Playing my DVD's almost at random, on their way to eBay/Charity shops, and I landed on the Survivor Series from 2005. This was an interesting show for me, as I'd been to see "Raw" and "Smackdown" tapings in Sheffield the week before this show took place. Despite that personal connection though, I thought the show was flat, only really coming to life in the Flair vs. HHH Match and bits of the main event.
This event took place during one of the Smackdown vs. Raw storylines that happened every so often after the brand split. The rivalry was played out between General Managers, Eric Bischoff and Teddy Long - both in a (frankly horrible) match between the pair and in the only traditional 5 vs 5 Elimination match in the main event. Elsewhere, Chris Benoit and Booker T began the recreation of their classic WCW best of seven series, with another series for the United States title. John Cena and Kurt Angle fought for the WWE Championship and Trish Stratus and Melina battled for the WWE Womens Championship. My favourite though was the lengthy Last Man Standing match between Triple H and Ric Flair, in which Flair was bleeding after only a few minutes and proceeded to gush for most of the next 27 minutes.
Despite that HHH vs. Flair match, it was mostly a night of misses for me. Seeing Chris Benoit is always a jarring experience these days, and his match with Booker wasn't the classic I might have expected it to be - they are looking to do it 7 more times though, so I suppose it makes sense. They immediately followed that with the notorious segment when Mr. McMahon comedically used the 'N Word', with John Cena which again, would not play today.
The worst aspect of the show though, without question, is the commentary. There are 5 commentators, all forced to hype up a cross brand rivalry which, quite simply, nobody in the audience ever cared about. They talk over each other and 'banter' backwards and forwards and it's horrible.
One really good match, a couple more that were acceptable and a whole lot of rubbish.
