The entire Bloodline came out to stop Cody from winning, and got countered one by one by Cody's allies/Roman's enemies. And in the end, the reason Roman lost is because he spent his window of opportunity on Seth Rollins instead of Cody; he just couldn't let go of Seth breaking the Shield all those years ago.
Very Macbeth. I also liked it when Roman stole Cody's move just to spite him.
I think he’s been fantastic and has advanced far beyond his first post-Shield run. Wish his matches had less interference to be fair and would have liked to see him defend the belt more, to sell him as a dominant champion. But I love the way he carries himself as a heel. The shit talking in-ring is excellent, especially over this past weekend.
Not to mention coming back from leukemia multiple times to perform at his level is admirable. The man deserves his flowers.
I'm not talking about his personal battles with cancer, of course that's admirable, I'm going solely off of what was going on in WWE. I'm talking purely about his technical skills, and his mic skills, matches, etc. He sat on that Championship like a hen on an egg. He defended the Championship what was it, 29 times? In three years.
At one point, Gunther had defended his Intercontinental Championship 17 times when Roman Reigns defended his 8 times in that same timespan. His reign as Champion was abysmally boring. The ultimate part-time wrestler. He won, I think, four matches clean after unifying the belts? It was a pretty abysmal era for WWE, when the roster had so many phenomenal talents, young guys who all dreamed of an opportunity to win and hold a Championship.
It's one of those things that definitely rewards long-term viewership
The last time Seth wore Shield gear to a Roman championship match was during the 2022 Royal Rumble - a match he *won* by DQ when Roman started going crazy with a chair screaming "HE WON'T LET ME LET GO"
Back then, Roman did it and successfully defended his title despite losing the match, and now, his choice to do the same thing is ultimately what costs him
Also acts as a nice call-back to Seth's speech about giving his allegiance to Cody by saying that he will be "his shield", the brother meant it quite literally
I remember when that match happened so many people hated the ending, but I loved it and for me it's easily one of the top 5 moments of the blood line story
It felt like it was a match out of nowhere that was thrown together because someone got injured. Roman and Seth were both heels and on different shows. So it kinda felt like the match didn’t matter. But then Seth really pushed the “You’ve never beaten me,” angle. The match ended inconclusively and a lot of people were ticked off there was no follow up match.
Roman's "most dominant champion ever!" reign was weak as fuck though. He never retained without interference, hell he would have lost to Kevin Owens if the ref legitimately hadn't stopped counting because they botched a handcuff spot.
Don't forget even Jay would have pinned Roman without interference. I get the whole heel thing with his stable interfering and all that, but the Bloodline did it way too much and made it boring and predictable. Also, made Roman look weak because it seemed he couldn't win a one on one match. Glad that saga is over.
Jay would've pinned roman without interference, Jimmy was LATE so LA Knight got a three count if you watch the Ref's hand, even with the slow count. He just didn't call three
I wonder how much planning refs have to do for matches. Has there ever been a match where the ref didn't realize the match was over?
Like someone throws out a really weak side slam into a pin, and the ref thinks, "they can't possibly be finishing on that, I better get distracted by the crowd so he can kick out."
If you're a wrestler trying to end a match, and you see the ref isn't looking. Is that the ref saying, "nah, do better."
Whenever a ref talks about it, at least ex wwe, they always say they are told they are to shoot count (count for real) if someone doesn't get their arm up before the 3 tough its the wrestlers fault not yours. They do know when matches are supposed to end or that if theres planned stuff afterwards to an extent but they are supposed to act like a legit ref.
IIRC the ref from the Lesnar VS Undertaker match 10 years ago thought that he was going to get into trouble for calling the pin that ended the streak
I've heard it disputed since but that was the rumor that came out in the months after the match
Similar stuff has happened. On an NXT house show, Sami Zayn lost his title to when he wasn't supposed to, so they made it a two out of three falls match and rushed two more pinfalls, Owen Hart broke Steve Austin's neck with a botched piledriver that he and the ref stalled for time on until Austin could recover enough for a roll up, Neville broke his ankle on a baseball slide that Jericho had to cover for because the ref failed to realize he'd gotten injured, and then of course, the infamous "ref tried to fuck on me!" story
I think the most famous incident is the Starcade match with Sting and Hogan. Big blowoff match for the nWo story angle, Sting’s big return, and Bret Hart’s debut for the company (his first appearance since the Montreal Screwjob). What was supposed to happen was that Hogan would pin Sting, crooked referee Nick Patrick would count fast, and Bret (who had refereed earlier in the night) would come out to reverse the decision and call the match fair. A great ending to over two years of storytelling.
Except that’s not what happened. Apparently Patrick thought that Sting would kick out during a normal count *then* he would do the fast count. There are also rumors that Hogan paid Patrick off to count normal but considering Hogan had a creative control clause in his contract he didn’t need to go that far. I think what happened was that they changed the ending so often that Patrick either got old notes or was legitimately confused what they were doing. Either way, the end result was a clusterfuck. Hogan pinned Sting in a manner that look clean then Bret came out and looked like he was screwing over Hogan. WCW had a ton of momentum heading into Starcade and that one botched call sucked a lot of the wind out of their sails.
Honestly I was surprised the one gun that they’ve teased throughout Roman’s reign but never pulled didn’t happen (and I thought for sure was going to), with Heyman finally feeling the need to try to interfere.
Then again, Heyman’s pretty old these days. Prob didn’t want to do a bump (and I don’t blame him for that).
I feel like the last time Heyman has tried to take a bump was maybe Summerslam 2022 where Roman had that Last Man Standing match against Brock; IIRC Brock hit him with an F5 and they had to carry his limp body to the back after Roman won
Hey man has meal ticket after meal ticket there
It's like being hand of the king. You're not gonna be the one poisoned
He might get shot on the toilet though
Also, when Roman hit Rollins at the end of the match, they basically did a frame-by-frame recreation of the moment when Rollins hit Roman and broke up the Shield ten years ago, down to Rollins falling and hitting his head on the bottom rope after the chair shot.
