Maffew and Mike Review Shows Considered To Be Stinkers – WWE Backlash 2003

Happy Stinky Friday Everyone!

I’m back again with a very special guest, as Maffew himself is joining me for this trip down Stinker Lane today! Maffew not only curates the highly successful Botchamania over on YouTube, but he also writes excellent reviews here on the Blog. I had fun doing a Tandem Rant with him a while back, so when it came to tackling WWE Backlash 2003 I decided to ask the Gregarious Geordie (Maffew in best Jericho voice: I’m from County Durham you idiot!) for his assistance, and thankfully he agreed!

WrestleMania XIX might not have been the business success that WWE was hoping for, but it was certainly highly rated from a critical perspective. WWE made news the following night by having Goldberg show up to Spear The Rock and set up a big Dream Match for Backlash. However, the rest of the card was somewhat lacking, and Backlash 2003 ended up being mostly panned at the time (one particular match aside).

Do you have any memories of Backlash 2003 Maff?

No, I watched it years later because this was in between wrestling phases. I only remember The Rock’s promo on Goldberg and being confused why Jericho would team up with HHH.

Well, let’s see how Backlash 2003 looks with 22 years of perspective. Is it really a Stinker, or did folks in 2003 overreact when judging its awfulness?

You can view the full card for Backlash by clicking below;

WWE Backlash 2003 Card

Pics come from IMDB and Classic Wrestling Reviews

Backlash is emanating from Worcester, Massachusetts on the 27th of April 2003

Calling the action are Jonathon Coachman and Jerry Lawler for Raw, whilst Michael Cole and Tazz handle the duties for SmackDown

The Intro video is good at least, focusing on Rock’s record breaking career and Goldberg’s incredible WCW streak.

The pay per view theme is Remedy by Cold. I actually bought Year of the Spider back in 2003. Don’t ask me why like

(Maffew: I don’t understand, I googled “Cold” and “Remedy” and all I got were adverts for Beechams.)

Opening Match
SmackDown Tag Team Titles
Champs: Team Angle (Shelton Benjamin and Charlie Haas) Vs Los Guerreros (Eddy and Chavo Jr)

Match Write-up by Maffew:

Team Angle are the champs, they have beautiful hoodies and a giant framed photo of Angle for moral support. If Rock had gifted that to Faarooq, the Nation of Domination would still be around. Tazz of course talks to the portrait like it’s really Kurt because he’s the best. Guerreros are face here despite their lying, cheating and stealing. I mean so was Robin Hood. Charlie Haas starts off with Eddie who has a weird short hair cut with no mullet. Eddy out-wrestles Haas and then stops to absorb the “Eddy” chants. Ever the family guy, Eddy insists the crowd chants for “Chavo” too. Awww.

He tags in to take on Shelton (or “Bobby Lashley” if you’re Tony Schiavone) and despite the quality exchanges, there’s a notable BORING chant from these smelly fans. Los Guerreros double-team Shelton’s wrist until Haas sticks his knee into a bouncing Chavo. Eddy sees it and responds with his own to Shelton. Ha! Eddy then angrily fake tags in while staring at Charlie to rile him up. Eddy then fake tags out when he could have simply tagged to annoy Team Angle and crowd love that level of kavorka. See, this is why Eddy was so great: He could hear the fans weren’t into the action so he hammed it up instead and now they’re into it. Team Angle decide to isolate Eddy in the corner which also gets a mild BORING chant and fuck me what a terrible crowd. I’m glad this show sucks. The AWA Special which I always thought looked a bit rubbish gets two but at least the crowd popped for the height on Shelton’s jump.

Eddy really hams up his desire to tag in Chavo by jumping into Charlie’s arms to get to him, only for Haas to double leg the hell out of Eddy to Tazz’s amazement. Yeah he SLAMMED THE SHIT out of him there. Luckily Shelton is there to work on Eddy’s leg before landing an early version of the Exploder suplex. Eddy manages to get the crowd into chanting his name as loud as they’re going to tonight and manages to dive into Charlie with enough force that he torpedoes into Chavo for the mild tag. Chavo dropkicks both members before side-stepping an avalanche in the corner resulting in Angle Implosion. Shelton powerbombs Chavo leading to Eddy missile dropkicking him.

This sets up the Three Amigos which gets a lovely pop from the crowd who are eager for Chavo to somehow make the cover…for 2.9. Ah, I see Kurt taught his lads how to kick out at the last possible moment. Eddy delivers a Frog Splash onto Charlie without tagging in which the ref can’t do anything about until he’s already done the move. I mean it’s not like he could catch him in mid-air. So Chavo pins again but it’s another 2.999 special with Shelton pulling off at the last possible moment. Great camera work there. Chavo gets sent into the steps and we get the Wrestlemania V Rude/Warrior finish as Shelton pulls Eddy’s leg out from under him on a slam and that’s the victory at 15:03.

WINNERS AND STILL CHAMPIONS: TEAM ANGLE
MIKE’S STAR RATING: ***3/4

Maffew’s Thoughts:

I know I’m going to sound like a fat greedy fan but this was merely good by the standards of both teams. Spoilt as I am on Los Guerreros being amazing every week means I came in with higher expectations than I should have considering Team Angle weren’t quite at that high level yet so although the work from Guerreros was typically great, it was also evident they were keeping it simple for the newbies. Also the crowd was rubbish. Who chants “boring” minutes into the opening PPV match? Except for Philly?

