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Despite the fans' backlash, this week's Raw was sub-par again, and quite fittingly got low ratings. There was not much improvement as the writers still tried to fill the whole 3-hours with illogical segments. They really need to put on a good show next week, otherwise, they are just going to lose viewers rapidly.
On the other hand, Smackdown was the better show of the two, again and utilized their 2-hour slot quite well. We got to see some great matches mixed with a good contract signing segment. Daniel Bryan was easily the highlight of the week.
Each week, we get to know about the next moves in the different storylines, and this week WWE didn't disappoint in that regard, as storylines were building-up for the TLC pay-per-view. This week, we will focus on Raw (December 3) and Smackdown (December 4).
3. Balor and Strowman to lead babyfaces' rebuilding in Raw
For a couple of weeks, heels were getting the upper-hand over babyfaces as the team of Baron Corbin, Drew McIntyre, and Bobby Lashley was being booked as an untouchable force. It started when the trio got Strowman's hand between the steel steps (pun intended) and then they went on to destroy Finn Balor and Elias, who are scheduled to face McIntyre and Lashley at TLC, respectively. But, this week we saw complete opposite of that.
In the absence of Strowman from the show, who is nursing an elbow injury, we saw Balor taking the charge to give the taste of their own medicine to the heels. It started when he helped Dolph Ziggler to defeat Drew McIntyre in their match. Then, he assisted Elias, who hit Lio Rush with the guitar.
Apollo Crews then helped Balor to defeat Jinder Mahal. It seemed like the babyfaces of Raw have finally united to take on the heels, who were dominating the show using unfair means for the past couple of weeks.
2. Miz will be involved in the WWE Championship storyline in some form
Miz has proven his worth over the years that he is a main-event material and is the most improved wrestler as of now. Maybe he was not ready when he was initially given the company's top prize earlier in this decade, but his character's allure is screaming a big push at the moment.
This week, we saw Miz and the 'New' Daniel Bryan helping each other on multiple occasions to get an upper hand over AJ Styles, who is the only babyface in this storyline. It seemed like maybe we will see a partnership between Miz and Bryan in the near future to defeat Styles at TLC.
Miz is not involved in any storyline at the moment, and fits perfectly in the story of the WWE Championship. Personally, I would like to see this team for a short while as Miz and Bryan have amazing chemistry, which we saw when they were making team for the Survivor Series match last month.
This way we can build-up to the match between the two at Wrestlemania 35 as their feud was kind of dropped in the middle when the 'Old' Bryan became the no. 1 contender for the WWE Championship match in October at Super Show Down.
1. WWE doesn't care much about the fans' backlash
Bliss, Sasha Banks, and Bayley
Last week's Raw faced a lot of criticism and public outrage all over social media because of their booking, which I covered in last week's article itself. We would think that because of that backlash, writers would make an effort to improve their product and we would get a good show on Monday night, but, unsurprisingly, it remained the same.
We did get some good matches and got to see Balor taking the charge for the babyfaces, but except that, the rest of the show was filled with illogical booking and continuity errors.
First, we saw commentators encouraging the Lucha House Party when they had the numbers advantage against The Revival, but criticized AoP when they did the same with Bobby Roode and Chad Gable.
We again saw Baley and Shasha Banks answer some questions from the crowd, which ended with Mickie James and Alicia Fox attacking them, again.
Instead of using the 3-hour slot for booking quality content, they are filling it with non-sensical segments and backstage promos. It can be clearly seen that the management is unaffected by their viewers' opinions and will only do what they seem fitting.
