[4.0] "[3.9] The February 21st, 2025 edition of WWE SmackDown was quite honestly one of the most overhyped and one of the most underwhelming shows I've seen. I mean this felt like such a nothing burger of a show and everything felt so pointless. Nothing here was a highlight not even The Rock showing up could save this show. Average matches, little to no storyline progression throughout and it again proves SmackDown is the worst brand right now, The only riveting storyline for me is Solo and Jacob. Everything else was underwhelming. Wouldn't recommend this show at all to any casual viewers. This was a show that'd turn wrestling fans away from the product."

[0.0] "The Rock quite literally ruined the show. Quite a few matches either got edited in terms of who was in it or they simply got cut. Why is Drew, someone who SHOULD be the top heel, losing CLEAN to Jimmy Uso a week before elimination chamber? Tiffany Stratton probably just gave Candice the worst match of her career. I like Trish, this feud I don't care for one bit. Why are La knight and Carmelo Hayes getting put into awesome truth lore? It's sad. The Rock promo is far too long and repetitive. The idea was good, but the lack of follow up and the way it was done in the moment was really poor. Pretty deadly probably gave DIY the worst match of their careers. The main event is just BORING. Oh and, Naomi vs Liv should've happened. It's a 3 hour show, find a place for them to get minutes dude."

[0.0] "FiRiNg oN aLL cYLiNdUrZ...There hasn't been a lot that separates this terrible episode from the long stretch of very, very mediocre episodes before it. Weekly tv for any company now is a chore to get through. Some of what Triple H does is getting seriously overblown because it's better than Vince which is a bar so low to clear, the worms would be considered great bookers."

[3.0] "I could have spent money to go see this show live and in person, but for the first time ever, I turned it down because I didn't really have the money to afford to go with anyone but myself. And I'm glad I didn't shill out the money because god this show was a bore. Sure, I was live in person at the forgettable SmackDown in 2023 at Lafayette, but at least we had that fun Solo Sikoa/Sheamus main event. There was just nothing interesting to this show. Legitimately, the only memorable thing was The Rock saying WrestleMania 42 was going to be in New Orleans, which could have easily been done in a press conference. (Like they had after the show anyways? ) Besides for the alright main event which is planting more seeds for a Jacob Fatu singles run and The Rock getting uncomfy with Cody, this show was a major bore."

[7.0] "Not sure what all the whining and crying is about, but this was a pretty good show outside of the absolutely abysmal womens match. Every other match was good and we even got an entertaining promo(which doesnt happen often anymore) with The Rock and Cody. McIntyre vs the better Uso was good outside of the questionable finish, Truth/LA Knight vs Melo/Miz was fun and entertaining, DIY vs Pretty Deadly was short but hard hittting and the main event was pretty solid. Far better than most of the garbage we've been getting on RAW as of late."

[6.0] "I think a lot of internet nerds are getting worked up for no reason. The show was fine. Was it amazing? No. But it wasn't anywhere close to being as bad as a 2.80 rating suggests. None of the matches were bad, even if they weren't anything special. The Rock segment had me invested, although a little confused. I'm intrigued as to where the story is going next. Some of you need to leave your bedrooms and touch grass. (EDIT = THE INTERNET NERDS OWE THE ROCK AN APOLOGY)"

[2.0] "[2.0] WWE really needed to knock it out of the park with this episode considering The Rock puts many more eyeballs on the product with each appearance. To say they failed in doing so would be a massive understatement. Instead we got one of the worst SmackDowns in recent history. The whole show seemed disjointed and sloppy. There were production gaffes, too many botches to count and the pacing was way off do to the ridiculous amount of commercials and video recaps. The Rock and Cody segment was one of the most awkward and all over the place promos you'll ever see, leaving the crowd bored, silent and confused. They desperately need another promo to clean things up and try to make sense of what The Rock was trying to say. It's WrestleMania season and there's hardly anything to get excited about, and this show made it worse. Very disappointed"

[1.0] "This show is one of the worst I've seen in a long time, and look at how low WWE quality is nowadays, but damn, the same old shit. Drew loses like a bitch by package like always when he has no reason to lose, just to probably make a shitty redemption story for the Scotsman that only makes him more stupid. A clownish tag team match that would be the comic relief of the show if this show took itself seriously, but since it can't be taken seriously when the booking of the show is so bad, then I don't give a damn. A Zelina Vega package video as if it were the big dea. The same old basic Tiffany Stratton promo, Tiffany beats Candice and after the match Charlotte literally does the same thing she did last week with Tiffy. The worst promo in the history of the Rock that in his head sounded epic but it was too weird, even Cody was thinking "What the hell did this guy smoke? ". The fight between Pretty Deadly and DIY that ends by DQ where the Street Profits interfere again, COME ON, IF THEY INTERFERE SO MUCH FOR NOTHING, THEN FIGHT LIKE MEN. The only halfway decent thing was the video of Kevin Owens spying on Sami Zayn and his family (although they could have booked it better, I don't know, with Sami Zayn going to the ring to give a crappy promo but on the big screen Owens comes out and shows Sami that he's spying on his family, I think it would be better that way, Stupid Ass Bookers). And the main event where Solo Sikoa, who two weeks ago was presented to us as the great threat, receives the pin like a bitch by Damian, my goodness how many fuck-ups there were in this show, I think Triple H is going crazy or something, don't fuck with me. I give it 1 basically for the effort of some wrestlers in putting on a halfway decent show despite the crappy booking. Thank goodness I don't take WWE seriously since WrestleMania 40."

