WWE Wrestlemania 2023 Night 2 Live Results And Review: Roman Reigns Gives Cody Rhodes’ Story An Unhappy Ending

After a fantastic Night 1 of WWE Wrestlemania 39, the second evening of matches is shaping up to be even bigger. Roman Reigns will put his Undisputed WWE Universal Championship on the line against Cody Rhodes in what looks to be the toughest challenge yet for the Bloodline leader who has been WWE’s top champion for nearly 1,000 days.

GameSpot is inside SoFi Stadium for this year’s Wrestlemania, bringing you results and a review of Night 2 live, as it happens, mere feet from the ring. Unless you’re in attendance, the only way to catch Wrestlemania is on Peacock (or through traditional pay-per-view). While Peacock has a free tier, you will not be able to watch the WWE event through that. You’ll need a Premium ($5 a month, with ads) or Premium Plus Peacock ($10 a month, no ads) account. Regardless of which tier you choose, there will be a few WWE-related ads throughout the show.

There are multiple ways to watch Peacock. Aside from watching it on mobile devices and on the PC, you can stream the service on Amazon Fire devices, Android TV, Apple TV, LG Smart TVs, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Roku, Samsung Smart TVs, Xbox One, Xbox Series X, Xbox Series S, Xfinity, and more. As for when you can watch (and should tune into our live review, check out the times for Wrestlemania below.

Start time:

• 8 PM ET
• 7 PM CT
• 5 PM PT
• 1 AM BST (April 1, April 2)
• 10 AM AEST (April 1, April 2)

At current, there are 6 matches scheduled for Night 2 of Wrestlemania 39. The main event will, of course, feature reigning Undisputed WWE Universal Champion Roman Reigns defending his titles against 2023 Royal Rumble winner Cody Rhodes. That’s only one of the three scheduled title defenses on Night 2, though. Take a look at the night’s full card below.

Night 2 Match Card:

• Roman Reigns (c) vs. Cody Rhodes (Undisputed WWE Universal Championship)
• Brock Lesnar vs. Omos
• Bianca Belair (c) vs. Asuka (WWE Raw Women’s Championship)
• Gunther (c) vs. Drew McIntyre vs. Sheamus (WWE Intercontinental Championship)
• Edge vs. “The Demon” Finn Bálor in Hell in a Cell
• Liv Morgan and Raquel Rodriguez vs. Natalya and Shotzi vs. Ronda Rousey and Shayna Baszler vs. Chelsea Green and Sonya Deville in a Fatal Four-Way Tag Team Match

Brock Lesnar vs. Omos

Winner: Brock Lesnar via pinfall

The size difference between Brock (known around these parts as Bork Lazer) and Omos is hilarious because the Beast Incarnate is rarely the little guy in the room. That’s not the case here, which makes for some downright fantastic visuals as Lesnar gets tossed around the ring by the Nigerian Giant. Something WWE has wisely done of late is show that Lesnar isn’t impervious to pain and, for his part, Lesnar has gotten very good at selling offense.

Still, like most Lesnar matches (and certainly most Omos matches), this was a short and basic fight. Omos beat Brock up a ton, Brock got in a couple (very impressive) German suplexes and hit an F5 for an absolutely pointless victory. This does nothing for Lesnar and makes Omos look weaker than a guy who’s not around very often. Sadly, this wasn’t as hot a start to Night 2 as Theory/Cena was for Night 1. But you can’t win them all.

Rating: 5/10

Liv Morgan and Raquel Rodriguez vs. Natalya and Shotzi vs. Ronda Rousey and Shayna Baszler vs. Chelsea Green and Sonya Deville in a Fatal Four-Way Tag Team Match

Winner: Ronda Rousey and Shayna Baszler via submission

The issue with this match is that there’s just not really many actual tag teams in the women’s division. Most of these were makeshift teams. Sure, Ronda and Shayna have been working together of late, but even they don’t feel totally gelled as a team. Of course, there’s still time for that but given this is a Women’s Tag Team Showcase match, it felt more like a bout designed to get a bunch of women not in storylines onto the card.

Ronda and Shayna won by submission (the first of the weekend, so far, unless you count NXT) but there’s no telling what that victory will actually mean going forward. This just felt inconsequential and while it wasn’t a bad match, it didn’t match the level set by the men’s match on Night 1.

