Welcome everybody to this week’s historical Raw Redux. Why historical you ask? Because Rosa Mendes was involved in the most segments of any Diva tonight. That, for the loyal Mendeslovers, is the change and progression we… I mean, they (remaining unbiased) have always been after. As the recent Rosa/Alberto story advanced, we also had some more with Vickie Guerrero and the AJ Scandal. It may not be everyone’s cup of tea, but it is getting a female air time, and back in the days of the eleven second matches being our only sight for an entire show, we would be longing for days like this.
Also, we did have some action as well. Flip-flop Fox as I like to call her, was feeling cheerful today. Perhaps the loss on SmackDown a few weeks ago made her realize that she needed to join the nice Divas side this week. Whatever the reason may be, Alicia is all smiles tonight as she must go one on one with the recently returned daughter of Jimmy Superfly Snuka, Tamina! Will Tamina demolish her like easy pickings? I’m kind of worried if she does as I’m not sure what another loss could do to our unstable Fox just trying to find her identity out in the world. Nonetheless, let’s begin!
Returning with a Vengeance
Skip to 1:02 (Or 0:23 if like me, you want to catch a video hyping former Maxine Love Triangle interest, Johnny Curtis as his new alter ego, Fandango)
We return to the ring and spot Alicia Fox, who I don’t know what to make of this week. She has a skeleton on her gear, which signifies Halloween aka evil so that’s a point in the bad side. But there’s a heart on it, which signifies love and happiness, so there’s a point on the good side. Add in that she’s jumping, smiling, cheering, and screaming… and I guess that means she’s decided to be good tonight. Perhaps wanting to get on Santa’s list this year? Just my guess. Nonetheless, she is here and ready to fight, but her opponent does not look as happy as she does. The sound of our former Diva national anthem, “TA-MEE-NA” hits, and out she comes looking quite unpleased with everything around her.
A video pops up onto the screen, where Tamina informs us that she doesn’t like a woman who doesn’t respect authority. Therefore, she is using Alicia Fox as an example to show AJ what happens when you cross paths with Vickie Guerrero (and by association, I assume Tamina as well.) The bell sounds and Alicia turns on the evil inside of her by going right to work on Tamina with the aggression we normally see on days where Fox feels like joining the bad side. The referee has to restrain her a few times, which allows Tamina to lift her up and drop her on the top turnbuckle.
Tamina lands a stiff clothesline, following it up with an uppercut and one of the greatest evil scowls of all time. A clothesline to the back of flip flop Fox by the exotic Tamina, but Alicia gets a quick small package for a near fall. Tamina decimates the Fox with a shot to the face, before landing a Samoan Drop. Tamina drags Alicia Fox over towards a corner of the ring, which sparks the downed Fox to begin shrieking in an oddly hysterical way. (Note: I don’t endorse pain to Alicia in any way with that comment) With that, Snuka heads to the top rope as the crowd gets excited, before leaping off with the Superfly Splash that is so majestic we get a few replays of it.
Defending the Honor of a Freakin’ Costa Rican
Skip to 13:24
On commentary, Michael Cole notes that Ryback isn’t the only angry person looming around the Raw Locker Room… before showing us a recap of last week’s antics involving ROSA!… I mean (ahem) involving Rosa Mendes, Hornswoggle, The Great Khali, Primo & Epico. Poor Rosa got her makeup ruined by a gag batch of flowers, and before we know it we are transported backstage to see her screaming at someone, which is soon revealed to be Hornswoggle from earlier in the day. She wants to know who he thinks he is that he can just go around embarrassing someone of her class and grace, but he tells her to calm down. Hornswoggle (of all people) wants to know who would kiss or give flowers to Rosa, dubbing her conceited!
Rosa follows this up and prompts me to burst with laughter as she screams “Claro Claro” and then begins fading in between English and Spanish while her anger grows! She then proceeds to ask who he is to say that to her, but what I’m really wondering is how on Earth Hornswoggle managed to get up on such a high crate when it’s clear the only other person around, in Rosa, wasn’t in the helping mood. Anyways, Alberto Del Rio and his suit seemingly hear the commotion, as he intervenes and tells Rosa to not let this piece of trash bother her. He only does these things to Rosa because he knows no real woman will take him seriously… uh oh I smell NXT Diva debut storyline. Del Rio says that if it’s revenge Rosa wants, he would be more than happy to help the senorita! Hornswoggle begins to panic as he should, but a hand spins Alberto Del Rio around! DUN DUN DUN! Thankfully unlike a cliffhanger ending to a TV episode, we don’t have to wait a week to find out who it was because the answer is righhttt here.
Why, it’s The Great Khali everybody! Alberto Del Rio doesn’t back down though, as a former star of the gone, but not soon forgotten NBC series, Outsourced, tells Alberto to leave his friend alone. Alberto backs away, and Rosa seems to have disappeared, as Khali and Hornswoggle high five one another and head to the ring.
Note: You may also watch the match right after the conclusion of the backstage segment to see Rosa Mendes cheer Alberto on from a backstage monitor around 2:06, as well as give her reaction to the ending of the bout upon the conclusion at 5:25
Skip to 8:27
Alberto Del Rio, now back in the suit from earlier today, and Ricardo Rodriguez are shown walking backstage when they are approached by senorita Rosa Mendes. She begins her speech in Spanish, but slowly transitions into Spanish I can understand, in the form of Gracias, before converting fully to English and thanking Alberto for defending her honor against Hornswoggle and Khali. Back to Spanish she goes to end it, with Del Rio saying that whatever she needs… something in Spanish. (I really need to learn this language so I can understand what’s going on.) Del Rio winks at the Costa Rican of Freakin nature, before heading off and leaving her staring on with a gleam in her eye. Viva La DelRosa!