[1.0] "TheRock and Cody Rhodes segment was the best moment of this show and it says a lot. This smackdown was terrible from start to finish and I hope it's only because they had to rewrite the show last second."

[5.0] "So, like... why exactly was so much hate for this SmackDown? I mean, it wasn't perfect. Kinda mediocre matches, not the best finishers, a little more botching than usual, but it was still pretty easy to watch. The worst part was anything involving the women - Tiffany/Candice match was terrible, beat-down after it were terrible, and the only thing that was decent was Trish and Charlotte. Other than that, I enjoyed it. R-Truth's tag team match was pretty entertaining. The Tag Team Title match only suffered from the lack of crowd interest. And the main event was pretty good. But what really carried this show was The Rock's phenomenal promo. I think you could give him a mic and he will fill those two hours with great material without breaking a sweat. It's a story as old as time, but because of the people involved and the great execution, it works for me. I have no idea what everyone hated about it. A least, one promo from The Rock was better than the best AEW shows in recent memory."

[5.0] "Smackdown is a dire wasteland of horrible old and behind their peak talent being forced into the midcard because they don't want to not book them, but its destorying the new era midcard they were building. A booker books what he know his talent can execute, and Miz teaming with fucking Camello is NOT that. It is horrible. Shinsuke needs to retire. BUT this Smackdown is redeemed with one of the greatest promos in the history of professional wrestling. if this has me coming back this is a success. Charlotte please try."

[5.0] "Clearly this SmackDown was under previous weeklies (both RAW and SD combined), because of the Tag Team Championship "match", and a Stratton/LeRae with sometimes no reactions from the crowd. Otherwise, I appreciated the main event, and the others matches was decent, with a funny, then interesting match from R-Truth / Miz / LA Knight & Hayes. 5/10"

[6.0] "This Smackdown was definitely different. I can understand why people are upset with the Rock situation, especially with the things that were happening last year, and now he's trying to make Cody look good. Also, why did Drew McIntyre lose to Jimmy Uso right before EC? Maybe a DQ would've been better."

[4.0] "Raw this week saw an improvement in the WWE Programming for me, this is the first time in 2025 where I felt like an episode of RAW/SD was better than the previous week, can Smackdown keep up the trend? We started off this show with a video package about how The Rock is here tonight, more on him later. Spoiler Alert - It's not good things I have to say. We then have our first match of the night with Drew McIntyre taking on Jimmy Uso, this was set up last week and you'd think would result in a win for Drew heading into the Elimination Chamber but no. Drew McIntyre loses to Jimmy Uso. Now I won't lie, Jimmy Uso has been much better since returning, but him beating Drew McIntyre while not even being a part of the Chamber match himself is CRAZY, it was a decent match, just the wrong person won. Drew attacked after the match but it wasn't like a masochistic beat down, I feel like if Drew had dismantled Jimmy around the ringside area it would have been better, with Drew getting some of his momentum back. We had the Bloodline talking backstage for a bit, Jacob seems like the leader now which is a crazy power shift. Backstage again now and Carmelo Hayes was speaking to R-Truth, then the Miz came around to pitch a tag team with Carmelo, there's a tag team match later. Zelina Vega video package happened, would've been great if she was Naomi's opponent last week instead of the Womens US Champion but oh well. "Melo don't Miz" the faced LA Knight and R-Truth, it's the year of 2025 and we are still devoting time to Miz VS R-Truth when they broke up 4 months ago. WHAT ARE WE DOING? Melo and Miz won the match, it was an okay bout, no idea where Andrade is during all of this, but creative seem to have given up on him again, maybe he'll get Zelina back as a manager, that would be great for them. Tiffany Stratton then had a promo, she's still developing as a babyface so it's not the most natural promos but she's doing well, just needs to give a bit more in terms of what the audience can chant along to or interact with. Nia Jax and Candice came out to interrupt and a match was made with Tiffany and Candice, which was up next. For 2 very very talented performers, this just didn't hit, it dragged on too long and made Tiffany out to be a weaker champion than it should've done, shave 5 minutes off this match and it not only becomes a better match, but your world champion comes across much better too, I know Raw doesn't make their World Champions look strong that often, but you don't need to copy that formula Smackdown because it sucks. Nia & Candice then attacked Tiffany and Trish Stratus after the match, Nia Jax hit possibly the worst looking annihilator of all time on the duo. Charlotte Flair went into the ring and stood tall over Tiffany for the 2nd week in a row... Just like I said in my RAW review, if they don't change things up in this feud soon then the next 6 weeks will be long. I get that things will change after Elimination Chamber but why on earth would you run the same thing 2 weeks in a row? Is there even a creative department in WWE anymore? Damien Priest talked to Cody backstage in a really cringey promo, god that guy sucks. Bianca and Naomi cut a promo on Liv and Raquel, they have a tag team title match on Raw next week. Alexa Bliss had a video package, was kinda cool, but these are mostly nothing segments. Naomi & Bianca entered for a match but got attacked by Liv & Raquel, referee's broke it up quickly, where were they earlier on in the show for Tiffany & Jimmy? Chelsea Green spoke with Nick Aldis backstage in quite a funny segment, she's great. We had the Rock segment up next, but I'll speak about that last, Tag Team Title match was up next, Crowd wasn't into it all that much, I'd argue that has something to do with barely letting any of these teams show their characters in front of live audiences, instead only in backstage segments & matches that fans struggle to care for. It was an okay match but a wacky ending with The Street Profits attacking everyone, good to see them taking no prisoners. Should lead to a good 4 way tag team match, but if WWE just continues running the Tag division this way then it won't be as good as it should be. Kevin Owens was talking on a video next, good segment as always from KO. Finally we had Solo & Jacob against Damien Priest & Braun Strowman, can you guess who won this match? Damien Priest did of course. It was okay, nothing special, and Priest continues his absolute reign of awfulness. Now that that's over let's talk about The Rock, he announced he'd be on this show the day before and it's all but confirmed he won't be wrestling at WM41. His promo was to 1 announce WM42's location, and 2 to talk to Cody Rhodes, you may be thinking this would lead to a mens world title match but no, The Rock cut one of the most confusing tweener promo's I've ever seen, not sure if half of it was in character or not, it was a bit of a mess to be honest. Rock finished by saying he wanted Cody Rhodes soul, hinting at a corporate Rock and Cody duo. Heel Cody does interest me and I'll admit I'm intrigued as to what will happen at Elimination Chamber but the surroundings of this appearance disgust me, WWE announced 2 matches on social media prior to the Rock announcing he would be on the card, a women's and men's match, guess which one got cut to make room for The Rock, HINT: it wasn't the mens match, because the men's match had the Anoa'i family in it. I'm sick to death of the nepotism on display with this family, Jey Uso is literally a worse LA Knight but gets afforded all the opportunities, Jimmy Uso just beat Drew McIntre, Roman has to work 4 dates a year and Solo Sikoa main events every smackdown he's a part of simply because he's samoan. It really irks me and it should irk the roster as well, this show blew overall, not good in-ring, not good stories and not good creative decisions. I am interested in the Rock & Cody segment but other"

