The Redman Report: WWE Smackdown 16/12/11: Crisis averted.

Last week’s show was ruined so badly by Cole that I couldn’t finish it. This week’s show was so awesome at every point that I love wrestling more than ever. Oh, Smackdown. How could I ever doubt you?

I enjoyed Josh interviewing Booker as a nice, old school change of pace, and Cody’s response. Cody has found his ‘next step’ promo voice and moved beyond the goofiness of Mask Cody.

Cody vs Bryan was a fun match. They busted out some cool stuff like Bryan’s surfboard stomp and Cody actually suplexed him to the floor. The FINISH WAS AWESOME, a super slick sequence with a rollup rolled through right into Cross Rhodes. I marked HARD.

This entire thing was actually made by Booker T. Cole was still his Cole self but the difference was Booker was actually able and allowed to respond to Cole, shut him down and get his points across instead of COLE SHOUTING OVER EVERYBODY ALL THE TIME. Booker, I mean, with Truth out Booker is by far, by FAR the wackiest, goofiest character in wrestling. And yet here he was doing the greatest job of selling a match you’ve seen in forever. He was so great here, just so…believable, and I loved it. So much so that I’m quite looking forward to the match now.

AHAHAHAHAHA OH MY GOD ALICIA STOLE NATTIE’S WEAVE!

GREATEST SH*T EVER.

You all probably think I’m mental, but Alicia and Nattie had a Superstars feud over hair pulling with the roles reversed, and here we are months later and Alicia gets her babyface turn hair pulling redemption. A trillion billion points. I love wrestling.

Also, I enjoyed her wacky rhyming promo, as well as everybody recovering BEAUTIFULLY after her leg drop almost completely missed. I am so, so down with Alicia as the next challenger and working with Beth and especially Nattie for weeks on end.

Replaying the ‘Pipebomb’ montage from Raw was totally worth it to see “Man you crazy!” again. I will never, ever in my life get tired of seeing that.

Huge props to them for actually referencing the Swagger/Show World Title feud from 2010. Henry wanting Swagger to hurt Show’s ankle again was great. Swagger if I were you I wouldnt talk back to Mark Henry. Heel tension.

Usos! Oh man, they have to face Los Colons. Yes! This was a fun sprint of a tag match, the Usos are so underrated and the Colons are becoming quite the tag team. Rosa is already better as a manager than the rest of her career combined.

Once again, replaying and referencing the Swagger/Show stuff from last year is so cool. Swagger is a jobber but with those two segments this match seems so much bigger and has an actual angle to work with. Great work.

MARK HENRY IS THE GREATEST OF ALL TIME.

OF ALL TIME.

ALL. FREAKING. TIME.

Cannot overstate how amazing this entire match and segment was. Henry came down and sat at the bottom of the ramp to watch, and he was the world’s greatest watcher. He was visibly uncomfortable watching Show’s corner chops. Show was great tossing Swagger around, and Swagger really brought it himself, especially when he got to go on offense and work the ankle. A really fun match.

Then, finally, Swagger ROLLED HIM UP and got the Ankle Lock. Henry marks and is all “break it!” Show is in the hold, staring face to face with Henry, and he fights and fights, he looks this man in the eye and knows he CANNOT tap, and finally throws Swagger off and Henry flips out. That was some epic ‘Rock in the Crossface stares down Brock’ type sh*t and it was freaking GLORIOUS. Anyway, both men are up and Swagger walks right into KNOCKOUT PUNCH OF DOOM and HOLY F*CKING JESUS, MARK HENRY’S F*CKING FACE WHEN HE SAW THE PUNCH. His jaw literally dropped and that was the greatest facial selling of anything since Wrestlemania.

So afterwards, they get to jaw jackin’, Show kicks Swagger out to Henry’s feet, and, angered by his failure (as well as the sass from backstage) Henry kills Swagger with the chair, as if to say “Yeah, I can beat this guy up too.” Then BAM, Henry DRILLS THE CAMERAMAN. That was so out of left field and so awesome, it went from both guys strutting and evening out over Swagger, then suddenly Henry decides to get the upper hand by bein’ a douche and Show is all “WTF? You motherf*cker!” Epic f*cking win.

This was all so excellent on so many levels. The ankle story was great: Henry’s ankle is injured. Henry previously injured Show’s ankle, and Swagger had done it last year so the idea was to do it again. BUT, Show survived the ankle targeting and won, because he’s the babyface challenger demonstrating that he’s stronger now than he was then. And again, the Ankle Lock moment was so Rock & Brock and it was awesome. But after all that, Henry still left as an even bigger asshole by killing a defenseless cameraman. So, in conclusion, both guys are primed and ready for this Chairs Match. So pumped. This is the best feud in forever, honestly. And Henry is the greatest of all time.

Orton trying to no-sell Zack’s wacky hijinks is money. They should team all the time just for the backstage conversations.

Woah, stop the presses! They showed footage of the DiBiase Posse! About bloody time. This was a really, really fun sprint. Ted is the Master of the Rollups, Slater tries slapping him in the face, Ted DECKS HIM and gets to work. I love babyfaces. F*ck a Jinder Mahal though.

Sheamus vs Jinder went far longer than you would expect and was actually a lot better than I expected too. Sheamus being a boss and beating the crap out of this man probably helped. But this was easily Jinder’s best match so far.

The main event was a great f*cking tag match. Just as good as the one from a few weeks ago with Sheamus and Swagger. The work was just so, so good and they got a great deal of time. Barrett avoiding Orton early was cool, their mind games angle has been quite good. Orton and Dolph working was immense, these two need to work together until the end of time. Orton sold and sold which made the first hot tag to Zack great. Then Zack sold and sold and Orton got into it and the crowd got into it and then he got the second hot tag and went insane. Two great babyface performances and the heels were equally good. And the finish, with Orton staring down Barrett on the pin so Barrett wouldnt interfere, that was boss as hell and theirs is another feud done really well. Really looking forward to the PPV.