Mike Reviews WWE Armageddon 2008

Happy Saturday Everyone!

I haven’t watched WWE Armageddon 2008 since it happened, but I remember some of the matches being fun, so lets’ see how the show has held up. We’ve got Chris Jericho taking on John Cena, as well as Edge facing off with Triple H and Jeff Hardy in a Triple Threat match.

You can view the full card for Armageddon 2008 below;

https://www.cagematch.net/?id=1&nr=32524&page=3

Let’s see how Armageddon 2008 holds up!

The event is emanating from Buffalo, New York on the 14th of December 2008

Calling the action are Michael Cole, Jerry Lawler, Jim Ross, Taz, Todd Grisham and Matt Striker

The opening video package is the usual dramatic one you’d expect, with the narrator snarl whispering their lines like a Metal Gear Solid villain. It’s alright, just a bit by the numbers

Opening Match
The Moscow Mauler Vladimir Kozlov Vs ECW World Champion Matt Hardy

Kozlov had been having some issues with Jeff Hardy in recent months, so Jeff’s brother Matt has stepped up to wrestle Kozlov tonight seeing as Jeff has his hands full in the Main Event. Kozlov was doing the undefeated streak gimmick at the time, but he hadn’t ever officially been an ECW guy, so Striker explains that Teddy Long won’t let him challenge for the belt as a result, which actually makes sense and is good commentary.

Kozlov takes most of the match here, with his offence not being especially exciting. Matt sells it all well though and the crowd likes him, so the match has some atmosphere at least. Kozlov mostly applies holds, throws strikes and yells, but his stuff doesn’t look that bad. It probably helps that Matt is an expert at making bigger scarier wrestlers look big and scary. Kozlov’s bumping, selling and feeding needs work though, which is probably why he was a Heel at this stage.

Matt eventually manages to make a comeback, selling his arm from the heat, and he actually gets a near fall from the Side Effect. Hardy remains shockingly over here, despite spending most of this match getting killed. Hardy ends up taking a spill onto the ring post from a ten punch and Kozlov follows up with a Sambo Slam for three.

WINNER: VLADIMIR KOZLOV
RATING: **

Thoughts: Kozlov was dull and functional, but Matt was over and made Kozlov look good, so the match was watchable

Backstage, Edge and Vicky Guerrero are happy Matt lost, whilst Chavo Guerrero Jr wants to know if they REALLY had nothing to do with Jeff Hardy getting beaten up at Survivor Series. Vicky reiterates that it wasn’t them, and then sends Chavo off to get her some coffee.

WWE has a poll about who could have attacked Jeff Hardy at Survivor Series. Edge, Kozlov, Triple H and Other are the options. I don’t know about you, but I don’t trust Other, they look awfully suspicious…

Hornswoggle is annoying Eve Torres backstage, but she takes it in good humour. Fit Finlay manages to wrangle his kayfabe son before he does too much damage, and then asks Swoggy to stay backstage during Finlay’s match later on as he doesn’t want his little chum to get hurt. Hornswoggle is all sad.

Intercontinental Champ William Regal, along with his chief strumpet Layla El, will be watching the next match at ringside.

Match Two
Final of Intercontinental Title Tournament
CM Punk Vs Rey Mysterio Jr

William Regal was the IC Champ at the time, so they put together a tournament to decide his next challenger with the idea being that having all these folks scrap for a chance to face Regal would make him and the belt seem important. Hey, works for me! Both Punk and Rey-Rey were babyfaces here, although Punk would eventually go Heel in 2009 and that would lead to Punk and Rey feuding in 2010. The brackets for the Tournament were;

Quarter Finals
Kofi Kingston over Kane

Rey Mysterio Jr over The Miz

John Morrison over Fit Finlay

CM Punk over Snitsky

Semi Finals
Rey Jr over Kofi

Punk over Jo-Mo

They do the standard babyface Vs babyface match to start, with both of the wrestlers doing things like chain wrestling and arm drags rather than really laying into one another. Punk eventually manages to send Rey to the floor at one stage and then follows Rey out there with a dive, right in front of Regal, who seems to be amused more than angry. I guess his smile would soon disappear if Punk accused him of being a stooge again. Punk controls things in the ring following that, with Rey doing a good job of selling it all and Punk looking good on offence. The crowd seems more into Rey than Punk here, as they chant for Rey whilst Punk has control of things.