[2.0] "This was terrible, and I do not use that word lightly. No, The Rock making a last minute appearance is not an excuse, because Smackdown has been treading water for months now. What even is this show man; why is Drew losing to Jimmy? Especially if he's supposed to be one of the top heels? Why are Miz and R-Truth being featured more than the guys who been busting their ass' for months, like Andrade? Candice LeRae is not good enough to be getting 13 minute matches, and that's on top of Charlotte giving the most boring commentary imaginable, and then the entire segment ends with the same ending as last week with her just standing over Tiffany after a beatdown, they're doing a terrible job at getting people invested in this match. The Rock/Cody segment dragged and it felt like Rock was flipping between face and heel, but the gist of it is that he's trying to corrupt Cody. This was, unsurprisingly, the best segment of the night and the crowd reacted appropriately to both guys. DIY had the unfortunate task of following that with a match against Pretty Deadly that didn't even last long before a DQ finish by the Profits. The main event was the same Bloodline tag team that we've seen a million times already, but at least the Faces won this time. This episode sucked, and has all the pitfalls of the old regime; babyfaces winning and then getting beaten down by heels, over reliance on "comedy" and mediocre wrestlers, and flat finishes to the matches outside of the main event, and that's on top of the pacing being horrific due to the 3 hour format. They need to figure out what to do with this show, because what they're doing isn't working. It's amazing how RAW is so much better produced every week, but Smackdown feels like a complete afterthought."

[5.0] "Very bad, very meh episode of Smackdown that obviously still gets overhated because people can't be measured or fair and don't understand what actually horrible stuff looks like (just watch Triplemania or something, idk). The Rock segment was atrocious, mind-numbingly bad in just about every way possible. But! The promos were decent overall, I found Cody/Damien/Strowman one to be the most entertaining alongside Chealsea Green being a highlight as per usual. I thought the main event was really good, and Tiffy and Candice worked really hard, if not smooth. Even considering the modern high level of pro wrestling content in the landscape of television -- this was merely subpar, not the disaster people rate it as. Again, Dwayne needs to be stopped. That man has gone nuts and his ego is not only affecting the World Champion, but the whole roster and the whole wrestling industry. Poor Liv & Naomi didn't even get to do a match, and the entire wrestling audience that pays attention feels stupid and enraged."

[6.0] "The elephant in the room was the polarizing show-up of The Rock, and it wasn't as confusing/incoherent as "fans" complain; he's a corporate dipshit and wants the fan-adored Cody to be his puppet which is a tried-and-tested arc that worked greatly in different iterations (Austin/Vince, The Authority, etc.), and I'm curious to see how Cody could look if he embraced that side rather than the predictable fanboy path. Otherwise, it was a decent show with cool matches & questionable finishes. There's only so much we can expect when a PLE is perfectly shaped up. I'm rooting for stories to kick up a notch once the Chamber is in the rearview."

[4.0] "Man it really hasn't been a good here from either RAW or SmackDown. I mean The Rock gave what I can only describe as one of the most confusing long winded promos I think he's probably ever given."

[5.0] "This episode of SmackDown was really strange with some decent matches but nothing special, The Rock promo was really surprising either bad or good, but 3 hours show is way too long with a really bad timing episode after some decent episodes in February. Wasn't terrible to watch but way too long and easily the worst WWE TV show of the year."

[4.0] "Aside from one of the least coherent promos of the 2020s, this was fine. The matches were good, the other segments were ok, the Miz-Truth stuff is REALLY not the best utilization of LA Knight and Melo, so that's a full-point deduction."