Mike’s Thoughts:

This was a really great opener, with plenty of tag formula stuff on display, although it had the fun twist of Los Guerreros being babyfaces that cheat, so they were able to invert a lot of the traditional Heel tag spots and sequences into babyface ones, with the crowd being hip to the act and playing along with it. Haas & Benjamin were still young and relatively inexperienced here, but they were both mechanically sound grapplers and they were in there with two more experienced opponents who could help them out whenever it was required, so the contest was well worked and the Champs never felt like they were out of their depth at all. There were a few instances of boorish oafs in the crowd complaining whenever the action went down to the mat, but thankfully the majority of the crowd seemed to be into the wrestling and were behind Los Guerreros in their quest to win the belts. The finish was a way to have an actual winner but in a way that would set up future contests between the two teams, so we essentially got the best of both worlds by getting a continuation of the feud that didn’t require a non-finish. Los Guerreros weren’t hurt by the defeat and were due to win the belts at Judgment Day until an injury to Chavo scuppered the plans

Los Guerreros get their heat back after the match by stealing both the belts and the portrait of Kurt Angle before very-slowly-getting-away in their lowrider. You know you’re watching a wrestling show when stuff like that happens!

Torrie Wilson and Test get to show off their Oscar-worthy acting skillz in a backstage skit. Wilson is annoyed that Test keeps harassing her over her stint in Playboy, but it’s 2003 so Test forces a kiss on Wilson, as was the style at the time. Test was actually a good smarmy Heel there, but Wilson’s performance wasn’t going to trouble the likes of Pacino or De Niro anytime soon. It’s revealed that Wilson’s rival, Sable, was watching along there, so I’m sure that will lead to something later on. Yippee…

Match Two
Sean O’Haire w/ Rowdy Roddy Piper Vs Rikishi

Match Write-up by Mike:

O’Haire had made his return to the main roster by playing a devil’s advocate character who would try to convince the audience and other wrestlers to do questionable things, such as getting Spanky to streak and Dawn Marie to show the crowd her flowery baps. It was an interesting character, but then WWE decided to just make him another generic henchman for another wrestler, in this instance Roddy Piper. Piper had feuded with Jimmy Snuka back in the day, and now he’s moved onto another member of The Bloodline in the form of Rikishi. This whole 2003 Piper run really was a mistake and it didn’t last that long, because it was Roddy chuffing Piper in 2003 WWE being used as a regular onscreen character, long past the point that Piper could be an effective presence or anywhere near reliable in that kind of role.

This one falls into the usual problems WWE had around this timeframe when they’d try to use one of the previous Attitude Era guys to try and get one of the new Ruthless Aggression guys over, in that they care too much about protecting the AE wrestler and that means that any rub the RE wrestler gets is lessened as a result. For instance, despite being the youngest person with arguably the most upside in this one, O’Haire is clearly positioned as the least important person in the match, with Piper being presented as the real star and his feud with Rikishi being presented as the issue we should actually care about rather than Rikishi looking to try and topple this new up and coming star in O’Haire. O’Haire’s work is basic but fine enough, with him mostly focusing on strikes and rest hold’s.

Rikishi does take a couple of nice bumps for the youngster, but he also mostly shrugs off the majority of O’Haire’s offence and it takes Piper getting involved for O’Haire to ever be able to get anything in on Rikishi. In a fair fight there isn’t a lot that O’Haire can do, which again doesn’t help with getting O’Haire over because Rikishi was very much a lower mid-card competitor around this timeframe, so O’Haire needing involvement from his aging insane manager to do anything makes O’Haire look like an ineffective goober who can’t even beat a lower card guy without help. If O’Haire was a smaller conniving Heel then that would be one thing, but he was a big muscular jock who they were trying to get over like a powerhouse, so this booking was wildly counterproductive. Rikishi eventually manages to bust Piper open with a coconut shot, but that distracts Big Kish long enough to allow O’Haire to get the Widow Maker (modified Spicolli Driver) and that’s the three count.

WINNER: SEAN O’HAIRE
MIKE’S STAR RATING: *1/2

Mike’s Thoughts:

This did nothing for O’Haire, and he’s the one they should have been focusing on pushing here as opposed to the decrepit Piper and the ice-cold Rikishi. The actual wrestling was a standard SmackDown level match, which wasn’t terrible but you expect more on a pay per view level event, even a B Show like Backlash

Maffew’s Thoughts:

You already know this isn’t going to work for O’Haire when Piper gets a separate entrance and Cole explains the reason for this match is because Piper hit Rikishi with a coconut on Smackdown. Why would O’Haire’s character need a manager anyway? At least O’Haire got to show off his skills, which include not being able to do anything without Piper interfering. Crowd only made noise when a fan got thrown out. Highlight was Taz trying to blame the sudden crowd noise on the fans spotting Cole’s new suit. Piper seemed to interfere at the wrong time multiple times too so this was a disaster of a supposed first PPV match on the level of Mordecai

Stacey Keibler and the worlds smallest plate of food are hanging out in catering. Sable comes in to introduce herself and let Keibler know that Test and Torrie Wilson shared a smooch earlier on. Sable of course neglects to mention that Wilson was an unwilling participant in the whole kissing situation. This causes Keibler to throw down her tiny plate in disgust. They apparently did 17 takes of this scene, and what we got was the best one.