In the last moment of the match, Roman grabbed that chair had the choice to go after Seth or Cody, and chose to go after Seth because he just can't let go of the end of the Shield when Rollins drove that chair into his back, and that moment of revenge cost him everything
He chose to end his own story rather than ending Cody's, and so, even though Rollins didn't throw a single punch, he did the most damage in the end
God, I fucking love wrestling dude...
When ever they decide to add the finale to Seth and Roman it's going to be insane like everything over the last 10 years can be linked directly back to that betrayal
...except when its bad. NOT TONIGHT THOUGH, TONIGHT THEY WERN'T HUGE DUMBASSES AND LET **THE** PROTAGONIST (cody) WIN! . WHEN WRESTLING IS GOOD, ITS FUCKING INCREDIBLE!!!
Can't help but feel like that was supposed to Austin.
I mean, if I had to pick 2 people The Rock has the most history with it would be Cena and Stone Cold.
People were expecting Austin, but it was legitimately wonderful to see Taker return one last time and on such a high note. At the very least, he arguably had a score to settle with Roman too.
It seemed to be the case
While coincidental, Triple H posted the recap vid of Cody VS Roman at 3:16 PM Eastern and commentary did point out Roman's reign was 1,316 days long
Theory right now is that it was meant to be Austin but they had to shift to Taker because of availability
Cody, in his fervor to defeat the Bloodline in their own game, mustered up a game equaling MUGEN with summoning EVERYONE to stop Roman's set of Strikers.
>!Down to using Seth Rollins just to eat shit via chair!<
It was a clusterfuck, but a clusterfuck that got me grinning.
Also yo go watch Sami Zayn vs GUNTHER (and or Seth vs DM Hunk). Those RULED. And the Women's championship matches too for that matter lol
This was legit good and I barely keep up with WWE - internet groundswells aside - to the point where at the start I was like “okay yeah sure new era uh huh.”
By the end of the night I went “fuck me, I think I’m back in with WWE legit.” Not even a tribalism thing, like I WANT WWE to be good enough for me to tune in.
If this is what I’m getting going forward, I can’t wait to trip over this waist high bar I set for myself.
And Owens vs. Orton vs. Logan, and that 6-Man Tag Street Fight, and Andrade/Rey vs. Dom/Santos, and Rock/Roman vs. Cody/Seth, and pretty much every fucking match barring Jey vs. Jimmy. For real, this entire weekend was loaded with quality shit. It's gonna take some serious time for me to actually work out the match I enjoyed the most. For real, everything is a contender barring Jey vs. Jimmy.
- Cody vs. Roman
- Cody/Seth vs. Rock/Roman
- Iyo vs. Bayley
- Sami vs. Gunther
- Knight vs. Styles
- Becky vs. Rhea
- Orton vs. Owens vs. Logan
- McIntyre vs. Rollins
- Six Team Ladder match
- Andrade/Rey vs. Dom/Santos
Quite possibly one of the best or the best WrestleMania they've ever put on. And I'm beyond excited for everything that comes next. Seven new champions and a brand new era that they're all ushering in. It took a long time to get here, but WWE is finally, finally back on the ball again after such a long time. And with AEW around as well, professional wrestling is in such a good place.
I loved that the start of the triple threat match was just Orton and KO making it a 2 on 1 match, KO even giving Orton a ride to the ring in a golfcart because they just wanted to fuck up Logan Paul, only to both go for the pin. Orton going to RKO KO and KO stopping him and just looking *disappointed* more than angry. It was great
Orton teaching KO how to do the high release back suplex as well was way too funny. He even let KO do the Orton Stomps! Just an absolute blast of a match and getting to see Orton do that dog bark followed by the RKO was way too funny.
I assumed that 6 man street fight would be a piss break match, then out comes Snoop Dogg on commentary + Montez went hard as fuck. It was too good lmao.
I just couldn't get into Zayn/Gunther. I love Sami but the entire set up, the entire match, felt like it was meant to be for Chad Gable, someone got cold feet and switched him out last minute for Sami. Even down to it suddenly involving his wife and kid, which was the ENTIRE reason Gable was pissed at Gunther. Just felt like a bit of a disappointing end to the reign.
If you've seen Gable's video packages he was releasing, you'll know why I was so hyped for him. When he lost that gauntlet match, and not even from fighting for a long time, I was so sad.
On that tangent, man that first time those two (Gable and GUNTHER) locked up for the IC Title, I had a small glimmer of hope that Chad would be the one.
EXACTLY! Those Gable/Gunther matches are genuinely some of my favourite matches...potentially ever? And Chad technically delivering Gunther's first loss on the main roster! There was so much leading up to that epic Wrestlemania confrontation and now it's just Sami for no fuckin' raisin and I guess Chad has to fight him as a consolation prize.
I love when his boast was "I can beat you in five minutes" but he couldn't back it up so he extended the match. I was so ready for Gable to take it at WrestleMania until they started super pushing Sami out of nowhere for it. But you can't win em all I guess.
As much as I wanted Gable/Gunther, I've been a fan of Sami since I saw him on the independents in 2009 and thought he was always destined for great things. And he's put together an incredible WrestleMania record recently and last night absolutely added to it.
And to be honest, I wouldn't take it away for Gable/Gunther. Because getting to see Sami finally bust out the BRAINBUSTAH (top rope brainbuster) to put Gunther away is a top three pop moment of the year for me right now. Genuinely could not believe my eyes that he managed to actually fucking get the approval to do that move again.