Rey eventually manages to dodge a Punk attack whilst he’s hanging in the Tree of Woe and then gets a Moonsault Press onto a standing Punk, only for Punk to then catch Rey with a Samoa Joe styled Powerslam for two in a nice sequence. Rey supposedly had an injured wrist in the weeks leading up to this event, so Punk tries winning it with a Fujiwara Armbar, but Rey refuses to give up and then even gets his own Armbar when he busts out the La Mistica, which is a flying head scissors into the hold that Mistico popularised down in Mexico.

I should point out that WWE Network runs so awfully on Amazon Firestick that I had to switch to watching the rest of this on my phone, because it actually ran much better on that. I’m not sure if that’s a WWE issue, an Amazon issue, or both, but sort it out guys because it’s near to unwatchable when I use that device. We get a fun finishing stretch, with both wrestlers having chances to win it and the crowd getting into the near falls. It certainly helps make Regal’s belt look important to have these two former World Champions going heck for leather in an attempt to face him for it. Punk eventually manages to counter a rana into the Go To Sleep and that’s enough for three, with Rey’s nose getting busted in the process.

WINNER: CM PUNK
RATING: ***1/2

Punk and Rey make nice following the match, whilst Regal looks on and actually applauds.

Jeff Hardy cuts a to-camera promo by himself in the dark, where he says tonight is a new chapter in his career and will answer the question of whether he’s capable of winning the WWE Title. This was a decent promo from Jeff and the crowd seemed to enjoy it.

We then get a recap of a terrible storyline where Shawn Michaels was supposedly broke, despite years of being a Main Event level guy in WWE, and this led to Shawn working for JBL for a bit. I think this was supposed to continue on to WrestleMania, but it wasn’t working so they paid it off in February and moved Shawn onto a Mania feud with The Undertaker.

JBL and Shawn then do a promo segment in the ring, where Shawn tries to make this somewhat believable by saying that he gave away a lot of his money to his friends and also paid for all of his knee and back surgeries (that makes WWE look TERRIBLE by the way that a star of Shawn’s stature is being made to pay for his own surgeries after getting hurt on WWE’s watch) and eventually he made some bad investments and lost all his money. Shawn Michaels trying to start an investment portfolio would be one heck of a skit I must say. The fans don’t really buy into this and give Shawn the “WHAT?!” treatment whilst he tries to cut a dramatic serious promo. Why this had to be on a pay per view I have no idea, but I have an appropriate picture to post for it at least…

Eve Torres tries to do a backstage interview with Randy Orton, but Cody Rhodes and Manu interrupt, with Cody stating that Batista was just hired muscle in the Evolution stable, whilst Orton was the crown jewel due to his family history. Manu adds that Orton will show that Batista is a fraud in the match tonight, with Orton just walking off rather than adding anything else. This was a decent segment actually, with Cody and Manu sounding very WWE in their delivery, but they still did a good job with it.

The Buffalo Bills are in the crowd. I’m amazed players from that team could be brave enough to actually go out in public if I’m honest.

Match Three
Belfast Brawl
Mark Henry w/ Tony Atlas Vs Fit Finlay

Henry had been the scary immovable object over on ECW until Matt Hardy was finally able to dethrone him. Finlay was Henry’s first post-ECW Champ feud. They were doing the thing where they always treated the little people on the roster like they were on par with defenceless children, which only demeaned them and really made no sense. Hornswoggle is clearly an adult, he’s just smaller than the average adult, so him suddenly being on par with a child really makes no sense. Say what you want about those Teo and Puppet blokes from the early days of NWA:TNA, but at least they were presented as adults who would stand up for themselves. Heck one of them was even armed!

Finlay mostly spends this one trying to get out of the way of Henry’s attacks before getting in some attacks of his own, including using weapons such as metal bins and Singapore canes. Atlas manages to distract Finlay whilst he fills the ring with weaponry, which gives Henry a window to clobber Finlay with a metal bin lid for the cut off. Finlay sells well whilst getting worked over, whilst Henry’s stuff looks believable, although he’s working a pretty tepid pace and it’s not making the match especially interesting. Henry actually breaks Finlay’s shillelagh at one stage, as this is bordering on being a squash. However, Hornswoggle ends up joining us and passes Finlay a new shillelagh, which Finlay uses for the three count.

