[5.0] "SmackDown est maintenant plus court que d'habitude, mais cette durée réduite ne suffit pas forcément à rendre le show plus efficace. Le principal élément qui me laisse indifférent reste le règne de Sami Zayn. Je n'accroche toujours pas à cette direction et j'espère que la situation évoluera rapidement avec sa défense de titre face à Cody Rhodes. Une perte du championnat pourrait permettre de relancer la ceinture et de repartir sur une histoire qui m'intéresse davantage. Heureusement, deux éléments sortent du lot. Tout d'abord, le retour de la rivalité entre Trick Williams et Carmelo Hayes. C'est un programme qui possède une vraie histoire et un potentiel important grâce à leur passé commun. C'est clairement l'une des choses qui me donnent encore envie de suivre SmackDown. L'autre point positif est le match entre Rey Fénix et El Hijo del Vikingo. L'affrontement est excellent et montre une nouvelle fois le talent des deux hommes. Le seul regret vient de sa durée : le match avait largement le potentiel pour être plus long et devenir un véritable moment fort du show. Au final, ce SmackDown reste mitigé. Le format plus court n'apporte pas forcément l'amélioration espérée."

[5.0] "A weak episode in the ring, saved almost entirely by the AAA Cruiserweight Championship match. The return to a two-hour format made SmackDown easier to watch, but even the promos felt underwhelming, while Cody Rhodes versus. Jey Uso was a uninspiring choice for a number-one contender match. Randy Orton's absence is becoming increasingly noticeable."

[4.0] "*sighs*, Dear Smackdown, why ? Why are you so pathetically bad... The first match was just not good, who would've thought with Cargill and B-Fab. The second match was basically just a AAA Match, because they had no ideas what to do as a match lmao. Lainey Reid vs Brie was painfully bad, and not interesting. The fourth match is just Drew McIntyre v2, isn't it ?"

[3.0] "WWE and SmackDown are stuck in the endless mediocrity of their weekly shows. I promised to be tougher with my scores, but this show makes it easy for me. Sami Zayn is defending his title a week later on a different show, and it smells fishy. The women's six-man tag team match was a disaster. Rey Fenix and EHDV had a somewhat atypical match, very high-flying but not aesthetically pleasing, and to top it all off, the Viking got injured. Zero aura and content between Trick Williams and Carmelo in that promo. Fatal Influence is no longer a threat. The main event was bad, slow, and we've already seen Cody and Jey Uso wrestle without fantastic results. Danhausen and R-Truth's humor... you have to be a child or a pervert to laugh at that stuff, man."

[5.0] "A pretty weak episode match wise, with the AAA Cruiserweight title match being the only thing that saved the show. SmackDown going back to 2 hours definitely makes it feel more fast paced and easier to watch, but even the promos were pretty underwhelming this week. As for Jey Uso vs Cody Rhodes to become N1 contender...honestly, it's like picking your poison. And by the way, can someone tell me when Randy Orton is coming back? Thanks"

[6.0] "**6.5/10** This was a reasonably entertaining episode of SmackDown that advanced several storylines, but the overall wrestling quality remained inconsistent. The strongest match was Rey Fenix versus El Hijo del Vikingo. Their athleticism, speed and natural chemistry produced the most exciting action of the night, although the short runtime and commercial interruption prevented the championship match from reaching its full potential. The six-woman tag team match had energy and star power, but it felt rushed and primarily existed to continue the various tensions within the women's division. The additional women's match also lacked flow and functioned more effectively as storyline progression than as a worthwhile contest. Cody Rhodes versus Jey Uso had the biggest stakes, but it did not fully deliver as a main event. The final stretch contained a few convincing near falls, yet the slow opening, multiple commercial breaks and slightly messy closing sequence weakened the match considerably. Cody's victory was logical, but also highly predictable. The episode was more successful outside the ring. Sami Zayn's championship celebration and confrontations with Cody and Jey established the central direction of the show, while the developments involving Finn Balor, Tama Tonga, Trick Williams and Carmelo Hayes gave future episodes several promising programs. A solid transitional SmackDown with one very good match and useful storyline development, but not enough consistently strong wrestling or major moments to qualify as a great episode."

[3.0] "Two very rushed and bad match, a mediocre main event with more commercial breaks than actual wrestling, a terrible Danhausen segment.... This show sucked and just like last week the only good thing was the Rey Fenix match. At least this time it was only 2 hours."