Rob Van Dam and Kane are talking about their upcoming match, with Kane being the more chill of the two for a change.

Match Three
Guest Referee: Chief Morley
Raw Tag Team Titles
Champs: The Unlikely Duo (Kane and Rob Van Dam) Vs The Dudley Boyz (Bubba Ray and D-Von)

Match Write-up by Mike:

The Dudleyz had been fired by Morley, so they had started lackeying for him as a way to get their jobs back. This had led to The Dudleyz cheating RVD and Kane out of the belts on the episode of Sunday Night Heat prior to Mania XIX (originally it was going to be on Mania itself, but they needed more time for the Miller Lite girls to fight instead). RVD and Kane went on to eventually win the belts on an episode of Raw from Morley and Lance Storm, so now Morley is trying to cheat them out of the belts here at Backlash by appointing himself as the special guest referee. Morley wouldn’t be long in this role, as Stone Cold would soon be back as Co-GM and one of his first acts was to fire Morley and make him come back as Val Venis. The version of Backlash on WWE Network (I’m watching this before the Network gets closed in the UK) appears to be the same one as the DVD cut, as everyone’s entrance music is changed to generic themes as opposed to the Powerman 5000, Breaking Point and Slow Chemical themes everyone had at the time.

The idea seems to be that Bubba is less reluctant to be a Heel if it means he can be a Tag Champ, whilst D-Von would rather tell the Heel authority figure to get stuffed and stay a babyface. The action is decent here, as these two teams had probably wrestled one another quite a bit by the time Backlash came along. Morley is actually a reasonably fair referee in the early going, even giving Kane a fair count when The Big Red Freak has D-Von down for a cover at one stage (the exchange between D-Von and Kane was the first time we’ve had a sloppy moment in this one really, but they covered for it well enough). The Dudleyz work some heat on RVD at one stage, which RVD sells well enough and that gives us some moments for Morley to subtly increase the speed of his counts whenever RVD is down on the mat, as well as Morley turning a blind eye when The Dudleyz gouge, bite and pull hair. They haven’t been totally in the face with the Heel Ref shtick here, and that’s worked reasonably well.

Kane eventually gets the hot tag, and he runs wild in a decent segment thanks to The Dudleyz being in the right place to bump when Kane needs them. Kane could probably be better served to just trust The Dudleyz to come to him rather than lumber around the ring trying to catch them though, but sometimes folks get excitable during the hot tag. We get the usual sequence of big moves down the home stretch, with everyone hitting their signature spots, such as Kane coming off the top with his clothesline. This leads to Morley finally giving up the ghost of being a fair ref and clocking Kane right in the Jacobs’ (isn’t it a shame when insane right wing nutters can’t get along with one another). Morley accidentally clocks Bubba with a clothesline though, which leads to D-Von attacking Morley for a big pop. This leads to everything breaking down, with the Champs getting the victory in the confusion when a replacement ref enters the fray.

WINNERS AND STILL CHAMPIONS: RVD & KANE
MIKE’S STAR RATING: **1/2

Mike’s Thoughts:

This was all kinds of messy at the end, but the crowd enjoyed it and it ended up being an entertaining Dog and Pony Show. They would finally move RVD and Kane onto a new feud with La Resistance following this, although that then sadly led to the team breaking up when there was arguably some juice left in the tank for them as a tandem

Maffew’s Thoughts:

RVD teaming up with Kane, Val Venis as a guest ref, Lawler & Coach commentating…Monday Night Raw’s crew was made up of whatever was left in the fridge. Coach & Lawler have horrible chemistry, they’re both pro-face colour guys. Lawler doesn’t get any funny heel lines in because he’s too busy helping Coach learn on the job like he’s a seeing eye dog. At least RVD and Bubba act like they’ve met before and their exchanges get the crowd invested in the those three letters they had their biggest success (TNA). I never liked any of the teams RVD was shoved into post HHH demotion (Kane, Booker, Rey) cos they felt like how they acted: two singles guys getting together because WWE didn’t care about tag teams, and Coach yelling “wow Kane & RVD have amazing chemistry!” when they were making no attempt at working together kind of sums that up. Decent action between the ex-ECW guys that Morley did his best to distract from but at least the crowd were awake for a bunch of lads who were over in ’98. Best thing on the show so far, oof

Stacey Keibler continues our melodrama for the evening by getting into an argument with Torrie Wilson over the whole Test things, which leads to Ivory showing up in a towel to break it up along with the rest of the women’s locker room, raising the question as to why she was at the venue and showering when she wasn’t even wrestling at Backlash?

Match Four
WWE World Women’s Title
Champ: Trish Stratus Vs Jazz w/ Theodore R. Long

Match Write-up by Maffew:

“The bitch is back and the bitch is black” Urghhhhhhhh. Crowd shower this with “we want puppy” chants because they’d had the horrible Stacey acting through the night to really blaze the trail. Jazz’s strength impresses the members of the crowd still awake with Trish doing the same with a tilt-a-whirl. Jazz does her best with an Earthquake Stomp of all things before distracting the ref by removing a turnbuckle pad (Ref: “what are you doing?” Teddy at ringside: “what are YOU doing??”). Jazz appears to have the advantage and heads to the top but Trish unleashes her slow rope-assisted Frankensteiner…which Jazz counters beautifully into a single crab with both wrestlers flying to the canvas. Even the bored perverts appreciated that.