[6.0] "This was a more story-forwarding Smackdown than a ring-centric one, so milage can vary. The show was dominated by The Rock and annoucements/storylines around it. I generally really liked it. The Rock continues to be a monolith of charisma. He had cool zingers in his promo and walked that fine line of him in character wanting to be loved by people and glazed, but also actually deep inside being a heel and lashing back at people. I love his character of a smug CEO, always name-dropping who he knows, movies he has been in and all that. Him and Cody have fantastic chemistry. The Rock trying to temp Cody to go down the lane that Rock himself went down on and become the corporate champ is great storytelling with a rich sense of contiunity. Any following resolution has a lot of promise to it. Wether it be Rock putting sticks in Cody's wheels for the following months, or Cody becoming the corporate champ and going full on homelander. Nothing really negative to say about that segment. The rest of the show was mostly No Contests or dirty finishes. Bloodline storyline continues but to me might lack just that little extra oomph and steam. Nothing that is unfixable though or terrible to watch"

[2.0] "SmackDown has been THE worst weekly TV show for a while, but this episode was even worse, somehow. So far this Road to Wrestlemania has been very lackluster, despite how hot the ads (which there are many of them) might mention that WWE."

[2.0] "This was one of the worst complete episodes of any wrestling show I've seen. Pointless and badly performed matches, badly performed and written segments and promos. But the biggest issue was the man with the biggest issue and the least to say. The Dwayne promo derailed the entire show and was at least 15 minutes too long. He said nothing, he said it badly, he brought a cheap pop with him and then went through the tired old repertoire of irrelevant insults and catch phrases. Whatever this is building to is going to need to be exceptional because the opening salvo hit like a children's wet wipe thrown across a windy room by a tired pensioner. It looks like Cody will never escape the Bloodline."

[3.0] "The show had its ups and downs! Big Jim and McIntyre kicked things off with a solid opener, and I really enjoyed the tag team match between Miz Hayes and Knight Truth--it was a lot of fun! Statton and Lerae delivered an okay match, even if it didn't leave a lasting impression. The Rock, despite his lengthy segment, definitely kept my attention and brought some excitement to the event."

[4.0] "This episode of Smackdown was not a hit. My favorite match on the show was LA Knight and R-Truth vs Miz and Carmello Hayes where Truth's comedy worked great. Main Event was also a good tag match. Otherwise, the rest was average at best with confusing booking decisions. The Rock's segment with Cody was very long and confusing. Was not super into the Naomi and Belair vs Liv and Raquel story either since it seems like an obvious red herring."

[3.0] "When I saw the average 2 rating for this show I thought something truly bad happened with The Rock segment that made everyone lose their shit about it and spam the show with low rating just because of it. Well, after watching it, I understand all the criticism for this one, but what I don't understand is how no one truly saw this coming for months, hell, I even say a year. WWE's product quality has just been merely decent in general. A lot of shows here get 7 to 10 ratings when in reality there's nothing memorable or good enough to deserve those ratings at all. The shows are mostly just serviceable, with maybe one or two really good things happening from time to time. The general acceptance, the lack of criticsm of the product and its overvaluation has made WWE being more and more conformist with what they deliver. They just don't have the urge to think for something really good because the crowds will eat up anything that's thrown to them and they will call it "cinema" just because of how epic WWE desperately works to make it look (over)epic. This is just the monster you just created. A monster born out of self-complacience and conformism. This is supposed to be Road Dogg's first show back as head writer of SmackDown, right? Well, just in his first show he showed how lame he is. Let's see if he can bounce back from this or just make it sink deeper. Let's see how AJ Styles defends him from this now. What are they even doing with Drew McIntyre? I don't understand what kind of booking is that for the guy that carried a heavy part of 2024 along with Cody, the guy with the best feud of the year, a guy that always deliver great promos, great storytelling, great in-ring performances, and you have him filling a void that leads nowhere instead of giving him a solid story that's worth of his name and talent. Very poor match with Jimmy Uso here. Who wants to see goddamn Carmelo Hayes teaming up with The Miz in big 2025? I'm afraid that team works given how popular dysfunctional teams always prove to be. Maybe if it works it can help Melo gain some popularity that gives him some solid chances, but I'm beyond zero interested in having him stuck in a comedy lowcard team with Miz. The US Title scene may be the worst booked in the whole company right now. Shinsuke Nakamura doesn't have a defined character, he's just dark and mean and goes attacking and lurking around random people because creative doesn't know what to do with him. They went back with putting him against LA Knight, presumably to lose the title back to him and it would be the best thing to happen. Seriously, they never should've changed him from being the Swagsuke we always knew. They straight up murdered him by not allowing him and AJ to have the proper match they should've had at WrestleMania. Everything after that was just lame from Shinsuke. R-Truth's comedy keeps being gold and the only genuine good thing about that match, but it's just a very futile thing in the show, it's not something to build on to create a truly compelling story. It's just easy fun. WWE is so conformist with what they do they don't even try to innovate in the formula of wrestlers alliance beyond of always doing a leading figure and a follower that's just used as a jobber for that leader's feud at the moment. To be more clear, why the fuck don't you allow Candice LeRae to have really good matches instead of just booking her as a jobber for Nia's foes? Candice vs Tiff could've been an amazing match, but the whole nature of the booking prevents it from happening, resulting in a finely worked but dull match. The whole Trish Stratus thing here is empty fanservice for Canadian crowd at the PPV. There's nothing exciting about that match and her appearance here at all. I didn't like Tiffany's promo before the match, she didn't look good as a face. She is over with the crowd because she's charismatic and is a great performer, but her whole charm comes from being this bratty and slutty rich daddy's girl, being arrogant, obnoxious and vain, and those are not qualities of a babyface. She just lost all her charm in that promo and if she keeps that path it won't be long before crowds start turning on her. I liked how Charlotte was portrayed here, and how the story with Tiff looks at the moment, but I don't trust WWE to actually book it properly. Charlotte feels clearly she is over Tiff, she just underapreciates her, but doesn't attack her. Tiff is the Champion now, but she still isn't the certified top star she could be, she doesn't feel like that yet. She still is a rising star and defeating Charlotte is her way to solidify herself as the true top woman of the brand and one of the top stars of today. Having Naomi and Liv match being cut due to The Rock's segment may be a blessing in disguise. I really didn't want to see that. I don't care for that story at all. Now, about The Rock. The whole potential of what this segment suggested may be good, but I think it's all way too overcomplicated and randomly done that it just looks like it's all made up in the moment. I had the same reaction as Cody during the whole promo, so really weird. The Rock just come here and basically tells us he does whatever he wants to do and no one can tell him otherwise, and that's the bad part about all of this. Let's see how it unfolds. Kevin Owens promo was the best thing BY A COMPLETE SHIT TEN TON OF MILES about this show. The only interesting, organic, amazingly performed thing here. Kevin and Sami are geniuses and they deserve to have a real big match at WrestleMania, so I hope this match next week is not a one-off thing. The tag team titles match got way too overhated here, I don't think what happened is so horrible for that low rating. The action was fine during the match, the Street Profits story is good, but I agree that everything else was lame, specially after how poor the show was being. The main event was finely worked, but also very dull and boring in general. Poor show"

