It's funny that Roode and Charlotte have such strong chemistry together and are currently champions yet both are far more comfortable in the heel role. Despite that, they seemed to be having a ton of fun teaming together here, while Apollo and Jax felt like a thrown-together tandem (Apollo replaced Enzo Amore, who had been teasing something with Jax a few months ago). As a match, it was enjoyable, all four stars worked well together, and the right team won. Jax going off on Titus Worldwide afterward went a little longer than it needed to, but I assume that was done to get heat back on Jax before she faces Asuka at Elimination Chamber.

As I've said before, the Superstars are given plenty more freedom on this show than they normally are on Raw and SmackDown Live, so it's worth checking out for that alone. The matches aren't always excellent, but this was an entertaining installment on the whole. The first round matches are officially done, and next week, Finn Balor and Sasha Banks will square off with The Miz and Asuka to kick off the next round.

It's amazing that Raw kicked off with a super lengthy match on Monday night yet SmackDown Live was the total opposite in opening with a talking segment. While this wasn't terrible by any means and everyone handled their promos fairly well, it felt very formulaic. Styles being the only babyface in this whole thing makes little sense and adding Ziggler and Corbin to the mix does nothing to make the storyline more compelling than it already was (and it wasn't). Fastlane couldn't come quick enough to end this abysmal angle.

All of the WWE Championship challengers need wins right now, so putting them in meaningless matches against each other heading into Fastlane won't help matters any. Nevertheless, Owens and Ziggler have good enough chemistry together that this was an entertaining match. Despite the heel vs. heel dynamic, the crowd was engaged in the action here and bought into some of the nearfalls down the stretch. Was Sami Zayn aiding Owens to victory a sign that there's no tension there after all?

I'm curious as to whether Triple H is in full control of the Cruiserweights now, or just 205 Live. By that I mean, is he booking these matches with the Cruiserweights on Main Event and Raw as well? Anyway, while not incredibly lengthy, this was along the lines of what you'd see on 205 Live nowadays. It was very well-wrestled and the crowd was invested in the action more than I expected them to be, so I enjoyed this and I was happy to see Metalik score a victory.

These two teams have clashed on a number of occasions on Raw over the last few months, but they've largely been squashes, whereas this was an actual competitive contest. It was fairly formulaic for the most part, but it was still a good match where the crowd rallied behind the babyfaces throughout. The Revival won as they should have, but I can't help but think that they deserve in contention for the Raw Tag Team Championship at Elimination Chamber this Sunday and not Apollo and Titus O'Neil (even though that has yet to be confirmed as of this writing).

Reigns talking to Charly Caruso before the bout about how this upcoming Elimination Chamber match is his ticket back to the main event of WrestleMania and another encounter with Brock Lesnar only for Rollins to be introduced as his opponent was perfect. Those two always work wonderfully together, and they kicked off the contest with a fun little mini-match. Rollins pinning Reigns clean surprised me, but that all but confirmed Reigns will be winning the men's Chamber on Sunday. Rollins' outing against Cena was much slower paced, but they did deliver down the stretch with some strong nearfalls. Rollins looked absolutely phenomenal with the performance he had here for over an hour, first beating Reigns and then Cena. Elias eliminating him the way he did was slightly anticlimactic, but it was a big victory for Elias, nonetheless. The crowd grew a bit restless by Elias vs. Balor, but the effort was there and they had a good match. I liked how Miz jumped Balor ahead of their clash and they had much better chemistry together, making me want to see them go one-on-one for the Intercontinental Championship at WrestleMania 34. However, the 'Mania match for the Intercontinental title might instead be what we saw next: Miz vs. Strowman, especially considering Strowman pinned the champ and annihilated The Miztourage afterward. On the whole, this was a hell of a way to kill television time and the wrestling was excellent. I wish WWE would take this approach more often. No, I'm not saying we need 90-minute matches every week, but something like this is far more effective in building toward a major pay-per-view matchup and switching up the usual formulaic layout of Raw than your average-length match or talking segment.

Asuka isn't known for cutting long promos (her general presence essentially does the talking for her), but we needed to hear from her going into this match with Jax at Elimination Chamber and she did well here. On paper, it isn't a blockbuster bout, but the commentators were really playing up the possibility of Jax ending Asuka's undefeated streak beforehand. That said, it was totally logical for Jax to lay out Asuka here and look like a threat to her going into the contest.

This stemmed from oVe attacking Lashley in the parking lot last week, for what reason I'm not sure. That said, this was a great opening match that kicked off the show on a high note (I always appreciate whenever they start the show with an actual match and not a talking segment). I loved that they went all out and that this was fast-paced from start to finish. I was fine with it ending on a disqualification, if only because it protects Callihan. Eddie Edwards saved Lashley from an oVe attack afterward, so they seem to have found a common enemy.

I've heard only good things about Hania's in-ring work, and while she didn't impress me all that much in her debut match last week, Rosemary was the perfect opponent for her to shine against. I though they put together a pretty nice matchup, but they merely scratched the surface of what they're capable of. Rosemary won in a way that protected Hania in defeat, but it was weird for her to be beaten in her second-ever match in IMPACT before being run off afterward.