Sadly the crowd isn’t that behind Trish powering out, which takes away from the moment, with Trish easily reversing out and locking in a STF. Teddy pushes the ropes (which is always better than pulling rope) towards Jazz so she can escape. With both wrestlers stood up and equal, Trish gets a close two with a Chick Kick and Jazz responds with a dropkick for the same. Then Stratusfaction lands and…Teddy lobs a shoe off Trish’s head to protest the Iraqi invasion, which is enough for the ref to stop counting, but not DQ Jazz or throw Teddy out. Trish throws it back and survives a sneaky small package, but Trish’s Sunset Flip is countered via the ropes for Jazz to win via Dirty Pin.

WINNER AND NEW CHAMPION: JAZZ
MIKE’S STAR RATING: **1/2

Maffew’s Thoughts:

About as good as WWE women’s wrestling got during this period, which is damning praise. Action was fine and Jazz always managed to bring out one cool spot per PPV match which I always appreciated. It’s a shame this era has to have finishes so dumb that they require referees to forget how to referee temporarily

Mike’s Thoughts:

This was the usual Jazz Vs Stratus match, in that Jazz mostly battered the humus out of poor Stratus whilst Stratus would sell and bravely fight back when the opportunity allowed. Jazz was one of the best in-ring performers on the scene in the early 2000’s and Stratus was rapidly improving as a wrestler, so this was a “perfectly cromulent” wrestling match as Scott Keith would say and it was nice to see the women get some time to go out there and have a “real” match rather than having to do a “diva” style match that was primarily designed around titillation rather than traditional Pro Wrestling storytelling. Long was actually allowed to be a reasonably effective Heel manager briefly for a bit during this run until Vince McMahon woke up one morning and decided that he hated manager’s again

Shawn Michaels, Booker T and Kevin Nash might not be on the same page later on, as Nashy is all intense due to Triple H kicking him right in the Diesel’s on Raw.

Match Five
The Big Show Vs Rey Mysterio Jr

Match Write-up by Maffew:

So two weeks ago, Big Show took a 619 and he fell flat on his fookin’ arse. So then Rey hid behind some ring steps to kick Show down again as the commentators have to do their sad laugh watching Big Show fall in a sport that sees people fall over a lot. Unless Diesel’s wrestling I guess. I don’t know how this highlights Rey’s positives. Rey annoys Show with his quickness, nearly knocking Show on his giant arse again with a springboard dropkick. Rey repeatedly jumps onto Show in the corner which draws laughter from the crowd. Was that the intent? Show chops Rey’s everything in the corner as Cole and Taz bicker to further give this match the respect it deserves. Show catches Rey on a springboard and delivers a backbreaker as Cole wonders if Rey has shit himself. A fan holds up a sign saying BIG SHOW LIKES CHER. Is anyone taking this seriously? Show press slams Rey but he lands on his feet so Show chops him so hard he flies outside. Show shoves the ref out the way so Rey can chair shot Show to get a two-count from a follow-through (not like that) back senton. 619 to the gut and the arse and the head leads to Rey diving directly into a chokeslam to end a match that proved…something?

WINNER: BIG SHOW
MIKE’S STAR RATING: *

Maffew’s Thoughts:

Everyone treated this like a joke and Show pinning someone the size of Rey did nothing for either man. Weird tone here, that only gets weirder as it gets all pretend-serious with Rey being stretchered out after taking one chokeslam…leading to Show returning to grab the stretcher and smash it across the ring post and causing Rey to drop right on his fucking face

Mike’s Thoughts:

The point of this was to have Big Show destroy a babyface so that Brock Lesnar could then try to avenge that babyface at the next pay per view. Why that babyface had to be Rey Mysterio of all people totally eludes me. This just made Rey, and the entire Cruiserweight division as a whole, look lesser to the “real” stars. They could have easily had Big Show destroy Chris Benoit instead for instance, and that would have not only been a better match but it would have also given Big Show a more impressive scalp. Plus, Benoit and Lesnar had been onscreen buddies for a few months prior to this so Big Show destroying Benoit would have actually made sense as a way to get Lesnar all angry and demand revenge, rather than them just having Big Show embarrass Rey like this. Rey took some good bumps, as he always has, but aside from that this match was a real head scratcher that didn’t really help anyone. It was a TV angle that didn’t need to be on pay per view, and I stick with my assertion that they should have done a Big Show Vs Benoit match instead where Benoit could have done the big injury angle in a better match

Following the match we get a sickeningly dangerous spot where Big Show grabs a stretcher that Rey is being loaded onto and then FLINGS it into the ring post, leading to poor Rey landing face first on the floor. I believe Big Show got in some trouble following that, as he should have done. Don’t get me wrong, it’s not like there was a 100% safe way to do that spot, but Big Show could have at least TRIED not to kill his opponent. This is the injury angle to set up Big Show Vs Brock Lesnar in a stretcher match on the next pay per view.

Triple H, Ric Flair and Chris Jericho are all on the same page, that being the page of evil and villainy. Jericho looks to be having fun tagging with Flair and being as extra as possible.

