15. WrestleMania 29
This show isn’t bad, but you can tell just looking at the card how underwhelming the WWE roster was in 2013. And given how many of the top stars on this card are no longer working with the company, you can draw your own conclusions for what that means in 2015.
The Undertaker and CM Punk ended up being the show-stealing act, surprising some and living up to other’s high expectations. For most it would have been impossible to live up the excellent standards set by Triple H in 2012, or the two Shawn Michaels matches in 2009 and 2010, but Punk did a comparable job to say the very least. Prior to Lesnar ending the streak, it always amazed me how we KNEW going in there was no way the record was ending, but these matches always brought you to the edge of your seat because of the artists telling their stories in the ring.
The rest of the card was largely a disappointment. Chris Jericho returned…and feuded with Fandango. That one is actually more hysterical in hindsight, which I never thought possible at the time. Alberto del Rio and Jack Swagger attempted to have a decent match for the World Heavyweight Championship, but couldn’t get much going in 10 minutes. The 6-man tag match with The Shield opened the show, and might have been the first time the trio didn’t leave me speechless.
Perhaps the biggest down point was the second collision between Triple H and Brock Lesnar. They had set up Lesnar as a monster since his return – despite having lost to John Cena in his first fight back – breaking everyone’s arm with his “super legit UFC” Kimura lock, including Shawn Michaels. This had the makings of a show-stealer, but ended up being 24-minutes of mediocrity. I would say other than the concussed match with The Undertaker at WrestleMania XXX, this was the low point of Brock’s return so far.
The main event featured The Rock dropping the WWE Championship to John Cena. This may have been the most obligatory feeling match in wrestling history. Everyone knew what was happening. They knew the minute Rock won at WrestleMania XXVIII – they were going for round two, and Rock would put over Cena just like Hogan did for him at WrestleMania X8.
The major difference is that creatively the WWF ended up turning X8 in favor of both men. That didn’t really happen with Cena, and the reasons are glaringly obvious. Cena had already been the face of sports entertainment for a decade at this point, and didn’t really need the affirmation of a part-time former legend; the story was there, and I enjoyed the match, but the whole thing felt like an escalator – moving directly to the obvious destination with the least amount of effort possible.
You also have to factor in that in order to make this “dream match 2.0” happen, they basically had to screw over CM Punk, who had become the longest reigning WWE Champion of the “modern era” and one of the hottest stars since Rock and Austin. Very few people wanted Rock to beat Punk, because the end result was the obligatory title swap to John Cena. Basically this was a way of getting the title back on John without having yet another match between the two. The ironic thing is, it probably would have been a much better match.
