy shouldn’t be pushed to the moon.
“He wears a News. Boy. Hat.”
Go obliterate Jeff Hardy and/or Sami Zayn for The Intercontinental Championship please & thank you.
POP: King Pinned
Finally, we get to something on the card with some story & an actual build behind it. Corbin has been giving Riddle shit since he got to Smackdown weeks ago, even putting up a bounty of free royal sedan rides to the rest of the roster to anybody who could do his dirty work for him. Sadly, this only attracted Shorty G as a participant, who I’m assuming has never been that high up before, so he desperately wanted to cash in. Gable couldn’t get the job done & we get these two guys coming to blows in the ring. Corbin makes sure to tweet out about Riddle’s real life infidelity before the match to sweeten the pot. I’m sure that won’t backfire, King!
Corbin & Riddle delivered just like I knew they would heading in. They get enough time with a solid back & forth that really showed how good each of these guys can be. There was enough there to build on heading forward & as this was surprisingly only their first match despite feuding for over a month, I do want to see them go at it again. I’m sure this will happen as Corbin naturally decides to jump Riddle as he’s giving his post match interview backstage because King Corbin is contractually obligated to feud with someone for nine months minimum. More Payback for Payback!
POP: Golden Rolled Models
I will be nothing but completely impartial for my review of this match.
Dammit! Why did Bayley & Sasha have to lose!? I hate it! I hate it! I hate it!
I certainly understand the story they’re telling with Banks & Bayley, so I get what they’re going for. I’m not however, for a team thrown together in literally five minutes taking out a championship team made up of non-debatable two of the three best women currently on the roster, who have also been tagging for months. And this isn’t like The Riott Squad nonsense from earlier where there’s dissension in their ranks during the match. Bayley & Sasha worked great as a unit all match & wrestled smartly the entire time.
Having said all that, this was absolutely the outcome everybody knew was coming to set up the inevitable showdown between Sasha & Bayley as one of them is bound to stab the other in the back in the coming weeks. I’ll take solace in the fact that at least in this match Shayna Baszler looked like an absolute buzzsaw for the first time since probably her feud with Kairi Sane back in NXT. Her throwing Sasha in The Muta Lock & then snatching Bayley in The Kirifuda Clutch, just to make Sasha choke out her own partner as Shayna stretched her arm under Bayley’s chin was easily one of the highlights of the whole show. They also might have found a good use of Nia Jax as a complete goober champion who thinks they’re way more important to the team’s success than they actually are. She’s officially in the running as the most Jannetty tag team partner on the show & Angelo Dawkins can breathe a sigh of relief.
POP: Rankle Keith, Orton
Back to back good Randy Orton pay per view matches? Man, 2020 is a strange year. In this case, a lot of that is probably helped by the fact this match got in & out with the quickness. Once an Orton affair surpasses the twenty minute mark, I’m all but guaranteed to check out & this one clocked in at under seven. A lot of people have been hung up online about Keith’s new presentation now that he’s on RAW, but frankly, I have no time to argue about whether a guy needs to be wrestling in a shirt or not (that new theme is trash though). As long as he’s getting wins & not turned into a Tozawa ninja, he can wrestle wearing a rubber ducky innertube for all I care.
I am curious where this brings him, however. Lee just beat the top heel on the show cleanly in his first official match that wasn’t marred by interference. Where does that put him? I’m assuming the stuff with Orton will continue for a little bit since WWE reported McIntyre has a fractured jaw, but beyond that, I’m not really sure. I don’t think you can just throw him down the card after a win like that to feud with The Hurt Business or whomever. Maybe once Drew is healed up you can run the two at each other now that they both can claim they beat Orton cleanly? Is that something I can interest you in?
POP: God’s Son
Now this is the match we should have been given at Summerslam. If you read my review, you know I wasn’t exactly sold on The Street Fight between Rollins & Dominik, particularly since it had Dominik go for a really long time on his own & I thought it was kind of unfair to ask that of him in his debut match at one of the biggest shows of the year. I still think he’s got plenty of upside & performed well, that’s just a tall order for anyone. Putting him in a tag match like the one we got here allows you to play to his strengths a lot more without making him bite off a little more than he can probably handle just starting out.
You could make the argument that this was the match of the night & I don’t think I’d have a lot to fight you on. Everybody in the contest was on point & shined at times. Rey Mysterio still being able to go like he does at this point is really impressive. To my point earlier, Dominik was able to get in & get out hitting his spots crisp & wasn’t asked to do too much. It clearly helps when you’re in there with the likes of Rey, Seth & Murphy, so unless Dom completely imploded, these guys should be able to put on a great match with their eyes closed with him. Of course WWE can’t get out of their own stupid way & announced literally as the match started than Rollins will be squaring off against Rey tonight on RAW, so I immediately said out loud at the time “Oh. So Dominik is pinning Murphy, then?”. Take a guess how it ended! Dom hits a pretty good 6-1-9 & Frog Splash in honor of his stepdad & real dad, respectively to pin Murphy. Maybe save that announcement for after the match happens next time, guys.
