Friday Night SmackDown Review - December 3, 2021

By Graham "GSM" Matthews

Brock Lesnar Convinced Sami Zayn to Challenge Roman Reigns for the Universal Championship Later in the Night

Lesnar has had an illustrious career, but I'm not exaggerating when I say that this may be my favorite version of Lesnar. Badass Brock is great, but it's been played out over the years, whereas him showing a bit more personality is fresh and new. Hell, if always spoke like this, he wouldn't have needed a mouthpiece for so many years. I loved the hell out of this segment and thought both guys played their roles well, effectively setting up the Universal Championship main event for later in the night.

Sasha Banks def. Shayna Baszler

This was probably the most competitive and entertaining singles match I've seen Baszler have all year, but her booking is still highly questionable. WWE wasted an entire year of her career in the pointless tag team scene, and just as it looked like they would start seriously pushing her on her own upon her move to SmackDown, she settled into a stooge role for Sonya Deville and she lost here clean to Banks. Obviously, I'd have rather have Baszler losing to a big star like Banks following a back-and-forth bout than to someone like Aliyah, but I don't know what Banks gained from this unless the idea is to put her back in the SmackDown Women's Championship picture soon.

Drew McIntyre and Jeff Hardy Crashed Happy Talk with Happy Corbin and Madcap Moss

I'm probably one of the few remaining supporters of the Happy Corbin character (as if there were a ton in the first place), but even I couldn't care less about these Happy Talk segments. The comedy is intentionally awful and they don't really accomplish anyway. Yes, we got Corbin vs. Hardy made official for next week, but they could have set that up some other way. This was a lame segment, but at least the babyfaces stood tall.

Los Lotharios def. The Viking Raiders

Random side note: I'm not a fan of the new entrance theme for Viking Raiders. They're trying to get people to chant "Raid!" along with the song, but were they not doing that during their original entrance? At any rate, this felt like a total waste of time. Los Lotharios should be stacking up tag team wins if they're going to contend for the SmackDown Tag Team Championship eventually, but I would've liked to see these teams get more than 90 seconds. Rick Boogs attempting to distract the heels by playing his guitar at ringside only for Los Lotharios to win anyway was pretty dumb. The Intercontinental Championship hasn't felt this much like an afterthought in a while and it's a shame.

King Woods def. SmackDown Tag Team Champion Jey Uso by Disqualification

Woods was absent from last week's Black Friday Battle Royal I believe because he had time off. Instead of coming out and asking why he was left out from a storyline standpoint, he continued on business as usual with The Usos instead of resuming his rivalry with Reigns, who he beat by disqualification last week. It sure looks like that feud is over despite never actually being blown off (and no, I don't count Reigns vs. Big E at Survivor Series as the payoff). Woods vs. Jey was over before it had a chance to get going, so yet another throwaway match on this show. My guess is we get New Day vs. Usos at Day 1 for the SmackDown Tag Team Championship. Been there, done that.

Toni Storm Embarrassed SmackDown Women's Champion Charlotte Flair

That Flair and Storm segment last week with the pie was just dreadful. So, WWE's answer this week was having Storm throw a pie in Flair's face. Riveting television, I know. Flair spoke for a few minutes only to turn down Storm's challenge yet again, but obviously, Storm embarrassing her here will likely lead to Flair giving her what she wants if only to get revenge. This whole feud has been terribly booked and it's a bummer because I think the eventual match could be excellent.

Sheamus def. Cesaro

Could WWE not be bothered to build this up over the course of a few weeks before finally doing it, or save it for the Day 1 pay-per-view? I mean, these two teamed for a good chunk of time and have a ton of history. If they were going to randomly throw it away on TV like they did here, the least they could have done was have the match last more than four or five minutes. That was disappointing, but I enjoyed it for what it was. Hopefully they have more matches, but Sheamus winning clean doesn't give me a lot of hope that'll be the case.

Brock Lesnar Attacked Sami Zayn; Universal Champion Roman Reigns def. Zayn

When Zayn made his entrance with a half hour left in the show, I was surprised that WWE was going to give them so much time. And then they aired what felt like a dozen recaps, commercials and backstage segments, only to have Lesnar destroy Zayn. I'm not complaining about that since the crowd ate it up, but that was more of a "main event" than what we ended up getting from Reigns and Zayn. Zayn was hardly a threat to the title to begin with, so while I wasn't bothered by Reigns vs. Zayn being so short, I question what the whole point of last week's Battle Royal was when they could have just announced Reigns vs. Lesnar for Day 1 a week ago.

Overall Show

The return of Lesnar was the only thing this show had going for it. No wonder it was the only thing they hyped in advance because everything else was largely lackluster. The in-ring action was below average and the one competitive match we did get (Banks vs. Baszler) had the wrong outcome in my opinion. What I feared has come to fruition in that SmackDown has really fallen off since the Draft. This was a very weak show. I appreciate that they bothered to advertise two matches for next week, but who's to say they won't pull them at the last minute?

SEE MORE: SmackDown Reviews