The Good
For Raw, the ending of their show this week was the best we have seen in a long time. The ending segment was for Ric Flair’s birthday. While waiting for Flair to come to the ring, Batista made his comeback and attacked Flair. He did this in order to get the attention of Triple H. This definitely is the starting to the build of a match between Batista and Triple H at Wrestlemania.
For Smackdown, they had two different returns on their show this week and both of them were pretty surprising. With that being said though, Kevin Owens’ return had a bigger impact. During the contract signing between Kofi Kingston and Daniel Bryan, Vince McMahon decided to change things up and have Owens replace Kingston instead. This came out of nowhere and really shook things up for the WWE Championship picture, which is really positive going towards Fastlane as well as Wrestlemania.
The Bad
For Raw, while the build for the rivalry between Finn Balor and Bobby Lashley hasn’t been bad, seeing the same match between Lio Rush and Finn Balor for the past three weeks has gotten a little overwhelming. While these two are able to work together pretty well, there can be different ways to build this rivalry than having the same match.
For Smackdown, the only thing missing from their show this week was something for the tag team championship. That was one of the first matches announced for Fastlane and yet WWE couldn’t find time to showcase it this week.
The Final Verdict
Both shows were really good this week. Surprise returns, solid matches, and proper time for most of the rivalries going forward. But, the shock factor for Batista as well as Roman Reigns returning is how Raw won this week. Both shows were solid from beginning to end, but Raw was able to hit on all cylinders this week. In conclusion, WWE’s road to Wrestlemania stories have been very intriguing and hopefully they can keep this momentum going into next week.
