WWE Hell in a Cell 2019 Discussion

[Kam 243]

 

The Card

 

Hell in a Cell match for the WWE Universal Championship

Seth Rollins © vs. "The Fiend" Bray Wyatt

 

Hell in a Cell match for the WWE Raw Women's Championship

Becky Lynch © vs. Sasha Banks

 

WWE Title Match

Daniel Bryan and Roman Reigns vs. Erick Rowan and Luke Harper

[Kam 243]

I'm hoping for The Fiend and Banks to take the titles! ?

[Poppy 31]

Becky and Sasha should've been the main event in my opinion. I surely hope this doesn't turn into a quick disqual match like we've seen before.

[Snarky-Guru 7]

I'm rubbish at predicting match winners, but I think Sasha Banks will come out on top. Well, I hope so at least because losing to Becky Lynch will surely ruin her momentum. It's making me miss Ronda Rousey, even though I snarked about her when she was actively wresting, Rousey's matches with Lynch were entertaining.

[Zack T 171]

It seems like the Fiend is gonna win, but I question the timing. I dunno. I wouldn't be surprised if Seth somehow escapes with the Universal title without beating the Fiend, but I dunno how that'd go down.

[DandyMandy 25]

**Spoilers**

The match between Natalya and Lacey was way more entertaining than I thought it would be. Evans is getting better. Now I just hope that the creative team puts that feud to rest.

I'm hoping for Banks to take the title.

There, there dear Kam. It'll be okay. Sasha will get her next time.

Really, who will beat Becky now? Asuka (after a switch)? I figured she'd lose this match and move back to SD. It was an excellent bout between two great performers, but I went into it thinking Sasha would defeat Becky.

[ShadowEdge 48]

I'm still aggravated. I would've been happy for either Seth Rollins or The Fiend to win. I knew it was going to be a great match either way. What on earth happened to that ending??? Has a stoppage/DQ happened before just like this one? If so, I can't recall it. I figured something must have gone wrong and one of them was seriously hurt, thus the reason to stop the match like they did. But nope, it doesn't look like it. The crowd was furious.

[Zack T 171]

I only watched the 2 HIAC matches. I bounced around a bit to see what else happened, but mostly read those results.

 

Sasha/Becky was definitely very good. Disappointed that Becky retained, felt like the time was right for a new champion and Sasha was a good fit. But all the same, good match.

 

As for the Fiend and Seth...the red lighting effect reminded me of Sin Cara's old lighting when he first debuted. I know that was blue, but similar concept. The Fiend got a decent amount of offense in, but yea it was mostly just him appearing to be a monster and shrugging off everything Seth threw at him, which was great. It was even great up through when the Fiend kicked out at 1 after 3 Stomps, that was some Brock Lesnar type stuff. For a minute, I was hopeful that they were trying to establish the Fiend as being nearly as unbeatable as Brock is. Then Seth kept hitting the stomp over and over again, and I was like AW COME ON. But the Fiend kicked out after 7 Stomps, which is utterly ridiculous but promising right? NOPE. More stomps, more stomps, I think he did 12 or 13 all together, plus a Pedigree. The chair shot to the head spot was sick, I liked that, the ladder + chair was good. But at this point it just felt like we were watching a video game and Seth was just beating down an opponent who'd put down the controller and walked away.

 

Then the ref stopping it was absolute trash. I appreciate the post match beatdown Fiend gave him, but come on. WWE actually had a pretty damn good week last week. Raw was decent, NXT was stellar, Smackdown was good, all they had to do was not completely screw up HIAC and they'd be golden. But they couldn't do that, they dropped the ball at the very end and we end the show with fans booing, chanting bullsh**, and chanting for AEW. Good job guys. Good job.

 

It's their own damn faults too, they absolutely DID NOT have to go this route. The Fiend shouldn't have even been in a Universal title match at this point, he should've been feuding with someone, anyone else, like the Miz as originally planned, that'd have been good. But they decided to repeat history the same way they did with Ryback in 2012 and write themselves into a corner and the only way out of it was to blow the whole thing up.

[Snarky-Guru 7]

I hope Bayley's meltdown is foreshadowing a change to her image/gimmick. She really needs to try something new.

 

I was really into The Fiend and now I'm just confused about what happened. I thought something might have gone down behind the scenes, but surely we would've heard about it by now. Who is to blame? Eric Bischoff? Paul Heyman? Other members of the creative team? Vince?

[Kam 243]

Urg!

 

The show started off great, Becky and Sasha delivered, easily my favourite match of the night. I was gutted Sasha lost, she never got past Charlotte in their feud and now she's lost her feud with Becky also. This would have been the perfect time for it.

 

I enjoyed the tag match too, nice brawl.

