Mission 032 – The Mission? Analyzing the End of the Ventura Epoch
While all of you sit at home watching a pair of warring wrestling programs from AEW and ULW respectively, WWE takes a hiatus for the remainder of the year in the wake of a blockbuster show which should have been headlined by the match which opened it…but more on that in a second!
Before we talk about WWE, though, I want to quickly touch on my thoughts about Dynamite last week, which competed against ULW’s Aggression headlined by the 40-woman Classic Royale won by Chelsea Green (a ratings encounter that we still have yet to see the results of).
By the way, I have received word that Sasha will defend her International Title against Living Dead Girl (the runner-up in the aforementioned royale) at New Year’s Bash, while defending her Women’s title against Green at Merry Massacre. A fun two weeks for the “Undisputed Champion”, might I say?
Back at it, and we open Dynamite last week with an encounter between Paul Heyman and Doc Brown. I have been enjoying Brown’s run in AEW so far, and while things still feel a tad off, he is growing on me here. Meanwhile, this segment was fantastic. Heyman’s disgust with his interaction and with Mr. Lloyd’s insanity definitely caught me up in the moment. Loved it, and would honestly cheer if I see more of this in the coming months. Not too much, but enough to remind me that Heyman has a new nuisance: the former Intercontinental..er, nevermind, that didn’t count.
The Tag Match between Pretty Deadly and the Briscoes was entertaining, and I have no complaints regarding the decent Young Bucks vignette which occurred post-match. I am very much looking forward to that encounter. I will just leave it at that. I also enjoyed the LA Knight interruption of Cody’s interview. The two are set to kick off the next installment of Elite Warfare, and I am really excited for it. They are going to steal the show, and I wouldn’t be surprised if they last until the end or if they eliminate each other before the match’s climax.
Sean Olson beat Ricochet in the evening’s most predictable bout, but I still felt that tickle of joy watching these two ooo and aaaa the crowd with their skills. Heyman grins evily as Olson beats the hell out of Ricochet. Probably heard what Ricochet likes to do in his spare time with objects and his bunghole. Wait…did Ricochet confiscate something of Olson’s for the forbidden cave?
Next, MJF’s attempt at bullying his way into being the man in charge of his alliance of convenience with the Hurt Syndicate backfired as Lashley and Shelton said adios and left MJF to drown on his own under the rising tide of the Bullet Club. MJF isn’t getting back to a world title any time soon, and Lashley is THE reason why. Not that it’s a bad thing…just an observation.
Finally, to conclude the show, we see Shocker and Splinter pondering how they can get Splidder back into the fold without selling out their souls and giving in to his dark desires to badly follow the advice they’ve inferred from Mickie Mouse’s reveal about the Mouse Twin Curse. Uncle Howdy appears with a revived appeal for the rats to abandon their pursuit to save Megan peacefully, and the show comes to a sudden end with a hell of a cliffhanger. Great stuff!
As I shift gears over to WWE, let me just say that this whole WIN thing is a tad silly, but silliness and the permanent-revolving door of power and labels is par for the course with the brand. I am going to start by looking at Saturday Night Main Event’s midcard, followed by the Main Event, and then finishing with the opening segment, which most definitely should have been the Main Event.
Every match had a title on the line, and part of that was the realization of merging the two mid-card titles in the latest reset we’re seeing en route to the debut of WIN’s other subsidiary minor league promotions in January – more on that when I review the year for the era -, and the merger here that we see of the Intercontinental and United States Championships by deposing the rising Dexter Lumis and strapping the rocket once again to Chad Gable.
Gable winning is fine by me, but he has lost a lot of his spunk ever since he was separated from Doc Brown. While the company has long seen Gable as a future world champion, I fear that they over-corrected by separating him prematurely from the manager who gave him new life. In my opinion, it would have been better if Gable gradually soured on Doc and then turned on him in dramatic and brutal fashion. That ship has sailed, though, and maybe it is because the aging actor behind the mad scientist-doctor-manager was unwilling to take the bumps necessary to make this work. Even so, Gable needs a new defining characteristic which makes him standout again. I don’t know how they get there, though.
