The Phantom

Money in the Bank: A good opener to the event, but I have to question the eventual outcome. This was kind of a different ladder match. Not so much high flying aerial spots this year, with the exception of Shelton’s suicide somersault from the ladder. I really don’t understand why they gave the briefcase back to CM Punk? HE didn’t do anything storyline wise with it the first time, so unless he uses it to steal the title off Orton (who took him out of defending his title) then I see no point in him having it. A far better option would have been to give it to MVP or Christian in my opinion.

Diva Battle Royal: Why did they have this on so early? It would have been a perfect breather after one of the world title matches. However, this match was bowling shoe ugly. I didn’t even see Sunny or Jackie, and caught brief glimpses of Molly Holly and Victoria. Also I hated the fact that the commentators couldn’t figure out who the mystery diva was. Don’t insult my intelligence… even the people in the nose bleed seats could work out it was Santino.

Chris Jericho vs. The Legends: Now I wasn’t expecting much going into this one, since both Piper and Snuka are not the most agile of people these days, but by gawd was Ricky Steamboat great! He looked in good shape, and his wrestling was better than some of the current rosters! His participation in the match saved it. I wasn’t so keen on the Mickey Rouke involvement at the end, but I guess that’s what WWE need to do if they want to get publicity.

Matt Hardy vs. Jeff Hardy: Good solid match. They didn’t go overboard with the extreme rules concept and I liked that. Jeff’s crazy move off the ladder was the highlight of the match – the dude is crazy with the risks he takes. I’m very supprised he’s walked away from all of these relatively injury free. Nice to see Matt pick up the win – but I’m sure this is not the end for this feud.

JBL vs. Rey Mysterio: Now I’m not against squash matches at Wrestlemania, but I’d prefer them not to be for a title. This was the second consecutive year that a title match lasted no longer than 30 seconds. The only conclusion I can come up with, is they did this as a way to fast track JBL to the Smackdown announce booth. Had Tazz not left earlier in the week, then this match might have been longer. Also before the match I was anticipating a different costume from Mysterio – and we certainly got that!

Shawn Michaels vs. The Undertaker: Wow… what a match. A true Wrestlemania classic. So many near falls, the action towards the end of the match was non stop. I really didn’t know who was going to win. There were countless times I was willing The Undertaker to kick out. I haven’t been so into a match in a very long time. Hats off to both men, defiantly match of the night… and a match that made this Wrestlemania worth the purchase if nothing else.

Edge vs. The Big Show vs. John Cena: Cenas’ entrance was kind of fun, if not a bit chest with those other Cenas’ doing the “You Can’t See Me” motion. Not a bad match overall. They worked a typical triple threat match, laying one out and then the other two battling against each other. Wheather you’re a John Cena fan or not, you have to give the guy credit, he’s immensely strong. He lifted the Big Show countless times, and I’m always impressed with him FU’ing Show. I also didn’t realise that they’d renamed the FU to the Attitude Adjustment. Kind of lame, but I see where they are coming from.

Triple H vs. Randy Orton: This match had so much intensity in the build up, that it could have been one of the matches of the year – however for me, this one was highly disappointing. Both men hit their finishers in the first few moments, and after that it went downhill. When you’re going on last in a 4 hour card you need to do something special, something that will keep the fans interested – this match didn’t have that.

Other thoughts:

- Kid Rock too up way too much time, and that could have been used for the Tag Title Unification match. I’m very disappointed that didn’t get on the card.

- The 3 man announce team didn’t work for me. You can get away with one play by play guy, and two color commentators, but not two play by plays and one color commentator.

- It did seem as though all weekend Austin was saying a goodbye to the Wrestling world. His speach at the HOF suggested that, and also JRs comments as he left the stage saying something along the lines of Austin is saying goodbye to Wrestling.

- Overall this was a very disappointing event. One that for me promised so much, but failed to deliver. This Wrestlemania will certainly not be mentioned in the top 10 Wrestlemanias of all time.

Dman

It def wasn't a good PPV....knew HHH/Orton was gonna struggle soon as it wasn't announced NO DQ.

Lol @ Jeff's spots.

__________________

James Deuce

Since you were there, how was the crowd during Kid Rock? They seemed pretty dead, but it could have been WWE messing with the audio so we could hear him better. Also how were they in the HHH/Orton bout?

__________________

Awesome

Well I wrote my little review and Im listen to WNL and they just fucking hated the PPV. I read the comments on stuff and everyone hated it. Wow I liked it. I knew what I was going to get. I knew mitb was going to be average, HBK and Taker was going to have a rediculous amount of false finishes and I promised that I wouldnt let HHH winning spoil the ppv for me. I think my opinion comes from I only paid $ 30, being in Aus. It puts me in limbo. Im not pissed because I payed regular ppv price, but not going to bash what I paid for. I knew what the ppv was going to be, but Im going to re watch HHH Orton because either Im dead fucking wrong or everyones crazy, and I think its the first one.

BTW I took the morning of for Mania so it sorta makes it worth it. Or was it? I dont know anymore.

__________________
Under new management

Awesome

In fact I just dont know anymore. Im generally the kind of fan that watches the ppv, thinks its really good or really bad, then listens and reads every review, and reajust my opinion fairly. I just got what I knew I was going to get. By the way RKO Franklin who are you Chris Jericho?? What have you done to earn anyones repect, let alone demanding it?

__________________
Under new management

King Steventon

I would be so f'ing pissed if I was bunked from this show.