[6.0] "After moving to 2-hours show, SmackDown feels more dynamic, what is good. But not everything was intresting. Matches on a different level - good and garbage. Trick/Melo segment was just a basic conversation, but with some logic what I like so much. Sami Zayn was the main star on this show. His promo felt really emotional and conversations with Rhodes, Uso and Gargano were intresting. He and Cody will get a rematch for the title on the next Raw, what's not cool, because I feel that at that night Sami's reign will be ended and with Punk's return we will get his match with Rhodes at SummerSlam."

[4.0] "Following Zayn's title win, Adam Pearce is finally back in control. As a result, Sami will have to defend his title on the upcoming episode of RAW, with the challenger to be determined later tonight between Jey Uso and Cody Rhodes. While the first match holds little significance, the show looks back on the confrontation between Gunther and Nick Aldis. The SmackDown! General Manager is somewhat taken out of the line of fire, but that doesn't mean the former TNA World Champion (Brutus Magnus) doesn't have another match up his sleeve. Even though Gunther will surely win a potential showdown, this is at least an interesting development. El Hijo del Vikingo gets to make his debut on the other side of the border, but fails to impress anyone. This will likely be a brief visit. Meanwhile, the long-running feud between Hayes and Williams is clearly not over yet. In the Danhausen madness, the entire WWE undercard gets buried. What a load of bullshit! At least Brie Bella loses. By the way, the Tongas attack Balor, for whatever reason. And in the end, Cody Rhodes naturally prevails over Jey Uso, though neither of them manages to convey the significance of the match or even a discernible structure. SmackDown! is a bit shorter again, but unfortunately, they've brought along a lot of garbage."

[4.0] "Well, the few brief glorious weeks of semi acceptable Smackdowns are clearly in the rear view as we go back to our established standard. This was full of bewildering booking, generally low quality matches and apart from Sami Zayn's EXCELLENT monologue at the open, really boring promos and backstage segments. The only upside was it was only and hour and twenty minutes long. So thanks for that Netflix, I really appreciate it."

"Another mid Smackdown episode with only 2 positives, AAA Cruiserweight Match and the Lainey Reid win"

[6.0] "Finally back to 2 hours! Not a bad show, but not the most entertaining. Show started with a good Sami promo, with Cody and Jey interrupting. 6-woman tag: **3/4. Not a bad match with Chelsea surprisingly getting some good offense in. Fenix/Vikingo: ***1/4. Nice coming out party for Vikingo to the general Smackdown audience. He looked great and we'll probably see a lot more of him from now on. Trick and Melo have a great segment to set up a match next week. Lainey/Brie: *1/2. Some of those shots Lainey was giving looked stiff. Wonder how Brie feels her first singles match in 10 years was only 3 minutes, lol. Cody/Jey: ***. Standard Cody and Jey match. Nothing special but also not the worst thing to ever happen. What sucks here is the result of the match. I don't want Cody winning the belt back from Sami so soon."

