People often ask me, they say, “Elliot, how do you get so little done?”

Firstly, example person, what a shitty way to start a conversation, and in answer to your question, I get so little done because the WWE produce more hours of TV every week than Stuart Blackburn (Wikipedia tells me he is a Producer on Coronation Street, so yeah, zing). Oh, and as a supplementary answer to that question from before, I also recap Smackdown Live on a weekly basis because I hate having free time. Here is that aforementioned recap for August 9th’s episode.

We’ve been hearing a lot about Viperville recently. Arriva buses don’t do any services to Viperville, nor do London Midland trains or National Express coaches, so it’s probably a hastily named fake place that Randall Keith Orton’s promo writer made up to rival Brock Lesnar’s ever-popular “Suplex City”. Speaking of Randy’s promo writer, he’s either turning in the same script every week because he’s more checked out than the guests of the Bates Motel (please let me know if this is a current reference), or he’s on holiday, possibly in Viperville. Rambling half-jokes aside, Orton has been giving the same promo since he returned at Battleground and I’m 100% done with it. Oh, and he gifted Alberto Del Rio with a one-way ticket to that fake place in this week’s episode.

So American Alpha had some jobbers to beat this week, which they did with a Grand Amplitude, and in the same way we were introduced to SD Live’s women’s division, during this match, we met the tag division (otherwise known as NXT 2.0). I don’t know if this means The Ascension will be a legitimate threat on Smackdown, like they used to be on NXT, or if they’ll be on the receiving end of a good, old-fashioned merking every week. My guess is they’ll have a few decent matches, then the writers will get bored of them, like ladies do with Bradley Tiernan after he tells them he’s a sketch-comedy/wrestling review writer.

Okay, there was actually a women’s match this week. 2, in fact! The first one, however, can only be accurately summarised in shoddily made web comic form. Presenting, The Wacky Misadventures of Eva Marie!

Well, I hope that was both enjoyable and informative. And now onto some less interesting things! YAY!

– Notorious free agent, Heath Slater faced Rhyno in his “Can I Have a Contract?” match. He said something about having many children and an above-ground pool to pay for. The crowd popped for him. Rhyno won. Bryan and Shane were about to offer Slater a contract for showing heart but then he was all “You guys don’t deserve me I’m proper good,” so he didn’t get that contract and the fun is set to continue.
– The Miz did a segment with Maryse in which they laid on Renee Young’s smack talking table and the writers proved they still don’t have a gimmick for Apollo Crews.
– The Miz also did a segment with a man dressed as Scooby Doo, promoting a new Scooby Doo/WWE thing that’s out on DVD. All I can tell you about that is The Undertaker probably attended more VO recording sessions for that than he has WWE events in the past 6 months.
– Carmella beat Natalya and screamed so much that I had to mute my laptop, lest my neighbours think I was watching a certain type of adult entertainment, as opposed to the kids show I was actually watching.
– JBL can’t say “Carmella”.

So the main event of the night was Dolph Ziggler (who is fluent in American Sign Language) and Dean Ambrose (who is one nonchalant promo away from being repackaged as “The Dudemeister”) vs. Bray Wyatt and Erick Rowan.
It’s a bit of fun, wrestling, innit? Like, remember when Rowan was lost a 6 second match to a part-timer a few months ago? Now he’s holding his own against the champ and the #1 contender. Anyway, Ziggler pinned Rowan after a superb-kick, then Ambrose came in the ring all “I’m a crazy dude, brother. What am I gonna do next?” and predictably hit Ziggles with a Dirty Deeds.

So, we’re in the pre-penultimate show before a PPV slump, and really, the best thing about this week’s episode was the comic I made for the Eva Marie match, so congratulations, I saved you about an hour. Go hug your children or look up Bates Motel and let me know if it’s still a show. BYE!