Instant Feedback: Live Together, Die Alone

All the ending of RAW needed was Dr. Jack Shephard giving a speech from a secluded beach about how if Team WWE didn't live together, then they were going to die alone. If you're a fan of LOST, you know exactly what I'm talking about and you're nodding. Tonight's RAW ending reminded us dual LOST/wrestling fans back to the first season of the recently-finished and iconic TV show, where Jack was pleading with the other castaways to put their differences aside. The difference though was they were initially surviving a plane crash. Team WWE faces the Nexus, a unified front of rookies who had just squashed six mid-carders and an announcer.

Yeah, about that. I initially felt good about the match. I'm not going to lie, I was smitten by some of the awesome spots that were laid out, most especially Skip Sheffield nailing Tyson Kidd with the best lariat ever. However, once the realization set in that Evan Bourne got squashed, that the Tag Champs got squashed and that Mark Henry got squashed for the sake of continuing to pound the round peg into a square hole, it was frustrating. Yes, Nexus had to win that match. No, it didn't need to be 7-0, and even if it did, would it have killed for Bourne, their newly minted megastar who is genuinely the most over face on the roster not named Randy Orton, to have gotten a few near falls? Would it have killed them for Henry, a guy who has proven he could get crowd reactions on the level of a top-card babyface, albeit for a very short period of time, to have killified a few guys and just missed on pins due to a save from another Nexus member? Would it have messed with their booking plans to have made the Harts, who hold gold, look like they were deserving of holding gold?

And that's where the frustration sets in with WWE booking. It can be so good for weeks and then they hit a wall where it just makes you go "wtf?" and it almost undoes whatever good they tried to do leading up to it. I don't care what your feelings were prior to now, but overreactions about the second week of the angle and Bryan Danielson's firing (I MENTIONED HIM AGAIN GAWD WHY CAN'T I STOP DOING THAT?) aside, this was the first major hiccup of the angle. It couldn't have come at a worse time.

Sadly though, the rest of the show was decent. The opening promo was okay. Cena carried it, but I was just aching to hear Jericho work the mic as a face just one more time. It was refreshing to see him work in the ring as a face, but as good as his jaded heel character is, it's kinda run its course. I want fun-loving, heavy metal, fan-favorite Chris Jericho back, or at the very least, smarmy, sarcastic, over-the-top heel Jericho again. C'mon Chris, you're pushing 40 and possibly leaving the company again. You don't have to continue the reinvention.

I will say though, the subplots in the WWE Championship angle are getting good too. I love the interplay between Sheamus and The Miz, and the segment that came after the face midcard burial was the best on the show all night.

But the main angle... teasing dissention in the ranks is sort of a hacky way to get things done, and honestly, it was so predictable that it just puts a damper on everything. IT was as well-done as you could possibly do, especially the end segment, so I guess I can't hate on it that bad, but maybe I was just wishing for them to do it more subtly, with uneasy truces that exploded when an unlikely source turned heel at SummerSlam.

However, if they start to introduce time travel or rebrand the Nexus as the Dharma Initiative, all bets are off.

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