Rhea Ripley retained her Women’s World Title against Tiffany Stratton (oh…what could have been) in an ok contest, and DIY overcame the Usos in a match that had an ok build until WWE took a mid-season break. Admittedly, I had to check my notes to remember who won here, as the match kind of faded in my memory. In the post-match, though, we did get an odd twist as Roman Reigns rebuilt the Bloodline, and I will patiently await the explanation as Roman and Moxley were abruptly stripped of their gold and separated from each other and Seth.
Forgive me, WWE, it is sometimes impossible to keep up with all of the swift pivots.
John Cena then dropped his World Title to Seth Rollins. More on Rollins in a second, but for now I want to express how sad this made me for Cena. His second world title run was forgettable by comparison to his career-defining first run that should not have ended (it was tragically thrown away to add to Ventura’s world title count, if you may recall).
Yet, Rollins won his third world title here, and then promptly buried the comedic push of Hurricane and his fake ULW Title tournament. Helms wanted Seth to enter his fake tournament and Seth threw away both Hurricane’s hopes and the former ULW World Title; proclaiming that there would be no tournament, and that he was the last real ULW Champion.
I liked this and hated this. No, the ULW Championship strap carried by Helms was not a legitimate world title any longer. Yes, it had the legacy and lineage of the WOW Undisputed Title as well as the PWI and HCW title lineages, but ULW effectively stripped Seth of his recognition as champion once he jumped ship as champion. There was potential for WWE to capitalize on this in a truly earth-shattering way, but they threw all of that out of the window the moment they steered the strap and its story into the hands of Hurricane. I and the rest of the world loved his journey, but it did no favors for Seth.
So, what I hated about it was that it took us on this journey with Helms only to burn it down along with Hurricane’s push. What I loved, though, was that the moment savored a sliver of what could’ve been by having Seth openly recognize himself as ULW’s “last world champion” even as he destroyed the gold which used to represent that status.
In my opinion, this moment in conjunction with Seth’s victory over Cena for the World Heavyweight title effectively passed on his former world title in a de facto unification with this younger world title. For all intents and purposes, the new world heavyweight title has a claim to a connection with the lineage of the WOW Undisputed Title, as the WOW actually still recognizes Seth as the current WOW Undisputed Champion, and I am told that the WOW page will be updated by the end of the week to reflect as much.
With this having been said, I will just say that my eyes are still fixed on what the future holds for Mr. Rollins, and that brings me to the end of the past, the glory days, the journey which began all of this: the run of Jesse “the Body” Ventura.
Perhaps it is because of what Seth was set to do to the old ULW strap that his match took the main event, but I will go to my grave declaring to the heavens my belief that Jesse’s swan song deserved the closing moments of the show. After all, we would not be here today without the megastar run of his reign atop the O.G. WWF that started the First Era.
A pleasantly surprising moment that WWE did NOT have to give us was a peak back into the moments prior to Jesse dropping the USWA strap to Hunter Hearst Hillsley at USWA’s fifth Wrestlemania on April 15th, 2001. He was seen gazing at what would be his last world title for two year until his brief UWA title run in 2003 and his second to last recognized world title run until he captured the Evolve world title this past summer.
Added to this beautiful moment and the montage which accompanied it was a moment I was hoping we’d get: the return of Car by Jesse’s side one last time. The match itself was as amazing as you’d might expect from the outgoing icon, complete with all the “heart” that we could hope for, and a fitting and traditional end with the retiring talent giving the Rock his nod of approval en route to Rock’s undeniable record reign which is now in reach with no signs of ending prior.
This was an emotional moment for me, a lifelong fan of Jesse’s, the man who got me interested in this business. Truthfully, what convinces me that this bout’s placement at the start was a mistake was the fact that the pure emotion surrounding the moment deprived the mid-card of any real momentum. I was emotionally drained instead of properly primed for the amazing action to come.
Yes, I still enjoyed myself, but I think the mid-card suffered in ways that were at least clear to me. Perhaps it could be argued that this was about moving beyond the past and looking to the future, but a farewell of the chief pillar of this industry screams “goodnight” to me more than it does “welcome!” Well, that’s just my take on it.
Overall, this was a stellar show, and it came in hot and left us waiting to see what’s next when the company and its so-called WIN unit return next year. In that respect, it did its job. I’m just a cranky traditionalist, so don’t mind me.
With that, I need to get back to work on watching Dynamite, preparing that review, and helping put the pieces in place for the next magazine as well as the year-ending review.
Until our next Quest, this has been Johnny with yet another mission!
World Of Wrestling: Murrey Universe 