Women's Tag Team Elimination Chamber Match
No eliminations for absolutely bloody ages until The IIconics eliminate Carmella and Naomi via a bridging suplex cover. I guess that's their punishment for Carmella and Corey Graves having scandal break. Graves has spent the entire match up to this point burying Carmella at every opportunity, rather obviously instructed to do so. The IIconics last approximately 45 seconds longer, getting absolutely murderised by everyone else and eliminated in short order by dual Samoan Drops by Nia and Tamina. We get a fairly entertaining "Everyone Get your Shit In" segment which is a bit too obvious a spotfest for my liking but still fun, then we lose the Riott Squad to a Splash from Tamina. Nia steams straight through a chamber pod, leaving Tamina to get annihilated by Bayley and Sasha. We're left with Bayley & Sasha vs Rose & Deville which is a really good closing segment. Bayley gets left in a heap but with Rose incapacitated by an errant Spear from her partner, Deville taps out to a modified Bank Statement (playing off Sasha's injured shoulder) to give Banks & Bayley the win.
A much better match than I was expecting considering the only previous Tag EC match was fully atrocious. Well worth watching.
Rating: ****1/4
Winners, and NEW WWE Women's Tag Team Champions: Sasha Banks & Bayley
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Shane McMahon & The Miz vs The Usos
I refused to watch this match because I refuse to watch Shane McMahon massage his ego at the expense of actual legitimate tag team. Turns out the result I wanted but didn't expect actually happened. I can't tell you how the match was because, again, I refused to watch.
Rating: N/A
Winners, and NEW WWE Smackdown Tag Team Champions: The Usos
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Bobby Lashley & Lio Rush vs Finn Balor
This was a match that happened. It followed the most basic and predictable pattern possible; the heels smack up Balor for roughly seven minutes, Balor manages to isolate Rush, heel miscommunication through Rush getting cocky, Balor capitalises and pins Rush via Coup De Grace to win the Intercontinental Championship. I have never been less enthused about a Finn Balor match, despite my overwhelming urge to stare at him, and more specifically his abs, 24/7.
Rating: **
Winner, and NEW WWE Intercontinental Champion: Finn Balor
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Ronda Rousey vs Ruby Riott
This match begins with a Charlotte Flair promo. Of course, it does. TERFy Ronda appears to be in her best The Shield cosplay. Once the bell rings, Rousey immediately shits Riott up, who decides to fuck off out of the ring. Within 60 seconds, the crowd is chanting "WE WANT BECKY". Rousey hits Piper's Pit and taps Riott out to the Armbar. That was over in less than two minutes. Yawn.
Rating: *
Winner, and STILL WWE Raw Women's Champion: Ronda Rousey
Charlotte goes to stare Rousey down but Becky Lynch hobbles into the arena through the crowd on crutches. Becky absolutely fucking batters Flair with the crutches before offering one to Rousey to continue as revenge for Charlotte's actions at Survivor Series; as Rousey goes in to do so, Lynch smacks the shit out of Rousey with the crutch as well. I love Becky Lynch and I would die for her.
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Braun Strowman vs Baron Corbin
Corbin immediately starts smacking up Strowman with a Kendo stick. He jams it into the turnbuckle to use as a weapon but Strowman stops him and breaks the Kendo stick. Baron Corbin does that little "slide under the ropes and sprint around the turnbuckle" spot WAY too much. Corbin launches a chair at Strowman but Braun just catches it. Banter. Corbin takes control, because of course he does. Remember when Braun Strowman couldn't be knocked off his feet by five men combined? Feels like a lifetime ago. As an aside, Corbin is no longer an authority figure, so what the hell is he still wrestling in formal gear for? Anyway, my stream froze up and now Strowman is battering Corbin. He gets a table and props it against a turnbuckle; he Powerslams Corbin through the table but before he can pin him, Drew McIntyre comes out and distracts Braun while Bobby Lashley attacks from behind because, again, of course. We get a couple of Strowman hope spots but the numbers game is too much and they triple powerbomb Strowman, Shield style, through two tables for the pinfall.
That match has completely destroyed the atmosphere in the arena. Atrocious. Good to know literally no babyfaces are willing to defend Strowman, especially Kurt Angle and Finn Balor.
Rating: No stars. Not even a quarter of one.
Winner: Baron Corbin
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Lacey Evans comes onto the stage, walks down halfway, then turns back and fucks off again. Okay. Great. Thanks. The entire current Lacey Evans gimmick pisses me off monumentally so the less I have to see of her, the better.