"[4.0] A poor effort for the first 2-hour Smackdown of the year, with your typical soulless, formulaic episode, this time pre-taped for some reason. Just like this week's Raw, only the opening and ending parts of the show mattered, and the middle portion was really devoid of interest or urgency. Only things that delivered on a positive note were the Sami, Cody, and Jey, I guess, opening segment and the Fenix vs El Hijo match, and the only newsworthy topic from the show is the WWE championship scene with Sami Zayn. I don't know who would watch freaking Smackdown over the now history-making Argentina - Cape Verde match for the World Cup's round of 32, which extra time overlapped with Smackdown. Cape Verde is a bigger underdog than Sami, lol. I wouldn't ever contemplate watching Smackdown over that match's extra time at 3 am where I am anyway. Not even when there isn't anything major on, or when the show airs at an earlier time. Sami with a heartfelt promo to open the show in his last real good guy era, Cody interrupts and then yeetman interrupts, who is a Raw superstar btw. Yeetman delivers his warning shot, bow. Adam Pearce comes out, replacing Nick Aldis. He announces a No. 1 contendership match between Jey & Cody, and the winner faces Sami for the title... on Raw? The Raw GM basically books the WWE title, a Smackdown-assigned title, on the upcoming Raw between 2 Smackdown guys. A Smackdown storyline and title match is going to main event Raw. Makes all the sense in the world. The upcoming Raw emanates in Chicago. Cody and I hate to say this, wins again unnecessarily and then CM Punk comes back after 3 months, setting that world title match for SS. Sami Zayn's world title win was just another of Triple H's "moments", and nothing more, not even lasting at least to SNME or even SS, which we all knew was going to be transitional. Now, it'll really likely be only a transitional "Here you go" type of reign of 9 days, kind of like Christian in 2011, just to drop it back to Cody to set up a huge 1v1 match with CM Punk at SS, which could easily happen without the title. There's a slight chance, and I hope that'll be the case, where Punk returns and costs Cody the match and sets up their match, and Sami, highly unlikely though, gets a returning Kevin Owens later on Smackdown, which would be the best case scenario, but with only 3 weeks to go. Even if the first thing happens, what does Sami do at SS? Probably that's why he's been posting himself with the title constantly like he's on a date with it. An alright segment, with bad and nonsensical booking. Another 6-woman tag, which we've seen this variation a thousand times in the past 2.5 months with Jade and her cronies vortex every single week. Got to build in some way Charlotte vs Jade at SS, which I'm just not interested in, mainly because of Jade. Match was subpar. Gargano backstage with Sami, continuing his planking on crates "comedy" gimmick that doesn't go anywhere. Probably the best part of the show here, Rey Fenix vs El Hijo for the AAA Cruiserweight title, which is the only reason Triple GPT is booking Rey in the show, to give the show some good TV matches since they don't let Carmelo anymore or really anyone else do that. A good match for the 9 minutes they were given, and could've definitely been given a good 12 minutes instead of having 2 entire freaking Raw recaps despite the show going back to 2 hours. Some really exciting offence and sequences, and it has given the show some good in-ring work amongst some really subpar matches, albeit the match is random and heatless. Trick & Yatchy in the ring for their typical promo. Carmelo interrupts immediately. He is quite decent on the mic. Yatchy is cutting the whole freaking promo for Trick, and Yatchy gives Carmelo a match with Trick, but non-title. He now books the show, apparently, and specifically for Trick. Maybe they have Carmelo pin Trick just to earn a shot for the title at SS? Most likely, the goal is to have Carmelo vs Trick at SS for the title, and that's great, but we're really getting that match 4 weeks before and with only 3 weeks to go for a build, and none of their past history explored yet. A lazy segment that was just there and didn't really do that much. Reid vs Brie. Awful for those 3 minutes. Mostly because of Brie. Why is it even there? At least Reid won. Women's tag division is dead, and nobody cares. Smackdown has a tendency, these past 2.5 months, to load the show with women's matches, but the thing is, the matchups are the least interesting they could be, and most of them have average or subpar in-ring work, there are no storylines and barely any character progression. The majority of the women's matches they load the show with just don't add anything to the show, and overall, they're there to fill TV time, especially when it comes to Jade and her cronies and the women's tag division. Another freaking Raw recap in this 2-hour Smackdown extravaganza. Jey vs Cody was average and basic. Even Cody can't bring Jey to at least a decent match. Good thing yeetman lost and probably isn't going to be in any single's capacity for SS. This match determined the challenger for a Smackdown title, which will happen in a match on Raw. Make it make sense. They want the title on the line for Punk vs Cody, and 4 weeks of build instead of 3. Overall, a skippable show that didn't really do anything for Summerslam, unlike Raw with its 2 huge matches, and didn't offer anything in the current 2-hour format in terms of stories or wrestling, apart from where Sami's booking with the WWE title goes. Just a pathetic, soulless effort, and even with an hour less, the show still managed to have recaps and filler in. Also, the show managed to book 2 matches for the SNME show in MSG in 2 weeks, which so far looks atrocious."

[6.0] "This was actually not a horrible episode by any means. The first hour felt very strong; I did like the opening segment involving the Undisputed WWE Champion Sami Zayn. I also thought the segment between Carmelo Hayes and WWE United States Champion Trick Williams was very strong as well; they are building towards that SummerSlam match, which I'm excited about. The matches on the show were mediocre outside of the awesome El Hijo del Vikingo and Rey Fenix Match for the AAA World Cruiserweight Title. I did like seeing Lainey Reid get a win, and that Fatal Influence will fight for the WWE Women's Tag Team Titles at MSG. The Main Event was mediocre; I don't care for Cody Rhodes winning the title off of Sami Zayn. I really want Cody Rhodes to branch away from the World Title Scene because it's annoying, and he's done everything there is as Champion as a Face; now, if he turned heel that a whole different story. But very decent episode."

