WrestleMania Week 2021 is, for all intents and purposes, finished. Technically, WWE is constituting Monday Night Raw and Tuesday’s NXT as part of it, but that’s more so the start of the next chapter.
With the past seven days behind us, I wanted to look back on the ride that it was and call attention to the highest of highs and the lowest of lows, as there were certainly a good number of both.
Keep in mind that with any list like this, it’s my own personal list. Obviously, your opinion may differ in terms of what was good and bad, as well as how you’d rank them. By all means, give us your thoughts in the comments below and tell us your list!
Without further ado, I’ll start breaking down the top five worst to get the bad news out of the way.
#5 Worst – Rain Delay
To be perfectly honest, I don’t think this is as bad as it could have been, but it fundamentally has to be on this list just on principle alone.
It was very strange to kick off WrestleMania, only to immediately go into a delay for the first time in 37 years. Killing time for 45 minutes with more promos wasn’t something I felt like watching, but I can’t fault WWE for it. They can’t control the weather.
We had some decent impromptu promos and some people who were floundering. It was interesting to see who could sink or swim on a moment’s notice. But it isn’t something I doubt anyone wishes there was more of.
It could’ve been much worse and at least it gave us something interesting to talk about and another “first time ever” thing for the record books.
#4 Worst – Dealing with Peacock
If I were grading on a curve of what frustrated me the most, it would easily be this. This transition to Peacock has been problematic in more ways than one with the only benefit to this being that you don’t have to pay double to watch The Office if that’s your thing.
The lack of a pause and rewind function is awful. I, like many others, ran into some issues where it would say I was watching on too many devices at the same time even if I only had 1 of those active. The no-commercial tier shows you plenty of commercials, because apparently, those commercials don’t count as commercials. Mind-boggling.
But worst of all is the delay. My phone’s app was 30 seconds ahead of my computer and Xfinity feeds, and all of Peacock seems to be somewhere between 2-5 minutes behind the actual WWE Network. This meant the entire week, I had to avoid social media during matches because a few times, I was hit with a text where someone said “Well that match sucked” and I had to wait a minute or so to see the ending, or something similar.
After reaching out to Peacock to ask why this was the case, there was no solid answer. Basically, this is a situation where “thank you for your feedback, but we either know this is a problem and don’t want to acknowledge it, or we don’t care and would like it very much if you shut up and just renew your subscription anyway” is all those representatives want to say.
This isn’t entirely WWE’s fault, but as partners in this deal, it’s something WWE suffers blowback from. Yes, this is a new transition, but that doesn’t stop it from being a problem that WWE and Peacock need to take seriously, rather than just blow off as “people will always complain no matter what, so none of their concerns matter.”
#3 Worst – NXT UK Prelude
What a waste. This show had the potential to be a mini TakeOver and to really do something cool to get people talking, but it just flat out wasn’t that.
The matches were fine, but not memorable. No one is talking about them and to be fair, no one was talking about them later that same day, even.
While I’m more than okay with the title staying where it’s at, if WALTER had dropped the belt to Rampage Brown, at least it would have felt like it served a purpose. But the tag team match, for instance, proved this was just a regular episode of NXT UK with a bad subtitle attached to it.
I’m one of the few people out there, likely, who bothered to watch it from start to finish, and I have nothing at all to say about it other than that if I wasn’t always trying to be as informed as possible as a foundation for my analysis articles/podcasts, I would have easily wished I could have skipped it entirely and wouldn’t have actually missed a thing. It would have been a bigger deal for me to have slept a little later that day or something.
#2 Worst – Randy Orton vs. The Fiend
I knew it. I’ve been saying for months, from the very start of this feud in November, that this was not going to live up to being worth any of the time invested in it. And guess what? I was right.
For MONTHS, WWE dragged this story out without actually having anything to do. It was just a constant reminder that Orton had done something and teases that Wyatt will do something all to lead up to…what? A slightly different variation of the black goo, a generic match under red lights, a jack-in-the-box entrance and another win from Orton?!
Terrible. Absolutely terrible. Can we please stop putting these two together and can we please stop booking feuds from November to WrestleMania without having a game plan in mind of how to properly make it worth that much of an investment?
#1 Worst – Everything Revolving Around the Women’s Tag Team Titles
WWE decided to take the Andre the Giant Memorial Battle Royal and the SmackDown Tag Team Championship off the WrestleMania card because “there wasn’t enough time”, but then split the women’s tag team title match in two.
We got a rushed last minute “I don’t know, how about a multi-woman match?” type of booking for the “build” for this, between a bunch of teams that had all lost and a makeshift Billie Kay and Carmella team that WWE botched the announcement of, with the wrong graphics.
