The biggest show of the summer arrives on DVD and BluRay. Courtesy of WWE Home Video, Matthew Roberts takes a look at Summerslam 2020.
On a personal note, SummerSlam 2020 was a bittersweet night for me. But for the global pandemic currently hitting us, I would have been taking my seat in the Boston Gardens for the show (as well as three other nights of action). Instead it was me and my dogs on the sofa at home. On the night it was a show I enjoyed and for the most part it stands up to a repeat viewing.
The main show kicked off with a match I was really looking forward to, as Bayley defended her Smackdown Women’s Championship against Asuka, who was pulling double duty tonight. It didn’t disappoint for the most part; the fact it wasn’t an absolute barn-burner is understandable under the circumstances, with Asuka’s shot at Sasha Banks’ Raw Women’s Championship coming up later in the show. It was a strong match and kept both women strong.
The Raw Tag Team Title match was another decent effort as the Street Profits tangled with Andrade and Angel Garza. It was your standard tag team formula match for the most part but was done with enough vigour and finesse to keep you entertained. It was followed by a match that had been heavily affected by a real life incident involving both of the participants. The upcoming court case for Sonya Deville’s stalker was rumoured to be why her match with Mandy Rose was changed from a loser gets their hair shaved match to a No DQ “Loser Leaves WWE” match. The two went at it with an intensity and credit has to go to both for putting behind them, if only for fifteen minutes, the very scary real-life attack both had been a part of to go out there and entertain.
For all the criticism Seth Rollins gets for some things, there should be no doubt that he is one hell of a professional wrestler. As such he was a very good choice to be the opponent for the first in-ring appearance of Dominik Mysterio. The Street-fight stipulation (oddly this was scheduled right after the No DQ stipulation match that preceded it) allowed for some smoke and mirrors to some extent but there is no denying that this was a superb effort. And credit doesn’t just go to Rollins. Dominik was certainly no Erik Watts in here and he played his full part in an excellent match.
Up next was the Raw Women’s Championship match as Asuka had her second title bout of the evening, this time challenging Sasha Banks. These two have been magic in the ring before and if this wasn’t quite up to those previous standards it was still a very good effort. Particularly good was the trading of submission holds. The only real downside to this is that nothing other than an Asuka win seemed likely, and it was clearly just another step down the line towards the Bayley/Sasha feud.
It seemed odd at the time that Drew Galloway and Randy Orton weren’t headlining. It made me fear that Orton would grab the title and curtail Drew’s title reign. Of course we were soon to find out that there were other reasons for the placing of this match. This was a very good match and had a good intensity to it. Even the ending, which disappointed some, seemed to fit. These were two evenly matched competitors and all it takes is one move to finish it.
That left us with the WWE Universal Championship match between Braun Strowman and Bray Wyatt. For a show that had been consistent up until this point it was a shame that the main event was the worst match of the evening. I’m yet to be convinced by “The Fiend” in terms of an in-ring characterisation (as great as the promos and vignettes) and going up against Strowman was never going to help that. There was a lack of intensity and I just couldn’t get invested in it at all. Still the moments after the decision more than made up for that. The return of Roman Reigns was indeed one of those moments that I never saw coming. It ended a good show on a very memorable note.
8 out of 10
Photographs courtesy of Fetch and WWE
Thank you to WWE Home Video for our review copy of Summerslam 2020 which is out Monday 5 October on DVD. You can buy your copy from WWEDVD.co.uk by clicking here.
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