BOTCH: Wreck Everything & Leave
And here I was thinking Keith Lee had the worst championship run this year.
I don’t even know where to begin on this one. The Universal Championship Match going into last night had all the potential to easily be the star of the show. The Fiend rehabbed himself greatly since getting punked by Goldberg & finally got his title back. Braun Strowman regained his edge & showed a lot of character development. Alexa Bliss was thrown into the mix to add another interesting layer to the story. Top all of that off with Roman Reigns’ surprise return, coupling him with Paul Heyman of all people to solidify his heel status & you’ve got all the ingredients you need to have one hell of a main event match.
To say this wasn’t that would be putting it mildly. I guess let’s start at the beginning. The Fiend enters first & once he hits the ring, Strowman jumps him from behind. Charles Robinson, who’s been a wrestling official longer than all of the guys in the match have been in WWE combined, decides out of the blue to ring the bell to start the match despite it being a triple threat & the third person involved isn’t fucking there. That’s not how any of this works, Chuck. They even had the stones to throw up a Dot Com interview with the guy afterwards & somehow the interviewer’s first question wasn’t “So… why did you ring the bell?”. Is anybody around here a real journalism??
Everything that happens after the random start & Reigns showing up is actually really great. Braun & The Fiend continue their Hoss War that started at Summerslam & are fun to watch smash everything in sight, including each other. Too bad it couldn’t be fully enjoyed with the absence of Reigns looming over the entire thing. They successfully Poochie’d him. “When Roman’s not on screen, everybody should be asking: ‘Where’s Roman??'”. During all this, the Alexa Bliss stuff that was so promising going into to Summerslam gets back burnered again with just a random shot of her side eyeing a tv. I’m sure that’s definitely going somewhere, but it’s a bummer a story with that much intrigue going in has been swept to the side.
After Braun & The Fiend do the Superplex ring destroyer spot we’ve seen in the past, Reigns finally shows up on the ramp with Heyman holding the contract for the match, signs it, then enters the ring. WWE has always played fast & loose with their contract laws & getting mad at them about it isn’t going to change that, but I’m pretty sure that’s not at all how match signings are executed. This one felt particularly insulting. How can you sign yourself into a match already in progress? Stop over complicating the whole thing. You can make the argument that’s how Money In The Bank sort of works, but that’s implied the contract is already signed & ready to go. The person cashing in doesn’t pop open the briefcase & signs the thing before they enter the match. The worst part is they had the perfect out from last Friday’s Smackdown. Reigns mentioned to Pearce to “make the changes we discussed & I’ll sign” as that show went off the air. You could’ve easily explained it away that Roman added a clause that he can show up when he feels like it (why his opponents would agree to that, nobody knows, but it’s something) & at least it gets addressed. They still might talk about it on Friday, but as it stands you’re just making everybody watching throw their hands up in confusion.
I’m even more frustrated because once Reigns does enter the match, there’s some good stuff there to work with, but it’s now overshadowed by how we got there. I like the nod of stealing the main event like Roman experienced at the hands of Seth Rollins back at WrestleMania 31, which Heyman was also present for. Reigns thinking he had it made & will get the easy win only to have both guys kick out of his lazy pin attempts & fight back was fun too. He takes the easy way out dick kicking The Fiend after he gets caught in The Mandible Claw, which I’m sure Heyman pointed out to him is a great weak spot given his last client. Strowman of course takes the pin from Reigns & he’s back on top of the mountain. Sadly, Otis did not cave his head in with his meat lunchbox while he was standing on the ramp celebrating & stole the title from him like he just did to The Fiend.
As for The Fiend, what a bummer. You can do the whole “He doesn’t even need a title” talking point & yeah, you’re probably right, but I still don’t love him getting Goldberg’d again less than a week after winning the thing. They did give The Fiend an out by not having him involved in the finish like most of us predicted, so we should get a follow up at Clash Of Champions, which is shockingly not tomorrow & in four weeks. I do actually like the direction we’re headed in, just not super pumped about this particular beat of the story. With a proper build, they can really make this feud pop, so hopefully that’s what we’ll get going forward.
So uhhhhhh where’s Retribution? 😐
— Renee Paquette (@ReneePaquette) August 31, 2020
Now that’s a real journalism I’ve been looking for.
So that’s Payback. Pretty solid overall, but nothing that’ll really blow your socks off. With a little more time in the oven for the build, it could’ve been a lot better. After a few weeks, most of it will likely be forgotten. We did get a lot of new champions out of it, so it’ll be interesting to see how they fare as we head into Clash Of Champions coming up. How about you? Like the show? Not so much? Are you a contract lawyer & can explain the main event to me? Feel free to comment below or on our Discord! Until then, see you in four weeks (oh happy day) for our next WWE pay per view.
