1 week Ago By RobertLeightyJr
-My latest Retro Review of World War 3 1995 can be found here and my review of the latest Peacock/WWE Doc on Mania IX is up as well. Let’s get to it! -Gabriel Iglesias is our host and is joined at the table by Natalya, Kevin Owens, Sean Waltman, and JBL. Nattie thinks Roman and Seth are wrestling soulmates and could have a match in any time and place and it would be special.
KO doesn’t know if they are friends anymore, but knows they are competitive. -Roman Reigns bio as his father is WWE Hall of Famer, Sika. We see the famous of Hulk Hogan holding a 3 year old Roman.
Also one of Roman with Macho and Liz. Guy moment here: Liz is absolute smoke show and reason why she was the first celebrity crush I ever had. We get a brief rundown of The Bloodline: Umaga (cousin), Rikishi (cousin), Yokozuna (cousin), and The Rock (cousin).
Roman was born into the business and one day he was ready to go and he got the call to try-out at FCW. -Wade Barrett lets us know about FCW and how it was a proving ground for future WWE stars. Roman said he had a lot of ground to cover.
-Now to Seth Rollins, who lived and breathed WWE since he discovered it at 4-5 years old. Basically same story as me, but I write about it while he does it. We see home video of Seth with his wrestling buddies as a kid and then he working on a trampoline.
He worked his way up through the independent scene and found his was to FCW the same time as Roman. They threw in some Full Impact Pro footage. -Roman notes Seth was an asshole.
He came off as a dick and was anti-social. He didn’t know the etiquette of the business. CM Punk says Roman was the hand picked blue chip guy and Seth felt that should have been him.
Seth says it did rub him the wrong way as he felt Roman got chances because of his family. -FCW TV: Feb 5, 2012: Roman vs. Dean Ambrose vs.
Seth: This match is pretty historic now. It is fun to watch. Seth notes he and Ambrose had a lot more experience than Roman.
Roman notes he was in such deep water and learned he was under educated and his opinion of Seth changed. He realized Seth put in the work. Wow, they throw in some old Dean Ambrose interviews as he notes FCW was a desert island where nobody really noticed what they did.
It gave them even more of a chip on their shoulder. -Survivor Series 2012: HHH takes over talent relations and said it was time to give people a shot. The Shield make their debut by attacking Ryback.
HHH says he knew the group was going to work and was going to be big. Punk says they were in their with Main Event top guys from the start and he doesn’t mean just him: The Rock, John Cena. -JBL notes when the music hit and they came through the crowd you knew a car wreck was going to happen.
Waltman says they had a synergy and the sum at that time was greater than the individual parts. They developed a friendship and respect for each other and Seth says they became brothers very quickly. Roman says it wasn’t just on camera and it became a real and authentic bond.
Seth notes that he and Roman worked well together and were put as a team. He says Roman listened and learned quickly. -Roman says they all knew they were competing against each other as iron sharpens iron.
“In the most healthy way we were butting heads.” They became Tag Team Champions together (remember they had Ambrose as The US Champion). KO remembers Seth saying all he was trying to do was keep up with Roman as the office really liked Roman.
-Barrett says the Shield looked unstoppable until something happened. Chair Shot! -Commercials! -Plan B: All that time teasing that Ambrose would be the one to turn and it was Rollins. Waltman and KO say it was shocking as the group may have split too early, which usually doesn’t happen in wrestling.
Seth says he has seen the clip so many times he doesn’t even have first person memories of it. -HHH says Seth started to succeed after The Shield pairing with The Authority made the sky the limit for him. Ambrose says staying in your comfort zone makes for boring television and he thinks it is important to change and reinvent yourself.
Perhaps he should change and reinvent this whole Death Riders thing. -Taker and Seth both talk about how leaving a group means who are out on your own. Seth says he had Randy Orton and HHH on each side so he was in the big time now.
Hulk Hogan says everyone wants to be The Guy and you need to have the mindset that if you are going to lead, you have to put yourself so far ahead that #2 can’t even see your tail lights. -Money in The Bank: Seth wins MITB and it put the stamp that he was going to be a World Champion and a pillar for the future of the company. -Royal Rumble: Roman wins and Taker brings up how the crowd turned on Roman because they all knew the office was pushing him down our throats.
Roman admits he wasn’t ready and everything was happening all too fast around him. -WrestleMania 31: Bang Bang Niner Gang! Brilliant way for WWE to get out of Roman winning and being booed out of the stadium. Seth Rollins runs down to cash in and .
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-Commercials! -Back to Mania 31 as Seth Rollins becomes the first man to cash in at WrestleMania (well, unless you count Hogan at Mania IX) and he curb stomps Reigns to take the Title from Brock Lesnar. The crowd was so happy it wasn’t Roman that it got a huge pop. KO notes that Seth won the Title before Roman and that had to mean something.
We get some backstage footage of a sullen and banged up Roman. It’s wild how he just looks like so much less of a star compared to The Tribal Chief. -Seth says he was 29 years old and was on the run of a lifetime.
He got to do cool stuff in the summer and fall and was ready to roll with Roman. Then it happened as he tried a sunset flip bomb through a table on a house show and tore his ACL. He says he was in a bad place after giving up the Title and having surgery.