WINNER: FIT FINLAY
RATING: *

Thoughts: This one didn’t do a lot for me. Henry had a great character during this time and certainly looked the part, but his matches were kind of boring and sluggish for the most part

Santa Charlie Haas has presents for all of the women wrestlers, but Santino Marella and WWE Women’s Champ Beth Phoenix show up to mock them, which leads to The Bogeyman and Goldust showing up and scaring Santino away. This was exactly how it sounds, although Santino was doing his best to make it entertaining.

Mr. Kennedy……..KENNEDY encourages everyone to drink responsibly and not do drugs this Christmas, before hyping up Behind Enemy Lines: Columbia, which was a movie that Kennedy played a supporting role in. Apparently he was decent in it too, although I’ve never seen it.

Match Four
Randy Orton w/ Cody Rhodes and Manu Vs The Animal Batista

Orton and Batista used to be stablemates, but now they are on opposite sides of the Heel/Face divide, with Orton putting together a Heel faction made up of second and third generation wrestlers called The Legacy. Orton supposedly laid Batista out with an RKO on a recent episode of Raw in order to heat things up, with the personal issue to go alongside both wrestlers trying to get themselves in the Raw World Title picture. I think this might have been the first pay per view singles bout between the two, although they’d opposed one another in tags and multi-wrestler matches, along with some separate singles matches on regular TV.

Batista does the traditional power spots to start, like you usually get when a bigger babyface wrestles a smaller Heel, but Cody and Manu jump him at one stage, leading to the ref sending them to the back. The damage has been done though and that allows Orton to cut Batista off and work some heat. Batista sells that well, as he was quite a good seller by this stage in his career, whilst Orton does a good job being evil and deliberate during the heat. Orton wasn’t quite yet full on Viper yet, but he was getting there after years of being more of a traditional cocky good looking Heel, and you can see shades of it in the way he wrestles here, such as how Orton almost stalks Batista at points when he has Batista on the back foot.

You can tell that the pieces are starting to come together for Orton with this more psychotic villainous character, as he seems more comfortable in the role and the crowd is starting to cob on to what he’s doing, with some actually enjoying and getting into it. Batista gets the occasional flurry, but he’s never really able to gain the traction for the comeback, with Orton always going back to trying to meticulously grind down his bigger and usually more dominant opponent.

It gets a little bit slow at points, but the work itself is decent throughout for the most part. Orton constantly having an answer for all of Batista’s attempts at fighting back does an effective job of making Orton look like a strong Heel threat, whilst Batista hanging on and continuously looking for avenues to mount a comeback keeps him from looking weak, although Batista hasn’t had much chance to really shine in this one either. Eventually Orton can’t help himself and goes for the Punt of DOOM, which leads to Batista dodging it and then catching Orton with a Batista Bomb OUTTA NOWHERE for the three count.

WINNER: BATISTA
RATING: **3/4

Thoughts: It’s funny as, even though Batista got the supposed big win there, the match itself was really all about Orton, with him continuing the evolution (pun marginally intended) of his Heel act whilst Batista was kind of just a tackle dummy for large parts of the match. Batista sold well when it was required of him and timed whatever comeback attempts he got well, but Orton took the majority of the match and kind of stole the show, even though it was Batista who ended up getting his hand raised. The match was pretty slow at points, which is what you were going to get with Orton working the more deliberate style that was often a trademark of his early Viper days. Orton’s mechanics are second to none and Batista carried his ends of things from an in-ring perspective, so it was a solid match that picked up more as it wore on. However, I’d never say that it ever really reached what I would class as “good”, but it was still a perfectly “cromulent” pay per view bout as Scott Keith would say

We get clips from The Slammy Awards. 2008 Wrestler of the Year ended up being Chris Jericho, which was honestly a fair pick as Jericho had some great matches and storylines in 2008. Edge and John Cena then wrestled each other on the show, which ended in a No Contest when Jericho, Triple H and Jeff Hardy all ran in.

