RAW - 5.18.20
 

1 day b4 May 19th

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">It's been a week of quarantine since our last RAW so there's no telling who else is pregnant now <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/RAWTonight?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#RAWTonight</a></p>&mdash; WWE Creative Humor (@WWECreative_ish) <a href="https://twitter.com/WWECreative_ish/status/1262391327687430146?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">May 18, 2020</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

I'm here, guys. Don't worry.

So, AEW has a roster crowd.

Doosan Bears of the KBO put some cardboard cutouts of fans behind home plate.

Today, FC Seoul got caught with having sex dolls as a fake crowd. Not their fault. A fan who is owner of a company that makes them supplied them.

And we still wait to see what WWE does to get rid of the crickets.

Have there always been so many shots of a band playing during this raw intro or is this new?

:lol: FC Seoul

Not sure that would be PG for WWE

It's been like that ever since Dio Madden's first episode, but they don't always show the opening anymore, so it's easy not to notice.

...and we're really gonna stick with this "best wrestling match...ever" thing?

Charly is so smoking hot.

Oddly enough, I'm almost getting used to it. I'd really prefer a crowd, though.

Get out of my living room, Randy.

In a good mood tonight. The last feature film I was in is getting released tomorrow on DVD, Blu-Ray, and Vimeo.

That's right, guys. I'm in a movie being released on...MAY 19th!

I'll be setting people on fire in no time at this rate.

Going from a Last Man Standing to a regular match still seems ass backwards for a feud and booking.

Edge is still around?

Is he still alive in Vikings?

The term workhorse is fine when discussing as fans, but when they refer to it on air, I think it sounds awkward. Shouldn't a point of a fight be to win, and to win quickly? The goal shouldn't really be 30 minute bouts every night, ya know?

The greatest wrestling match...ever...will happen at Backlash. In front of no one. Is that what I am to understand here?

I'll definitely take another Murphy/Black match.

Rollins looks dressed for a funeral.

Murphy's spending that Messiah push money on snazzy jackets.

6 FEET!

I know that Drew just got the title, and I like him a lot...but I kinda feel like Seth could really use the title in this gimmick. At least some kinda title.

Despite one of the AOP's being injured, Rollins still should have the non-injured one around as the muscle for his group.

One of these days I'm going to figure out what was the video game song I've heard before that sounds similar to Rollins theme.

Carillo's gotta stop being given a microphone. He could have just run in and kicked off a brawl to set up a match for later between the two.

Oh fuck, Murphy's on double duty.

Charlotte might be the most annoying person on the mic these days in WWE and not in a good heel way.

I have RAW on in another tab but have only switched over to mute it a few times while watching clips of movies on YT.

It sounds pretty boring so far.

Any mentions of Shad or does Vince still hate brown people?

Kane is gonna be PISSED!

https://www.wwe.com/f/styles/gallery...ref_512006.jpg

Pretty much so far. Only real difference compared to recent weeks is it being very talk heavy like with last week's show.

Oh great, Nia Trash

Asuka gets me to switch to my tab with Raw playing

oh, nia

:lol: at this celebration segment.

Whelp Nia's out here to ruin the fun.

Not sure if Truth became legit crazy after acting like one for years or this was Creative's legit best idea for a nothing feud between him and Lashley.

This might be worse than the infidelity angle Lashley was in months ago.

I thought The Iconics were off TV to get a reboot of their characters?

They are literally the exact same as they were.

Creative somehow keeps coming up with some of the worst non-finishes for matches, especially with these empty arena shows.

All that finish did was make the IIconics look like big morons in the end.

r they breaking up the iiconics now

Doubt it although its not like the division has any real teams anymore besides them.

5 Nia Jax segments in one episode of RAW, good lord

This show likely is doing a record low rating

Submission match was decent I guess.

Guess Natty is not a fan of the KO Show.

Natty was born 2 days after me

Ring crew did a sloppy job

I'm surprised they've not given the group a proper name

Creative would need to actually care about them for that to happen.

Zelina's crew might be even more of a bigger bust than Sheamus' League of Nations was.

It's been the 2 worst being featured tonight, Nattie and Nia.

Where are the talent cuts when we need them?

Tag match was decent.

Wonder if Theory is going back to NXT considering his current RAW run has been very forgettable and he was only really brought in to beef up RAW's depleted roster.

These axe throwing skits would be more entertaining or effective if either Street Profits or Vikings Raiders were an actual comedic team. Instead feels just as dumb as last week's basketball skits.

Wonder how long till Theory gets kicked out of Rollins group.

This would also have been a pretty good ending for RAW if the show had actually ended now.

Apollo is boring as hell on the mic.

All those axe throwing segments just to reuse the same "they were actually faking being bad" joke from last week.

Also that didn't even make sense with the setup involving the cops.

LOL Wait, the brand to brand invitational is only available 4 times a year?

Charlotte already to Smackdown
King Corbin already to Raw
AJ Styles already to Smackdown to be in IC Tourney.

Just burning through those 4 times.

Lashley vs Drew at Backlash looks like

The way Cole mentioned it on last week's Smackdown, seems its more like each wrestler gets 4 appearances per year and only 1 wrestler can invoke it for their brand per week.

Already guarantees Styles can't win the tournament or else WWE has to quickly break their new rule.

This show seems like it was pretty good based on the results (due to things actually happening and storylines seemingly being furthered) but feels like whenever I think that, people who watched the show say that it was insanely boring

I only watched parts of it but listened to all of it playing in a tab while doing other things and it was insanely boring

Drew vs. Corbin was decent at best.

:lol: at Corbin losing two high profile matches in a row. Such a terrible choice to be the first one to showcase for the new rule.

This week's episode was somewhat decent overall. More due to the pretty good job they did with story building stuff and way less due to ring action since it was the weakest in a while.

Glad "my man" Austin Theory is kind of getting a push... Have a "soft spot" 4 him due to watching him in EVOLVE and thinking he was really good there

Aren’t both Styles and Charlotte having matches on Friday? So that’s the 1 wrestler per week rule blown (albeit I don’t think I’ve heard them mention that part on TV).

They did a really bad job explaining the “rules” on Raw. Definitely sounded like it was 4x a year for each brand.

They really shouldn’t have put rules on it at all.

Putting rules at all is pointless because they will 100% ignore them as soon as they decide they want to book someone on another show.

Yep.

This show was somewhat interesting. There wasn't a lot of useless filler, really. Natalya is the female Big Show when it comes to alignment turns.

Raw Thoughts

They’ve got a handful of things bubbling along that I’m finding interesting. I’m quite keen on Drew vs Lashley but I think my expectation has been skewed by an incredible match I had between the two on WWE 2K19 (insane I know). They’re two big dudes who can go in the ring. I’m onboard with the MVP/Lashley pairing too.

The Austin Theory joining Seth angle I liked too. Seth taking advantage of people when they’re at there lowest point is an interesting wrinkle in the tail, and it advances this cult/prophet deal as having Murphy as his only disciple would have limited range. Not entirely sure it’s part of the plan but I like that Seth has taken on one of Zelina’s outcasts when he’s on a collision course with Aleister Black. What intel did Theory get on Black from being in his (real life) wife’s group? Though I doubt we’ll see that play out.

Hoping we get both Seth vs Rey and Seth vs Black over the coming weeks/months.