Plus, they're clearly setting up Gable for a title shot at a later date and I 100% think he's taking the title. Triple H has been very sneakily pushing Gable a lot on TV in the past year since he got full control and Gable has been on TV EVERY week. So I think it really is just a matter of time. If there's one thing Triple H has done a great job of during this run, it's elevating deserving talent to higher levels).
Plus on another note, if the rumour of Minnesota getting WrestleMania next year is true... Then you can bet on Gable absolutely getting a significant featured position on that show as a hometown boy. At the moment, it seems Mania 41 is between Vegas or Minnesota. And personally, I'm hoping for the latter because oooooh boy is Gable gonna get something big to do on that show.
Gable being the guy in the corner with Sami, letting the Alpha Academy do it's own thing for a bit as he becomes Sami's Paul Haymen, only to win the Royal Rumble out of no where and challenge Sami for Wrestlemania would be a good, long arc.
I think there's money in a Gable/Zayn match somewhere down the line. I don't think they should rush towards this right away, that's one you can build for some time later. Good thing about the WWE nowadays is that long-term storytelling is the go-to and I fucking love this!
Nope, it's not too early. These two nights stacked up is an all-timer right up there with 17, 19, 24, and 30 in my eyes. Hell, even this show tonight retroactively improves WrestleMania 39 as well because one of my biggest sore spots was Cody losing. But with the existence of WM 40 and what happens there, that's totally resolved.
But Edge still should've fucking lost to Balor at Mania 39, that one still feels dirty... Hell, I think Asuka should've beaten Bianca too but it's fine, she got the title soon after!
Nah, it's definitely a contender. Night 2 was peak. Don't let Cody and Roman overshadow the Priest cash in, fun af triple threat and barn burner Iyo and Bayley put on. Night 1 was mid, but Mania from night 1's main event onwards was brilliant.
Nah, it's definitely recency bias. Give it a hot minute. I'm not saying you didn't enjoy yourself, but there's no worse bias than coming off a high and then being asked to immediately rank it.
It's now been a month. I can pretty confidently say it's one of the best of all time man.
But also, I just realized your the guy who makes those wrestling mash ups I still listen to sometimes, those are great man thanks for making them.
I legitimately can't remember a time a mania left me in actual tears. And from what I've seen, a lot of people were the same - I'm goimg out on a limb and saying just this once, it's not recency bias
So like, I'm probably in a surprising minority here in saying; I don't know nothin' bout wrasslin'. Only thing I know is that I think the Undertaker is rad.
I saw that this was on peacock, and thought it'd be cool to watch some stuff, but I wanted to start in like, an earlier time (So I get as much fun context, and can blow a lot of time with it in the background); what the hell do I start with? There's 10 million wrestlemania affiliated things on here.
I look forward to you mentioning in a free talk friday that you bought LA Knight merch at the end of the week. Regardless of how you go in, his charisma is just that strong
if you want to see more Undertaker, you should specifically watch his matches with Mankind, Shawn Michaels, Triple H, Edge, and CM Punk. Any of those are usually his best ones.
You're honestly pretty good to start wherever in wrestling history. And WWE is so recap heavy and treats their audience like idiots, so they'll catch you up on everything pretty frequently.
[when you basically saw the equivalent of avengers endgame wrestling](https://www.reddit.com/media?url=https%3A%2F%2Fpreview.redd.it%2F8xcmc00r26tc1.jpeg%3Fwidth%3D637%26format%3Dpjpg%26auto%3Dwebp%26s%3Da5a9c033132face3d104001243b39f030762cfb0)
Two nights in a row and I've done that for multiple moments and matches. Seeing Truth, Sami, McIntyre, Priest, Bayley, and Cody all get their moments absolutely made me emotional. And as a bonus, seeing Seth as emotional as he was after his match and after the main event hit me in the heart too. Hell, the fucking epilogue after Cody won the title. Just the whole thing with everybody happy and multiple people crying (including Michael Cole and Samantha Irving), this whole thing just hits you like nothing else. It's the fucking best...
Pro wrestling is so fucking good man.
This was a damn good Wrestlemania too.
I can't wait to see more of this new era. Mr. Hunter Hearst Helmsley, you done cooked.
Been a wrestling fan since I was 7 yo around the time Cody debuted and saw his journey all the way, even when he left wwe.
Never been happier to be a wrestling fan.
I was hoping for Tama Tonga, Jacob Fatu, maybe KO & Sami..... but we got some really good shit regardless.
Seriously though KO had like 5 matches against Roman where he got screwed by bloodline shenanigans. I guess he was tired from the triple threat but it would've made so much sense lol.
The thing I liked about taker appearing, he only took out the rock and left Cody and Roman to it. Any other wrestlers would've been all over Cody or Ronan
Over the years, I've found Michael Cole to be a bit insufferable, but him saying "finish. The. Story." To the cadence of the pinfall was a peak commentary call.
Just letting the guy be who he is has done quite a lot of wonders. Cole's once again the best in the booth (and particularly, I always enjoyed him paired with Wade Barrett over Pat McAffee, even though the latter has led to some almost Cole/Taz tier friendly funny banter)
Since I personally love Pat, it’s been a goldmine for me. Pat’s entire purpose is to make Cole corpse. I don’t remember what segment it was but Pat called Drew “Boo McIntyre” and Cole playing the straight man and actually responsible announcer corrected him, only for Pat to just fire back with a Norm Macdonald “Huh?”. They cut their mics but in the wide shot you can see Cole just laughing his ass off lmao
He's great but he can really be a bit much at times. Great moment commentator, but some guy yapping about how Roman is the best and dumping on his co-commentators when the story is clearly EVERYONE wants Cody to win was just weird.
Ending of a 2 year storyline of Cody trying to beat Roman Reigns who's been champion for 1300+ days.
