Opening: Daniel Bryan hits the ring to start the show, and—oh wait, we're starting with a match? Sweet, I like show-opening matches.

Segment 1 [Singles Match]: Daniel Bryan extend-squashes The Miz (w/ Damien Mizdow) by submission. Before the match really starts, Mizdow gets on the apron and appeals to the crowd, getting big pops. Miz calls a time out, explicitedly tells DB that he'll deal with him in a moment, then orders Mizdow to get to the back and fetch him an Egyptian cotton towel for his post-match sweat. Mizdow leaves... and DB kicks Miz in the legs.

Then Ryback hits the Shell Shock out of absolutely nowhere after about two minutes of the beatdown. Huh. Momentum to Ryback, for sure.

Segment 3: After a replay of RAW concerning his actions, Dean Ambrose hits the ring to join the commentary team for the next match. (Yes, he entered the ring, but he's not there to talk, only to pose, until he goes to the commentary table.) But we go to ads before we see anything more.

Segment 4 [Singles Match]: R-Truth reverse-extend-squashes Bad News Barrett by flash pin. Barrett had a little of the early offense while trash-talking Ambrose, who ignored him. Truth evaded a couple moves of Barrett's and delivered a couple punches in the corner, but he respected the clean break, and Barrett took advantage of it with power offense. Heel beatdown was on.

Eventually the fight spilled outside, so Barrett talked shit directly to Ambrose while beating on Truth just in front of the table. Ambrose calmly watched without reaction. Barrett took the fight back in the ring, then signaled for the Bullhammer Elbow while continuing to blather. Ambrose responded by turning and sitting on the table while facing the commentators, putting his back to Barrett and the ring. That's an awfully classy and clever move for Ambrose, whose entire character to this point has been “unpredictable lunatic.” It caused Barrett to just scream louder, which took his attention away from Truth, who recovered and wrapped him up in a small package.

Ambrose peacefully walked away (after chuckling a bit), and Barrett didn't give chase. He just looked highly offended at life.

Segment 5: RAW recap, which OO doesn't recap.

Segment 6: Bray talks a little crazy bullshit again as he calls out the Undertaker (without specifically calling him out). His punch line is: “Find me... or I'll find you.”

Pre-Segment 7: The New Day hits the ring with the whole “Feel the power!” vibe and song. Michael Cole and Jerry Lawler still try to get into it, or at least imply they will, and accuse Byron Saxton of being a “bump on a log” since he's not having fun. They do a couple shots of the crowd, and... man, there's like one dude out of a hundred who's actually clapping along. Rick is right: this just isn't going over, and it wouldn't be a bad idea to make them implode sooner than later.

Segment 7 [Tag Match]: The Ascension defeats New Day (w/ Kofi Kingston) by pin. Xavier Woods and Viktor to start, and Viktor holds control with power offense. The heels rapidly tag and keep Woods isolated with punchy-kicky offense. Woods hits a forearm out of nowhere, which gets way too big of a pop; if that's not sound-sweetening, I'll eat a bug. Woods then somersaults under a punch to hit a hot tag, and Big E hits a few clotheslines and shoulder charges to keep Viktor contained. Konnor runs distraction to keep E from getting too much on a roll; though E knocks Konnor off the apron, it gives Viktor time to recover. When E tries a running splash, Viktor puts his knees up to block it. Viktor throws E shoulder-first into a ring post, tags out, then hits the Fall of Man with Konnor to put an end to it.

Segment 8 [Singles Match]: Roman Reigns defeats Luke Harper by pin. Someone must have pissed in Reigns's coffee this morning, as he goes all aggressive from the start. Roughneck offense as he throws Harper into the corner, goes for punchy-kicky, throws him out of the ring, beheads him with a clothesline, and drives him into the barricade. Reigns keeps momentum as they get back in the ring, but fails on the first pinfall attempt.

Harper tries to escape via the apron. Reigns knocks him off, then goes to chase, but Harper shoves him backwards into the steps. Reigns falls hard, and Harper goes rough offense from there as he starts the heel beatdown.

However, Reigns doesn't have to stay defensive for long as he powers out of a rest hold, then counters with a weird-angle back suplex to pull momentum back. Reigns goes with about 400 standing clotheslines and uppercuts. Harper manages to reverse an Irish Whip, but Reigns just answers with a flying lariat. Pin, but only two.

Reigns wants a Samoan Drop from there, but Harper reverses it to a sunset flip, which was pretty cool. Harper managed to hit a tilt-a-whirl side slam from there, which looked sweet. But then Harper decided to preen a bit much as he teased a powerbomb, and Reigns powered out and hit his Samoan Drop clean. He signaled for the Superman Punch from there, but Harper hit a side kick to the jaw to counter. However, as Reigns reeled back from that, he bounced off the ropes, then came forward with a Spear out of nowhere. Pin, three, done.

Pre-Segment 9: Big Show hits the ring first. Erick Rowan, his opponent, comes down second. As Rowan gets in the ring, Show knocks him off the apron, then beats the shit out of him outside the ring. After a moment, he tosses Rowan in the ring, then backs away. The ref asks him if he wants to play, and Rowan is a gamer, so the ref rings the bell anyway.

Segment 9 [Singles Match]: Big Show squashes Erick Rowan by pin. OO does not recap squashes.

Pre-Segment 10: Cameron is resurrecting her thing where she looks at herself in a mirror as she hits the ring. I'm happy with that.

Also, they recap what went down with Paige on Monday. I won't recap it, but I will say that Lawler commented “it must have been embarrassing for Paige to wrestle dressed like [a pastel fairy],” but that's just stupid. Paige's entire thing is that she doesn't give a shit, so obviously it wouldn't have been embarrassing, even for her character. I'm not sure WWE pays attention to its own consistency and storytelling when it feeds lines to the commentators.

