It's been a long running gag around places I frequent on the Internet that the ad nauseam recaps the WWE runs during its programming make my blood boil with the intensity of a hot spring. It's not unwarranted. I do hate those recaps for the most part, especially ones that virtually replay an entire segment from earlier in the night, or ones that are repeats of recaps they ran earlier in the show. I know that they want to drive home the importance of angles and stuff, but I feel the way they recap stuff is overkill.
But the thing is, I don't think that recaps are bad in and of themselves. I have to say that the WWE production team does a stellar job with these. For example, the much-praised Undertaker/HBK feud recap that aired on RAW the other night was fantastic. The song was right, the clips that were picked were the right ones and the pacing was fantastic. You can watch it here. The problem I had with it though, it's a video package that's better suited to go before their match at WrestleMania, on PPV, not one that you sink up time on free TV for. It's the timing and length of the recaps and the utilization of the TV time they have remaining for the other things on the show, namely building the other angles and actual wrestling.
It's not all "hurr, they need moar tiem for Evin Born to do his flipz!!1" like the reason why I was accused of not liking recaps at one board. That is just one of the reasons, but it's not the largest one, especially heading into WrestleMania. The build to WrestleMania is the climax to the year. It's not the time to build new guys up on the main shows, it's the time to really amp up the builds to your marquee matches. So it's a shame that a guy such as Bourne isn't going to get much TV time except to job here or compete in a MitB qualifier there, but that's the breaks. Time is needed for matches and events surrounding the WM card.
But wait, you say, that's what those recaps set out to do, why are you bitching? Well, here's the thing. They're clumsily put together or placed in the show. There was a recap last year that replayed the entire segment where John Cena revealed he videotaped Vickie Guerrero and Big Show making out backstage the next week. Barely any editing at all. It was just an example in the total malaise that every match save HBK/UT had going into last year's WrestleMania. It was like each feud had its own big moment between No Way Out and WrestleMania and the rest of each feud was just lazily advanced with .500 heat trades and squash matches featuring the heels' inept henchmen (Chavo Guerrero, Legacy, etc.) The feuds aren't being driven home due to great build week-in and week-out; they're being built by repetition of single events here and there.
That's my problem, the recaps are being used by a lazy writing team that really doesn't want to do the work to make WrestleMania special. Notice that this only happens during the build to WM, when they don't have to build a new star or when they have to actually write angles and feuds to sell PPVs since WM sells itself. Yet, looking back, that's not how it used to be. I mean, the MegaPowers exploding was a masterfully crafted angle. Austin/Hart, great feud with a stellar blowoff at WM13. The Ironman match the year before... it wasn't just the matches that felt epic, but it was the lead-ins going into them.
If they did recaps short style, like hitting the two or three major things that happened during the important events they want to refresh and left more time for the wrestlers to perform and give us something more to build on, it would be great. Imagine how different last year might have been if they had fleshed the angle out among Show, Cena and Edge better instead of just playing off that clip and then replays of the little that happened each subsequent week? Imagine how much more exciting Money in the Bank could be if they actually gave it more than just a group interview the week before WM as a build and actually put subplots into it rather than making it just a midcard talent dump.
So when I groan about recaps on the card, don't mistake it for not wanting them at all. If there were no recaps, then it'd be like TNA, who could stand to use a recap package here or there rather than throwing a million details and snarky, insider comments out there and expecting people other than the Crucial Crew to remember them. I just want them to be used smarter and not used as a replacement for quality booking. Make my WrestleMania special again, WWE. Give me a build rather than one event and a million recaps, please.
