Retribution, Already Failing?

So a couple weeks ago it was promoted by WWE on there social media and website that a new faction would be debuting in WWE.  That weeks episode of Monday Night Raw didn't mention a faction at all, but they did discuss how some "weird happenings" were going on at the performance center that night.  The lights were flickering all night, they actually did a segment where Charly Caruso, the interviewer who WWE makes look dumb every week by having her ask stupid questions or report stupid things, she did a segment where "someone knocked down a box" that was a real thing they had their interviewer "report on" on a wrestling show.  Then later that night Vince McMahon made Tom Phillips throw to "security footage", of a group of people in black clothes and masks lighting a fake transformer on fire, and claiming this was the reason for the light flickering.

It would be reported later in the week that the group in question who wasn't named on that episode of Raw is called "Retribution", and they truly made there presence known on that weeks episode of Smackdown.  They continued the lights flickering gimmick (because when Vince McMahon likes an idea he runs it into the ground), and towards the end of that Smackdown the group finally appeared on screen.  Doing Nexus like attack on the ringside era.  Hitting the Plexiglas (and not breaking it) with bats, spray painting the WWE logo and crossing it out, for some reason hitting the ring with bats cause little to no damage in doing so, and using a chainsaw (presumably fake) cutting the ropes.  Michael Cole and Corey Graves ran for their lives, like they were in real danger.  They also attacked the performance center trainee's sitting in as the crowd.

Now let me just give my thoughts on these first couple of appearances.  Very obviously they are trying to somewhat recreate the Nexus a decade later (which is crazy to think about), but the fact they are promoting it, and saying "a new faction is coming", diminished the realism of this right away.  Every week the WWE is promoting this group but every time they appear they act like they shouldn't be here and that security isn't doing their job to protect the roster or the people around ringside.  The Nexus was special because nobody saw it coming, and even though we knew all of them already, it was unpredictable and different.  How am I supposed to take a group seriously who all they're really doing is vandalism and the company who is acting like they shouldn't be here are promoting it?

On the next episode of Raw, they appeared again in backstage segments destroying things, and the biggest segment that Michael Cole acting like shouldn't be happening again remember WWE promoted this appearance, the biggest segment they did was throwing two cinder blocks at some glass at the entrance of the performance center.  I laughed, that's not the reaction this is supposed to facilitate.  They want me to care, but I just don't and that's the problem.  Also everyone performing in the segments are under 5'8", very clearly letting me know these are all stand-ins and all the actual people that will eventually be revealed are not performing in these segments.  Then this weeks Smackdown saw the Smackdown roster acting like they are gonna ban together and stop them then during the first match they attacked Big E and John Morrison, so that match didn't happen at the time.  Then later in the night they had the match again and the lights flickered so the roster came out to ring side.  Then Retribution appeared backstage attacking a group of referee's, they did a spoof of NWO attacking backstage, and had a ref come to ringside to tell the roster (because for some reason there was no video footage on the screen in the building).

One of the things they did during this attack on the referees, was they threw one of the refs into the bathroom then LOCKED IT WITH A CHAIR ON THE DOORKNOB.  That isn't menacing, that's hilarious again, making me wonder, what is going on?  Now part of me is expecting a swerve, again this group, all they've been doing for the most part is vandalism.  So I want to believe this a ruse, a charade, for the real group and when the real group appears, that won't be the case anymore.  Like I said earlier it's very hard to take this group seriously when they are being promoted to appear, but they are still acting like they shouldn't be here.  The funny moments are always funny and in a stupid way.  The fact they are dressed similarly to a group of ninjas that is on Raw every week to lose matches.  All of this is bad.

So when do we find out what the real deal is with this group and who is actually involved?  My guess is, after Summerslam.  Now what I don't understand is why they dropped the hacker gimmick for this.  The hacker gimmick was fresh, it was different (for WWE) it could have been big for the person involved.  This whatever this is currently isn't working.  When the real intentions are finally revealed, I wouldn't be surprised if a group of NXT people are involved somehow, but who?  Speculation would tell you Tommaso Ciampa, and Dominik Dijakovic are involved somehow because if you go to their twitter accounts they whipped out all of their tweets.  I would be fine with them being involved, Ciampa has stated he'd never go to the main roster because he doesn't want to travel because of his neck injuries and being away from his family, but as long as they are gonna be in Florida, presumably for the remainder of 2020, I say why not. 

We'll have to wait and see, but right now my expectations for this group, especially with Vince McMahon's tendencies as far as creative goes (see Smackdown tag team division or really Smackdown in general for evidence of how bad that is right now), I have very little hope for it.  We will all be sitting and watching I'm sure hoping that it goes somewhere productive and most importantly entertaining.