Oh, and the Bella Twins are out on commentary for this as they blather about how they stole Paige's clothes just so they “could do the world a favor and show Paige naked,” which falls flat and doesn't make sense, not to mention being a little creepy/stalkery. God, I hate this storyline.

Segment 10 [Singles Match]: Paige defeats Cameron by submission. Paige has early offense with punchy-kicky. Cameron hits a rolling DDT early to take advantage, and she hits a couple decent but unimpressive moves as she maintains offense. No rest holds as she goes punchy-slappy, and she throws in a couple head slams. But she poses too much, and Paige takes momentum after attacking her from behind. Paige hits a few clotheslines, a few more kicks, then applies the PTO.

Segment 11: Renee Young interviews Goldust, who is perplexed at why Stardust (whom he calls “Cody”) would attack him on Monday. He doesn't know why Stardust did the whole Stardust gimmick in the first place, if it was to get closer to him or what, but they totally bonded as brothers, and they were totally on fire and even won the Tag Team Titles for a while. But then, “darkness crept in,” and he saw it a mile away since he's been there himself. “Stardust” isn't just a persona at this point; it's a cancer, and it's eating Cody alive. Goldust wants his brother back at any cost, so he has to do something that is “probably the most difficult thing” he's ever had to do in his career. I note that when he says “probably,” he puts a little extra puff in the “P,” hard enough that Renee's hair gets blown back from his air, and she winds up squinting her eyes. I can just envision Goldust accidentally spitting on her, and her thinking, “Ew...” at the top of her mind's voice.

Anyway... Goldust says that his next step is to face his brother and beat Stardust at Fast Lane to... uh... I guess break the spell?

Stardust then appears on a nearby monitor to talk some crazy bullshit. He says that after he wins on Sunday, “Cody” will cease to be, but won't be only one, as all the fans will forget the name of Goldust.

Smash cut to Goldust looking forlorn. It would be more effective if he wasn't all face-painted and shit, but in a professional wrestling context, it worked.

Segment 12 [Singles Match]: Jimmy Uso (w/ Jey Uso & Naomi) draws with Tyson Kidd (w/ Cesaro & Natalya) by double-disqualification. Kidd with early offense with rapid punching. Jimmy started to fight back, and then Rusev hit the ring to beat the shit out of everyone. Huh.

Jey tried to save his brother, but just got destroyed for his efforts. The heels bailed before any further damage could be done to them, but Rusev punched the Usos into unconsciousness. Lana smiled from the stage as Rusev grabbed a mic and blathered in Russian or whatever; body language and context clues show that he was just screaming generic threats to John Cena.

Segment 13 [Singles Match]: Seth Rollins (w/ Big Show & Kane) defeats Dolph Ziggler (w/ Ryback & Erick Rowan) by pin. J&J Security is banned from ringside for this match. Rollins and Ziggler start the match alone, but it doesn't last that way for long.

Grappling with little headway for about a minute. Once they break from that, they exchange fast attacks. Rollins is the last one standing when he dodges a charge in the corner, making Dolph slam himself into the turnbuckles. Rollins followed up with a bunch of stomps, and that's how we go to ads.

Back, and Rollins is still in control. During commercial, Big Show and Kane hit the ring for “support,” but Ryback and Erick Rowan arrived to even the odds.

Ironically, Dolph got a hope spot when he dodged the exact same charge attempt in the exact same corner, though the roles were reversed. Dolph hit hard but couldn't maintain momentum, despite a couple near-falls, including a backslide. At the tail end of the attack, Rollins fell to the the apron, and Dolph dropkicked him off. He fell into the laps of Ryback and Rowan, then shoved them for no reason; was he trying to get DQed or something?

Dolph exited the ring and landed a few shots, as Rowan and Ryback didn't take the bait. But back in the ring, Kane ran distraction, allowing Rollins to recover. He caught Dolph in midair trying to do a middle rope something-or-other, then followed up by hitting a running powerbomb to the opposite corner. Rollins followed up with a Curb Stomp, and that was that.

Post-Segment 13: J&J arrive to celebrate with Rollins, Kane, and Show at the bottom of the ramp. As Rowan and Ryback check on Dolph, the camera mics pick up Rollins saying “There's five of us and two of them,” then quickly covers his math faux pas by pointing out that one of them is basically unconscious. Heh. Regardless, the heels surround the ring.

Rowan and Ryback aren't dumb. They gently roll Dolph out of the ring to protect him as the heels take positions. All five charge together, and it doesn't take long before the faces are separated and controlled. The faces manage to fairly easily deal with J&J, but Kane and Big Show dominate the situation and even flatten Rowan with a double chokeslam. Rollins follows that up with a Curb Stomp.

The heels stand triumphant and unopposed in the ring. Ryback recovers enough to try one last attempt, and even manages to lay out Show with a Meathook Clothesline. He fights off the peanut gallery at first, but the numbers catch up: J&J pin his legs, Kane pins his arms, and Show blasts him with the Knockout Punch. Rollins finishes him with a Curb Stomp, though he was already unconscious by that point.

Final Thoughts: This was a busy episode, and a pretty decent one to hype Fast Lane. WWE didn't bother forcing additional story into anything; they just let the matches speak for themselves, especially given that most of them were mainly story-based anyway. In a vacuum, I'm not sure anyone would care, but it's sustainable episodic TV as a lead-in to a pay-per-view. Can't ask for more than that, really.

Have a good night everyone. I'll see you next week.

Episode Grade: B-