This week’s show starts with a recap of the brilliant angle that ended last week’s SmackDown, with it being revealed that Edge was behind the attacks on La Familia, when he turned on Chavo and tipped Vickie out of her wheelchair, promising to make her pay for putting him in Hell In A Cell with The Undertaker. I said it last week that it was a fantastic angle, and it really was, Edge has got across the fact that he can go psycho with anybody, and that’s such a dramatic character shift from the chickenshit who used his relationship with Vickie and took the cheap way out of everything that it’s a testament to how good a performer Edge is that he was able to pull it off so successfully and not have it look out of place.

Jim Ross and Tazz are announcing again this week, and I hope that is a permanent move, along with keeping Matt Striker with Todd Grisham on ECW where that team has been a revelation the last two weeks.

The opening match is Shelton Benjamin v. Jeff Hardy for the US Title. I was dreading this because I hated their match last week, but I was pleasantly surprised because this was fantastic, probably Shelton’s best singles match in the WWE (yes, even above the Shawn Michaels RAW match).

In a week, Shelton seemed to learn how to play a heel without either playing for crowd pops or doing boring shit like hour long chinlocks, and it added to the match significantly. He would duck outside at the right times, sell at the right times, bump like a maniac for Jeff, and you’d hope this is the week where the lightbulb goes off for him and he gets it. Hardy was fantastic as usual, he sold brilliantly, his comebacks were spectacular, he hit his spots in a way that made sense in the match without looking like they were contrived, and the two guys controlled the crowd fantastically, to the point where at the end they were just DYING to see Jeff win the belt.

The ending saw Jeff climb up top for the swanton bomb, but MVP came behind him and shoved him off the top for the DQ. After the match, Hardy took both MVP and Benjamin out with swanton bombs, which I guess means MVP is beating him on Sunday.

Vickie Guerrero is backstage panicking about Edge and Undertaker being there, and Victoria is there with her for some reason. But hey, if it gets her on TV every week without having to do jobs to Maria or Kelly Kelly then great.

Up next was Michelle McCool and Maria v. Maryse and Natalya. God bless Maryse, she looks incredible and manages to get heat, but my god she can barely walk properly never mind wrestle. Even when doing basic shit like punches she looks like she’s about to fall over and break her legs. Natalya got the pin by taking McCool down and covering her following Maryse’s distraction in a short match that didn’t really have much to it.

The Brian Kendrick and HIS MAN ZEKE were out next, and Kendrick cuts a promo about how great he is. His opponent is Scotty Goldman, who some people who follow independent wrestling might have known as Colt Cabana.

Significantly, Goldman got to cut a 1980s style promo in the box in the corner of the screen as he was entering, and used some comedy to get himself over rather than just going with a bland “its my dream to debut in WWE yay me!” kind of thing, and it’s clear he wasn’t just a TV jobber but a regular character on WWE TV now.

The match was fine, and it was good for Kendrick that he was able to get a clean victory with The Kendrick for once without having Ezekiel distract his opponent, but Goldman got to do some of his former trademark spots in a losing effort. This was fine, and I hope Goldman is on TV next week too, because I think he has a decent future in the WWE as a comic relief midcard guy, something the WWE haven’t really had for a couple of years, and it’s perfect for the new PG-rated kid-friendly promotion.

Triple H is backstage being interviewed by some woman. After clips are shown of him being laid out by Khali last week, HHH says he’s getting revenge at SummerSlam. Then Kenny Dykstra confronts him and says HHH better worry about him tonight rather than looking ahead to Khali. HA.

The Great Khali and Ranjin Singh come out, and through Singh’s translation we learn that Khali has said that Triple H is great (did we really need a translator there? That’s like the golden rule of HHH feuds, you have to talk constantly about how great HHH is) and what a great career he’s had, so he should retire rather than ruin all that when Khali destroys him on Sunday.

HHH comes out for a short squash victory over Kenny Dykstra where HHH never took his eyes off Khali in the entire match, which lasted about a minute. After the match, Khali gets in the ring and they get into a brawl, but HHH can’t hit the pedigree, so instead he clotheslines Khali out of the ring so both guys can shout at each other as they cut to a break. This was done really well, and not having HHH hit the pedigree here means there’s still room for him to hit it at SummerSlam and have it be something new.

Up next is The Big Show v. Ryan Braddock, who wrestled as Jay Bradley in WWE developmental territory Florida Championship Wrestling. After Show doing his million-dollar-dream-into-spinning-slam move, he knocks Braddock out with a punch for the win. Good short match that did it’s job in painting Show as a monster.

Then MVP cuts a promo backstage about how he’s better than Hardy and will beat him at SummerSlam. This was very good. As was the next R-Truth vignette, this time set in prison and showing him working out.

Vladimir Kozlov v. Festus was next, and regardless of the fact that the match is being done far too early, it was fucking great. A totally old-style big man v. big man brawl, where both guys had been somewhat protected by booking to the point where you felt like you were watching something fresh and important. Festus was on top for most of the match, with Kozlov selling and bumping for him more than he has for anybody, before Festus went for the flying shoulderblock but was met with the headbutt for the win. That was an excellent ending and the fact that it put down a monster like Festus made the headbut look like a killer deadly finisher.

The show finished with a video package of the Edge/Vickie/Taker Hell In A Cell build. Or the UK version of the show did anyway. In the US, apparently there was a segment where Victoria wheeled Vickie out to her limo but Edge was there, so he basically kidnapped her and forced her out on stage to humiliate her, but like I said I didn’t see it so can’t comment.

Mark Bright
mark@wwepreview.com