Stacey Keibler and Torrie Wilson are continuing to argue, which leads to Keibler getting pushed into a wall and something falling on her head. This leads to Scott Steiner trying to help Keibler, leading to Steiner and Test having an argument. Riveting stuff I assure you.

We get a video package for the next match.

Match Six
SmackDown World Title
Champ: “The Next Big Thing” Brock Lesnar Vs “The Doctor of Thuganomics” John Cena

(Hi, Mike here. So there was a bit of a mix up with this one as we both thought we were doing the match write-up. I was thinking of chopping up one of them, but as both of us went to the trouble of writing up the match, I thought I’d post both in full. So apologies for that, we’ll back to the usual format for Match Seven)

Match Write-up by Mike:

Lesnar had injured Cena by throwing Tha Doctor knee first into the ring post, leading to Cena getting himself over by cutting some bitter raps about it. Cena ended up managing to win a post-Mania tournament in order to earn himself a Title shot, and now he’s getting a shot at the belt in his own backyard. Cena attacked Lesnar with the belt on SmackDown, leading to Lesnar bleeding. Lesnar has the bandage of DOOM on his face here, which can only mean that we’ll see some claret in this contest as it progresses. Cena has a Yankees jersey on here, just to ensure that he gets booed in Massachusetts despite growing up just down the road. This was during Lesnar’s horribly ill-fitting “smiley Brock” era, where they decided to try and fit a round peg into a square hole by making the real-life surly anti-social Lesnar into a hand slapping friendly babyface, because heaven forfend a top babyface in WWE not fit into the very narrow mould that Vince McMahon thought was necessary.

Lesnar does have some good intensity in the early stages when he flings Cena around, with Cena being a decent ragdoll for it all. Angry intense fiery babyface Lesnar definitely had potential, but ideally he needed to be in there with really hated Heels that the fans would enjoy watching Lesnar kill. Cena doesn’t really fit that description, as he was more of a cool Heel who got over from rapping and doing impressive power moves. Cena manages to weather the initial Angry Brock storm and throws Lesnar face first into the ring steps, which leads to Chekhov’s head wound opening up so that Lesnar can get some blood flowing. Cena actually does an effective job in the heat of being a brawling Heel who has managed to get the big monster babyface on the backfoot, with Lesnar selling well and getting the right mixture between acknowledging the punishment he’s receiving without looking weak.

What lets this match down is that the crowd reactions are lacking, possibly because the fans don’t see Cena as a credible challenger, because they don’t really care about Lesnar’s babyface act, or a combination of the two. As the match progresses Cena actually gets some more support from the crowd, which is somewhat understandable in that he’s from the local area and he’s been presented as a resourceful fighter in this one who has been able to survive the Champ’s early attacks in order to gain control of the bout. A long rest hold slows things down at one point, which prevents me from going higher with the rating just because it goes on for so long that it starts to become dull. I have no problem with two wrestlers sitting in a working hold to grab a bit of a breather and continue the match story, but when they’re lying around for minutes at a time it just becomes boring. It also gives the wrong impression that all mat wrestling is sitting around doing nothing, which in turn leads to people thinking all mat wrestling is boring. Lesnar eventually manages to fight his way out of the bore-hold and that leads to a comeback, leading to Cena trying to use his trusty chain to win the belt. That goes awry though and the F-5 retains the Title for Lesnar.

WINNER AND STILL CHAMPION: BROCK LESNAR
MIKE’S STAR RATING: **1/2

Mike’s Thoughts:

The long rest hold killed this one for me, as prior to that I thought they were having a good match. They structured the match in a way to give Cena a rub even though he wasn’t winning, as outside of the babyface shine the match mostly went to Cena, with Lesnar bleeding and making occasional fight back attempts. The match might have benefitted from a more dramatic and exciting closing stretch, as you never really felt the bout was capable of kicking into a higher gear and some more interesting and intricate near fall sequences might have got the blood pumping a bit more (no pun intended). The blood aside, this felt more like a well built up SmackDown Main Event as opposed to a pay per view Title match, which wasn’t ideal when the purpose to this one was to showcase the new Ruthless Aggression guys to show that they could carry this kind of slot on a big event by themselves without help from the old guard

Maffew’s Thoughts:

Cena got F5’d into a ring post on Smackdown so Cena gets a rap that gets steadily more crazy proclaiming that they’re in prison and Brock just dropped the soap. So Cena beat Eddy Guerrero, The Undertaker (via DQ thanks to the FBI oh my god) and Chris Benoit to earn this shot. “John Cena is bigger than Brock Lesnar!” give it a few years. Strangely they show clips of Lesnar landing on his head at Wrestlemania to put over his toughness. I mean I get where they’re coming from but it’s still odd.

Nice pop for Cena during his Word Life entrance too. Cena name-drops a bunch of legends in his pre-match rap. “I’m straight, you’re Dude Love. Get off the Cactus, Jack!” God he was cheesy. Getting big reactions though, even with the “you can suck my (hold mic up so the crowd can yell it) DICK” ending. Oh wait then Cena’s heel cos he’s wearing the rival sports team’s jersey? But we just got shown a classic face build up video package! He got injured then beat a bunch of people to earn his shot at revenge!