Then, it leads to the worst match on Night 1 where Mandy Rose slips and falls on the ramp, there are wardrobe malfunctions, Greg Hamilton announces The Riott Squad as eliminated when they make an elimination, and the least popular tag team wins…only to go on to lose the next night in a match that was so bland it had the crowd chanting for CM Punk at one point.
Reginald wasn’t even there! The guy who has had more revolving around him for both the women’s tag and SmackDown Women’s Championship wasn’t able to go to WrestleMania, so all of that time was wasted, too.
Everything about this, in all facets, was awful, except for the fact that these women got a chance to perform in front of a crowd. But you know what? The fact that WWE split this match in two meant that Natalya and Tamina got twice the opportunity to do that while the Fatal 4-Way and ATGMBR competitors didn’t get a moment.
I’d love to hear an argument for how this is better than just throwing Jax and Baszler in the first match, making that for the titles, and then having Night 2 feature the SmackDown tag titles where at the very least, Dominik could have performed in front of an audience for the first time. Go ahead and try to make the case for Jax/Baszler vs. Tamina/Natalya being a better option.
Honorable Mentions for Worst
- The Nigerian Drum Fight was bogus. It was just a No DQ match where the drums weren’t even as factored in as kendo sticks.
- Adam Cole and Kyle O’Reilly have awful new themes.
- There was no new theme music for Roman Reigns.
- The Hall of Fame broadcast was awkward. I’m glad people were honored, but it was difficult to watch.
- The Bella Twins taking out Bayley was awful and the booing crowd was definitely not what WWE was hoping for.
#5 Best – AJ Styles and Omos vs. The New Day
One of the most fun matches of the week for me was the Raw Tag Team Championship match. It was strangely put together, with The New Day playing heels, in so many ways.
I can’t tell you a list of the best maneuvers that took place or anything, but I can tell you that I had a smile on my face pretty much the whole time. Omos didn’t do too much, but he did all that he needed to do, which was mostly to look like an unstoppable beast.
This was one of the most genuinely enjoyable segments for me, even knowing that one of my favorite tag teams of all time was going to lose.
#4 Best – WALTER vs. Tommaso Ciampa
Move for move, this was my favorite match of NXT TakeOver’s two nights combined. I thought it had a big handicap going into it, knowing WALTER wasn’t going to lose that title, but they managed to tell a good enough story that I didn’t care.
It was so simple, too. WALTER injures his hand by chopping the desk (very cool moment) and that takes away a lot of his arsenal. Boom. Done. That’s all they needed to make it the best hook.
I wouldn’t mind seeing another match between these two, with or without the title on the line.
#3 Best – Bad Bunny
I harped on about Bad Bunny being someone I didn’t want to see at WrestleMania and I’m so, so glad to eat those words.
Bad Bunny was fantastic. He put in the work to deliver one of the best performances of the week in what is sure to be a Hall of Fame worthy showing.
I was flat out wrong about him in practically every single way from my initial reaction at Royal Rumble. His popularity was far bigger than I had anticipated (even though I was out of the loop for that), I’ll even admit that his song has grown on me, and he didn’t just waste my time leading up to a crappy match. No. He had some interesting stuff along the way and more than held his own once the bell rang.
Awesome. This was one of my favorite aspects of WrestleMania, by far, and something I’m extremely happy to have been dead wrong about.
#2 Best – Welcome to WrestleMania!
Just seeing the roster on the stage, hearing the fans in attendance, looking at all the visuals and hearing Vince McMahon welcome everyone back to some semblance of normalcy was a breath of fresh air.
That felt so good. I really hope we don’t hear about any spikes coming out as a result of it or anything problematic like that, as it will sour my perception when I look back on it. But assuming that’s not the case, this was one of the most feel-good moments in a long, long while.
#1 Best – Bianca Belair vs. Sasha Banks
Best match of the week. Hands down my favorite goosebumps moment was watching those two crying at the start of their match. I’m a fan of both, so I’m glad they had their time to shine in the main event to make history. Belair winning the title was exactly what I wanted to happen, so that’s awesome for her, too. This was just so good.
Imagine how much better it would have been, too, if WWE had given them a halfway decent storyline and build from the past few months, instead of pulling out that garbage and then just hoping it would manifest into something good on the day of the show. Thankfully, it did.
Honorable Mentions for Best
- Karrion Kross vs. Finn Balor was better than I had anticipated and one of the better matches of TakeOver, with the right finish.
- Raquel Gonzalez winning the title.
- Santos Escobar vs. Jordan Devlin, particularly with Escobar becoming the unified champion.
- Rhea Ripley winning the Raw Women’s Championship.
- Vladimir!
- Broken Skull Sessions with Chris Jericho
- The Ultimate NXT TakeOver was a fun bonus show to check out while waiting for other things to start, too.
What would make your list? Tell us in the comments below!