 

I would have really liked it if they let Ali rollup Orton after that RKO swerve but I guess having 2 surprise wins on the show is too much.

 

When did Asuka and Sane turn heel? They acted like heels from the start of the match. LOVED Asuka with the mist.

 

I'm glad Gable won.

 

Gutted for Baley...I wonder if she'll end up being drafted back to NXT.

 

The Fiend entrance looked cool here too. I HATED the lighting during the match, I never liked it when they did it with the Sin Cara matches. I thought the booking was ridiculous. The stomp being used so many times just devalues the move. Having the referee stop the match was silly too. There was no reason to book this match if they didn't want to follow through with the push. It reminds me of when they hot shotted Ryback to face Punk soon after his debut, only for him not to win the title (albeit due to The Shield interference) and it hindered him. Similar deal with Braun.

 

Seems like the fans enjoyed it though :D

 

 

[DandyMandy 25]

I was really into The Fiend and now I'm just confused about what happened.

Right! How could the ref end it for too much violence when it's been well-established that anything goes in that cell. Didn't Mankind go through worse? How on earth will they play this off next year? I think the WWE needs to retire Hell in a Cell. It's been a thing since the late 90s and it's a tired gimmick now. Plus, it often goes wrong. Do you guys remember the time they had "vicious" dogs involved? I think it was still the WWF at that time. The dogs basically sniffed each other and played around while the commentary crew and wrestlers tried to act like they were dangerous dogs out for blood. It was comical.

[Zack T 171]

Vince McMahon is responsible for everything Seth/Fiend related at HIAC. Apparently he laughed off crowd reaction AT FIRST, but then by the end of the show, was clearly realizing he screwed up big time.

 

The Fiend still has hope, after all he wasn't truly defeated and withstood more punishment than anyone ever has that I can recall. But I'm not sure how optimistic I should be about his prospects.

 

As for Asuka/Sane, they weren't ever turned heel. Apparently it was just decided "Hey they're heel now". No actual turn. IT WAS APPARENTLY SUPER IMPORTANT FOR THEM TO BE HEELS RIGHT HERE AND NOW, NO TIME FOR A PROPER TURN.

[Poppy 31]

Someone who matters obviously really likes Corbin. And that's okay. But why don't they teach him? There are few natural talents in this world, most of the greats have to learn how to be great. So teach Corbin. Work with him. Make him entertaining while in the ring.

 

I bet the AEW crew loved HIAC.

[Ogmore 28]

Well, I've finally watched it and I don't think it was a bad PPV. I'm disappointed in certain outcomes but it was hardly horribly. Randy Orton's match was a little slow, but the only real downside was Rollins v. The Fiend and it was good up until the ridiculous stomps. I think I liked this PPV because I haven't had the time to view the weekly programmes. I just assumed Asuka had turned heel and I'd missed it.

[Zack T 171]

The problem with HIAC was that it was a throwaway PPV in the truest sense of the word. They announced 4 matches to lead in to the show (Both HIAC matches, DBry/Roman vs Bludgeon Brothers, and Bayley/Charlotte was added at the last minute on Friday). Everything else was just random filler thrown in there to occupy time. It felt like most of the show just honestly didn't matter a whole bunch (aside from the women's tag titles changing hands), as they put all their focus on Raw/NXT/Smackdown this week and the draft is next week. Add to that the fact they wrote themselves into a corner with the Fiend/Seth Rollins situation, and that they ended the show on such a horrible note that we're all gonna remember it as a crap show.

[Zack T 171]

I get WWE Fan Council Survey e-mails a couple times each month. So today I got one, and I thought "HERE. WE. GO."

 

I rated HIAC very poorly. They give you a big text box to write Why in, and here's what I wrote them.

 

The company did an absolutely terrible job of promoting hell in a cell. It's as if it got lost in the shuffle amidst Smackdown's debut on Fox and NXT's first 2 hour show on USA and Raw's season premiere. Yes, Hell in a cell was advertised on all these shows, but only 3 matches during the week were actually announced with a 4th (Bayley/Charlotte) being announced after Smackdown.

 

When has WWE EVER gone into a big pay per view type event with just 4 matches announced? That's ridiculous. It made the whole event feel like filler.

 

The main problem above all others was the ending to the show. For starters, there was absolutely no reason why this had to happen at all - The Fiend DID NOT need to be in a Universal title match so early. But it feels as though after all the merchandise Bray Wyatt sold during Summerslam weekend that the company was only seeing dollar signs and not common sense, so they rushed this.

