Hello Reader! Still no Rollins, but this is a big week with Cargill’s running buddies B-Fab and Michin challenging for the tag-team titles. Let’s get to it!
Jade Cargill – SmackDown
This week, we see the storytelling benefits of being in a match segment – there’s not only the spectacle of athleticism, but it also affords commentary time and space to enhance the narrative.
There are no entrances televised for the women’s tag-team title match, but commentary wastes no time in reminding us that ‘Cargill and friends’ have taken out Charlotte Flair, so she isn’t ringside for this match. Naming only Cargill positions her at the head of the group. Michael Cole follows this up by saying, ‘How confident is Jade to be able to put both these women in this tag team matchup?’ The implication is that Cargill is calling the shots and that B-Fab and Michin have had to earn her approval. The commentators then go on to credit Cargill for B-Fab’s increased aggression. Essentially, Michin and B-Fab are positioned as students or disciples of Cargill.
After these early assertions by the commentary team, Cargill is rarely mentioned, nor shown in the foreground of the shot. Instead, she almost haunts the background. This creates a narrative tension, where her ‘absence’ makes the discerning viewer expect, and wait for, her interference. Eventually, this interference does indeed arrive, as Cargill cheap-shots Paxley, which directly leads to Michin gaining the pinfall win. We can read this as the completion of a grander strategy in which previously taking out Flair has led to a numbers advantage, which has led to winning the belts.
On the bell, Cargill grabs the belts and presents them to her friends. Cargill takes centre shot and raises their hands, as if granting them her approval. Corey Graves tells us, ‘After a hard-fought battle, the Storm [Cargill] would make all the difference’, hammering home that the belts would not have changed hands without Cargill. Her influence is essential, she is the difference-maker. Finally, we’re left with one last victory shot: Cargill again centre-screen with her friends, as pyrotechnics go off in the background, augmenting the importance of their triumph.
Seth Rollins – Raw
Absent.
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