Scandal 2012: John Cena and AJ Look to Silence Vickie Guerrero
Skip to 8:23
To the ring we go, as in the midst of John Cena speaking on AJ’s kissing ability, Vickie Guerrero interrupts with her patented “Excuse Me!” I personally think these two just need to get on the phone with Olivia Pope already to get this taken care of, but it seems they are now embracing the inner-Scandal inside, so more power to them. Vickie Guerrero loves to say “I Told You So”, and after his display with AJ last week, it confirms they have been having an affair (which I still don’t get because neither are with anyone TV wise).
Miss Guerrero has a gift for John… matching bath robes! They are a token of Vickie’s admiration for them to bask in the honeymoon phase. Vickie feels that the two of them are going to soon implode like all of AJ Lee‘s relationships. Daniel Bryan… CM Punk… Kane… the forgotten Hornswoggle and Primo Colon… But before Vickie can continue, here comes AJ sans skip, which means business is going down. AJ climbs into the ring, which Vickie assumes is to deny AJ’s lovesick puppy status over the past year. Miss Lee does the opposite though, admitting that she’s had issues with men in the past… but she’s trying to learn from her mistakes and become a better person, that of which Vickie doesn’t know how to do.
AJ explains that this whole scandal arose from the two of them having inappropriate relations while she was GM, which confirms to me that the word “affair” now comes into play because AJ is one of those people who is married to their job. No paperwork or marriage license needed, but still a marriage nonetheless. AJ isn’t GM anymore, and thanks to Vickie, she can date whoever she wants or do whatever she wants. For example, she can caress John Cena’s ear or smack him on the bottom and cause him to drop a microphone. She can also… wait, wait, Vickie stops AJ from planting a kiss on him. AJ says it’s a shame that GM’s can’t be with talent anymore, because it’s the only way Vickie would ever land a man. Oh snap!
Lee follows up with the insults by stating that there is only one female dog in this ring right now, as Vickie gets in her face and tells this little girl to be careful with what she says. Just then, here comes Dolph Ziggler to stop this episode of the Jerry Springer show. Ziggler feels they are all losing the real story here, in the fact that Cena can’t deal with the fact that he just laid there and took the assault last week on Raw…
… and something about Cena’s cheap attack on SmackDown didn’t sit right. Dolph knows that last week when he kissed AJ, she was thinking about Dolph the entire time. AJ perfects her head tilt-scowl-eye glare look to a T, as Cena starts to head to the stage to confront Ziggler. Vickie then decides to have John Cena face Dolph Ziggler tonight on Raw!
Skip to 9:47
As the encounter between Cena and Ziggler commences, John looks to have tweaked his ankle again on the outside. This sparks Dolph to undo the turnbuckle padding with the referees distracted… until AJ runs out and climbs onto the ring apron! She stops him, but out comes Vickie to grab at AJ’s leg! AJ’s psycho face is back, as she backs Vickie up and allows Cena to hit the Attitude Adjustment for the victory! Post match, AJ and Cena engage in a kiss with each other before heading up the stage and to the back.
Thoughts: Wowza, a lot to talk about this week on Raw… and to be honest I wouldn’t have it any other way. This is one of my favorite recaps I’ve gotten to do since the days of that oh so missed yellow roped show because there was so much story going on and a lot of different things to talk about. I’ll start with the match, which I thought was pretty much the average of what to expect with the short time. I will say that I loved Alicia’s aggression at the start, and the Superfly Splash was one of the best Tamina’s done. Also props to the video interview because I think a reason for the assault on AJ needed to be established to the main audience, as not everyone has seen the wwe.com video I’m sure. I’ve always been a big fan of Tamina, but I particularly love the way she’s being handled right now by looking like this intimidating, scary bodyguard type for Vickie Guerrero. I do wish she would’ve been a part of the in ring segment Cena/Ziggler/Vickie/AJ had, even if she just stood there in front of Vickie to prevent anything from happening to her. But what we got was good development for Tamina, who continues to look like a badass.
As if it wasn’t obvious enough, Rosa Del Rio is probably one of my favorite things going right now. The turn it took last week with Hornswoggle was not the type of stuff I wanted to see, but it got turned around tonight and made into exactly what I was hoping for. Del Rio defended Rosa’s honor, and the two got multiple segments to build it up. I will say that I don’t want her to ditch Primo and Epico though because I feel like she helped them to stand out amongst the tag team division. There’s no reason they can’t all join together as this huge stable. In fact, I would love it. Alberto, Rosa, Primo, Epico, and Ricardo could do great things in WWE. They would already have their own ring announcer and ringside cheerleader to yell in Spanish and English while shimmying, so what more could they ask for? It would be great, but as a big Rosa Mendes fan, anything that gets her on screen is a victory for me.
The AJ/Cena thing I’m mixed on. I loved it at the start when it was AJ and Vickie having these awesome in ring segments and catfights, but now there are parts that confuse me a little. Don’t get me wrong, I still love seeing AJ get the air time and get to be in segments with main eventers, but I do also miss crazy AJ. And I have to admit the big thing with Vickie using AJ’s relationship as reason to get her fired as GM is kind of odd considering her own past as Smackdown GM with my favorite group of all time, La Familia. Is AJ Scandal 2012 perfect? No. But I have hope that it can become something excellent down the line when more of this gets flushed out and built up. I would like to see Eve thrown into this somehow, since it looks like Kaitlyn‘s title push might have sadly come to an end. If you could mix in the Divas Champion and AJ together in an angle involving John Cena and Dolph Ziggler, you could really do something special to get fans invested in a title feud. But that’s just my own personal thoughts, so have at it with yours in the comments below! And apologies if this recap is insanely long. I kind of go off in tangents when I have a lot of stuff to talk about.
