But not today, unless you really want to hear me discuss what I had for lunch or the three customers I checked out all day. I’ve never seen the store this dead on a Friday short of a three-foot downfall of snow, and even then it’s usually crowded with people buying up melting salt, followed by people who are pissed we didn’t have enough melting salt. (Here’s a hint: buy melting salt the instant your store gets it in while it’s still warm outside. You’d be amazed at how much they’ll have in stock!)

Wait a second, did I…? I did! I did make it past the ad box! Wow, these precaps are getting easier all the time! I’ll be a bloody pro by the time my OO career is done, which will probably be in thirty years or when My Rosa decides she needs more PyroFalkon in her life, whichever comes first.

And speaking of My Rosa, let’s get to SmackDown, where I’m sure she’ll put in another appearance…

Segment 1: After a video montage of Big Show plowing over AJ like a pissed off bull going after a matador, Big Show himself hits the ring for the first time since that event happened. Show says that he’s got a lot to say but doesn’t know how to put it eloquently, so he’ll just come out and say it: he’s sorry for what he did.

Apparently he’s said this to AJ personally, and she forgave him “immediately,” but he wanted to apologize to all of us too. The crowd cheers him, and he goes on that he wants the fans to forgive him too, but admits that he’s having trouble forgiving himself. See, flattening AJ wasn’t an isolated incident: when he was a kid, he didn’t know his own strength and frequently caused problems like that. When he joined WWE, he thought it was behind him, because he found a place he belonged. (What, your WCW run didn’t count because of Kevin Nash’s glass bones and Hulk Hogan’s artificial joints?)

Show goes on that he loves his job… but after thirteen years, he doesn’t know if he can really continue with his career after this incident. He’s proud of being part of the triple threat match at the Royal Rumble, but after that, he’s going to soul-search and might, just might, have to leave.

And here comes Daniel Bryan—strangely without the title—who gets in the ring to respond. He factiously says that Show apologizing totally makes everything okay. Then he drops the coy crap and says directly that AJ may have accepted his apology once, but the poor girl was heavily medicated at the time, and now doesn’t even remember Show visiting her.

But DB remembers, and remembers everything… He remembers WWE being a place for “athletes, not genetic freaks.” And DB immediately cuts off a potential argument against Andre the Giant, because he assures Show that he is no Andre. The fans cheer for Show, but DB tells us not to fall for him: Show isn’t serious about his contemplation of retirement, which are empty words along with his empty apologies. If Show was truly repentant, he wouldn’t be here apologizing to the fans, or DB himself, or AJ, or anyone: he’d be resigning and retiring. Right now.

Show takes a deep breath as DB starts yelling at him to just fucking leave, but he stupidly starts poking Show in the chest. Show takes this for a bit, until DB yells that if he (Show) “can’t” do anything about his super-strength and super-clumsiness, DB can… and he slaps Show across the face. Show’s eyes go wide, but he still controls it, until DB slaps him again.

And Show snaps, grabbing DB by the throat and shoving him neck-first into the corner. DB drops the mic, but the camera mic picks up the rest of the conversation. Show calls DB an “arrogant ass”; that what happened to AJ was an accident, but what happens to DB this Sunday at their triple threat match won’t be.

With that, Show tosses DB into the floor. DB is basically okay, but he crawls away to the opposite corner while looking wide-eyed at the giant.

And here comes Mark Henry to add his two cents, instantly pissing off Show and making DB confused and scared. Henry grabs a mic and says he doesn’t care about Show’s emotional problems, DB’s Napoleon complex, or “some 95-pound girl in a training bra.” He screams for DB to get in his face, and then declares that after DB escaped from their title match last week, Henry will “tear his skin off on general principle.” Ha!

DB tries to beg off, but Teddy Long arrives to stop any sort of fisticuffs. He says that given they’re only two days away from the Royal Rumble, they need to enter the PPV with a bang. We’ve already got one main event—the return of Randy Orton versus Wade Barrett—but we can use a second one. Since last week we had Henry vs. DB, and the week before we had Show vs. DB, it stands to reason that we need Henry vs. Show this week! Holla!

DB gets away with a night off, and the big men are too distracted jawing at each other to really care. Interesting…

Of note, that was a solid promo by Mark Henry. He kept it simple, didn’t try to do too much, and hit two hilarious lines. That was excellent, and a step in the right direction. Very solid opening all around, with a great dialogue between Show and DB (and the fans) too.