[7.0] "Whilst it's easy to get frustrated at the lack of speed the train is moving at right now, the in ring stuff here was still pretty damn good"

[5.0] "From week to week, Smackdown continues to be average but here we had the worst Smackdown of 2025. We start with the match between Mcintyre and Jimmy which is disappointing with Jimmy winning in the end. I'm not really disappointed, because if Drew wins the chamber, we'll have forgotten this defeat. For me, the second match was just filler. Although it's far from a bad match with a great codebreaker/skull crushing finish, we'd have preferred LA Knight to face Nakamura for the US title and Carmelo Hayes to do some interesting things rather than a random tag team match. Tiffy's promo is decent but Nia's makes no sense. It was Candice who caused the DQ, it wouldn't make any sense to give a championship match back to Nia. The match between Tiffy and Candice was very average, with Candice as slow as ever (not her worst match) and a match that lasted 13 minutes. The match between Liv Morgan and Naomi didn't take place after Liv attacked. It's a shame, we could have had a good match. It's time to talk about the MOMENT of the evening, which is the return of The Rock. The first part of the promo is long and not very interesting, but the second part is a bit more interesting with the arrival of Cody. It's the weirdest promo of the year with Rock asking Cody to be his champion and have his soul. I'm very intrigued to see a 'corporate Cody' and therefore a heel turn which has been teased for a few months. The problem with this promo is time. 26 minutes is too much, the second half of the promo was more than enough. Now the tag team match. Despite a 6-minute match, I thought it was well-paced with an ending that made sense to me. The Streets Profits explained in their promo that they wanted to eliminate all the smackdown teams, so it's logical to see them go after both teams. Zelina's video clip is nice, I hope she gets into a rivalry with Chelsea. Owens' segment is very cool and very personal. The ME is clearly the match of the night with good wrestling, a good Damian Priest as usual and an interesting ending. To conclude, I hope that the next smackdowns will be of better quality because since the smackdown on 3 January, which was excellent, we've had good to average smackdowns. Exploited these three hours."

[5.0] "No, I didn't think this Smackdown episode was THAT bad; especially given the very low rating here. However, it wasn't a good show either. Last night's Smackdown episode was just Mid. None of the matches on this show were good (although that tag main event with Damian Priest/Braun Strowman vs Bloodline was still a pretty solid match). The biggest offender was probably the DIY vs Pretty Deadly match getting shafted YET AGAIN with a lame DQ finish after 6 minutes. I didn't dislike the segment with Cody Rhodes & The Rock at all; but MAN did Rock take forever to get to the point (lmao). I don't necessarily think that they needed to scrap the Naomi vs Liv Morgan match at all; especially since Liv is one of your most biggest & most popular/over stars in the division too. Jimmy Uso also did NOT need to beat Drew McIntyre at all here. Additionally, LA Knight and Carmelo Hayes do feel like they're pretty wasted & lost in direction too (along with Andrade who's gone missing for around a month now too). It also doesn't help that Shinsuke Nakamura isn't really doing anything as the United States Champion atm. Anyway, I still liked the highlights involving Cody Rhodes, The Rock, Trish Stratus, Charlotte Flair, Tiffany Stratton, Candice LeRae, Kevin Owens, Sami Zayn, Liv Morgan, Braun Strowman, Jacob Fatu, DIY, Street Profits, and Damian Priest to SOME extent. Those minor positive highlights salvage my rating from being lower than a 5 here (because otherwise it'd be a 4 instead). I'll commit with the 5 here though since I just think last night's Smackdown episode was just a REALLY Mid show overall."

