Well after the eventful week we had last time, this week had a lot to follow up to. We know the feud between Kelly and Beth is still going on but Natalya and Eve both seem to be becoming prominent players in it. We also have our Divas' Champion appearing on Smackdown again this week as well as the final Impact before Mickie and Winter's rematch.
Raw - Eve vs Bella Twin:
I'm honestly not sure which twin Eve was facing. Cole said she'd be facing Brie and the announcer said it was Nikki. I think this is the first time in living memory that one of the twins wore street clothes. Of course we knew Eve would be going over here, but why isn't she using her new theme music? I liked it. Not really that much to say about the match, except it was fine. Not awful and not excellent either. Whichever twin it was did a good spot at the ropes but then quickly slipped back into her typical routine. Broaden your moveset, girls. We have seen Nikki do that in the past as a heel on NXT and they were good last week as well but an arm wringer in a 3 minute match isn't going to cut it all the time. The work was fine and of course Eve wrestling is always a treat for me. It's too bad the Bellas are the only other girls on Raw now or else we could have had Eve vs Melina for something fresh. We got some promo from the DOD but next week we will need to get a big step up. They've teased the tag match for long enough and we need to see these girls get physical to really sell this feud. 5/10
NXT - Maxine vs AJ:
I honestly wasn't expecting to get this match so soon but I was pretty happy with it. Last time she was on NXT Maxine did look a bit shaky with her moves. Her wrestling doesn't seem to have broadened much but what she did, she did well and she looked like she knew what she was doing. She was great at playing off the crowd and dominating, even if she didn't do a whole lot of wrestling. Obviously that kind of stuff gets boring if you do it too often (*cough* Maryse) but of course Maxine won't be a regular wrestler. I'm glad AJ finally got a good length of time to wrestle and she looked good in the ring, loving her crossbody and pretty much everything else. They had a decent match when they were both NXT rookies but this was far better and I enjoyed it. I'm happy that Maxine is on TV now since she has a great character and I'm sure we'll see good things from her. I'm hoping for a mixed tag match next week with Titus & AJ against Derrick and Maxine. 7/10
Impact - Velvet Sky, ODB & Jacqueline vs Sarita, Rosita & Angelina Love:
I might be nit-picking just a little but I thought Velvet was a little too smiley walking down the ramp with Jackie and ODB behind her. I would have liked her to look a bit wary, like she wasn't sure whether or not to trust them but we did eventually see some of that in the actual match. This was a pretty good one and told a good story between all six Knockouts, with the tension between Rosita and Angelina as well as the deal with Velvet and Jackie. I read someone saying about the Sarita/Velvet action which I agree with - Velvet was moving a bit too slow. These two did well enough in the past but putting Velvet with someone as quick on her feet as Sarita isn't a good idea. She worked fine with Rosita and Angelina though and I was really happy to see the Rosita/ODB interaction. We did get to see a lot of mini-matches in here that we either haven't seen yet or else haven't seen in a long time. I do like this new direction Jackie and ODB are going in anyway and I'm looking forward to seeing what happens next. They seem to be faces now but maybe they'll turn on each other? Maybe they'll get their contracts and go back heel? Who knows? 7/10
Smackdown - Kelly Kelly vs Tamina:
It is good to see a fresh match and it is also good that Kelly is appearing regularly on both shows like LayCool did. Her title reign is being handled relatively well. I do have a lot of criticisms for the match itself though. Firstly one big problem that always seems to happen with Tamina is her timing. She does her moves well but she's too slow. The match felt like it was going in slow motion in places with Kelly having to slow down while Tamina seemed to be deciding what to do next. The headscissors botch was nasty looking and I think it was more Tamina's fault this time around - she looked like maybe she was meant to land normally but changed tack and hit the ropes instead. She did work through it though and I would like to see the girls get some more time to improve on this. Aside from the botch, everything else was fine to me anyway. Obviously Alicia is off TV because she's selling the beatdown she got from Natalya though it wasn't that devastating so hopefully she's back next week. 4/10
So not as good as last week but with Night of Champions approaching us and a definite feud blossoming we do have stuff to look forward to with our divas. Will we finally get the much hyped tag match? What will Alicia do to get revenge on Natalya? We also have a title match to look forward to on Impact.
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