[6.0] "The 1st hour was good stuff from the Sami-Cody-Jey segment, to the 6 person tag, to the AAA cruiser weight match. Sadly though, the 2nd hour was a big nothing burger bar the Carmelo-Trick segment. Could've been a great episode but still a good and short watch"

[5.0] "There are some positives here, but the negatives hurt the show greatly. For starters, I'm glad Smackdown moved back to two hours, but why THE FUCK are we still showing 3-4 minute recaps about what happened on RAW, the matches on this show could be so much better if 3-4 minutes extra were allocated to them, so instead of allocating those minutes to wrestling we're getting recaps to a show we saw 4 days ago. Fenix Vikingo going only 9 minutes is criminal, the match was as smooth as can be, wish it got an extra 5 minutes though, these two deserved it. This was the only good match on the show. The opening 6 women tag did nothing for me, Reid vs Bella was 3 minutes too long, and Cody Jey was as standard as a Jey Uso match could be. The promo work on this show was up and down, the opening Sami segment was very good, Sami consistently is the best part of Smackdown. The Trick Melo promo was decent, but nothing memorable. The backstage promos were nothing to ride home about either, Johnny is still on crates, Danhausen is still doing experiments without explanation, Jacob Fatu is still Roman's bitch, Blake Monroe attacked Giulia again, same old same old. Such a mid episode, but at least it's not 3 hours, 5/10 show."

[8.0] "I'm enjoying the alliance with Charlotte, Alexa, Tiffany & Chelsea. Jade wins this round. Fenix vs. Vikingo on free tv is insane. We also get Cody and Jey Uso in the main event."

[4.0] "The two-hour runtime is easier to digest, but the matches felt a bit short. The first one was mediocre, but the other two deserved more time--especially Fenix vs. Vikingo. The opening segment was cool, but the other angles weren't particularly interesting. Balor seems to be getting involved in the storylines involving the former Bullet Club members, even though the idea of recreating a WWE version of the Bullet Club could have been fun. Maybe later. Match quality: 2.75/6.5. Angles and non-match segments: 1/3.5. Bonus/penalty: none. Total: 3.75/10. Show watched on Netflix (France)."

[7.0] "First two-hour SD and it's off to a good start. The opening segment is very good. The start with Sami was good. His 'tweener' side was still there, with Sami saying he'd like to tell his critics to kiss his arse, but that he won't say it because he's a good guy. Sami's right that those booing him are the same people who supported him three years ago. Zayn telling Cody to stop acting and explain why he's really there is good. Jey's arrival is a bit of a low point in the segment. Why compete for a title when you've just lost the KOTR final? If he'd won the KOTR, it would have made more sense. Cody spoke the truth again when he said that Jey is Roman's lackey. Sami's arguments explaining why he doesn't want to face Jey and Cody were good, with Zayn repeating the line Cody had said to him a few weeks ago and telling Jey that the belt is already in the family. Pearce's announcement that Zayn would defend his title on RAW against the winner of the Jey/Cody match didn't make sense at that point. But the backstage segment later between Zayn and Pearce teased something that could be very interesting, with Pearce saying he wants the WWE Champion on the best show and that he might bring wrestlers from SD to RAW. Pearce is running SD following Aldis's suspension, so he has an opportunity to further strengthen his RAW roster by bringing in wrestlers from SD. It makes sense because, fundamentally, RAW and SD are rivals, so Pearce wants RAW to be as close to perfection as possible. This could lead to a rivalry between Aldis and Pearce later on. The three-on-three match was decent. The second half of the match was fast-paced. Chelsea was finally able to show what she's capable of. Vikingo/Fenix is excellent. It's the first time I've seen Vikingo and, damn, that guy is magical. He pulled off moves I've never seen in my life. Fenix is consistent in his performances. Fenix's reign is going very well so far. Reid/Brie is a bit random. The big plus is the result - finally a win for Influence. Blake's attack on James and Giulia was good. Can't wait to see what happens next with Blake. The segment between Trick and Melo was cool. Melo was spot on when he said the US title has become a mere accessory (nice reference to the WWE shop), whereas basically this title is the 'match of the night' and belongs to the competitors. The fact that Melo is just in a singles match against Trick and not a US Title match makes sense. Trick had said it: no more open challenges or free title defences. The moment when Trick said he knows Melo like the back of his hand, and the move straight after, was well executed. Balor is now in the MFT/Bloodline Vortex alongside Knight, Nakamura and Keys. Sad. The Main Event is cool, even if their semi-final match at KOTR last year was better. Decent in-ring action between Jey and Cody. The result is spot on."