Friday Night SmackDown Review - November 21, 2025

By Graham "GSM" Matthews

The Usos Interrupted The Vision Before Drew McIntyre Attacked Undisputed WWE Champion Cody Rhodes

Hearing from The Vision at this point is rarely anything new. I actually wish Bron Breakker took more of a leadership role after they betrayed Seth Rollins, but whatever. The Usos interrupting them also wasn't all that interesting, but McIntyre attacking Rhodes in his tour bus because he's still suspended and can't technically enter the building was a nice touch. That would obviously set up Rhodes' return later in the show.

United States Champion Ilja Dragunov def. JD McDonagh

The crowd was quiet when McDonagh emerged as Dragunov's mystery opponent because they knew he wasn't winning, but it wasn't long before they got into the action and started reacting to the nearfalls. That's a credit to the chemistry these two have, which should come as no surprise to those that saw their matches together in NXT. This was a fun, hard-hitting affair, even though the outcome was never in doubt.

Carmelo Hayes def. Bronson Reed in a The Last Time Is Now Tournament First-Round Match by Count-Out

I wasn't sure how this would go with both guys being in the process of getting over with the audience in their respective roles (in addition to having never faced off one-on-one before), but this exceeded expectations as a very enjoyable outing. Hayes worked great while fighting from underneath and Reed excelled while in domination mode. I have no issue with Hayes winning by count-out since it was thanks to an assist from Rhodes and he wasn't pinned. Plus, Rhodes' fiery WarGames promo afterward was excellent.

#DIY def. Fraxiom

Hey, Johnny Gargano and Tommaso Ciampa got their OG entrance themes back! Awesome, Anyway, this was a logical match to do with both members of Fraxiom getting to challenge for the United States Championship before the disgruntled Tommaso Ciampa. They've had only one other standard tag team match against each other earlier this year, so it felt fresh. This was a hell of a sprint and a good win for #DIY. Axiom got his mask ripped off, so it's not like Fraxiom lost clean.

Penta def. Finn Balor in a The Last Time Is Now Tournament First-Round Match

I liked how the commentators acknowledged that Balor was the first man to pin Penta in WWE, even though Balor hasn't been booked worth a damn since then. This was another entertaining match and it helped that they wrestled with a real sense of urgency. Penta winning was the right call. On the subject of the tournament, it was announced Sheamus is hurt and won't be able to compete in the quarterfinals of the tournament, so LA Knight's opponent will be determined on next week's show.

Becky Lynch, Nia Jax, Lash Legend and WWE Women's Tag Team Champions The Kabuki Warriors Attacked AJ Lee, Rhea Ripley, IYO SKY, Charlotte Flair and Alexa Bliss

This pretty much played out as you'd expect after what was teased on Monday's Raw, but it was a solid segment to make the two teams for women's WarGames official. It was exactly what it needed to be. Honestly, even better than this were the backstage segments and vignettes we got with Flair and Ripley earlier in the episode establishing that they're willing to put their history and differences aside for the sake of eliminating common enemies. The build has been well done so far.

Overall Show

It's no secret that SmackDown has been a slog to sit through for the better part of the past few months, but this was a significantly stronger show than usual. Every match delivered and was really well paced. We also got plenty of effective WarGames build/Survivor Series hype. It's a shame because this was merely a taste of the blue brand is capable of when WWE puts in the effort and yet it'll be returning to a three-hour format at the beginning of the year. Sigh.

SEE MORE: SmackDown Reviews