[1.0] "Might be one of the worst professional wrestling programs I've ever seen. I admit that a lot of WWE ain't for me, but when I hear there is a good match or promo I always check it out on replay. This is one of those nights I wish I didn't watch live. This episode stink to the high heavens. Every match was heatless and boring, the segments were heatless and boring, and that Rock/Cody segment was as such a convoluted mess it's almost funny. Rock came across like he was blasting Beam & Cokes before he went on. The second year in a row they make Cody look like a geek by the Rock before WM, but this time it's being rejected because there is no story to finish. They are bankrupt of ideas."

[6.0] "Good show overall. Good competitive opener with a nice twist. Good tag match between Hayes/Miz and Knight/Truth only spoiled by Nakamura's interference. Good women's match between two champions. Another good tag match spoiled by outside interference. Great main event. JUST BECAUSE YOU DO NOT LIKE THE BOOKING DOES NOT NEGATE THE WORK OF THE MATCH!"

[2.0] "Lmao, what the fuck was this. Admittedly, I wasn't going into this episode of Smackdown with particularly high expectations, mainly because of the fact that for a solid few days following the announcement of The Rock's appearance, #WWEWomenDeserveBetter was trending on Twitter, which only increased after it was revealed that Liv vs. Naomi got cut. Everyone just looked so unmotivated. Melo & Miz vs. Knight & Truth was a mess, Melo should be doing far more than sitting in generic heel tag team purgatory, not to mention that the actual match was an uninspired botchfest. Candice and Tiffany looked particularly sloppy, with the ring action being nothing too special, and Charlotte's appearance really adding nothing but a reminder of the fact that she actually won the Rumble. And what the fuck was The Rock talking about? 27 minutes just for him to say he wanted Cody's soul, are you serious? I'm not even going to bother talking about the final two matches, because I feel like I've hit all the points about what was wrong with this episode. Sloppy ring action, shitty generic heel promo from The Rock where he rambled for 27 minutes about nothing, WWE needs to do better, because this was just awful."

[1.0] "Criminally boring episode of television. Not a single good match, and the whole thing felt like a weird AI generated wrestling show. All the segments were awkward beyond belief (especially whatever the fuck Dwayne was going for). All the matches were sloppy and heatless, the only potential interesting angle in this show was ruined by Dwayne coming out after too many shots of his shitty tequila and rambling for 27 minutes and turning what could have been an interesting segment into rambling nothing."

[10.0] "Finally a pretty fun Smackdown. Sure the Roch segment was head scratching, but really at least something that didn't feel like a filler episode, a bit of storyline progress, and to be honest quit intrigued of new Bloddline storyline new that Roman is finally, hopefully done with it. Gotta also praise Kevin Owens promo for Samy Zayne. But really all in all it was a fun Smackdown which feels really refreshing after a long time and my intrest for it dieing. And a bit hard to belive that what feels like 30 years of Jimmy loosing in singles matches he finally won"

"This smackdown was pretty decent, i wouldn't blame road dog, as he is prob still getting settled in, or has the other writers wrap something up so he can commence. It takes initiative and time for things like this to work, and have a great turn out. Only match I mostly liked, this is a personal opinion would be the Miz and r truth one, the rock had a midly mid promo."

[2.0] "History will look back on this era of wrestling and say that if The Rock had your best moment in an episode of WWE television past the year 2020, then it was a bad episode of television, period. Jimmy beating Drew is a baffling decision made worse by a ho-hum slog of a match, a waste of mid-card talent in the US title picture in a weird, awkwardly executed tag match, Charlotte is kind of tarnishing the good thing Tiffany had going, and... God. That DIY and Pretty Deadly match was gross. All of the problems in this episode had little to do with the wrestlers itself and how things were booked which has become a consistent problem within the past year."

"For an episode that had a title match and The Rock returning, this was quite dull. Pretty much everything on this show is not worth watching except for The Rock's segment. I have no idea why he didn't open the show or Main Event, that was pretty annoying too."

[5.0] "Yeah this was not very good. Obviously the main takeaway from this is the rock has some sort of personality disorder and he loves to yap in circles. Hopefully this leads to something worth watching. The in ring work was also really off on this episode. One of the weakest episodes of smackdown in a really really long time"

[3.0] "there's not a worse weekly wrestling show then smackdown weekly. It's just boring nothing important and it being 3 hours long for no reason at all isn't helping. This episode is the worse episode of smackdown since HHH took over i think. The only thing at all that's was worth anything was the rock and cody that was great i enjoyed it. Everything else was legit just pointless. Main event was solid just not anything i cared about. It has to has to has to get better and it must happen soon. Smackdown has been a chore to get through"

"This episode was quite middling but it became something truly awful when Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson came out and cut the absolute worst promo segment I've seen from WWE in quite some time. He came out announce that WrestleMania 42 would be held at the Superdome next year in New Orleans, which did pop the crowd. That felt unnecessary as you could've easily posted it online, but the promo became worse. He called out Cody Rhodes and in the most incoherent and confusing way possible, tempted to get Rhodes to join the dark side as his corporate champion. This felt like some out-of-nowhere, last-minute fuckery to garner interest and I think it failed on that front. This was honestly the worst episode of SmackDown this year and possibly one of the worst ever."