Segment 2 [Singles Match]: Cody Rhodes defeats Justin Gabriel by pin. Decent match but a bit short, with Justin doing almost all the offense. Cody’s entire offense consisted of counters, including the match-ender. With Cody down, Gabriel went for springboard moonsault (or a Lionsault, since Chris Jericho is back and all), but Cody rolled out of the way. Justin landed on his feet but tweaked his left knee, which I think was only kayfabe, but he sold it well. Either way, Cody took advantage to give Justin a quick Cross Rhodes to end it.

Segment 3: Santino Marella is chatting up T-Long in the back, and he’s got a super idea for a match: it’s a singles match where the loser has to join an astronaut monkey team and be blasted into space in the middle of the night, an idea so awesome that I want in on that match and intentionally lose.

T-Long rejects that, but Yoshi Tatsu, who happens to be there, thinks it’s a good idea. Santino says that these two are the next tag team champions, and their name… is Santoshi. Yoshi says fuck that: it’s Yoshitino. They go back and forth about that for a second, giving Long a chance to regret not packing his Excedrin for this event. (If I get a vote, I think “Santoshi” rolls off the tongue better, which I’d like to personally demonstrate to My Rosa.)

But now Drew McIntyre shows up, and Long isn’t happy with him, losing four straight weeks and unable to beat Santino last week after cheating. Drew responds that even the great Babe Ruth struck out five times in one game, and Drew is simply in a similar slump. Sure, Long replies, but the fact is that Ruth may have struck out now and then, but he usually knocked it out of the park… and that’s what Drew needs to do tonight.

Against Sheamus, on the other side of the commercial.

Segment 4 [Singles Match]: Sheamus defeats Drew McIntyre by pin. Decent match, nothing special, but one of Drew’s better ones. He was pretty aggressive early, until Sheamus had decided his health bar was low enough, then he flipped the switch and started just beating the hell out of Drew with pretty much nothing but clubbing blows and stiff clotheslines. One Blarney Boot later and it was over.

Poor Drew. And Sheamus: stop making that face. That’s scary.

Pre-Segment 5: Somehow, Santino convinced Yoshi to do that weird power walk thing before the match. Heh, amusing. It’s great to see Yoshi again, I don’t care if he’s being a little goofy.

Also: RRRRRROOOSSSAAA!!! Why the hell would the director zoom out when she was doing that squatting grind? What a douche.

Segment 5 [Tag Match]: Epico & Primo (w/ My Rosa) defeat Santoshi by pin. Decent match but short and a foregone conclusion. Solid work all around though, and the ending sequence was fast-paced. During the Pier Four Brawl, Yoshi was clotheslined out of the ring by Primo, who then ate a Cobra by Santino, who then ate a Backstabber by Epico. And it all happened in less time than it probably took you to read that sentence. Sweet ending.

Santoshi isn’t a bad team, though. Yoshi is credible, and Santino was allowed to be a little more aggressive, making him look credible too. I doubt they’ll get the Tag Titles unless something crazy happens, but they work well together. Hopefully we’ll see more of them.

Segment 6: And again the director decides that it’s in the show’s best interest to do a smash-cut from My Rosa’s gyrations to Mark Henry’s zoomed-in face, proving that the director really needs to be fired.

Henry is in the back doing… something. DB walks up and deflects the schmoz ending from last week by blaming T-Long for putting lumberjacks out there in the first place. And hey, it’s also T-Long’s fault that Henry has to deal with Show tonight, because DB was going to give him his rematch. Hell, DB so totally respects Henry!

And it’s because of that respect that DB came here. See, he wants to give some advice to Henry concerning Show. DB thinks that T-Long is conspiring to get Show to be champion, because if not, T-Long should have made that rematch.

His point is that Big Show shouldn’t even be in the triple threat match; it should just be one-on-one with DB versus Henry. So in their match tonight, Henry needs to hurt Show. Merely pinning him won’t prove anything, and it’ll be revenge for all the times Show injured Henry too. Show is clearly a monster, and he needs to be “taught a lesson.” And if anyone can teach him that lesson, it’ll be the World’s Strongest Man.

DB pats Henry on the shoulder—temporarily pissing him off—and leaves. Henry clearly is thinking about that as we fade from the segment.

Segment 7: Wade Barrett hits the ring for his match against Randy Orton, but of course wants to talk first. He says that tonight’s SmackDown has a bunch of pageantry attached to it (really? I haven’t noticed!), and it’s all due to the return of Orton. But Barrett is sure that Orton isn’t 100%. The doctors may have cleared him, but Orton is spiritually messed up from being thrown down a flight of stairs.