Lesnar turns his back on Cena so John pounces. Lesnar shrugs it off to land multiple backbreakers before carrying into a Fallaway slam. Lesnar’s sweet suplexes where he’s going full force while also making it look easy at the same time. And then Lesnar locks in a facelock as I guess the crowd is supposed to start cheering Cena? After he ragged on the local sports team and told everyone to suck his dick? Oh as Lesnar press slams Cena, the crowd get behind him with “CENA SUCKS” chants.

Cena holds the ropes after an Irish Whip so he can head outside for a chair. Lesnar stops him easily but Cena’s able to whip him into the ring steps to re-open Lesnar’s forehead wound. Lesnar starts overselling for Cena as his cut is a beaut. Sadly Cena’s offence lacks immediacy and intensity. He lands a backdrop suplex and a blatant choke. He’s an incoherent promo away from being Roddy Piper. Lesnar tries to come back but the bloodloss is getting to him, allowing Cena to get more chokes and an early version of his second rope legdrop. Even if Cena’s offense was more exciting, there’s little reason for the crowd to get behind him cos he’s a prick. And they are absolutely not making any noise now, despite Cole & Taz’s best attempts at sounding dramatic.

Cena’s next move is a chinlock which crowd quietens for again. They’re coming back to life just to die again. Brock finally spinebusters Cena to the crowd’s relief but no-one’s believing Lesnar is in any danger. Cena lands a clothesline and Cole & Tazz explode like OH MY GOD THIS IS IT. Meanwhile the crowd are silent. Oh immediately after I type that, some of the crowd start chanting for Cena and I don’t know if that’s out of boredom or spite because both men have been in a chinlock for three minutes now.

Tazz & Cole make excuses for the crowd as Lesnar finally Brocks Up to shove Cena into the turnbuckles repeatedly. Louder “Cena” chants now so of course now it’s time for Lesnar to land several STOs to noticeable boos. Cena appears to forget what’s next but it’s OK as Lesnar simply deadlifts him for a slam. Cena gets a low blow and roll-up for the loudest pop of the match but it gets two. Lesnar picks up Cena and charges so strongly into the turnbuckle that Cena’s head lands behind the turnbuckle in a scary moment. Cena goes for his chain but the ref spots it, allowing Cena to simply walk into the F5 for the clean win at 15:11.

What a weirdly booked match with heel Cena being a heel and a dick and boring the fans into…somehow getting behind him? I think this is one of those “right for the wrong reasons” situations. Lesnar was doing a grand job of bleeding and selling for all the good it did for the crowd reactions but this was one of their matches you can definitely skip

Co-Main
Raw World Champ Triple H, “The Nature Boy” Ric Flair and “The Highlight of the Night” Chris Jericho Vs “The Five Time WCW Champion” Booker T, “Big Sexy” Kevin Nash and “The Heartbreak Kid” Shawn Michaels

Match Write-up by Maffew:

I didn’t watch this PPV when it happened so I have a vivid memory of reading Powerslam Magazine and being disgusted at the idea of Jericho teaming with HHH after everything that happened in 2002. This was my generation’s version of seeing Savage team up with Steamboat at Series ’87.

Video Package: Kevin Nash finally returned after tearing his quad in 2002 to save HBK from a HHH sledgehammer attack as Coach’s voice yells “THESE TWO USED TO BE BEST OF FRIENDS”. No I’m pretty sure that’s HBK and Nash, not HHH and Nash. The match is announced by Bischoff so then HHH tries to stir the pot by saying HBK will try and steal Nash’s spot-light. They missed an opportunity to show HBK deliberately fucking up the powerbomb at Wrestlemania XI. It’s not like it’s any more Insider Baseball than the rest of this wank. The dramatic music video hype package sums it all up – Cold (by Remedy).

The lack of pop for Jericho is belief beggaring considering how good HBK vs. Y2J was a month prior. Flair with his 1991 theme gets more but even then it’s nothing earth-shattering. HHH’s entrance is longer than both men’s combined but this is during the water retaining stage of Hunter’s body so he needed to conserve his strength. Booker’s theme is REALLY badly overdubbed here which I don’t recall. Shawn gets the most crowd love and then there’s nothing for Nash with an awesomely forgettable two-chord chugger that Jim Johnston was pumping out like a Queen Ant during this period. Nash gets in-ring pyro to wake the crowd up.

Oh Coach yells about HHH and Nash being besties again and I’m now realizing they mean the Clique. But they don’t have footage of that so it’s all insider bollocks that the normal non-smelly fan is supposed to know (or care about) and it feels like when AEW bring up an indie/puro feud that they can talk about but not show footage of. Jericho and HBK start off after HHH declines to get in, with both men going through a lovely pinfall reversal sequence which seems ill-fitting to start off a match but considering some of the participants here I’ll allow it. Jericho goes for the Walls very early to no reaction because the crowd know that even if he locked it in it’s not ending this after two minutes. Nash tags in to a kinda pop to bounce Jericho around. Nash knocks Flair off the apron and beckons for HHH to come in but he’s busy. Jericho tries a sneak attack but he’s here to bump for Nash which he does after skinning the cat.