[0.0] "This was easily one of the worst SmackDown's in recent memory. The creative staff on Friday Night's are extremely awful and can't utilize anybody to their fullest potential. When you have Andrade doing nothing, Carmelo Hayes in a Tag Team with The Miz that's a major problem, and where was Chelsea Green? You see RAW and NXT which are very solid weekly shows with solid storylines and good matches. SmackDown doesn't have a solid storyline and the matches are putrid on a weekly basis. Road Dogg returning to be part of the writing team has made this show to the levels of what SmackDown was in 2018-2019 and in that time period I stopped watching WWE because of how putrid and unappealing those episodes were. I think right now they need hit the reset button immediately and I know the Draft is coming in April that reset is gonna make it a fresh show again. But please stop giving minutes to The Miz & R-Truth and utilize someone like Andrade who can actually go in the ring. But that's how I feel with SmackDown just an awful show."

"Very bad episode botches rampant, little to no story progression, and I was just waiting for it to end. Do yourself a favor and watch highlights or skip altogether!"

[4.0] "A really mediocre, if not bad, episode of SmackDown. Apart from the main event and Owens' video, the rest was awful. A botch in the women's match, a canceled tag title match, and, most of all, The Rock. Once again, he completely breaks kayfabe. When you've had a violent feud for four months, you can't suddenly say you're buddies now. Then he shows up just to announce WrestleMania 42... in New Orleans again? Seriously, three Manias in 15 years is way too much. Sure, the US lacks big stadiums, but given the size of the country, they could have picked somewhere else. And let's not even talk about that last line--total WTF. Rock vs. Cody in a singles match with no title on the line. Rock wants Cody's soul? What is this, is he the Undertaker now?"

[3.0] "Since TKO's purchase and Vince McMahon's ousting, most weekly shows seemed okay, storytelling-wise. But, for some reason, all plans are discarded once "The Final Boss" announces that he's coming back for an appearance, letting his ego, once again, take over instead of having the show's best interest at heart. The show has become worse since yesterday's announcement about The Rock's appearance; It could have been just fine without him. His awful segment made this one of the worst SmackDown shows ever. How does The Rock succeed in ruining the show every time he appears? The show started with Nick Aldis announcing Rhodes that he's off the main event since "The Final Boss" said so. Really? McIntyre & "Big Jim" opened the in-ring action for the night. It was okay, but the finish left me confused. A roll-up win for Uso and a post-match attack from Drew on Uso. Was this the best way to portray Drew a week before Elimination Chamber? I'm not sure. Next was a backstage segment between Solo, Jacob & Tama Tonga. Solo tried to escape the tag match, but Jacob told him no. I like how WWE has turned the tables from "I love you, Solo" to "I love you, Jacob"; that's cinema! Jacob has become a star in WWE in such a short time. Then, we saw a backstage segment featuring R-Truth, Carmelo Hayes, and The Miz, which led to a tag team match, with LA Knight being R-Truth's partner. The in-ring action was okay, but the highlight was R-Truth's comedy skills. He's so funny! Later on, Tiffany Stratton came to the ring before her match with Candice LeRae. She started to speak, just to be interrupted by Nia & Candice. Tiffany vs. Candice was too short, and nothing major to show other than a cameo from Charlotte Flair and Trish Stratus after another post-match attack by Nia and Candice. Next, we saw Rhodes and Priest speak backstage, teasing a potential match at Wrestlemania. Then, Braun came to talk with Damian before their main event match. I like this pairing of Braun & Damian. They work well together. Naomi was supposed to wrestle Liv, and Byron Saxton interviewed Bianca and her. They promoted their title match on Monday vs. The Judgement Day. The match between Liv and Naomi didn't happen (most likely because of all the time that The Rock took from the show) and ended with a Judgement Day attack on the tag champs. Nick Aldis had quite a night, and Chelsea Green only made it worse for him :) She wanted a spot on EC PLE, so Aldis set her up for a match on the SmackDown show the night before. It'll be interesting to see who she'll go against (not Michin again, please). After The Rock's abysmal showing, we were supposed to have a tag team title match. There wasn't much of a match, which ended (again) with a Street Profits attack on DIY, PD, and MCMG. WWE had slotted another promo from KO before his match with Sami Zayn next week. This one was unique, filmed outside of Zayn's house. It was original; I'll give them that. Then, we got to the main event, which was decent. How the match ended builds some anticipation for Solo & Jacob going forward. As for the winners, I wonder how WWE plans to utilize them after the elimination chamber. I wouldn't mind seeing them having a run as tag team champs (Braun worked well last time with Ricochet). In between segments, WWE showed several vignettes from Zelina Vega, Charlotte Flair, and Alexa Bliss. With Charlotte, it's well-known what her plans are. But what about Zelina and Alexa (given that she won't win the EC match)? SmackDown's women's division deserves more than they're getting."