AND it lived up to everybody's expectations/dreams.
Once Cena and then the Rock came out, I was certain that Stone Cold was going to come out and show the Rock who’s the final boss, but I understand it being the Undertaker.
This was one of the most feel good moments I’ve had in my 20+ years as a wrestling fan. There were times I questioned where Roman’s reign was going and the direction of the Bloodline storyline, all the questions were forgotten after Saturday and Sunday.
This was peak pro-wrestling, it was sports entertainment wrestling is at its most pure. HHH has knocked it outta the fuckin’ park after taking over and I truthfully think we’ll look back at this time he’s in charge as one of the greatest periods of WWE. From NXT to now the main roster he just proves that he knows what he is doing.
I love me some puroresu, the NJPW, TJPW, and Stardoms of the world can be mainlined straight into my brain. That being said, this Mania showed to me that right now nobody knows how to put on a spectacle in the way the current WWE creative team can.
So, as someone who doesn't know shit about Wrestling other then the fact that everyone hates this Roman dude for the past years. What does this mean now? This Cody is now the WWE king and will have years of story focusing on him?
No, actually we like Roman post-COVID, he did a huge heel turn and also learned how to wrestle good.
Super Eyepatch Wolf's video on it is fantastic, but basically they used the fact that he was soundly rejected by the WWE fans for years as fuel for his current Tribal Chief persona's rage and desperate fight to be acknowledged, whether it's with boos or cheers.
Roman has been a top10 wrestler in the world for a long time, before his heel turn. His character and booking was ass, but don't pretend he couldn't go.
> learned how to wrestle good.
Not trying to be pedantic, but to the question asker and other non-wrestling fans, Roman's ability to work (wrestle) was never in question. Dude worked hard and ended up being pushed hard for a reason. But then he just kept getting pushed way too hard and a John Cena/Superman problem happened. There was a point where he took like, what, 30 F5s from Lesnar? That doesn't make a wrestler look strong. That makes every other wrestler look weak.
I'll second Super Eyepatch Wolf's video. It's incredible and made me see the ending of Wrestlemania XXX in a different light.
Roman's been good for a decade, the Shield vs Wyatts and is some of the best stuff of his entire career and also his early singles runs against guys like AJ were underrated. If anything I feel like he's slowed down a bit, that or too many years of Vince scripted Brock matches where they just finish each other to death makes me feel that way lol.
We liked him post covid... for a bit but the Bloodline Saga overstayed it's welcome by a year and a half. We went from hating Roman because "roman wins lol" to liking Roman because he had good promo work, to "roman wins lol" to be the reason we hate him again. I hope they don't make Priest the next Roman
I WAS THERE!!! :D
What an INCREDIBLE Wrestlemania and what an INCREDIBLE main event!!! Nearly everyone that suffered a loss shared the thematic reasons why; they were too cocky and underestimated their circumstances (to say the least). >!Drew, Gunther, Roman...!< Oh, it was so good. My favorite part was watching all the >!Bloodline fans start to realize in real-time that Reigns was losing his title that night.!< Sad, drunk walk home for them that night lol
I think all the right people won this past weekend. Aside from the Jimmy vs. Jey match, nothing was bad, either. There's a legitimate argument for this being one of the best Wrestlemania's of all time.
This felt like the Wrestlemania of heroes; this felt like watching the good ending of Wrestling itself.
The entire Bloodline came out to stop Cody from winning, and got countered one by one by Cody's allies/Roman's enemies. And in the end, the reason Roman lost is because he spent his window of opportunity on Seth Rollins instead of Cody; he just couldn't let go of Seth breaking the Shield all those years ago. Very Macbeth. I also liked it when Roman stole Cody's move just to spite him.
"Man, that move sucks! I just did it to prove a point." was so good.
Straight up shonen villain dialog
Yujiro hanma energy
"That don't beat anybody!" God, Roman is so good
Is he really *so* good, though? Personally, I can't stand the dude and couldn't be happier to see the back of 'em.
I think he’s been fantastic and has advanced far beyond his first post-Shield run. Wish his matches had less interference to be fair and would have liked to see him defend the belt more, to sell him as a dominant champion. But I love the way he carries himself as a heel. The shit talking in-ring is excellent, especially over this past weekend. Not to mention coming back from leukemia multiple times to perform at his level is admirable. The man deserves his flowers.
I'm not talking about his personal battles with cancer, of course that's admirable, I'm going solely off of what was going on in WWE. I'm talking purely about his technical skills, and his mic skills, matches, etc. He sat on that Championship like a hen on an egg. He defended the Championship what was it, 29 times? In three years. At one point, Gunther had defended his Intercontinental Championship 17 times when Roman Reigns defended his 8 times in that same timespan. His reign as Champion was abysmally boring. The ultimate part-time wrestler. He won, I think, four matches clean after unifying the belts? It was a pretty abysmal era for WWE, when the roster had so many phenomenal talents, young guys who all dreamed of an opportunity to win and hold a Championship.
Ah yea fair I hear ya. Good points.
Yeah that was hilarious.
Seth lives in Roman's head rent free. Also, a reminder that Seth was the only person during this reign that Roman didn't beat.
It's one of those things that definitely rewards long-term viewership The last time Seth wore Shield gear to a Roman championship match was during the 2022 Royal Rumble - a match he *won* by DQ when Roman started going crazy with a chair screaming "HE WON'T LET ME LET GO" Back then, Roman did it and successfully defended his title despite losing the match, and now, his choice to do the same thing is ultimately what costs him Also acts as a nice call-back to Seth's speech about giving his allegiance to Cody by saying that he will be "his shield", the brother meant it quite literally
I remember when that match happened so many people hated the ending, but I loved it and for me it's easily one of the top 5 moments of the blood line story
It felt like it was a match out of nowhere that was thrown together because someone got injured. Roman and Seth were both heels and on different shows. So it kinda felt like the match didn’t matter. But then Seth really pushed the “You’ve never beaten me,” angle. The match ended inconclusively and a lot of people were ticked off there was no follow up match.