Booker tags in for a pop on the same level as Nash and he’s just kinda there in 2003. Wait no, didn’t he spend 2002 feuding with the nWo? As in HBK and Nash? Urgh. Booker flapjacks Jericho which is enough to get HHH to tag in. He’s wearing purple trunks with an Iron Cross insignia which I assume he got for being wounded in combat. And by “wounded” I mean “wrestling like he is.” Booker attempts to fight HHH but Flair cheap-shots to keep the advantage and…oh and then Booker simply out-runs old man Flair and that’s enough for HBK to tag in. Flair gets all his trademark bumps in for HBK which causes envy amongst Jericho and HHH who also run in to get taken out by Sexy Boy. No wonder he’s getting the most cheers.

HHH lets Flair take a flying forearm so he can strategically pedigree HBK before rolling outside to escape Nash. It’s 2003 so I’m still expecting HHH to tag in 20 seconds later and pin HBK. Instead Flair recovers first to tag in Jericho who remembers to try and get heat by mocking HBK’s posing. Crowd boo that then go back to being sedated when HHH tags in. Flair tags in for lots of WOOOOs which distracts Flair long enough to allow HBK to grab a small package in a cute moment. Flair takes a punch then uses his legs on the floor to trip and hold onto HBK as he tags out in another nice moment.

HBK continues to get worn out like all good middle-aged sexy boys, getting stuck in the corner while Flair brings the personality and expressions. That’s something that HHH of 2000/2001 was also very capable of doing but stopped during the Reign Of Terror. Flair takes an enziguri so both men reset with HBK selling the beating so well he bumps into Flair and then flops on top for a pin and a two-count, before getting another one because he’s too tired to move off of Flair. Little moments like that are making up for the dullness elsewhere. HBK finally tags in Nash who is wearing a BIG DADDY COOL singlet but you can’t call him Diesel. Scoop slams for everyone (sideways one for Flair, natch) until HHH gets a snake eyes. “You talk about ring rust? I don’t see any!” yells Coach after three guys walked into position for him several times. Nash no-sells Flair’s chops and the crowd laugh as Flair naturally begs off. Match breaks down with Nash again throwing Jericho around the ring but he sees the HHH pedigree coming and blocks it to set up the Jackknife Powerbomb but Jericho blocks it with a missile dropkick. I’m amazed Jericho didn’t slam himself after hitting his first offensive maneuver on Nash.

Booker and Jericho get a bit lost until a Scissors Kick puts down Jericho and a Harlem Sidekick knocks down Flair. Spinaroonie connects as the crowd goes wild. Lawler asks if Booker invented that. He claims Booker’s dad invented the Limbo Dance trying to get into a public toilet. Hey remember the legendary Lawler/Coach commentary team? Only Flair and HBK are left in the ring which I’m thankful for. Flair gets thrown off the top rope (no really) but as HBK revs up the band, Jericho expertly lands a bulldog at just the right time to piss off the crowd. Flair locks in the Figure Four as Coach points out he’s not legal leading to Jericho stomp HBK in the face and land a lionsault for the hell of it. Nash stops his potential Jackknife on the outside as he realises Jericho hasn’t taken a bump in five minutes and wanders in for the Snake Eyes. “Nash being a great team mate at the expense of getting his revenge on The Game.” Yeah that’s what we remember Nash for, his selflessness. Flair prevents a Jackknife by being shoved into Nick Patrick and the groan from the crowd is hilarious. Jericho takes the Jackknife before that smart Unteroffizier kinda collides his sledgehammer into Nash for the pin at 17:52 as Coach yells “that’s why he’s the Cerebral Assassin! He’s always thinking!”

WINNERS: TEAM TRIPLE H
MIKE’S STAR RATING: **1/2

Maffew’s Thoughts:

HBK and Flair did their best to make something out of nothing here but the highlight of the match was Scott Keith’s legendary assessment of the finish:

The sledgehammer, with the added force of HHH’s hand in front of it and Nash’s own hands clearly in front of his face, totaled the equivalent of a sledgehammer blow PLUS three punches.

Mike’s Thoughts:

Not that I’m a big Kevin Nash advocate or anything, but if he was getting the next Title shot then why didn’t he get the winning pin here? It’s not like he had to pin Tri himself, but why couldn’t Flair or Jericho look at the lights in the quest to give Big Daddy Cool some semblance of momentum? Why would Nash even be in contention for a Title shot now that Triple H pinned him in their first meeting? As for the match itself; early on it promised that it might be fun, but then it meandered a bit and didn’t really deliver on those promises. It was still a decent effort overall, but it was another in a long line of matches tonight that felt like TV matches masquerading as pay per view contests. Shawn Michaels was an excellent babyface in peril, but the big hot tag to Nash was decidedly tepid, which is all the more reason why they needed to have Nash go over strong here in order to establish him as a viable challenger for Emperor Paul

Main Event
The Rock Vs Goldberg

Goldberg was finally signed by WWE in 2003, long after the disastrous Invasion storyline had ended and just after Stone Cold Steve Austin had decided to retire, thus meaning we never got one of wrestling’s most requested Dream Matches of Goldberg Vs Austin. Rock was ready to go away and make some more movies though, and was also a friend of Goldberg in real life, so he volunteered to step up and put the new guy over, hence this match. They make the mistake of allowing Rock to cut a hilarious pre-match promo however, where he shows more charisma than anyone else on the roster and tells the crowd that they can wipe a cockatoo’s ass with what they think. He closes by calling Goldberg a “whisker-biscuit ball headed bitch”, which gets a “Rocky” chant from the crowd.