Match Five
Maryse Oullet, Jillian Hall, Nattie Neidhart and Victoria Vs WWE Divas Champ Michelle McCool, Kelly Kelly, Maria Kanellis and Mickie James

Oullet and McCool had been feuding over the Divas belt around this time, with Kanellis also being involved in the storyline. As you would imagine, the best bits in this match are when Victoria, Neidhart and James are involved but the match in general isn’t bad at all, with Kelly actually looking decent when she gets in there and does some of her flippy gymnastic based offence. The Heel side works some heat on Kelly for a bit until she makes the hot tag to Kanellis. The crowd doesn’t really care that much about the action in the ring, but it’s watchable and it teases the eventual McCool Heel turn, as she blind tags in when Kanellis is running wild and puts Hall away with the Styles Clash.

WINNERS: MCCOOL, KELLY, KANELLIS & JAMES
RATING: *1/2

Thoughts: This was a reasonably well structured match, although it was rushed when it really didn’t need to be. The crowd didn’t really care that much, but it was fine for an under card tag match

McCool ducks out of kissing The Great Khali following the bout, which they play off as a Heel move, but if she doesn’t want to kiss someone then that’s perfectly fine and shouldn’t really be a heelish thing for her to do. The three other members of the babyface team don’t seem too into it either, although they are slightly nicer when it comes to rejecting the advances of the amorous giant. This leads to the payoff of Mae Young showing up for a smooch, as the “comedy” continues. This segment wasn’t really that funny and it was just more filler on a card that didn’t really need it as WWE had a strong enough roster during this period that they could have filled this air time with actual wrestling matches. I don’t think the entire show has to be just matches, as angles and promo segments have their place as well and can sometimes be a very valuable addition to an event like this. However, this segment didn’t advance any storylines, wasn’t especially entertaining, and just didn’t really serve much of a purpose other than to draw out the one note gag of Mae Young being a crazy old horn-dog. If an elderly woman forcing a kiss on a very tall man is your jam though, then this is the segment for you!

Match Six
Raw Title
Champ: John Cena Vs Chris Jericho

Cena had returned from injury to win the belt from Jericho at Survivor Series, which led to Jericho building up the rematch by saying that his child loved John Cena and he had to destroy Cena so that his child would have a better role model. That’s some comic book villain level evilness. A big part of the video package is dedicated to showing footage of Cena destroying Jericho on an episode of Raw, followed by Jericho then needing help from The Legacy to even get remotely anything in reply, which makes me think that Jericho was a pretty weak challenger coming into this one.

Cena gets the babyface shine to start, bumping Jericho around in a pretty clumsy manner. This looks like one of those matches where Cena’s Heel opponent needs to grab hold of him and tell him to calm down a bit, which appears to happen when Jericho slaps on a Sleeper at one stage and has a bit of a talk with him. Cena works a bit smoother following that, with both wrestlers eventually fighting onto the apron where Jericho gets a Skull Crushing Finale off there onto the ring steps, which appears to be the cut off. I should say so!

Cena keeps trying to drag himself back to his feet during the heat whilst still acknowledging the pain he’s in from Jericho’s offence, which is nice to see. It shows the Cena fans that their man is still fighting whilst also showing that Jericho is a dangerous opponent who can actually threaten the Champion. Cena makes the comeback and gets the Five Knuckle Shuffle, but Jericho slips out of the F-U and comes off the second rope with a dropkick for two. I don’t think anyone really bought that John Cena was losing the World Title to a Missile Dropkick from the second rope, but I appreciate the effort on Jericho’s part nonetheless.

Jericho gets another slick counter to the F-U, this time landing on his feet and then snapping off the Code Breaker, but Cena kicks out at two in a good near fall. Cena does manager to get the F-U on his third attempt, but he’s too hurt to make the cover right away and the delay allows Jericho to kick out. The near fall game of both wrestlers has been on point here actually, and it’s added to the match. We get some submission hold countering, which is always solid family friendly fun, with Jericho applying THE DREADED YOUNG LION BOSTON CRAB at one stage, leading to the dramatic submission tease from Cena until he’s able to roll out and apply the STFU for a the submission win. That was some good drama and the counters were nicely done.

WINNER AND STILL CHAMPION: JOHN CENA
RATING: ***1/4

Thoughts: Very good outing there, with Cena being a bit choppy to start until he calmed down a bit, at which point the match got rather fun, especially when it came to the near falls and submission teases at the end. Jericho looked strong in defeat and Cena got a battling clean win that showed off his guts and resilience. Not an all-time classic or anything, but a darn good pay per view Title match

We get a Royal Rumble hype video, seeing as that’s the next pay per view and all.