 

But that's what we got, so let's talk about why it was horrible. The red lighting is part of it. I don't know if it was necessarily bad, but it wasn't good either. Reminded me a lot of the way the lights went dark and blue for Sin Cara when he first debuted, and it's just not a good effect because it makes the match more difficult to watch for the live crowd. Past that, the match itself was actually pretty good up until the point where Seth Rollins began Stomping the Fiend literally a dozen times. Even that was fine for awhile because it felt like we were seeing an unstoppable monster rising up before us, until it just kept going...and going...and going. It felt like Seth Rollins was playing WWE 2K20 and his opponent had put down their controller and just walked away. Finally, the ref stopping the match was absolutely stupid. Let's just ignore the fact that the Fiend had his own hammer (that was bigger and heavier than the sledgehammer) that he used on Seth earlier in the match, let's just ignore the fact that it's a no disqualification match and throw it all out the window because clearly, the company realized the Fiend shouldn't be pinned/submitted yet, but they didn't want him to win that night for some reason and so this is the only way out. Great. Just like last year, let's end a hell in a cell match in a no contest (Cause that was so well received when Brock wrecked Braun/Roman last year, clearly the company pays attention to what worked or didn't work *rolls eyes*).

 

The Fiend is saveable. He doesn't need the title just yet, just let him terrorize people. Stop writing yourselves into corners where the only way out is to do something stupid. The company had a great week overall last week with Raw, NXT, and Smackdown, BUT you ended it on such a bad tasting note with Fiend/Seth at HIAC that all the good will you built up in the week to promote this "new era" felt wasted, like we're just gonna get more of the same. Stop it. Task writers or producers with actually double checking what's been done in the past so you don't make the same mistakes. Have them check what other people are planning on doing in their matches so people stop doing 20 suicide dives per night, or doing the same spots. Be smarter. You're a multi-billion dollar company, but apparently you can't hire writers who know how to make a scripted promo sound like an actual conversation instead of a monologue, who can't even take into account the fact that the wrestler is going to be asked a question by an interviewer and the answer needs to sound like an actual answer to that question and not just a scripted promo they had before hand (I'm talking about Rey Mysterio's promo the next night on Raw, that was absolutely awful and it's not his fault, the script was trash).

 

You have the resources to do better, and yet you consistently focus only on production values and presentation, while the actual wrestling and storylines are subpar at best. Take a different approach. Stop trying to counter-program AEW so hard, it just makes you look like a bully and also like a liar when WWE representatives act like they're aloof and unconcerned. You don't need to transform into AEW to be good, you just need to do WWE better. Hire writers who actually understand wrestling, not reality or syndicated TV, that's NOT WORKING and it hasn't worked for years. You're an entertainment company, but at the core of that is wrestling and if you can't present a better wrestling product, you won't entertain folks. Get it together.

[Gareth The Great 20]

The problem with HIAC was that it was a throwaway PPV in the truest sense of the word.

Did you know that going in, mate? I didn't. I expected a brilliant PPV due to their competition with AEW. Plus, they seemed to pull out all the stops for NXT the Wed before. I thought they were keeping much of the card secret to build anticipation because what we'd get was going to be a big deal. I thought The Fiend would be another unstoppable phenom like The Undertaker and I guess he was, but it just felt off.

 

@Kam Yeah, I'm glad Shorty Gable won, but then he got punked in the end. That bit was ridiculous. And is that a thing now? Calling him "Shorty"? He seems to be embracing it and hey, maybe it'll help him get over with the fans. Whatever works.

[Zack T 171]

If the fact that only 4 matches (Really just 3) were announced before the show started didn't tell you that, then I dunno what will.

[ShadowEdge 48]

@Zack T That's a good point, but to be fair there are often issues with the card. Sometimes it's a last minute thing and there are some that go without being promoted or discussed. A match will be announced then it will change, or there'll be a last minute surprise guest, or a surprise tag-team match, or star is supposed to show who doesn't, or whatever. Last year (I think) the arena for HIAC leaked the card info in advance which caused problems with the audience knowing the feuds and winners of matches during the weeks leading up to HIAC. So I guess it's reasonable to think the WWE was keeping the information quiet, but had big things planned. I mean, didn't AEW have more viewers than NXT (with some veteran stars) the Wednesday before? The HIAC card could've been thrown together after that in an effort to show off. Vince is said to be naturally competitive after all. I get what you mean about the whole thing though.

 

As an aside, I'm beginning to like AJ more and more. He's good at selling it.

[Zack T 171]

To put it in perspective, the last time WWE announced so few matches for a big show was ECW's failed PPV, December To Dismember in 2006. It just doesn't happen. The whole "Card subject to change" thing doesn't lead them to not announce matches, just gives them the freedom to change them without refund-riots if they have to change for whatever reason (Such as TLC a couple years ago when Roman and Bray had to be pulled from their matches due to illness and replaced with Kurt Angle and AJ Styles)