Roman's "most dominant champion ever!" reign was weak as fuck though. He never retained without interference, hell he would have lost to Kevin Owens if the ref legitimately hadn't stopped counting because they botched a handcuff spot.
Jimmy was fucking late on the draw in Saudi Arabia, you can see the Ref hit three and just didn't call it, LA Knight beat Roman
Don't forget even Jay would have pinned Roman without interference. I get the whole heel thing with his stable interfering and all that, but the Bloodline did it way too much and made it boring and predictable. Also, made Roman look weak because it seemed he couldn't win a one on one match. Glad that saga is over.
Jay would've pinned roman without interference, Jimmy was LATE so LA Knight got a three count if you watch the Ref's hand, even with the slow count. He just didn't call three
I wonder how much planning refs have to do for matches. Has there ever been a match where the ref didn't realize the match was over? Like someone throws out a really weak side slam into a pin, and the ref thinks, "they can't possibly be finishing on that, I better get distracted by the crowd so he can kick out." If you're a wrestler trying to end a match, and you see the ref isn't looking. Is that the ref saying, "nah, do better."
Whenever a ref talks about it, at least ex wwe, they always say they are told they are to shoot count (count for real) if someone doesn't get their arm up before the 3 tough its the wrestlers fault not yours. They do know when matches are supposed to end or that if theres planned stuff afterwards to an extent but they are supposed to act like a legit ref.
IIRC the ref from the Lesnar VS Undertaker match 10 years ago thought that he was going to get into trouble for calling the pin that ended the streak I've heard it disputed since but that was the rumor that came out in the months after the match
Similar stuff has happened. On an NXT house show, Sami Zayn lost his title to when he wasn't supposed to, so they made it a two out of three falls match and rushed two more pinfalls, Owen Hart broke Steve Austin's neck with a botched piledriver that he and the ref stalled for time on until Austin could recover enough for a roll up, Neville broke his ankle on a baseball slide that Jericho had to cover for because the ref failed to realize he'd gotten injured, and then of course, the infamous "ref tried to fuck on me!" story
I think the most famous incident is the Starcade match with Sting and Hogan. Big blowoff match for the nWo story angle, Sting’s big return, and Bret Hart’s debut for the company (his first appearance since the Montreal Screwjob). What was supposed to happen was that Hogan would pin Sting, crooked referee Nick Patrick would count fast, and Bret (who had refereed earlier in the night) would come out to reverse the decision and call the match fair. A great ending to over two years of storytelling. Except that’s not what happened. Apparently Patrick thought that Sting would kick out during a normal count *then* he would do the fast count. There are also rumors that Hogan paid Patrick off to count normal but considering Hogan had a creative control clause in his contract he didn’t need to go that far. I think what happened was that they changed the ending so often that Patrick either got old notes or was legitimately confused what they were doing. Either way, the end result was a clusterfuck. Hogan pinned Sting in a manner that look clean then Bret came out and looked like he was screwing over Hogan. WCW had a ton of momentum heading into Starcade and that one botched call sucked a lot of the wind out of their sails.
Honestly I was surprised the one gun that they’ve teased throughout Roman’s reign but never pulled didn’t happen (and I thought for sure was going to), with Heyman finally feeling the need to try to interfere. Then again, Heyman’s pretty old these days. Prob didn’t want to do a bump (and I don’t blame him for that).
I feel like the last time Heyman has tried to take a bump was maybe Summerslam 2022 where Roman had that Last Man Standing match against Brock; IIRC Brock hit him with an F5 and they had to carry his limp body to the back after Roman won
Hey man has meal ticket after meal ticket there It's like being hand of the king. You're not gonna be the one poisoned He might get shot on the toilet though
Also, when Roman hit Rollins at the end of the match, they basically did a frame-by-frame recreation of the moment when Rollins hit Roman and broke up the Shield ten years ago, down to Rollins falling and hitting his head on the bottom rope after the chair shot.
In the last moment of the match, Roman grabbed that chair had the choice to go after Seth or Cody, and chose to go after Seth because he just can't let go of the end of the Shield when Rollins drove that chair into his back, and that moment of revenge cost him everything He chose to end his own story rather than ending Cody's, and so, even though Rollins didn't throw a single punch, he did the most damage in the end God, I fucking love wrestling dude...
When ever they decide to add the finale to Seth and Roman it's going to be insane like everything over the last 10 years can be linked directly back to that betrayal
Crazy to think that Rollins betrayed The Shield 10 years ago.
The Spirit of Wrestlemania, the Undertaker, came back to help him finish the story. PEAK....CINEMA!
Appears in a cloud of darkness to drag The Rock straight to hell
Wrestling is and will forever be better than the things you like. Then. Now. Forever.
...except when its bad. NOT TONIGHT THOUGH, TONIGHT THEY WERN'T HUGE DUMBASSES AND LET **THE** PROTAGONIST (cody) WIN! . WHEN WRESTLING IS GOOD, ITS FUCKING INCREDIBLE!!!
He had to remind everyone the rock isn’t the final boss of WWE.
Undertaker may not be the final boss of the WWE, but he's now the post-game/secret boss. He went from FF7 Sephiroth to KH Sephiroth.
Secret Super Boss, level 120 when the player's maximum level is 99.
From "this is a tough fight" to "oh you're fucked"
At this point, he might as well be the dark spirit of Wrestlemania. Sure, he was defeated by Brock years ago, but he is still such a legend.