The fan vote reveals that think Edge was the one responsible for Jeff Hardy’s attack back at Survivor Series

Main Event
Smackdown Title
Champ: The Rated R Superstar Edge Vs The Game Triple H Vs The Charismatic Enigma Jeff Jardy

Edge had returned at Survivor Series and had usurped Jeff’s spot in a Triple Threat match in order to win the belt after Jeff had been attacked in a stairwell. Eventually it was going to be revealed that the returning Christian had been behind the attack, leading to a series of Edge and Christian Vs Hardy Boyz matches. However, WWE felt too many fans could see where the storyline was going, so they had Matt be revealed as the attacker instead in order to SWERVE people. Triple H is the former Champ and Jeff got screwed at Survivor Series, hence this match being booked, with Edge playing the challengers off of one another in the hope that they will cancel one another out, thus allowing the “Ultimate Opportunist” to pick the bones.

This one soon settles into the usual formula for one of these matches, with two wrestlers going at it in the ring whilst the third wrestler sells outside the ring until it’s time for them to get back in. I understand why so many of these multi-person matches are structured like this, but I must say I prefer it when all three wrestlers are in there with one another most of the time as it normally leads to more creativity and interesting spots. The wrestling itself is good here, with all three of the combatants entering strong performances for the most part, although Jeff does have the occasional bout of sloppiness, as he is want to do.

Jeff looks to have it won with the Swanton on Tri at one stage, but Edge breaks the pin up to save his belt before dragging Jeff to the floor and flinging Brother Nero into the ringside barricades. As you would expect, Jeff took a fantastic bump for that and sold it like his entire body had been broken by it. You might not want Jeff Hardy behind the wheel of your Reliant Robin, but you cannot deny that the bloke is an absolutely fantastic bumper. One of the very best in the history of the business if you ask me. We of course get some table antics at one stage, with HHH trying to Pedigree Jeff through the announce table at one stage, leading to Jeff fighting that off only to then get Speared through the other commentary table by Edge anyway. Poor Jeff…

With Jeff tablised, Edge and Tri head into the ring to seemingly settle things, but before HHH can pick up the win he is attacked by Vladimir Kozlov, as they continue to try and push Vlad at the expense of everyone else. Matt Hardy runs down to brawl to the back with Kozlov, but not before the biggest fan of Double-Double-E has taken out Triple H and prevented Jeff from recovering first. Edge still has the upper hand, but he can’t polish HHH off with a Spear, which allows Jeff to finally recover and get back into the match. HHH soup cans Jeff out of the ring though and that looks to finally be that for the Rainbow Haired Warrior, but Jeff won’t be denied tonight and he comes off the top with the Swanton onto Tri when The Game tries to pin Edge, leading to the three count on Edge in order to give Jeff the win and the Title.

WINNER AND NEW CHAMPION: JEFF HARDY
RATING: ***3/4

Thoughts:

This was a great match and a solid way to close the show, as the crowd was very happy to see Jeff pick up the win. It was worked at a breezy pace, with them going only slightly more than 17 minutes, but that kind of worked in the match’s favour in some ways as it meant there was very little wasted motion and they didn’t overstay their welcome. This was possibly the peak of Jeff’s entire career, although he did win another World Title in 2009 in WWE and he did have the TNA/IMPACT World Title a couple of times as well

Jim Ross and Tazz go quiet for quite a while at the end of the match so that we can take in the atmosphere of Jeff’s big win. That was a nice touch that made it feel like a special moment. Jeff then climbs onto the titan tron to celebrate as the show comes to a close.

In Conclusion

There was a bit too much filler on this show for my liking, but there was some good wrestling to be found as well. As I mentioned previously in this review, I’m not someone who thinks that a wrestling show has to be nothing but wrestling matches, but I think that on pay per view events like Armageddon 2008 the focus should be more on the in-ring and less on long promo segments and/or skits. Overall though there was enough good stuff on this show that it’s an easy thumbs up, but it would have been nice to have a bit more wrestling than we got and slightly less filler in my personal opinion.

Recommended Show

You can read the follow up episode of ECW following this event courtesy of Maffew