[1.0] "If I had a nickel for every time the Rock swanned into the WWE a couple of months before Mania and absolutely completely fucked up the entire build for the show, then I'd have two nickels. Which isn't a lot, but it's weird that it happened twice, right? But the comparison to the post-Rumble Smackdown last year is apposite, except tonight may be even worse in the round. Because as disastrous as that infamous promo last year was, that it caused the entire fanbase to revolt in disgust, that Smackdown had a couple of decent matches and a rather well-effected Bayley face turn. This has neither. We've had talented workers disappear off the card. We've had other talents put into tag team hell because Triple H's strategy for them is incredibly suspicious, to say the least. We have matches and feuds going nowhere, if not backwards. And we had a women's match bumped from the schedule, again. Because despite Smackdown going for three hours, Rock can't help but hog the screen so they're basically giving him a very wide berth to do his mic work (in yet another baffling and long-winded promo), and yet half an hour was not enough so they had to give him a press conference after the show too. And dear god, that press conference just made the taste of Smackdown worse. We've been assuming that WWE have two plans for Mania these days dependent on the Rock's status to go, which is why the build has felt kind of weird as of late -- they don't know which envelope to open until he makes his decision. But now it feels like they're just making it up as they go along, because what is the absolute point of tonight, and what is the absolute point of the past few months of Smackdown, if the Rock just walks in to the press conference and says that the story between him and Cody doesn't need a match? Of course it needs a match, it's professional wrestling! I know WWE infamously and historically treats wrestling as a dirty word (how you doin', Paul E? ), and Michael Cole was doing the media rounds trying to disclaim their status as a professional wrestling promotion in lieu of being a "storytelling entity" earlier this week, but still... man, what are we doing here? The journey matters just as much as the destination, and the journey being taken absolutely sucks. For a promotion that prides itself on storytelling, the blue brand is full of needlessly convoluted diversions that feel good in the moment but do nothing to work to the future, and WWE desperately needs one eye on the future. I compared the Bloodline melodrama last year to a more competently booked (in parts) NWO circa Starrcade 1997. WWE in 2025 feels like the creative decline that presages the business decline, like WCW in 1998 or WWF in 2001 and 2002. But there doesn't feel like there's an OVW class of 2002 or NXT class of 2013 to keep the wheels turning - certainly not on the men's side of affairs - and bringing back Road Dogg - even though I honestly think people may be scapegoating him for how bad SmackDown was tonight - doesn't inspire confidence either. A worrying show; please pay attention to all of the alarms."

"i haven't logged into cagematch in a long time, but I thought I would log back in just to say that this fucking sucked what a load of crap and such horrible utilization of a talented roster: melo tagging with the miz, andrade cant get time, the main event usually ends up being pointless, the us titles don't matter, just all round horrible stuff, cheers"

[3.0] "Nothing special happened at this event despite The Rock's return. Most of the things were neutral with a few minor negatives (Nia talking about Tiffy stealing her title 637282 weeks in a row, Drew losing the week before Elimination Chamber). I would give it a 4 but I'm wondering if I shouldn't give it a 2 for The Rock."

[4.0] "It may be easier to think of this week's SmackDown as three one hour shows, rather than one whole three hour show. The Rock took over pretty much the whole second hour to announce WrestleMania 42 (Life, the WWE Universe and Everything) in New Orleans next year, and then go on some random spiel about Cody Rhodes's soul. Apparently this was all put together near last minute, and ruined the flow of the show as a result. The best match of the show was merely satisfactory, and there were some strange booking decisions throughout the show. I didn't think it was terrible like most, but it certainly wasn't good."

"This is one of the first shows in a while where it felt like almost everything hit the wrong notes. Drew's match had very little happen, was effectively just a boring slog. The roll up pin is interesting but outside of the early stairs spot, it was 11 minutes of dull. The tag match between Hayes & Miz - Truth and Knight was the sole bright spot for me. Some good comedy spots combined with some good ring work. R Truth continues to impress despite his age, and Melo brought some much needed energy. The Tiffany-Candice match was just a 13 minute long Charlotte Flair interview with little happening in the ring, except for somebody who sits between jobber and midcarder is somehow able to keep up with your champion... odd decision. Getting dull, boring matches out of both Drew and Tiffany on the same night is quite an impressive feat. The tag title match was another interference into a DQ, something they have done several times and was already boring, to establish a build which is already established. Even before the interference, nothing interesting happened. The main event was another slow, plodding tag match. It picked up when Priest got involved, and there was some fun story telling with Solo and Jacob, but once again it was an almost 12 minute match with the majority of it being very boring. The Rocks promo was also an incredibly odd affair. Constantly backtracking on himself, no clear message what he was trying to say, I'm not even particularly sure if he was meant to be a face or a heel. Multiple cutaway's to the crowd to make the same tired STD jokes he's made before, and it went on for absolutely ages. I would call it slow, confusing, uninspired and boring, but to be honest that could be the tagline for most of this show. Also makes absolutely no sense why Cody still couldn't be in the main event because of this promo. It's not like they were happening simultaneously. They could have just had him do both. Very weird choice to pull him. They've been on a real hot streak lately with some great Chamber qualifying matches, interesting story developments with KO-Sammy, the Jade situation, the Royal Rumble winner's choice, and the Solo-Jacob reuniting. This week just missed on every shot. Hopefully can return to form with the next one because that was a very, very sluggish watch."

[3.0] "Horrible and disappointing show. The first two hours were a real challenge to be able to see them in full because it was a weak product, slow fights with many lack of coordination and quite poor booking, but what can we rescue from these 3 hours? The segment between The Rock and Cody Rhodes was quite strange and left me thinking for many minutes. Something quite interesting within the disaster that was this program. The worst of the night was Drew's loss against Jimmy Uso, an unusual booking error and I can't make sense of giving a loss before a few days of EC. 3/10."