Our latest review sees us venturing into the world of the WWE Superstar Collection. For those of you who don’t know this is it’s basically a budget series of DVDs which contain just a handful of matches. Think of it as a cheap and cheerful way to kill an hour or so.
This first review comes from a man who was recently described as an A+ player by the powers that be after he recently regained the gold. Yep, you guessed it, our first subject is none other than John Cena.
So let’s start at the very beginning…..
December 14th, 2008
Our man defends his World title against Chris Jericho at Armageddon.
While this won’t go down as the greatest match of Cena’s career it was a pretty solid encounter. Jericho spent the early going targeting the champion’s recently repaired neck, and although Cena kept coming back the challenger frustrated him time and time again by constantly countering his most illustrious moves.
The action got a lot better as they moved towards the end. Both men kicked out of the other’s finisher, which only served to frustrate Jericho more and more as the match went on. Eventually he managed to synch in the walls, but just when it looked like Cena was about to tap he managed to power out of the hold and lock in his own submission, the STF. Jericho tapped within seconds, giving Cena the submission win.
November 22nd, 2009
It’s on to the Survivor Series, and our man defends the WWE title against both members of D-Generation X, Triple H and Shawn Michaels, in a triple threat match.
There was a lot of speculation going into this match about whether Michaels and Trips would co-operate against the champion. Those questions were quickly answered when Michaels super kicked Trips out of the ring as soon as the match began.
That move more or less turned this into a series of three singles matches, beginning with Cena against Michaels, then Cena against Trips, and finally Trips against Michaels. On their own they were very well executed, but stringed together like this they told a very interesting story.
Eventually all three parties entered the match at the same time, and as moves were matched by counter moves all three came close to getting the win on numerous occasions, with Trips coming the closest after Michaels took him down with another superkick, with the Game’s limp form falling on top of Cena, the champion barely escaping the referee’s count.
The best exchange was saved for last. Michaels took Triple H down with another superkick Cena took HBK out with an attitude adjuster onto the Game before covering Trips for the title retaining pin.
December 14th, 2009
The Superstar of the Year Slammy is on the line as our man faces perennial rival Randy Orton on Raw.
The storyline here was that Cena had lost the WWE title to Sheamus in a tables match the night before and had vowed not to lose again until he’d regained the title. His old buddy Orton was looking to break that vow though.
So what we had here was your basic television match. It was nowhere near as long as some of their previous encounters, which is probably why it wasn’t that bad. The performances of both men was pretty solid, and it looked like Cena wasn’t going to keep his promise when Orton took him down with his patented DDT from the ring apron to the floor.
Cena managed to kick out of the pin though, and after narrowly avoiding Orton’s punt he sprang back to life and took his man down with the attitude adjuster to win the match and the Slammy.
May 1st, 2011
It’s the final match of the collection, and a triple threat steel cage match as our man joins John Morrison in challenging the Miz for the WWE title at Extreme Rules.
The post-Wrestlemania pay per view main event can sometimes be a somewhat tricky affair, as was the case with this particular match. Originally R-Truth was meant to be the third man, that was until Morrison tricked him into putting his spot on the line in a match and promptly beating him.
The match itself was okay. There were some good moments, and a couple of OMG ones, but overall I don’t think it would make any multi-disc compilations. All three men put in creditable performances, and there was a cameo from the aforementioned Truth as he gained a measure of revenge on Morrison.
With the Prince of Parkour eliminated it left Miz and Cena to fight it out, and after jockeying for position on top of the cage Cena eventually took Miz down with a super attitude adjuster for the title winning three count.
In conclusion – I think that years of reviewing best of compilations may have spoiled me a little.
Don’t get me wrong, this collection is okay, but there’s no way that any of these matches would make a Cena’s Greatest Hits collection. This thing is okay if you want something cheap and cheerful, and it’s a good thing to put on if you want to keep your wrestling-obsessed kids quite for a while, but for the older fan may find this a little wanting.
But with that being said, I’m still in two minds about whether to give this the thumbs up or not, so let’s just keep that thumb hovering in that grey area for now.
With thanks to Fremantle Media and Fetch Publicity for supplying a copy of this release. WWE Superstar Collection – John Cena is available to buy online at www.wwedvd.co.uk.
By day I’m an unemployed retail worker, and at weekends I volunteer at a local museum, but by night I’m the author of The Two Sheds Review, Britain’s longest running professional wrestling and mixed martial arts blog. Visit my site at www.twoshedsreview.vze.com. It’s been online in one form or another since June 2000!
