WWE SmackDown 10/30/2026: 3 Things We Hated And 3 Things We Loved - Wrestling Inc.

Welcome to Wrestling Inc.'s weekly review of "WWE SmackDown," in this case,Danhausen's "Very Nice,Very Evil" Halloween special! We have some things to say about Danhausen, the Halloween theme, and the return of "The Demon" Finn Balor here in the column this week. We also have thoughts on Sami Zayn's Undisputed WWE title defense, Chelsea Green's WWE women's title defense, Rey Fenix's AAA Cruiserweight title defense, and more!If you missed the show, as always, you can turn to our "WWE SmackDown" 10/30/26 live blog, which contains all the objective information you could possibly want about what went down Friday night. If you're interested in the WINC staff's opinions on what went down at least the matches and segments that grabbed our attention the most, for better or worse you're in the right place. Here are three things we hated and three things we loved about the 10/30/26 episode of "WWE SmackDown!" We are edging closer to WWE Crown Jewel 2026, a show where the two champions from each of WWE's brands will go one-on-one in special interpromotional matches, but when it comes to the women's division, it really has been a slog of a build up.The opening match of the October 30 episode of "WWE SmackDown" saw Chelsea Green defend the WWE Women's Championship against Nikki Bella in a match that was not very good. We could all kind of see this coming as the feud between Green and Bella has been dull to say the least we get it ladies, you want to bring some of that "Divas" flare back to WWE, but for the love of everything that is good and pure, don't bring the Divas Era wrestling back, it stunk.That is what this match did, it stunk. It was slow, it was boring, it was sloppy in all the wrong ways. Sometimes wrestling can actually look better when it's rough around the edges, but when it's between two women who have little to no chemistry together it just becomes rough to watch. It almost looked AI-generated at times and the world rejoiced when it was over. However, this portion of the show wasn't over as Liv Morgan came out to run down her Crown Jewel opponent, and it all just kept going downhill.Morgan, who isn't exactly the most popular champion in WWE right now, repeatedly beat the drum of Green being a fluke champion, which is an angle that is just so played out right now that if you had a hearing aid while Morgan was talking, I wouldn't be surprised if you just turned it off. Then Tiffany Stratton showed up, and I'm not even kidding when I say this, teased cashing in her Money in the Bank contract for a third consecutive show and still didn't do it.We talked about this on Monday after "WWE Raw" it's okay to tease it every once in a while, but doing it on back-to-back shows just feels weird. Now it's happened on back-to-back-to-back shows, and that isn't weird, that's just stupid. if she tries to cash in on Monday again, just be prepared for months of cash-in teases that get worse and worse by the week, to the point where I wouldn't be surprised if Stratton tried to cash in her contract to try and win the WWE Women's Crown Jewel Championship just for the surprise factor.Put it like this the sooner we can get past Green vs. Morgan, and the sooner Stratton cashes in her contract, the better the WWE women's division will be heading into the new year.Written by Sam Palmer Tonight's "SmackDown" wasn't short on the Halloween theme, but the opening segment was like most openings of the show. Cody Rhodes came to the ring and opened with his trademark question. He immediately answered himself and said he wanted to talk about the Last Man Standing match at Crown Jewel. Rhodes noted this will be the first time competing in a match with that stipulation.Rhodes got more serious and straight to the point. He apologized to Orton's kids, wife, and fans for what he's going to do to him at Crown Jewel. Rhodes said he didn't want to be macabre, but showed a photo of the aftermath from his WrestleMania match where he was bloodied and with a swollen eye. He left it on the screen for the rest of his segment. Rhodes warned Orton that he was getting revenge for every person he's punted over the years and will punt Orton like he did Baron Corbin. Before leaving the ring, Rhodes declared he'd be the Last Man Standing and that he would become the No. 1 contender for the Undisputed Champion.I appreciated Rhodes cutting to the chase. He was more direct than usual, and apologizing to Orton's family for the brutality he's going to impose next week was a nice touch. For the most part, Rhodes leans heavily into the Ultimate Good Guy. He occasionally shows seeds of heel tendencies, but he doesn't lean into it. Tonight's promo wasn't heel by any means, but he was serious about the violence he wants to enact on his frenemy to put an end to their ongoing feud. It's the seriousness he should be exuding going into this match and Orton would do well not to take Rhodes lightly.Written bySamantha Schipman It's sometimes crazy to me to see charismatic guys like Trick Williams, for example, get so far after being called up from "WWE NXT," while others who can talk and can wrestle at a higher caliber fail to really get anywhere. No shade to Williams, as I'm a big fan and happy he's risen to the top, but tonight, I once again found myself questioning what the heck WWE is doing with Ricky Saints.There was nothing wrong with the in-ring action when Saints took on Rey Fenix for the AAA Cruiserweight Championship tonight. The match was better than the one the pair had two weeks ago, which ended in a terrible DQ finish when the referee let Saints hit the Roshambo and then refused to count the pin, all because Saints shoved him before the finishing sequence. At least this match had a clean finish, but Saints didn't emerge victorious.It seemed kind of silly to book this one at all, when Fenix has an open challenge for the cruiserweight title tomorrow in AAA, something commentary even brought up. Maybe Saints will go down there and challenge him, but it seems like Fenix is wrapped up in another storyline in the promotion. This was also the third televised match the pair have had together for the gold, so I don't see that happening.Saints needs a good, solid feud against someone he can battle with on the mic, perhaps Williams, or he could slide over to "Raw" and easily face off against Intercontinental Champion Chad Gable. Either way, he needs to start stacking some wins, and WWE desperately needs to give me a reason to care about him.When looking back on his matches since being called up to the main roster, I had already forgotten he and Williams squared off at WWE Night of Champions for the US title. In