-- 2/19 WWE Elimination Chamber PPV Reax

Bryan of Philadelphia, Pa., student (7.5): Best Match: Raw Chamber for WWE Title. Worst Match: Swagger vs. Gabriel. I liked this PPV for the most part. I find it hard to blame WWE for NOT being surprising and swerving the audience for no reason besides Vince McMahon going insane by the hour. They have trained fans to expect swerves that make no booking sense, so when a predictable show occurs, it feels like a letdown. The problem is when things make sense, you don't need to swerve, even if the card is predictable. Epic/illogical swerves do not need to take place five or six weeks before Mania. Not to mention a holding pattern with champions makes the titles look more important as well. I do have a problem with how they get Jericho into the #1 contender spot. It would have behooved WWE to make the Raw Chamber for that spot to give Jericho more heat and had Sheamus declare his opponent earlier... The Smackdown Chamber wasn't bad at all except for the lack of top talent that were too busy chatting with John Laurinaitis during the middle of the show... Cena-Kane was what it was. Cena's character gained NOTHING from that feud, as he's still the confident dork who is made of teflon. They wasted a great chance to get Cena to become more of a human, accepting his flaws and gaining character dimensions. I wish I could blame the writers, but I feel like it's really on Cena himself. I like Cena to a degree, but he wasted a chance to add layers to a stale character and instead is as "above it all" as ever. Barf.

Jorge Lopez of Miami, Fla. (5.0): Best: Smackdown Chamber. Worst: Rest of the show. WWE has just completed another installment of the John Cena Experiment. Five matches and the top two titles are placed first and third on the card. So, Cena main-events regardless of whether he has the title. Result - I thought putting the Chamber matches in non-main event or co-main event spots proves the titles are worthless in their eyes. The Cena match was bland and didn't bring closure to the Ryder-Cena-Eve love triangle. No shocks or surprises... Vince, do the right thing for investors and fans at the next shareholder's meeting. Tell the world that the Big 4 PPVs stay on PPV, and the others are going to The Network to sell advertising time. At this rate and quality, the only people who are going to buy these monthly PPVs are the significant others of the Superstars and Divas. WrestleMania, with its $60+ tab, is next. Wow me Monday night on Raw...your time is running out.

Joe Degnan, director: Best Match: SD Elimination Chamber. Worst Match: Cena vs. Kane. I enjoyed this PPV, but I would not have been happy if I'd had to pay for it (U.K). The Raw Chamber match was great and set up Punk vs. Jericho in a different way than everyone thought. The Divas had a great showing and I'm glad Beth retained because she is the best thing the Divas have as WWE continues to ruin Natalya. Santino was over huge. I was watching and following on Twitter and a lot of people were going nuts when they thought he had the chance of winning, but I guess he only "went the distance." Cena vs. Kane annoyed me. Two minutes into the match, they where trying to shove each other into the ambulance - I thought they would really try to destroy each other. John Cena won, of course, so I hope this leads to Ryder vs. Kane at Mania. Overall, an enjoyable PPV, but I didn't pay $55 for it.

Joe, PWTorch Reader (6.0): Best Match: Raw Chamber. Worst Match: Swagger vs. Gabriel; This might have been the worst EC PPV in a long time. First off, I thought the SD Chamber was a joke. Khali and Santino were really not needed for that match at all. Khali was eliminated in about a minute and as soon as Big Show was eliminated, I knew they were going to to put Bryan and Santino as the final two... The Raw Chamber was decent enough to actually watch. I didn't quite mind the Divas match. It wasn't that bad, surprisingly. Kane and Cena as the main event really made absolutely no sense. But, all in all, the match was okay. It was nice for what I think is the end of the rivalry. Cena has to prepare for The Rock and who knows what Kane's doing.

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We welcome your 0-10 score and comments on this show for a "WWE PPV Reax" feature in the Torch Feedback section of PWTorch.com. Just to add a twist to this feature, include not just your hometown, but also your occupation (mechanic, lawyer, stay-at-home-dad, college student, etc.) so readers get a flavor for what everyone does as "day jobs." To contribute your thoughts on the PPV, click here or email us at pwtorch@gmail.com.

[Torch art credit Travis Beaven (c) PWTorch.com]

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