-WrestleMania 32: Seth hated being there and hated having to watch from a box. Roman says Seth couldn’t hold up and he showed he was the more durable one. “Good things come to those who wait.
” Sad face as Nattie talks about injuries while sitting next to Kevin Owens. Get well KO! Roman beats HHH to win The WWE Title for a second time. -Extreme Rules: Seth was making his comeback and they had him hiding on a bus.
He wasn’t sure if the people were going to care. Roman pins AJ Styles and Seth makes his return to a big pop and hits Roman with a Pedigree. -Money in The Bank: Roman says the obvious choice was to go back to Seth.
Am I dreaming or was there some kind of Wellness thing that popped Roman around the same time? He says Seth is really good and going against someone that good will always make you better. Seth gets the upset win and is WWE Champion again. KO notes it was the second time he pinned Roman to win a World Title.
No mention of Seth losing the Title seconds later to an Ambrose cash in, which gave us a 3 members of The Shield holding the Title on the same night. Oh, and yes, Roman was suspended for 30 days for a Wellness Violation at that time. -SummerSlam 2018: Roman Reigns finally beats Brock Lesnar after failing twice at WrestleMania and becomes Universal Champion.
They actually got the crowd to cheer Roman by the end of that one. -Oct 2018: This sucked as Roman let us know his real name is Joe and has been living with leukemia for 11 years. Just awful stuff! Seth says hearing the word leukemia stops you in your tracks and we see Ambrose and Rollins watching on the monitor in Gorilla.
They come out to embrace Roman and the tears are flowing. Roman: “it was good to see him there.” -Roman notes his leukemia was caught early and thus he has to take a potent medication (still on to this day).
Roman returns in Feb and lets the world know he is in remission. -Not long after a pandemic hits and Roman disappears for four months. Seth becomes a work horse during the pandemic era and reinvents himself.
Roman then makes his return as The Tribal Chief and WWE is never the same again as Roman finally became the mega star they always wanted. He crushed it as a heel from day one and it is maddening they were sitting on that for as long as they did. -Seth says he had to work harder as he knew there was no way they would ever see him like Roman.
Miz notes Seth works 365 days a year and Roman doesn’t have to because he just needs to show up for the big events. Seth: “I knew I could out wrestle and out talk him, but it didn’t matter.” He continues that put a bigger chip on his shoulder.
-Commercials! -Big E says people love stories where brothers have something happen and they face each other. That leads to Royal Rumble where Seth gets his first crack at The Tribal Chief. KO believes that each man feels they are the bigger star.
That’s never a bad thing! Becky says Seth is the very best and has a drive and work ethic like nothing she has ever seen. Way to support your husband! -The story became Roman can’t get beat Seth and he is still scared by Seth breaking up The Shield. Roman says Seth brought up old shit and got old feelings.
I love that Roman has never totally forgiven Seth for The Shield being destroyed. -Royal Rumble: Great stuff as Seth comes to the ring with Shield music and in Shield gear to play mind games and trigger Roman. He sold that so well! Seth pulls out a one man Shield powerbomb through a table and hey, he take our last break.
-Commercials! -Back to The Royal Rumble and Roman says that night was not about wrestling. It was about consequences and he beat the shit out of Seth. Becky says Seth can’t have a bad match and calls him incredible.
Seth says they created some iconic moments in the match. Roman refuses to break the choke even as Seth is in the ropes and Seth wins by DQ. One of the few times Roman didn’t win during his massive run as Champion.
Seth deserved another shot and never got it! -Seth says he continued his win streak over Roman and a match between them deserves to be a Main Event at WrestleMania. That takes us to Mania XL where they are in The Main Event of Night One in a Tag Match. Hogan puts over Seth and Roman huge and puts them on the level of The Undertaker, John Cena, and The Rock.
-WrestleMania XL: Seth says their rivalry has defined a generation. The Tag Match was a special moment and one he never saw coming. The Rock and Roman get the win as Night One ends like Infinity War.
-WrestleMania XL: Night Two: Now we have Endgame as The Avengers come to help Cody and we get the awesome moment of Shield Seth sacrificing himself and costing Roman. Roman says he made a decision that night to pay Seth back for 10 years earlier and it cost him everything. He says he would make the same decision again.
-Seth says the three Shield guys wanted to change the industry and 12 years later, “we did pretty well.” Nattie says Roman and Seth are so different, but they are leading the way for the younger guys. KO says this is a feud that can run five years down the road and still work.
Roman says there is one reason why he is better than Seth: “because I want to be.” Seth says they have a bond that is unbreakable. -This was fun, but with it still being relatively new it didn’t carry all the feels of nostalgia for me.
It is interesting we get Seth vs. Roman at Mania this year, but again, someone else is added and in this case CM Punk. You have to think down the road there will be a Seth vs.
Roman Mania Match. I actually still hold out hope we get a Seth vs. Roman vs.
Ambrose (Mox) match at Mania. I think this may be the last episode of this season as next week we have nothing with Mania and in two weeks they are advertising back to back episodes of LFG. If so it was another fun season and hopefully they continue with it.
Thanks for reading!.
