WWE Backlash review: Smoke and mirrors

John Cena and Randy Orton met one last time (probably) on Saturday.

It started out relatively fine, some good back and forth, somewhat mechanical in nature but perfectly alright. The crowd was totally into hometown hero Orton even though most probably knew he wasn’t winning. Then we got the dreaded first ref bump of the match. Cena went through the new announce table that doesn’t do a good job of breaking. Another ref bump. Then Cena went through another table.

They wind back up in the ring with another ref who also gets taken out. For some reason this, somehow, causes SmackDown GM Nick Aldis and a bunch of former wrestler agents to come out and check on this one referee. Nevermind another referee was taken out earlier and was still laying on the floor, this is the referee they’re concerned about. Orton proceeded to lay everyone out one by one until it was just him and Cena. But then R-Truth came out to do the idiot shitck, he was taken out. Cena recovered just in the nick of time to low blow Orton then strike with the WWE Championship for the victory.

This was significantly better than Cena’s WrestleMania match, but geez Louise it was way too overbooked. Someone thought of doing THREE ref bumps in this match when one probably would have been fine. By the time of the third ref bump I was begging for this to end, and thankfully not long after it did. Cena clearly can’t go at the same level as other main event WWE stars so doing smoke and mirrors is fine. I would prefer he do it for the rest of the year. Just, please, do a finish that doesn’t suck.

What’s next for Cena? R-Truth. Yes, during the press conference Cena took out Truth and put him through a table. Remember when Triple H was winning the perception wars against AEW handily just a few months ago? Yeah, that seems to be running out fast.

Backlash overall was an easy show to watch, two in a half hours of mostly good wrestling padded with a lot of commercials and highlight videos and talking heads. I think there’s a happy medium between this and AEW’s five-hour twelve match format, but that’s just me.

Here’s the rest of the show:

• The four-way that opened the show was very good and probably the best match on the show overall, right next to Lynch/Valkyria. Very intense, a lot of cool spots and it helped that the crowd, which was hot all night, was totally into it. Based on the giant chokeslam spot at the end Drew McIntyre and Damian Priest are probably having one more big match, perhaps in Saudi Arabia as long as McIntyre is okay.
• Dominik Mysterio defeated Penta to retain the IC title in a good match. Mysterio did some cool stuff like a suicide dive into a DDT that looked very clean. The finish was a backdrop to El Grande Americano running in and interfering yet again, causing another loss for a luchador. I’m kinda ready to get to the part where Americano loses or gets unmasked because it seems like they’re too into the heat building part. Maybe Worlds Collide?
• Becky Lynch and Lyra Valkyria also had a very good match, with Lyra retaining the title in somewhat of a surprise. These two have terrific chemistry with one another and I think this will be a feud that gets over Valkyria, who is very good but needs something more here on the main roster level. The finish came out of nowhere, but Lynch’s beatdown afterwards clearly implies this is just the start of what will be a long storyline involving Valkyria, Lynch, and eventually Bayley.
• Gunther mostly destroyed Pat McAfee in a match that was perfectly fine. People got into McAfee big time and absolutely lost it when Cole took off his headset to help. But I have to say, McAfee’s offense looked so ineffective at times, particularly towards the end of the match as he’s throwing punches that did not look good at all, like Shane McMahon-level. Still, can’t complain too much about a match that the crowd enjoyed. I wonder what the direction is for Gunther moving forward…

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