Wade is sure that Orton won’t show up, but surprise surprise, his music plays then. Rather than an entrance, Orton gets the Goldberg treatment, with a camera in his face in the backstage. Orton has the face expression of a guy who’s really wanting something from the vending machine and just can’t find it, but he instead manages to get to the gorilla position.

After a moment’s pause, Orton doesn’t walk out from backstage, he’s in a dead sprint. Wade meets him at the foot of the ramp, and we get a nice brawl. Refs hit the ring and try to break them apart, but that doesn’t work, so the lower midcarders hit the ring to separate the two. It takes Tyler Reks, both Usos, Trent Baretta, and Some Guy I Don’t Know to stop him.

The midcarders finally restrain the Viper in the ring as Wade runs up the ramp. As Wade looks on, Orton randomly RKOs the Some Guy. Stupidly, the other four decide that this is a good time to try to attack Orton one at a time, so he naturally RKOs all of them in turn. Wade craps his pants, and Orton just stares on in anger. No match, but you’d be an idiot if you think this won’t extend to the Royal Rumble.

Segment 8: After commercial, we find that DB is talking to AJ’s bestest friend, Kaitlyn. DB says that she needs to do AJ a favor by telling Big Show that Henry is going to try to injure him tonight. She may be a blond, but those aren’t blond roots, so Kaitlyn wonders whether that would be doing AJ the favor, if that’d be doing DB a favor.

DB twists this to say it’s so totally a favor for both of them. After all, AJ loves him. With that, Kaitlyn agrees, and I hang my head in shame. How exactly did that convince her?

Well, Kaitlyn already wants DB to return the favor by telling her how he really feels about AJ. DB responds that he likes to keep those feelings private. This, again, instantly convinces her. Stupid girl. [Ed. Note: Hey, now! You don't see me pointing out how Rosa dresses like a repellent $7 whore, do you? So lay off Kaitlyn; who cares how stupid she has to act so long as she's finally back on TV being all the-hottest-girl-in-WWE?]

Pre-Segment 9: Ted DiBiase pops out of the back for a match. Even though it looked like he tweaked his knee, but it seems DiBiase actually damaged his left wrist during the match. It’s all wrapped up, but he’s good to go.

Segment 9 [Singles Match]: Hunico (w/ Camacho) defeats Ted DiBiase by pin. Very short match, but it told a story. Hunico immediately went after the wrist, doing some wrist locks and even leg dropping it once Ted was down. Then, inexplicably, Hunico slaps on a submission… to Ted’s shoulder. Meanwhile, the commentators blather about how smart of a strategy it is for Hunico to get that wrist. Idiots.

Well, since it is only the shoulder, Ted fights out of it. After a little back-and-forth, he manages to set Hunico up in Dream Street, but that wrist won’t let him complete the move. Hunico jumps on that chance, doing essentially Jericho’s Codebreaker to Ted’s wrist, then following it up with his sick finisher that he’s calling the Inside Out. As a reminder, he put Ted up on his shoulders like the Torture Rack position, but did a twisting fall-away slam instead of a submission attempt. Ted couldn’t get up from that.

After the match, both heels just beat the shit out of Ted. Camacho held Ted’s wrist on the steel steps, then Hunico stomped on it. That seemed to satisfy them, although they hung out long enough to admire their work.

Segment 10: Aksana is hanging out with Teddy Long, but before any stupidity ensues, Natalya breaks into the office to raise the overall hotness of the scene. Nattie wants a rematch against Tamina, and Aksana mocks her for losing. Nattie doesn’t like that, and Ted says that since Aksana has been wanting to compete anyway, he books a match between Nattie and Aksana next. Natalya gets in a last taunt.

…And then someone farts, because WWE enjoys keeping it classy. All three looked at each other guiltily, and then Nattie was the first to run out.

There is no way that can end well. I don’t care what that was all about or who supposedly farted, that shit (no pun intended) has any place on WWE TV.

Segment 11 [Singles Match]: Brodus Clay (w/ Naomi & Irrelevant) squashes Alex Riley by pin. My, how the mighty have fallen… a guy who flirts with the main event against the WWE Champion The Miz is now jobbing out to comedy squashes. Heath Miller deserves this, not you, A-Ri.

The match “started” with Riley getting a little too much into Brodus’s entrance, to the point where Riley wanted to show off some dance moves. Brodus countered with those gyrations that look like someone dropped a bottle of rat poison in a pool of Draino. Alex thought those were awesome, so he wanted a high-five. Brodus acted like was going to do it, but instead did a Samoan slam. Two moves later, including the What The Funk, and it’s over.