In a weird touch, Goldberg was using the WWE version of his theme here, which they often used to dub over WCW footage for years, but on this occasion they dub the WCW version over the WWE version on the WWE Network. I just can’t even begin to comprehend the decisions they make on this platform sometimes. Just use the original audio unless there is some sort of copyright reason that you can’t. Surely they own their own version of Goldberg’s entrance theme don’t they? If not, why were they dubbing it over the WCW theme for so long on WCW footage? The music rights maze just baffles me.

Now hindsight and Goldberg’s later WWE run has shown us that the best way to book this would be for Goldberg to plough through Rock in under two minutes and pin him clean to pop the crowd, but this was back in 2003 when they were still trying to make Goldberg conform to the traditional WWE babyface mould, so he gets an extended shine where he bumps Rock around until he misses a Spear, which allows Rock to get some heat on him. Thus Goldberg has to sell for a long time, which is a totally counterintuitive way of getting him over and thus means the match becomes all about Rock clowning about and having fun, which of course causes a lot of fans to cheer for Rock because he’s so entertaining.

Rock goes to a Sharpshooter, which would be an excellent opportunity for Goldberg to power out of the hold and send Rock flying in impressive fashion, but we can’t be having an ex WCW star in Goldberg looking so good at the expense of a home grown WWE guy like Rock, so Goldberg has to instead meekly grab the ropes and then get punched in the balls by the Rock for good measure. Goldborg (Called as such by Jonathon Coachman on commentary) manages to catch Rock with a desperation Spear, but lays around selling rather than popping back up, before making the old “block a punch, thrown one of your own” traditional babyface comeback, which he is totally ill-suited to doing.

Rock gets Goldberg with a Spear of his own (to a big pop from the crowd) and then follows with a Rock Bottom for two. Rock continues to play to the crowd, as I honestly ponder whether he was actively trying to sabotage Goldberg at this stage? That would be super weird seeing as he apparently played a big hand in convincing Goldberg to come to WWE to begin with, but man, it’s hard not to think it watching this back. Rock drops The People’s Elbow for two, which leads to the fans chanting “Bulls—“ as a result. Wow, great job with your new top face there WWE. Goldberg replies with two Spears, to audible boo’s and “Goldberg sucks” chants, before following up with the Jackhammer to put this match out of its misery.

WINNER (BUT LOSER IN THE LONG RUN): GOLDBERG
MIKE’S STAR RATING: DUD

Mike’s Thoughts:

This was as counterproductive a match as you could possibly have done for Goldberg’s debut, as a combination of Rock’s antics and the match structure handicapped him straight out of the gate. The actual execution wasn’t entirely awful, but the match itself actively offended me, so it gets a DUD and f’ing likes it! No wonder Bill was in such a foul mood about WWE for so long!!

Maffew’s Thoughts:

I’m not a Goldberg hater by nature despite what he did to our lord and saviour Bret Hart, but I don’t see the logic in putting him against Hollywood Rock who is so far ahead of him in every single way that only Goldberg’s negatives can be highlighted by putting them against one another. Obviously on paper it makes sense as it’s the changing of the guard and all that but replacing Rock with Goldberg is like burning your house down to live in the shed. Heel Rock is cheered and chanted for in his pre-match promo which is one of the highlights of this crappy show and because Rock is so selfless he puts over how scared he is to tangle with Goldberg. Maybe-face-maybe-heel commentator Lawler says “I used to be head of the Goldberg fanclub until I resigned out of loneliness.” Rock thankfully oversells everything and does his best to be a bitch because it’s the only way he’s going to make this a main event length match, but again, all it does is highlight how straight-laced and dull Goldberg is by comparison. His selling is unnatural and he kicks out too late on a pin attempt. Oh his gimmick is he beats people? You’re supposed to beat people you idiot, this is wrestling. So yeah, this was our first look at WWE Goldberg and he was already booed. All up hill from there

Is It Really A Stinker?

Mike’s Thoughts:

No I wouldn’t say that Backlash is a Stinker. It was widely hated at the time, but watching in 2025 it was a mostly dull show with a lot of matches in the **ish range by my clock, which isn’t grounds for a Stinker rating in my opinion. The Main Event was a total disaster that did a lot of damage to Goldberg, and they never really course corrected on it that much either. The opener was really good and the majority of the main matches of the card were decent at best and so-so at worst. Really only O’Haire/Rikishi and Big Show/Mysterio were bad on the undercard, and those matches were at least kept reasonably short. The Raw Tag Title, Women’s Title and SmackDown World Title matches were all watchable, if not perfect, and the six man tag was okay with room for improvement. WWE just generally wasn’t that good in 2003 and business was dropping off considerably, so it was easy to be down on Backlash at the time, but two decades later it’s kind of just a show in my view.

What do you think about it Maffew?

Maffew’s Thoughts:

What Mike said. This show isn’t deserving of original thoughts. Watch in horror as Rey gets killed, Goldberg looks lame and the crowd chant BORING at Eddy Guerrero. WWE really did not give a damn about protecting anyone’s aura during this time, least of all the company’s.

Mike’s Final Rating: Odourless

Maffew’s Final Rating: Stinky

Scores are done on a scale of Stinker/Stinky/Odourless/Pleasant/Fragrant

Thanks once again to Maffew for joining me on this journey. Hopefully I’ll actually have a more exciting show for you to watch next time!

(Leave me alone Mike)