Roman Reigns, predictably, walked out of AT&T Stadium at the end of WrestleMania 32 with the WWE championship.
Also predictably, The Undertaker defeated Shane McMahon in Hell in a Cell, though you would not have predicted how.
Nor would you have had the second best match of the night being for the Women’s Title.
Good show overall, maybe because of the historically low expectations for this WrestleMania, with all the injuries and card-shifting that had to be done.
MVP: Shane McMahon
I was among the legion who felt that WWE was beyond desperation in booking Shane O’Mac for Hell in a Cell against ‘Taker, but McMahon more than rose to the occasion, hitting the Coast to Coast and then daring to do the unthinkable.
At my WM32 watch party, I said the one thing I could guarantee wouldn’t happen in this HIAC or any other future HIACs would be a repeat of Mick Foley’s dumbass climb to the top of the cage that led to the inevitable fall onto the announce table.
McMahon actually did ol’ Mick one better: he climbed to the top to try an elbow drop on Undertaker on an announce table, and missed.
Crazy stuff there, man, knowing when you’re standing on the edge looking down what’s about to happen, and not crapping your pants at the thought.
That one move stole the nearly seven-hour show.
Marathon, not a sprint: Did it really go that long?
The kickoff show started at 5 p.m. Eastern. The main event concluded around 11:45 p.m. Eastern. For some reason, the bookers decided to put the wack-ass Andre the Giant battle royale in the 10 p.m. Eastern hour, and gave it way, way too much time, ending around 10:30. Then we got the guest appearance by The Rock, and you knew they weren’t bringing him out for a quick hello.
With the Wyatt Family and then John Cena making special appearances, it was after 11 Eastern before the extended promo package touting the main event began to run.
My party had long since broken up, with the kids having to go home to go to bed, my wife asleep on the couch, and me fighting it.
It didn’t need to go that long, by a long shot.
Why do fans loathe Roman Reigns?
One thing I will never get: the boos we hear raining down during Roman Reigns matches.
They sound to me to be piped in, honestly. I don’t attend many live events, but the last two that I was able to attend in Virginia had Reigns on the cards, and he got mad cheers from those crowds.
I watch on TV, and he gets booed lustily.
I don’t get it. What did he ever do to deserve the enmity of the fans, other than win the Royal Rumble that fans thought a couple of years ago that Daniel Bryan was supposed to win?
Face it, folks: Bryan is retired, and before he retired, he was a small kicker and puncher who every so often did an insane dive through the ropes.
That’s not the fault of Roman Reigns.
Boo him, boo whoever WWE wants to install as champ, boo yourselves for booing everybody.
Some folks just want to enjoy the damn show.
Match of the Night #2: The ladies almost steal the show
So, ‘Taker-McMahon was the showstopper with the dive off the cage, and the rest of that one had more than enough compelling moments.
The Charlotte-Becky Lynch-Sasha Banks match was the best match from start to finish and without gimmicky high spots.
The ladies can wrestle these days, and props to Triple H, in his role as the head of the talent development division who breathed life into NXT, for getting us there.
We can probably do without any more ladder matches
I love that Zack Ryder won the Intercontinental Title, and when I don’t think about how many years were taken off the end of lives of those involved, I can say that I really enjoyed the ladder-match opener.
But that said, this is why wrestlers have shorter life spans than any other profession, and I might as well lump in the Undertaker-McMahon and Brock Lesnar-Dean Ambrose matches here to be consistent.
All three were fun as hell to watch, but I feel like a Roman in the Colosseum rooting for one guy against the other in a fight to the death watching them anymore.
Give me AJ Styles-Chris Jericho in a strong-style match any day of the week.
Review by Chris Graham
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