Rating: 6/10

Gunther (c) vs. Drew McIntyre vs. Sheamus (WWE Intercontinental Championship)

Winner: Gunther via pinfall

This was a match custom built for those who like watching guys absolutely beat the snot out of each other. Three hard-hitters going at it in a triple threat is something we should definitely have on every Wrestlemania. It’s never the most technically sound and this particular bout lacke. Still, regardless of the stakes or story, these are always entertaining.

All three of these guys are going to be sore tomorrow morning and while everyone in the stadium wasn’t on their feet, as Michael Cole would like you to believe, the crowd only got more excited as the match went on. The two spots the audience went absolutely wild for were Drew’s dive to the outside and Gunther powerbombing Sheamus onto Drew’s head–seriously wild stuff. I’m glad Gunther retained, as I don’t know what the title would do for Sheamus or Drew. Eventually it’s going to have to happen, though, because we are all going to want to see Gunther challenge Cody for the Undisputed WWE Universal Championship, should he win.

Rating: 7.5/10

Bianca Belair (c) vs. Asuka (WWE Raw Women’s Championship)

Winner: Bianca Belair via pinfall

The press box absolutely loved Belair’s entrance. She’s such an important person on WWE’s roster and moments like this are perfect examples of why. As for the match, these two have excellent chemistry, so it should come as no surprise that their matches are awesome–and awesomely hard-hitting.

You know a match is good when you get lost in it and forget to write anything. That said, Asuka missing with the mist and immediately transitioning into Belair missing the hair whip is a nice way of flipping the expected on its head. And a finish that sees Bianca deadlift her opponent into a KOD is mere perfection. And her retaining the title is a surprise, since we likely all expected an Asuka reign. Still, it’s a great surprise as either of these women are fantastic champions.

Rating: 8.5/10

Edge vs. “The Demon” Finn Bálor in Hell in a Cell

Winner: Edge via pinfall

We’re not even going to talk about the Miz “match” against Shane McMahon and/or Snoop Dogg. We’ll just say we hope Shane’s alright after the fall he took. But let’s talk Hell in a Cell. Ahead of the match, I already had stupid nitpicks. “Brood Edge” isn’t a name that was ever used, and why does the Demon have Finn’s old song and act like old Finn, playing to the crowd? It feels inconsistent with the last year of his character’s storytelling. They didn’t even stick to the Judgement Day color scheme.

The match itself is another story, though. This was brutal and awesome–and Balor kept the hallmarks of his heel character. There was a vicious moment, though, where Edge threw a ladder at his opponent’s face, busting Balor open. While that temporarily slowed down the match, it had no trouble ramping back up.

There was also plenty of plunder in the match, with tables, chairs, kendo sticks, ladders, and so much more being being used as weapons. It was definitely a match that met the hype and as much as I love Judgement Day, this was the right call to end this feud once and for all. Edge got the win and hopefully both sides move onto something else excellent next.

Rating: 9/10

Roman Reigns (c) vs. Cody Rhodes (Undisputed WWE Universal Championship)

Winner: Eoman Reins via pinfall

It does a heart good to see Negative 1, the son of the late Brodie Lee, at ringside with Cody’s family as a show of support. Some things transcend what company you’re in and this is one of those moments. Meanwhile, Roman’s elaborate entrance was a beautiful way to kick off the main event. Why have only one pianist when you can have six?

Early on, Reigns was fairly dominant and very cocky about it, which is always a joy to watch and central to his character. It was also interesting to see Roman capitalizing on small mistakes made by Cody along the way, showing that Rhodes lets his emotions get the better of him sometimes, at least strategically. That’s exactly the kind of playground a master manipulator like Roman loves, as it allows him to bend the rules and get away with it.

Of course, it also makes for a more dramatic turn when Cody finally turns the tide and when he hit that Cody Cutter, both the stadium and the press box exploded with excitement. From there, the two traded the advantage back and forth, throwing everything they had at each other as the frustrations of their feud boiled over awesomely. Every time Roman thought he had Cody beat, Rhodes made a comeback that would shock and annoy the defending champ. Those moments where we see Roman scared about not being able to put his opponent away are the best Roman has as a character, and it played so well here.

What wasn’t played anywhere near as well was the ending of this particular match. This was the time to end Roman’s reign. This was the time to introduce something new. This was the time to finish Cody’s story. Instead, we have the usual Bloodline shenanigans. What’s more, we have it at a pivotal time in the Bloodline story where it was time to evolve. Instead, the status quo remains and a year of storytelling for Cody Rhodes has led to not very much. I expected better. But this puts a real damper on the weekend.

Rating: 5/10