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I watched the Raw debut... i actually thought they looked meaner and less comical then the vignettes they aired on tv and i seen them in NXT as well...seems like a lot works there that doesn't translate well with Vince Mcmahon and Kevin Dunn.
I need to see a little more of them... they sorta remind me a bit of the Acolytes team that JBL was apart of before they changed to the APA.... Road Warriors and Demolition also remind me of the Ascension... i also really like that tag team name.
So I'm watching these pair come out. I've seen bits of them via NXT and what they do and get that they've been pretty successful on a regional level.
Their look was pretty cool and stood out, obviously it had connotations to previous tag teams like Road Warriors & Powers of Pain but I wasn't too fussed about something from 25 years ago. An updated reinvention would have been a decent proposition. The first problem was that the commentary team didn't really explain if they were good guys/bad guys or a bit of both. So no-one seemed to know how to react and when they won, the crowd didn't do anything. It didn't seem like there was any crossover knowledge from NXT to WWE either. They were announced as having a combined weight of 487lbs, then Michael Cole said one of them was 290lbs & the other was 240lbs.
They beat their opponents Miz & Sandow in less than 2 minutes and they started the show as the tag-team champions. So you've steamrolled through the potentially 2nd best tag-team on the roster. Konnor is a big lad but the other guy Viktor was smaller than Sandow so him trying to be a brawler didn't bode well. They could avert that by him doing the moves & Konnor being the power guy. The closest I've seen to them doing a wrestling move was a double team hip-toss in their 2nd match on Smackdown against a couple of enhancement guys. (one of them looked like ROH's Rhett Titus) Even their finisher is a glorified punch and kick. LOD & Demolition had better finishers 25 years ago.
On Smackdown they asked JBL on commentary if the Ascension had what it takes to make it in the WWE. He paused and then replied, "I don't know, they had an incredible debut but we've seen a lot of incredible debuts. Only time will tell." He could have just said yes!
The gimmick needs a bit of tweaking but it could have the legs to get over. It seemed like they had been chucked out there and told to do their thing with little guidance or support.