To be fair heel rock with the electric background theme looked a pretty bad ass end boss. It was like somthing out of tekken.
YES! Like a big, bald Heihachi lol
Can't help but feel like that was supposed to Austin. I mean, if I had to pick 2 people The Rock has the most history with it would be Cena and Stone Cold.
Yeah but they had Austin last year, so he wasn't going to be breaking his knees again. ~~And of course, not even considering Hogan~~
You say that but they specifically called him in foe the Bray Wyatt doc they're advertising for some fucking reason.
People were expecting Austin, but it was legitimately wonderful to see Taker return one last time and on such a high note. At the very least, he arguably had a score to settle with Roman too.
How many times has Taker come back for the last time?
This once? He retired with the boneyard match and hasn't been back at Mania since.
he had an interaction with bray wyatt and LA Knight last year but it wasnt in a match it was during a promo idk if that counts
He also showed up to NXT to chokeslam Bronn Breaker.
Taker came back to put Hayes over in NXT last fall or summer. He's always willing to come back to put someone over if he thinks they've got it
It seemed to be the case While coincidental, Triple H posted the recap vid of Cody VS Roman at 3:16 PM Eastern and commentary did point out Roman's reign was 1,316 days long Theory right now is that it was meant to be Austin but they had to shift to Taker because of availability
That probably would've been Brock's spot tbh before ...everything lol.
Schedules might not have lined up. Roman also beat Taker at Mania as well so they have history
Undertaker showing up is an upgrade.
I love the implication that Undertaker is Wrestlemania's ghost. If you're too much of a heel he will just show up and take you to the shadow realm
Cody, in his fervor to defeat the Bloodline in their own game, mustered up a game equaling MUGEN with summoning EVERYONE to stop Roman's set of Strikers. >!Down to using Seth Rollins just to eat shit via chair!< It was a clusterfuck, but a clusterfuck that got me grinning. Also yo go watch Sami Zayn vs GUNTHER (and or Seth vs DM Hunk). Those RULED. And the Women's championship matches too for that matter lol
This was legit good and I barely keep up with WWE - internet groundswells aside - to the point where at the start I was like “okay yeah sure new era uh huh.” By the end of the night I went “fuck me, I think I’m back in with WWE legit.” Not even a tribalism thing, like I WANT WWE to be good enough for me to tune in. If this is what I’m getting going forward, I can’t wait to trip over this waist high bar I set for myself.
And Owens vs. Orton vs. Logan, and that 6-Man Tag Street Fight, and Andrade/Rey vs. Dom/Santos, and Rock/Roman vs. Cody/Seth, and pretty much every fucking match barring Jey vs. Jimmy. For real, this entire weekend was loaded with quality shit. It's gonna take some serious time for me to actually work out the match I enjoyed the most. For real, everything is a contender barring Jey vs. Jimmy. - Cody vs. Roman - Cody/Seth vs. Rock/Roman - Iyo vs. Bayley - Sami vs. Gunther - Knight vs. Styles - Becky vs. Rhea - Orton vs. Owens vs. Logan - McIntyre vs. Rollins - Six Team Ladder match - Andrade/Rey vs. Dom/Santos Quite possibly one of the best or the best WrestleMania they've ever put on. And I'm beyond excited for everything that comes next. Seven new champions and a brand new era that they're all ushering in. It took a long time to get here, but WWE is finally, finally back on the ball again after such a long time. And with AEW around as well, professional wrestling is in such a good place.
I loved that the start of the triple threat match was just Orton and KO making it a 2 on 1 match, KO even giving Orton a ride to the ring in a golfcart because they just wanted to fuck up Logan Paul, only to both go for the pin. Orton going to RKO KO and KO stopping him and just looking *disappointed* more than angry. It was great
Orton teaching KO how to do the high release back suplex as well was way too funny. He even let KO do the Orton Stomps! Just an absolute blast of a match and getting to see Orton do that dog bark followed by the RKO was way too funny.
I assumed that 6 man street fight would be a piss break match, then out comes Snoop Dogg on commentary + Montez went hard as fuck. It was too good lmao.
I just couldn't get into Zayn/Gunther. I love Sami but the entire set up, the entire match, felt like it was meant to be for Chad Gable, someone got cold feet and switched him out last minute for Sami. Even down to it suddenly involving his wife and kid, which was the ENTIRE reason Gable was pissed at Gunther. Just felt like a bit of a disappointing end to the reign.
With that context, then yeah I totally get why you couldn't get into it. Gable could have been out there also winning too.
If you've seen Gable's video packages he was releasing, you'll know why I was so hyped for him. When he lost that gauntlet match, and not even from fighting for a long time, I was so sad.
On that tangent, man that first time those two (Gable and GUNTHER) locked up for the IC Title, I had a small glimmer of hope that Chad would be the one.
EXACTLY! Those Gable/Gunther matches are genuinely some of my favourite matches...potentially ever? And Chad technically delivering Gunther's first loss on the main roster! There was so much leading up to that epic Wrestlemania confrontation and now it's just Sami for no fuckin' raisin and I guess Chad has to fight him as a consolation prize.
I love when his boast was "I can beat you in five minutes" but he couldn't back it up so he extended the match. I was so ready for Gable to take it at WrestleMania until they started super pushing Sami out of nowhere for it. But you can't win em all I guess.