addition to that forgettable match, all Saints has really done is debut in a match against real-life close friend Cody Rhodes, which he was never going to win, then have some good matches against Carmelo Hayes. The former NXT Champion seems entirely directionless, which sadly isn't exactly a new thing for many former "NXT" stars on the red and blue brands.Written byDaisyRuth I love a good themed episode of WWE programming, and also when the company uses its strongest characters to its advantage, and that's exactly what we saw tonight when Danhausen hosted his "Very Nice, Very Evil" Halloween special. This was the perfect use of Danhausen, before hopefully an equally as good use of him tomorrow as the host of Halloween Havoc, and we even got a huge surprise with it all.I had completely forgotten about Danhausen's experiment, the "body" left on the table in his lab. He hasn't been seen backstage messing with it for weeks. Then I thought the experiment was just the zombie-fied gingerbread man, who returned during a backstage segment with Lil Yachty and United States Champion Trick Williams. And, truthfully, as much as I hated that entire saga, this was actually a cute little callback, especially since the zombie gingerbread man didn't get involved in the main event. I don't mind a fun little backstage segment like that.Danhausen took to the stage in front of the crowd to reveal the experiment, but was interrupted by GUNTHER, who he's had problems with for weeks. GUNTHER beat him down and powerbombed him through a table on the stage before beating him in the ring. The lights went out and the cloning machine lights went up, and the Minihausens ran out to try and protect Danhausen. While I'm also not the biggest fan of the Minhausens, as they've been a bit overused, I also thought this was fine and fit the spooky, goofy Halloween theme.Thankfully, Danhausen's "real" experiment then rose from the dead, and was revealed to be "The Demon" Finn Balor, who we haven't seen since his street fight against Dominik Mysterio at WrestleMania 42. While I didn't ever expect WWE to follow up with the experiment gimmick, I definitely didn't expect it to actually make some kind of storyline sense to further a feud. I have to say, I was rather impressed.The Demon beat GUNTHER pillar to post, and the "Ring General's" chops and even a belt strike didn't phase Balor. He knocked GUNTHER out of the ring and on to the commentary desk, then set up a ladder and hit a Coup de Gras to GUNTHER to send them both through it.This did admittedly run a bit long, and Balor certainly could have risen up there to protect the Minihausens a lot quicker, but the overall segment was excellent. Both Danhausen and Balor have issues with GUNTHER, and GUNTHER has done enough to pull the demon out of Balor, so this worked incredibly well.Written by Daisy Ruth This week's main event saw Sami Zayn putting his WWE Championship, and thus the right to face Roman Reigns for the ceremonial Crown Jewel Championship, against United States Champion Trick Williams. Now, one could point out that Williams has made just the one defense of his midcard title in 55 days, and that Zayn was defending hisUndisputed World titlefor the second this time this week, and the third in 50 days as champion.But then, it was a match involving an elite veteran in Zayn and a blue chip prospect in Williams. Surely it was going to be good, at the very least. Well, WWE is in the business of defying any and all expectations, so much so that this match managed to be two matches, each as milquetoast as the other.There was the first one, the originally sanctioned one. Williams and Zayn went through the motions already seen in their previous two matches earlier this year. Johnny Gargano and Candice Lerae interfered on Zayn's behalf, Lil Yachty sought to neutralize that, himself interfering on Williams' behalf. But then Gargano was caught red-handed for a uniquely stupid disqualification finish.Worry not, Nick Aldis said, and the match was restarted as a No Disqualification match with all interfering parties banned from ringside. Williams beat the spit out of Zayn with a kendo stick, then got beaten with it himself, and did a little more beating until the stick was broken. Zayn somehow survived being effectively beaten, and then as he looked to lose again, he pulled the referee into the way of Williams; the referee flinched, Williams hesitated, Zayn went low and clattered his challenger with the belt. And that was all she wrote. Whyshe wrote it this way remains a mystery.As said before, Williams could and should be defending the title he already has. Zayn probably shouldn't be defending the title, given that he already has a match set for November 7 and that kind of gives up the ghost for any and all defenses until that point. No one really went into tonight thinking the United States Champion was going to become the WWE Champion, and then challenge the World Heavyweight Champion for the right to be Crown Jewel Champion. And rightfully so, that sounds horrendous.So why book it? And then why present in such a manner that the one selling point the match had going for it, the actual wrestling match, took a backseat to all manner of pantomime? Yet again it was weekly programming filled with inconsequential nonsense.Written by Max Everett Unfortunately, much of what happened during this week's show varied from alright to not very good, personally speaking. But while the present wasn't exactly the best there was at least a hook for next week's show, though technically it's like a barb being added to a hook that was already there. Nevertheless, this show offered up some added spice and a reason to watch next week.There wasn't much in the way of Kevin Owens and CM Punk this week, although it has continued to simmer as one of those hateful rivalries that only someone like Punk seems to be able to conjure. It's undoubtedly a hot program, kicked off with a WWE Championship match in August, flowing in and out of the Money in the Bank ladder match, and now due for a grudge match next Friday.This week it was announced that they would be battling in a No Holds Barred match, which is not only exciting because it's a great stipulation and the workers involved handle the extreme environment really well, but also because it feels warranted at this stage in time.Owens and Punk has continued to be one of the feuds that actively draws one to watch on Friday nights, again personally speaking. The fact that they will face one another next week under the stipulation is exciting, and as crucial as it is to have compelling TV in the moment, there is something to be said about planting seeds and setting scenes before they come.Written by MaxEverett