This was an Elimination Chamber match for Orton’s WWE World Heavyweight Title.
Before anyone accuses me of getting hammered and positively reviewing matches that I watched at a point in my life when I was more positive, that’s not really the case here. I didn’t watch this life. I got distracted with something else after The Shield vs. Wyatts, likely choosing that over a real bad Batista vs. ADR match that came on in between those matches. I didn’t see this match until the summer of 2014, in which one of the first things I did after getting an apartment so I could stop being briefly homeless was get the WWE Network. I got it because I wanted to see the second Shield/Evolution match, but I went back for this, and it blew me away. Now granted, “sleeping in an apartment and not a hallway or a public bathroom” is a pretty good feeling, but given that my only furniture at the time was an air mattress and an ottoman, I should hardly be confused with someone watching this in comfort and living in a positive space and reflecting upon some glorious time in my life when watching the match. I greatly prefer owning things to not owning things. Capitalism is whatever or something, but I’m much happier owning a mattress and a bed frame. The match simply just fucking rules.
In fact, it’s the best Elimination Chamber match ever.
There’s no point in running them after this, because the formula has been perfected.
So much of that is down to the talent roster, as there’s not a single weak link in this thing. Even the other best Chambers ever have some dud in there like Baron Corbin or Kane or hobbled 2003 Kevin Nash. The closest thing to this is the 2005 Elimination Chamber with Hunter, Orton, Batista, Benoit, Edge, and Jericho, but every single one of these guys is probably better than everyone in that match at that point except Benoit. The result of that is that every single moment of this is great. Even the stuff that isn’t big or major is full of really hard hitting and great bumping. The big stuff in this is all very creative, and just SO well laid out.
Like the other great match on this show, it’s also a complete and total victory for the system working like it’s supposed to. At the heart of it, it’s incredible best in the world level talent getting to do incredible things, only enhanced by everything going around the action itself, instead of being hindered like so often winds up being the case.
The order of entry here doesn’t really matter, because there’s not a weak point. That being said, it’s laid out perfectly so as to maximize the order of entry for the most drama possible. Cesaro and Sheamus begin and spent five minutes pummeling the hell out of each other. They slowly introduce the elements, but it’s mostly just a stunning level of physicality for such an early segment in a long match. Daniel Bryan follows them in, and with the hottest babyface in the world comes the crowd. Bryan’s arm is bandaged up, but it’s not until Christian is in next and specifically targets it does that matter. Christian’s the only one who does though, which specifically works very well for him here as the most desperate man in the match. Bryan’s selling also very accurately represents that. Christian briefly goes to it, but nobody else follows suit, so it exists as a nagging ache and not some major impediment.
What also works so well about this is that each guy in it is different. Nobody occupies the same space or has the same story, despite there being three distinct camps in the match. John Cena and Daniel Bryan are the two top babyfaces, but Bryan has a desperation to him relative to Cena’s calm confidence. Cesaro and Sheamus are both physical Europeans, but Cesaro is dirtier and more opportunistic. Christian and Orton are both opportunists, but Christian is a desperate striver on his last leg, whereas Orton has a confidence that Christian is incapable of ever possessing as a character.
The match is also just so good about all the different characters and stories it has to balance. Orton is naturally last in, as the corporate champion, and spends the match trying to avoid people and getting punished for it. Christian and Sheamus’ burgeoning feud continues when Christian evades comeuppance for a series of cheap shots. He takes advantage when Sheamus is thrown off the top when chasing him up to the top of a pod, and splashes him to eliminate him. Almost immediately, Christian’s met with some kind of karma for his recent actions, as Bryan easily takes care of him with the knee. Cesaro and Cena continue their thing, with new additions. Cesaro and Cena both counter counters that were used in the famous Raw match. Cena pays Cesaro a significant amount of respect by again jumping ahead as soon as he has the chance, now with the FU over the top to the steel that he used to defeat Punk when he won the match in 2011, also adding an STF back in the ring to seal it up. There’s a desperation to it that does wonders for Cesaro’s steady elevation.
When it gets down to the three top guys in the company, it’s magic. Cena and Bryan do battle for the last time ever, and what little we get already feels so much more monumental than SummerSlam. On some level, we’re all happy that Bryan somehow got away from Cena without ever giving that SummerSlam win back, but even the brief exchanges in this match show just how much they still had on the table together, especially with Bryan now arguably having eclipsed him. The Wyatt Family gets involved to stop Cena and let Orton sneak a pin on him, and it’s not the greatest. A weak point of the match. It’s not something that really deeply bothers me, I know the ride I bought the ticket for, but it does hurt an otherwise pitch perfect sort of a match.
When it gets down to Bryan and Orton, it’s electric. The most engaging stuff on the show, and once again, the best singles pairing in the WWE at this point delivers. It’s not long, but given that they’ve wrestled for close to an hour on free TV over the last eight or nine weeks, I find it very hard to be upset about that. They hit all the notes that have to be hit, they do some new things, and get to some WONDERFUL bullshit. Corporate Kane came out to stop the Wyatts from doing more damage to the match, but when he was there, Bryan hit him with a knee off the top, because he’s been screwed every time one of these people in a suit and tie has come out to the ring, no matter if there’s actually a good reason now. Bryan repeats the sequence from the February 3rd match that got him the win, only now for Kane to pull the referee away. A distraction leads to an opening, and Randy hits the RKO.
Only for Daniel Bryan to kick out.
Minneapolis comes entirely unglued. I hoot and holler in my chair at home in April 2021. People cheer as if it’s the liberation of France. It’s the value both of having such a great finish and such a protected finish that a kickout can feel genuinely monumental. Because it’s not just that Our Hero kept going, or that it was so well built in the match or whatever. It’s a kickout that almost nobody gets, and this undeniable sign that This Is Happening (dance yrself clean) after all, if not immediately than soon and finally undeniably so. It’d be one thing if they did it and Randy simply hit another to win. The match would still be the best Chamber match ever, one of the best of the year, all of that. The thing that puts it over the top into an all-time level deal is the moment after WHEN BRYAN GRABS THE SMALL PACKAGE AND ALMOST STEALS IT ANYWAYS?! Bryan manages just the slightest little comeback to provide this completely unexpected little window of hope, before Kane outright interferes finally, punches him, and a second RKO manages to steal the title away from Bryan yet again.
Like the other big match on this show, it’s one of the best examples all decade of just what the WWE can really do when all the gears are running smoothly and in the right direction. A gimmick match that’s usually filler bullshit, now used to add even more fire to what’s fast becoming one of the best storylines of all time, jump starting others, and using Booking to genuinely make a match better. I always say something like hey look what happens when you get out of the way and let talent work, but this is the opposite. For once (twice), look what happens when you apply just a little twist or the slightest movement to the pieces on the board, and create an environment and a production that manages to stay out of the way (mostly) of the work in the ring, while also giving it all an extra weight and importance in the end.
Once again, I have no idea what company this came from. If not from another universe, certainly from another time. All time level talents going wild, with the slightest hand of booking on the shoulder, but in a way that genuinely helps build things for the future without detracting from the match at hand. Sight unseen, you might think I mean IN YOUR HOUSE: FINAL FOUR from seventeen years earlier, but I’m talking about 2010s WWE somehow. It’s one of the crown jewels of the 2013-2014 golden age, and a companion piece to the match earlier in the show, as everything moves in unison to create the best possible version of a thing. It’s is what the ride has always been capable of being. It’s what you set your hopes for when you buy a ticket.
Expecting things from this company is a sucker’s game, but this is what it can be. This and the six man tag are the sorts of matches that make you expect things to begin with.
HANDWERK 
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