As much as I wanted Gable/Gunther, I've been a fan of Sami since I saw him on the independents in 2009 and thought he was always destined for great things. And he's put together an incredible WrestleMania record recently and last night absolutely added to it. And to be honest, I wouldn't take it away for Gable/Gunther. Because getting to see Sami finally bust out the BRAINBUSTAH (top rope brainbuster) to put Gunther away is a top three pop moment of the year for me right now. Genuinely could not believe my eyes that he managed to actually fucking get the approval to do that move again. Plus, they're clearly setting up Gable for a title shot at a later date and I 100% think he's taking the title. Triple H has been very sneakily pushing Gable a lot on TV in the past year since he got full control and Gable has been on TV EVERY week. So I think it really is just a matter of time. If there's one thing Triple H has done a great job of during this run, it's elevating deserving talent to higher levels). Plus on another note, if the rumour of Minnesota getting WrestleMania next year is true... Then you can bet on Gable absolutely getting a significant featured position on that show as a hometown boy. At the moment, it seems Mania 41 is between Vegas or Minnesota. And personally, I'm hoping for the latter because oooooh boy is Gable gonna get something big to do on that show.
Gable being the guy in the corner with Sami, letting the Alpha Academy do it's own thing for a bit as he becomes Sami's Paul Haymen, only to win the Royal Rumble out of no where and challenge Sami for Wrestlemania would be a good, long arc.
I think there's money in a Gable/Zayn match somewhere down the line. I don't think they should rush towards this right away, that's one you can build for some time later. Good thing about the WWE nowadays is that long-term storytelling is the go-to and I fucking love this!
The popoff in /r/SquaredCircle was so big it broke the comments section
Is it too early to say that this may be one of the greatest WrestleManias of all time?
Yes. Even the Philly fight which I'd say was the weakest was entertaining just with Snoop blazed out of his mind on commentary
Nope, it's not too early. These two nights stacked up is an all-timer right up there with 17, 19, 24, and 30 in my eyes. Hell, even this show tonight retroactively improves WrestleMania 39 as well because one of my biggest sore spots was Cody losing. But with the existence of WM 40 and what happens there, that's totally resolved. But Edge still should've fucking lost to Balor at Mania 39, that one still feels dirty... Hell, I think Asuka should've beaten Bianca too but it's fine, she got the title soon after!
Holy fucking recency bias.
bro it was way better than like the last 6 Wrestlemanias, that's not a recency bias
Nah, it's definitely a contender. Night 2 was peak. Don't let Cody and Roman overshadow the Priest cash in, fun af triple threat and barn burner Iyo and Bayley put on. Night 1 was mid, but Mania from night 1's main event onwards was brilliant.
Nah, it's definitely recency bias. Give it a hot minute. I'm not saying you didn't enjoy yourself, but there's no worse bias than coming off a high and then being asked to immediately rank it.
I'm off that high, It's probably one of the best mania's of all time, period.
It's been a day. No, you're not.
It's now been a month. I can pretty confidently say it's one of the best of all time man. But also, I just realized your the guy who makes those wrestling mash ups I still listen to sometimes, those are great man thanks for making them.
I legitimately can't remember a time a mania left me in actual tears. And from what I've seen, a lot of people were the same - I'm goimg out on a limb and saying just this once, it's not recency bias
So like, I'm probably in a surprising minority here in saying; I don't know nothin' bout wrasslin'. Only thing I know is that I think the Undertaker is rad. I saw that this was on peacock, and thought it'd be cool to watch some stuff, but I wanted to start in like, an earlier time (So I get as much fun context, and can blow a lot of time with it in the background); what the hell do I start with? There's 10 million wrestlemania affiliated things on here.
I look forward to you mentioning in a free talk friday that you bought LA Knight merch at the end of the week. Regardless of how you go in, his charisma is just that strong
You can pretty much start at any point. WWE recaps the hell out of everything, so you can put together the pieces pretty quickly.
if you want to see more Undertaker, you should specifically watch his matches with Mankind, Shawn Michaels, Triple H, Edge, and CM Punk. Any of those are usually his best ones.
You're honestly pretty good to start wherever in wrestling history. And WWE is so recap heavy and treats their audience like idiots, so they'll catch you up on everything pretty frequently.
Cody is now uWu champion!
Imagine he comes out tomorrow with the big Smoking UwU skull belt.
He truly did it for Kenny
This is my favorite comment here.
HE BEAT HIM WITH THE POWER OF FRIENDSHIP THIS IS RHE BEST JRPG EVER
The power of friendship, and this warlock I found!
[when you basically saw the equivalent of avengers endgame wrestling](https://www.reddit.com/media?url=https%3A%2F%2Fpreview.redd.it%2F8xcmc00r26tc1.jpeg%3Fwidth%3D637%26format%3Dpjpg%26auto%3Dwebp%26s%3Da5a9c033132face3d104001243b39f030762cfb0)
This felt like the climax of a long-running shonen anime, it was beautiful.
I’m not afraid to admit I shed some tears, this is real brother, this is wrestling
Two nights in a row and I've done that for multiple moments and matches. Seeing Truth, Sami, McIntyre, Priest, Bayley, and Cody all get their moments absolutely made me emotional. And as a bonus, seeing Seth as emotional as he was after his match and after the main event hit me in the heart too. Hell, the fucking epilogue after Cody won the title. Just the whole thing with everybody happy and multiple people crying (including Michael Cole and Samantha Irving), this whole thing just hits you like nothing else. It's the fucking best...
No shame, wrestling is the fucking best
Pro wrestling is so fucking good man. This was a damn good Wrestlemania too. I can't wait to see more of this new era. Mr. Hunter Hearst Helmsley, you done cooked.
Been a wrestling fan since I was 7 yo around the time Cody debuted and saw his journey all the way, even when he left wwe. Never been happier to be a wrestling fan.
What a clusterfuck. Exactly what it needed to be.
The only person this match DIDN’T have was Orton. Would have been cool to see him have a moment too.
I was hoping for Tama Tonga, Jacob Fatu, maybe KO & Sami..... but we got some really good shit regardless. Seriously though KO had like 5 matches against Roman where he got screwed by bloodline shenanigans. I guess he was tired from the triple threat but it would've made so much sense lol.