What do you think, Rick? Should we put an Online Onslaught ban on that name as a finisher? I don’t want to give Michael Cole any more of a reason to spew it every time Brodus is on TV. [Ed. Note: I thought it was the "Funk It." In either case, this proves I was right to never stop calling it the "F-U."]

Cut Scene: Before commercial, we see Kaitlyn talking to Big Show in the back.

Segment 12: They replay the entire Zack Ryder/Kane match from RAW.

Pre-Segment 13: Aksana isn’t in my top-5 divas right now with that awful dark hair dye, but good god is that a hot outfit. It’s basically an all-fishnet leotard, except with black undergarments to cover the naughty bits.

…Shit, Aksana, is going to win this, isn’t she?

Segment 13 [Singles Match]: Aksana squashes Natalya by pin. Aksana literally won in seven seconds. For absolutely no goddamn reason, Natalya started the match by looking toward the ramp (and turning her back to her opponent). Aksana ran up, did a schoolgirl pin, and that was it.

Ugh. Nattie deserves so, so much better.

Post-Segment 13: Natalya knows she deserves better, so she starts beating the hell out of Aksana. She’s booed for this because wrestling fans are idiots, but I for one cheer for her, especially when she slaps on the Sharpshooter.

Now Tamina comes down to make the save, and does so, including a beautiful Superfly Splash. If Tamina hadn’t officially turned yet, now she is: ladies and gentlemen, we have a face turn.

Josh Mathews says that Tamina’s move “was something out a videogame… and speaking of videogame, check out WWE ’12!” That was a really, really shitty segue, but more shitty is the fact that Michael Cole publically calls Josh out for it. No, Cole calling it out wasn’t shitty; what’s shitty is that Cole and I agree about something. I’m pretty sure seppuku is my only way out of that predicament.

Segment 14 [Singles Match]: Big Show defeats Mark Henry by pin. Show timing—that is, the timing of SmackDown—must have been really out of whack tonight. Before the match starts, DB hits ringside to watch, and we’re shortly underway.

Almost immediately, Show beats the hell out of Henry, making him collapse in a heap and roll out of the ring. From there, we go to commercial… and when we’re back, the bell is ringing because the match is over. The commentators manage to cram in that during the commercial, Henry got back in the ring, immediately ate a WMD, and was pinned. Your former World Heavyweight Champion, ladies and gentlemen!

Post-Segment 14: Also inexplicably [Ed. Note: *], the instant the match was over, DB slid in and started beating the shit out of Big Show with a chair. He got Show down and then grinded the chair into Show’s throat, then locked on the LeBell Lock. Show almost tapped, but wound up powering out.
 
[* The Rick Explains the Inexplicable: Mark Henry twisted his knee -- for real -- right before the break, and the finish of the match was audibled. It was awkward enough that the live crowd knew something was wrong, and so the way WWE presented it on TV is probably the best they could do without exposing the cooperation/ref-listening-to-his-earpiece/on-the-fly-ness of the improv'd finish. The entire post-match angle was affected by Henry's injury. Also, FWIW: Henry's still expected to be in the 3-way cage match on Sunday, though they'll probably try to "hide" him as much as possible.]

Show countered with a chokeslam, then readied a second WMD. DB saw it at the last second and bailed, skittering away on his ass like he did in the opening. Show celebrated by holding the chair over his head, which made no damn sense. But if DB’s status was ever in doubt—if he was a tweener—he is most certainly a heel now with his chair-happy assault.

Final Thoughts: The timing of the show was really weird. I’d rather they not have Natalya at all if they’re just going to have her squashed. They should have removed Segments 10 and 13 entirely, and just gave more time to Show/Henry. Or, even better, don’t replay the whole damn Kane/Ryder match, and give more time to both the divas’ match and the main event.

And seriously, keep the camera on My Rosa. What the hell is that director doing?

I gave enough commentary in the body of the recap, plus I had a late start and a late finish (it’s 12:40am now as I’m wrapping up), so I’m going to call it here. This episode didn’t really add much to my desire to see Royal Rumble since I was already sold on it, but they could have done a much better job selling the PPV to anyone who was still undecided. The first hour was promising, but the payoffs were just… not. Looks like I’ll have to do a weird dual grade tonight.

We’ll have the Royal Rumble recap for you very late Sunday or very early Monday, so we look forward to seeing you then. Unless my apartment explodes, I’ll have it, so Rick will get a night off (other than giving us the rules to his insanely popular Royal Rumble Raffle game, if he hasn’t already). See you then!

Episode Grade: D (as a lead-in to Royal Rumble), C (in a vacuum)