Lethal Targets Starks, WWE Teases Lita vs. Charlotte and More Friday Fallout

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Credit: WWE.com

While All Elite Wrestling has quite some time before its next big event, and WWE is in full planning mode for this year’s Royal Rumble Premium Live Event—which is apparently what WWE calls pay-per-views now. 

Lita made a special appearance to hype her upcoming participation in the women’s Royal Rumble match, but she ended up in a faceoff with the SmackDown women’s champion before it was all said and done.

The Usos helped find new No. 1 contenders for the SmackDown tag titles by holding a Fatal 4-Way that was won by The Viking Raiders.

Over on Rampage, Ricky Starks found himself in Jay Lethal’s crosshairs, while The Acclaimed debuted a music video for a new diss track aimed at Sting and Darby Allin.

Let’s look at what happened and what these moments could lead to in the future. 

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The Usos kicked off SmackDown by announcing a Fatal 4-Way match to determine the No. 1 contenders for their SmackDown Tag Team Championships.

The Viking Raiders, Los Lotharios, Jinder Mahal and Shanky, and Cesaro and Mansoor were all included. The Usos quickly delivered a couple of superkicks to Erik and Mansoor before everyone started brawling. 

After a fun bout, Erik and Ivar were able to score the win and earn the next shot at the SD tag titles. Whether this happens on SmackDown or at The Royal Rumble was not revealed.

The Usos have been the champions since winning the titles on July 18, so WWE might be toying with the idea of putting the belts on The Viking Raiders to freshen up the division a bit.

We have seen The Usos run through just about every team possible. It would be nice to get some fresh matchups on the blue brand because The Usos and New Day have had to carry the division for too long. 

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Lita was announced for a special appearance this week to hype her upcoming participation in the women’s Royal Rumble match. Before the interview could get going, Charlotte Flair took over and interviewed Lita herself.

They traded barbs back and forth before Lita hit her with a Twist of Fate. She celebrated to a cheering crowd as The Queen struggled to get to her feet.

This is an interesting segment because it could just be to hype the Rumble, but it’s also possible WWE wants to set up a match between Lita and Charlotte at some point.

If the winner of the women’s Royal Rumble challenges the Raw women’s champion, Lita could end up being The Queen’s opponent for WrestleMania. 

We will see what happens on January 29, but if WWE teases this combo more in the coming weeks, it will be a good indicator that Lita might have one more run left in her. 

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The FTW Championship has never been a recognized title in any promotion, but we have seen it defended a handful of times in AEW since Taz brought it back.

Now, it appears as if we have found out who the next challenger for the belt will be. During this week’s Rampage, Starks was in his usual spot at the commentary table when Lethal showed up to issue a challenge.

He said he didn’t care about the FTW title, but he did care about taking something that Starks loves away from him. An irate Starks accepted the challenge.

While this could lead to a fun match, it’s unlikely the FTW title will ever leave Team Taz. Starks is going to win, probably by cheating, and he will keep the belt while Lethal moves on to the next member of Team Taz.

Powerhouse Hobbs is the obvious choice for Lethal’s next opponent, but we have to get through his match with Starks before we find out if this is a short-term feud or if AEW has bigger plans in store. 

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The Acclaimed are set to battle Sting and Darby Allin, but before they step into the ring, Max Caster and Anthony Bowens delivered a special gift in the form of a music video.

They recorded a diss track, and the accompanying video mocked the two painted wrestlers with a few vicious burns and some hilarious visuals.

We have only seen this from The Acclaimed a couple of times in the past, so AEW clearly saves these music videos for feuds it deems to be more important than the average storyline.

This could indicate a longer-term storyline than initially thought, especially if AEW wants one of these teams to eventually win the tag titles.

Allin will likely make his own short film to respond to the music video next week, so we should keep an eye out for that to drop before their match. 

This week’s SmackDown and Rampage both had a few solid matches, but both shows were light in terms of storyline developments.