Message In A Battle, Eh?

When it comes to the WWE, there are three things you can count on: the episode before a big PPV will suck, as they’re resting all the superstars for their big PPV matches; the episode after a big PPV will suck, as the superstars are all recovering from their big PPV matches; and finally, any week of Smackdown will suck, as it’s just plain horrible. (A custody battle storyline between Eddie Guerrero and Rey Mysterio? Jebus! Just hand little Dominick over to the Mexicools and be done with it.)

Unfortunately for us, tonight’s episode took place one week before SummerSlam, the WWE’s second-biggest PPV, so the writers were scrambling to finalize storylines, which meant every segment had to have a message of some sort.

Don’t believe me? Then how else to explain Shawn Michaels’ inexplicable 16-minute message to open the show? If you’ve ever wondered if it were possible to stop a show before it even starts, tonight you learned the answer is yes, if that show is opened by the Showstopper, Shawn Michaels. During his bizarre set, HBK gave the Montreal crowd (which really seemed to hate HBK) a version of the Canadian national anthem that made Roseanne’s version of ours sound like a pre-crack Whitney. He also continually insulted Canada (not a good move when the crowd already hates you), and twice faked out the audience, first by playing Bret “The Hitman” Hart’s intro music, then later playing Hulk Hogan’s intro music. Oh, and he stripped. To make matters worse, since I was watching RAW on TiVo, I couldn’t even flip from this train wreck to check out the train wreck that is FOX’s Renovate My Family. Sixteen minutes?! If I wanted to watch a p*ssy ramble incoherently for that long, I’d just rent The Vagina Monologues.

Finally, we went to commercial. After the break, we were treated to a match between the 7-foot, 500-lb Big Show and two random gay men. Actually, it was the Heartthrobs, who stood as much of a chance against the Big Show as April would trying to keep the last piece of ghettocake^TM from Ivette.

The 3rd Eugene Gold Medal Invitational pitted our Special Olympic Medalist against Montreal’s hometown hero, Renee Dupree. (Little-known fact: The “French Phenom,” as Dupree is known, was forced to flee the country last year after Congress tried to make him change his name to the “Freedom Phenom.”) Exactly 11 seconds into the three-minute match, Kurt Angle bumrushed the ring, tossed Dupree out and smacked Eugene around a bit. Obviously, he was sending Eugene a message.

That Vonage spot was on again. Man, I love that song.

Next was a too-long recap of the Matt-Lita-Edge love triangle. And by too long, I’m referring to the length of Edge and Lita’s respective tongues. Isn’t Spike TV still basic cable?

Another week, another match featuring some combination of WWE Champion John Cena, Chris Jericho and Carlito. Tonight, Cena was forced to fight both Carlito and Jericho in a Handicap Match. As Cena is a definite crowd favorite, general manager Eric Bischoff devised a foolproof plan to put the Montreal crowd on their side: act Canadian. Carlito, whose middle name just happens to be Caribbean, was obviously a little hesitant at first, but Bischoff reassured Carlito by telling him they’ll just tell everyone Carlito is from southern Canada. “That’s cool, eh?” was Carlito’s awkward response.

With such a diabolical plan in place, surely Cena couldn’t escape with a victory yet again, could he? Unfortunately for Bischoff, his plan was as effective as a CTU hard perimeter, as Cena picked up a fairly easy victory, thus sending a message to Jericho and Bischoff that he is not one to be trifled with this Sunday at SummerSlam.

On a side note, is it just me or does Cena seem to be getting less thug and more lug ever since his switch from heel to babyface? At the rate the WWE writers are neutering the self-proclaimed “Doctor of Thuganomics,” it won’t be much longer before Cena will be whiter than one Mr. Rob Van Winkle. (Speaking of which, if you haven’t seen RVW’s Hit Me Baby One More Time dance kablosion, do yourself a favor: click here, scroll down about halfway and, depending on the time of day, prepare for a nice coffee spit-take.)

Ashley was named the 2005 RAW Diva Winner! While we’ll never know for certain what put her over the top, I’m guessing it had something to do with her costume, seemingly made entirely of black electrician’s tape and a newborn’s funeral veil. Along with a $250,000 check, Ashley can now look forward to a few years of demeaning herself in public, not to mention the requisite Playboy spread (pun intended), before returning to her life on the pole. The losers, meanwhile, have already resumed asking their “fans” to tip them for their dances.

Because he needed to send a message to Matt Hardy (as if tongue-kissing his ex-fiancé on national TV weren’t message enough), Edge had a match with former porn-star Val Venis. Val actually put up a good fight, until he threw his back out trying to lift Edge over his head. (Perhaps Val should’ve let the stunt-cock take his place tonight.) Edge then celebrated his victory by removing Lita’s tonsils. With his tongue.

The Hurricane, a super-hero, took on Rob Conway, a super-zero, in tonight’s winner of the “Most Meaningless Match” competition. The highlight of this bout had to be Coach’s continuing flirtation with coming out of the closet, witnessed in the following exchange:
JR: Rob Conway thinks he’s prettier than Staci Keebler.
Coach: He very well may be. And that rash on my chin is not from his testicles, in case you were wondering.
Okay, that last part was made up. Nobody was really wondering.

Finally, it was time for tonight’s Main Event: Hulk Hogan versus Kurt Angle. This match was a result of the two wrestlers’ confrontation last week over Kurt’s treatment of the very special Eugene. As both of these guys have big matches coming up next week at SummerSlam (Hulk versus HBK and Angle versus Eugene), they both had messages to send to their respective opponents. Unfortunately, this meant the chances of this being a good match were about as slim as Cappy’s chances of winning “America’s Choice” last week. (Thanks TVgasm readers!)

Of course, this match more than lived down to the hype, with Hogan’s entrance lasting longer than the actual fight, which ended when HBK interfered and took out the Hulkster, thus sending his final message of the night: Canada sucks.

Altogether, this turned out to be an evening of disappointments. Not only was the action less than stellar, but the evening’s most anticipated match ” Super Staci versus Victoria ” never took place. I say it was the evening’s most anticipated match because with the exception of midget wrestlers, few matches are more entertaining than those featuring women wrestlers. It’s just too bad the WWE has never experimented with female midget wrestling. Can you imagine how much ass Charla from AR5 would kick? Her cousin Mirna could be her manager, and sneak a side of beef into the ring for Charla to throw at her opponent. To distract the ref from the meat shenanigans, Mirna could then develop a creepy fixation on the referee, as she did with Phil Keoghan. (The dude wears a ring for a reason, Mirna!)

Actually, now that I think about it, how cool would it be for Phil to be a WWE manager? His first match would have to be a “Pose-Off” with Johnny Fairplay. Until that day, we can only dream…

So, what did you think of tonight’s episode? And what you expect from the upcoming SummerSlam PPV? Will Cena keep the title? Will Angle get his medal back? Will I even remember to watch it…?