SPOTLIGHTED PODCAST ALERT (YOUR ARTICLE BEGINS A FEW INCHES DOWN)...
RAW TALK REPORT
DECEMBER 28, 2020
AIRED ON WWE NETWORK
REVIEW BY NICK MORGAN, PWTORCH CONTRIBUTOR
Hosts: Charly Caruso, R-Truth
This week’s guests: Keith Lee, New Day (Xavier Woods & Kofi Kingston), Asuka
– Charly introduced the show and co-host R-Truth and of course had to once again mention their stupid little name game, “CharTruth,” ugh! Anyway, while the split screen played the end of Raw angle with Alexa and Randy Orton and the torching of Alexa after she poured “gasoline” on herself, Charly was talking about the stupid flower angle between her and Garza. Talk about tone deaf. Nonetheless, after this ridiculous moment, Charly mentioned how scary the moment was and that who knows what happened, I could do nothing but shake my head. Her and Truth were sitting right next to the ring where this had all taken place and they had no idea what happened.
– WWE has made no effort to separate this show out from the main show and even use the Thunderdome as a backdrop, right after the end of the show, to have these two “reporters” or personalities not to acknowledge what the outcome was is just stupid and treats us, the audience, as complete dupes, I for one and not a dupe and really hate this. Okay rant over, back to the show.
– Without a second thought, Charly moved right to the first guest: Keith Lee. As Lee took his seat, they discussed his new position as the number one contender and his upcoming match on Legends Night on Raw next week. They watched Drew’s comments from earlier in the night about Lee and his being ready for the “opportunity”, but that while Lee could be anybody, he won’t be able to beat Drew. Rather than accepting the compliments (okay with some shade thrown), Lee came back at Drew by saying that he can not truly accept a man who supports a man who does dirty (Sheamus). They are obviously using this to build up the match between two babyfaces, and Lee really leaned into it.
– Lee said that he is “a legend in the making” and it is appropriate that this match will take place on Legends Night. That’s right keep pumping up next week’s show. A quick segment, but a good job by Lee to build up the match and build some tension.
– Before Charly could introduce them, Xavier Woods and Kofi Kingston hit the set singing and dancing and actually made some quick and rather in bad taste jokes about paper and stuff and fire hazards. Not good. While they were talking the split screen played Big E’s victory over Sami Zayn over on Smackdown. Very interesting that they are giving such play to Smackdown, but it happened on the main show as well and I think because it involves Big E, it is appropriate here with the New Day.
– This segment was not really concentrated on the New Day, but on Big E and his Intercontinental win and then unexpectedly, Xavier took us to a sad, but really good place as he started talking about Brodie Lee, Luke Harper, John Huber, Gator. They said that he was their friend who was a fantastic human and that he was someone who isn’t just important to him (Xavier) but to everyone and that he loved him. Xavier looked truly moved and upset and Kofi picked up about how great a man he was. A really nice segment and a really nice tribute to the man, John Huber.
– To her credit and to the producers of the show, they ended the segment there and moved on.
– Nobody is ready for Asuka, even us on Raw Talk. This was strange, to have a talking segment with a woman who really is not an English speaker. They actually did a pretty good job at having Charly doing most of the talking and having Asuka give very brief answers. They did not seem scripted or memorized, but it was still pretty awkward. Asuka has great energy and that helped carry the segment and Asuka and Truth played off each other well. They ended the segment quickly with Asuka answering Charly’s question about new year’s resolutions by saying that she intended to keep both of her championships. And with that a quick goodbye and the show was over.
FINAL THOUGHTS…
Thankfully the show was a really quick 21 minutes and that was probably too long. The opening segment was just creepy and weird coming out of a show with self-emulation being the cliff-hanger. Keith Lee was rather bland and while effective in setting up his match with Drew was nothing special and the closing segment with Asuka was head scratching as to why they did it. Only the New Day provided some real juice both in cheering on Big E and his victory and in their obviously heart-felt remembrance of Luke Harper.
I am really getting bored and disenchanted with R-Truth as the co-host and need to figure out how to add some pizzaz to the show, the way Kayla and Paul are doing on Talking Smack.
As I noted this show was short so if you want to watch go ahead, but ultimately this Raw Talk is definitely one you can skip.
Well, that is it for now, see you all next week. Until then, take care and stay safe.
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