MITB was a pretty damn good and alot of fun. Best one since the original easily. If Kingston had been a little bit more involved at the end this would have been a total breakout for him. They need to push him after that performance. Christian didn't do much at all but he was easily the most over guy in the match. I would have had no problem with him winning with how over he was. MVP didn't do much, but again was over and him and Benjamin had a really nice exchange with the ladder in the middle of the ropes. Outside of that exchange Benjamin looked pretty awful. The big dive felt more like a Jeff Hardy-style face spot than a heel thing to do and seeing him botch a powerbomb them wrecklessly throw MVP almost head first into the barricade was cringeworthy. Kane did nothing noteworthy really, though him and Henry did some fun big man stuff at the start. Henry teasing a big dive was fucking awesome and his stuff with Kingston was great. Finlay ruled it, beating everyone up, SUICIDE DIVE, a using the step ladder, awesome. Punk was not a good choice for winner. If they had had Orton win the main, then have Punk cash in to beat him in the summer, that would have been epic booking, but they didn't so putting the win on a guy who was getting BOOED as he won was not smart.

Santino winning the divas match was the best option. No one would have given a shit if Beth won. No one would have given a shit of Candice won. No one would have given a shit if Maryse won. No one would have given a shit about the match at all, but people like Santino, thus it was alright for entertainment value. Didn't do much for me but it was better than if some diva no one gives a shit about won.

Pretty hilarious in a totally fucking awesome way that Ricky Steamboat hasn't wrestled in a decade or so yet still looks miles ahead of half the wrestlers on the scene today. Piper looked bad, Snuke looked bad, but damn Steamboat fucking ruled with Jericho. Hitting all his signature spots like he isn't old enough to be Jericho's daddy and even taking a bump to the floor and working a hot finishing stretch. Post-match stuff was awful though, just awful.

Hardy vs Hardy was pretty good, not amazing or anything. Matt may just be one of the best wrestlers going these days and the quality between him and Jeff was clear as Matt was able to be interesting and painful on offence without digging into the hardcore title bag of tricks. Matt's new ring gear is pretty sick too and he is an awesome heel. The table spot on the outside was pretty good though I'm not sure why you'd put a table on top of them too. Finish was pretty sick too and I give Jeff alot of credit for taking those sorts of bumps. Could have done with another five minutes or so to really get epic, but the right man won.

Rey vs JBL was just ridiculous and not even worth having on the card. Rey looked like a total tool dressed a Joker with down's syndrome and I would hardly even call it a match. JBL quitting was obvious but atleast it got heat, even if it did waste SO MUCH TIME. Pointless.

HBK vs Taker was spectacular. Not five stars, not close, I'm just going to kill that right there, but still a doozy of a match and it'll take something pretty incredible to top that. So glad they didn't just go down the route of hitting their signature spots for pops. HBK getting the best of Taker in the opening exchanges was great and Taker actually becoming the UNDERDOG was awesome. HBK's dive looked awful as always. Not sure wether he was meant to miss or not, it looked bad. Taker pretty much Hayabusa'd himself with that. I blame the cameraman and HBk for not catching him properly. But fuck, I LEGIT thought Taker was hurt bad and HBk and ref were improvising a countout finish. The Taker began to rise. Yes, I was phisically marking out, almost yelling "GET UP, GET UPPPPPPPPPPP" at my laptop. Yeah. That wa s a fucking great spot. Selling from both men was incredible and I totally bought into nearly all the false finishes. Taker busting out a proper last Ride as opposed to the one out the corner was awesome, credit to HBK for taking that bump. Loved the way both Tombstones were set up by HBK doing ridiculous shit like the skin-the-can and trying to go for a moonsult of all things. Execution could have been tighter, and I would have loved to have seen a huge Figure Four near fall near the end, but yeah this was pretty incredible.

The triple threat was better than expected, mostly because Show and Cena put on a good outing. Edge had nothing to do all match apart from selling and hit two Spear spots, neither of which he made look good at all. He may as well of just not turned up for this match. Like Punk winning the MITB, I didn't have a huge problem with Cena winning, but dammit Vince listen to the boos. The majority of people there didn't want Cena to win at all.

Main event was a total abortion. Triple H is good for one or two good outings a year, the rest of the time he is awful and just dominated the roster. The sooner he hangs the boots up the sooner the WWE will benefit. Orton was alright, could have done more, but he works at such a slow pace these days. Trips was just awful and the match was boring as shit. Oh, and shocker, the wrong man won. Why didn't they just have the entire McMahon family come out and publicly rape Orton? They might as well of now his career is ONCE AGAIN knocked back to stage one thanks to Trips.

Overall, the good was good, the bad was bad. Everything delivered what I was expecting. Glad I didn't pay for it, but glad I watched it. Decent show, hardly the worst ever like some retard was claiming last night. Didn't realy inspire me to watch more though.

__________________

horrorfan_1986

The only opinion of the event that really matters is your own. If you're the only one in the world that didn't hate it, then it's a good PPV. If anything, you got your money's worth a lot more than others.

Unfortunately, it looks like you're in the minority for loving the event. I'll wait until my torrent finishes and I can watch it before I give a real opinion on the show, but just judging by the results, this looks like a terrible Wrestlemania. After reading them, I'm glad I didn't pay the 50-55 dollars to order the Pay Per View.

However, just because someone doesn't agree with your assessment that it's one of the top three 'Mania's ever, it doesn't mean their opinion is ignorant.

__________________

Flip

You really didn't hear that pop when he won?

__________________

King Steventon

The booking was mostly pretty bad I thought, but considering th card was pretty shitzilla the wrestling was better than expected.

__________________

King Steventon

I heard the 60% boos when he came out, I heard the chorus of boos when he had Edge in the STF and I heard the split crowd when he won.

__________________