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WWE Championship Elimination Chamber Match
Kofi Kingston is over as fuck. Imagine if he actually won this? I would lose my fucking mind. Jeff Hardy is second to enter the arena and I really wish he would make his mind up and either go full Brother Nero or cast off the gimmick entirely because random DELETEs are pointless otherwise. Randy Orton's music hits and the crowd goes mild. AJ is next to the ring, and the crowd have long since stopped caring about him as well. I'd say that's what you get for being a vocal homophobe but this show is live from Texas so fuck knows. Second to last out is Samoa Joe, who is comfortably my favourite wrestler that WWE evidently doesn't give a fuck about. Finally, we get the WWE Champion Daniel Bryan, who cuts another promo standard for his gimmick. Of course, Vince McMahon would cast a baby-boomer hating environmentalist as a full heel in 2019. Of course.
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The bell rings with Bryan and Joe in the ring. Bryan immediately fucks off out of the ring. Reasonable. Bryan tries to kick Joe and Joe literally laughs at him. Great stuff. Bryan tries to chop Joe's chest into pieces and again Joe just walks through it. Absolute scenes. Bryan gets separation via a chopblock and takes control, less than 15 seconds after I get excited about how dominant Joe is looking. Great, thanks lads. Bryan again tries a chop and is met with indifference followed by a reply chop that makes me physically wince.
Second into the match is... Kofi Kingston, who immediately goes flying all over the place. I love him. Bryan's chest is a fully different colour to the rest of his body because of the chops from Samoa Joe. Bryan fucks off up onto the top of a pod, so Kingston just fucking jumps up off the turnbuckle onto the pod and scares the champion shitless. Kofi then jumps from the chamber side onto both other competitors. He really is over as hell with the crowd. Joe hits a wicked looking running Senton to Bryan.
AJ Styles is next out, and it's incredible to hear the indifference in the crowd's reaction to him. AJ hits a double DDT to Kingston and Bryan but can't pin either. Suddenly the crowd are into him, making me look and feel like the dumbest bitch in history. Bryan tries to disappear up the chamber again so Styles hits a Phenomenal Forearm to the back of his neck. Joe puts Kingston in the Coquina Clutch, Kingston escapes because the Coquina Clutch is nothing any more, and AJ hits a Phenomenal Forearm to eliminate Samoa Joe.
Jeff Hardy enters the match, hits Mandy Rose's finisher on Kingston for some reason, then uses him as leverage to go flying over the ropes at Bryan. He hits a Swanton Bomb onto AJ laid across the top rope, then immediately gets a Running Knee and eliminated by Daniel Bryan. Bye, Jeff. AJ is still hung up on the top rope roughly six weeks later.
Orton completes the match. I could not give less of a fuck about Randy Orton. Marsh just said The Randall Countdown should be the new name for the Doomsday Clock and I am giggling. Anyway, Kofi is still over as hell, right before getting absolutely merked by a Backbreaker by Styles. Styles tries to Phenomenal Forearm Kingston but gets an RKO for his troubles and is eliminated. Orton hits a draping DDT on Kingston, then turns to Bryan for five seconds and gets hit by a Trouble In Paradise to get eliminated. We're down to Kofi vs Bryan.
After a great hype up spot, Kofi hits an SOS for a great near fall. The crowd is super into this. Bryan takes control, trash-talking Kingston before Kofi knees him in the chest for another good near fall. Bryan rolls out of the ring instead of getting hit by another Kingston signature move. Bryan launches Kingston into a pod, then hits him with the Running Knee. KOFI KICKS OUT OF THE RUNNING KNEE. The atmosphere is fucking molten. Bryan stomps on Kingston's face, rolls through another Trouble In Paradise pin, and locks in the Labell Lock but Kofi reaches the ropes. What a closing stretch this is. Kofi hits a step-up enziguri, they go on top of a pod, Kofi knocks Bryan down and tries a Splash but Bryan moves hits another Running Knee and pins Kingston for the win. A simply wonderful closing stretch.
Rating: *** for the majority of the match, ***** for the final two competitors. So **** I guess.
Winner, and STILL WWE Champion: Daniel Bryan
The show goes off the air as Big E and Xavier Woods tend to Kofi Kingston, the New Day's music playing, with the entire crowd chanting "thank you Kofi". If WWE have even an ounce of sense in them, this will not be the last of Kofi Kingston in the WWE Championship picture. He's absolutely a main event ready player on this showing, and on the love and support he's been given by the fans.
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Final Thoughts
This was a PPV where a lot of note happened, but the match quality was very hit and miss. Both Elimination Chamber matches were highly entertaining and well worth watching again. The rest of the PPV in match quality was atrocious, aside from the Tag Title match which was apparently fun, but I declined to watch.
Rating: ***1/2
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