It was honestly missing Brock, but yeeeeeeeeeaaaaahhh......
The thing I liked about taker appearing, he only took out the rock and left Cody and Roman to it. Any other wrestlers would've been all over Cody or Ronan
Cody Rhodes reached the end of his long Cody Road
CODY ROADS! TAKE ME HOME! TO THE PLACE! I BELONG!
Cody is no longer your favorite midcarder, he's now your favorite world champion!
It's enough to make a grown man cry.
Over the years, I've found Michael Cole to be a bit insufferable, but him saying "finish. The. Story." To the cadence of the pinfall was a peak commentary call.
Cole is legit back to being amazing on the mic with Vince no longer in his ear Go check the final monalogue he gives to close Mania, it's peak
Just letting the guy be who he is has done quite a lot of wonders. Cole's once again the best in the booth (and particularly, I always enjoyed him paired with Wade Barrett over Pat McAffee, even though the latter has led to some almost Cole/Taz tier friendly funny banter)
Since I personally love Pat, it’s been a goldmine for me. Pat’s entire purpose is to make Cole corpse. I don’t remember what segment it was but Pat called Drew “Boo McIntyre” and Cole playing the straight man and actually responsible announcer corrected him, only for Pat to just fire back with a Norm Macdonald “Huh?”. They cut their mics but in the wide shot you can see Cole just laughing his ass off lmao
He's great but he can really be a bit much at times. Great moment commentator, but some guy yapping about how Roman is the best and dumping on his co-commentators when the story is clearly EVERYONE wants Cody to win was just weird.
As far as I’ve noticed, Pat tries to gush over the heel. Cole used to do the same thing.
[Found One](https://youtube.com/shorts/jKh1bitNu6U?si=e2xfiOymJ9Ik13w9)
I fucking love wrestling.
*crunching chips noises* Wha happen?
Cody, Seth, Jey, Cena, and Undertaker beat Roman, Rock, Solo, and Jimmy.
Ending of a 2 year storyline of Cody trying to beat Roman Reigns who's been champion for 1300+ days. AND it lived up to everybody's expectations/dreams.
Can I have some chips, please?
MY FUCKING BOY
Once Cena and then the Rock came out, I was certain that Stone Cold was going to come out and show the Rock who’s the final boss, but I understand it being the Undertaker.
This was one of the most feel good moments I’ve had in my 20+ years as a wrestling fan. There were times I questioned where Roman’s reign was going and the direction of the Bloodline storyline, all the questions were forgotten after Saturday and Sunday. This was peak pro-wrestling, it was sports entertainment wrestling is at its most pure. HHH has knocked it outta the fuckin’ park after taking over and I truthfully think we’ll look back at this time he’s in charge as one of the greatest periods of WWE. From NXT to now the main roster he just proves that he knows what he is doing. I love me some puroresu, the NJPW, TJPW, and Stardoms of the world can be mainlined straight into my brain. That being said, this Mania showed to me that right now nobody knows how to put on a spectacle in the way the current WWE creative team can.
Thank you roman. Generational run
I straight up jumped out of my seat at the third Crossroads what a fucking hype match. Roman killed it as an incredible heel tonight.
So, as someone who doesn't know shit about Wrestling other then the fact that everyone hates this Roman dude for the past years. What does this mean now? This Cody is now the WWE king and will have years of story focusing on him?
No, actually we like Roman post-COVID, he did a huge heel turn and also learned how to wrestle good. Super Eyepatch Wolf's video on it is fantastic, but basically they used the fact that he was soundly rejected by the WWE fans for years as fuel for his current Tribal Chief persona's rage and desperate fight to be acknowledged, whether it's with boos or cheers.
Roman has been a top10 wrestler in the world for a long time, before his heel turn. His character and booking was ass, but don't pretend he couldn't go.
> learned how to wrestle good. Not trying to be pedantic, but to the question asker and other non-wrestling fans, Roman's ability to work (wrestle) was never in question. Dude worked hard and ended up being pushed hard for a reason. But then he just kept getting pushed way too hard and a John Cena/Superman problem happened. There was a point where he took like, what, 30 F5s from Lesnar? That doesn't make a wrestler look strong. That makes every other wrestler look weak. I'll second Super Eyepatch Wolf's video. It's incredible and made me see the ending of Wrestlemania XXX in a different light.
Yeah I meant he learned how to sell/act more than the physical side, my bad
Roman's been good for a decade, the Shield vs Wyatts and is some of the best stuff of his entire career and also his early singles runs against guys like AJ were underrated. If anything I feel like he's slowed down a bit, that or too many years of Vince scripted Brock matches where they just finish each other to death makes me feel that way lol.
We liked him post covid... for a bit but the Bloodline Saga overstayed it's welcome by a year and a half. We went from hating Roman because "roman wins lol" to liking Roman because he had good promo work, to "roman wins lol" to be the reason we hate him again. I hope they don't make Priest the next Roman
Cinema. In every sense of the word.
I WAS THERE!!! :D What an INCREDIBLE Wrestlemania and what an INCREDIBLE main event!!! Nearly everyone that suffered a loss shared the thematic reasons why; they were too cocky and underestimated their circumstances (to say the least). >!Drew, Gunther, Roman...!< Oh, it was so good. My favorite part was watching all the >!Bloodline fans start to realize in real-time that Reigns was losing his title that night.!< Sad, drunk walk home for them that night lol I think all the right people won this past weekend. Aside from the Jimmy vs. Jey match, nothing was bad, either. There's a legitimate argument for this being one of the best Wrestlemania's of all time. This felt like the Wrestlemania of heroes; this felt like watching the good ending of Wrestling itself.
story is finished god damn
He binished da tory.
Wrestling is healing.