Survivor Series: WarGames (2023)

The 2023 Survivor Series: WarGames was a professional wrestling pay-per-view (PPV) and livestreaming event produced by WWE. It was the 37th annual Survivor Series and took place on Saturday, November 25, 2023, at the Allstate Arena in the Chicago suburb of Rosemont, Illinois, held for wrestlers from the promotion's Raw and SmackDown brand divisions. This was the third Survivor Series held at this arena after the 1989 and 2019 events (the 1989 event was held here when it was still known as the Rosemont Horizon; renamed in 1999). This was the second annual Survivor Series based around the WarGames match, a team-based steel cage match where the roofless cage surrounds two rings placed side by side, and as a result, it was the fourth Survivor Series to not feature a traditional Survivor Series match, after the 1998, 2002, and 2022 events.

Five matches were contested at the event, including two WarGames matches. In the main event, which was a men's WarGames match and was the main match from Raw, Cody Rhodes, Seth "Freakin" Rollins, Jey Uso, Sami Zayn, and Randy Orton defeated The Judgment Day (Damian Priest, Finn Bálor, "Dirty" Dominik Mysterio, and JD McDonagh) and Drew McIntyre, while in the women's WarGames match, which was the opening bout and was the main match from SmackDown, Bianca Belair, Charlotte Flair, Shotzi, and Raw's Becky Lynch defeated Damage CTRL (Bayley, Asuka, Iyo Sky, and Kairi Sane). The event also notably featured the returns of Randy Orton and R-Truth, both of whom had been out with injuries since May and November 2022, respectively, as well as the return of CM Punk in his first WWE appearance since the 2014 Royal Rumble (discounting FS1's WWE Backstage in 2019–20).

This was also the final WWE event to be officially distributed on DVD, before WWE shut their home video division down at the end of 2023. Survivor Series: WarGames had a 1-disc release on December 26 in the United States.

Production

Background

Survivor Series is an annual professional wrestling event produced every November by WWE since 1987, generally held the week of Thanksgiving. The second longest running pay-per-view (PPV) event in history (behind WWE's WrestleMania), it is one of the promotion's five biggest events of the year, along with WrestleMania, SummerSlam, Royal Rumble, and Money in the Bank, referred to as the "Big Five". From 1987 to 2021, the event was characterized by having Survivor Series matches, which were tag team elimination matches that typically featured teams of four or five wrestlers against each other. In a break from tradition, the 2022 event did not include any Survivor Series or elimination type matches and was instead based around the WarGames match with the event titled Survivor Series: WarGames. WarGames is a type of steel cage match where two teams face each other in a roofless cage that surrounds two rings placed side by side and the teams typically feature four to five wrestlers each but is decided by one fall instead of eliminating all opponents.

On July 7, 2023, WWE announced that it would be returning to the Allstate Arena in the Chicago suburb of Rosemont, Illinois for the 37th Survivor Series on Saturday, November 25. This was the third Survivor Series to be held at this arena after the 1989 (when it was still known as the Rosemont Horizon; renamed in 1999) and 2019 events, and featured wrestlers from the Raw and SmackDown brand divisions. In addition to airing on PPV worldwide, it was available to livestream on Peacock in the United States and the WWE Network in most international markets. Additionally, the November 24 episode of Friday Night SmackDown was held at the same arena. Tickets went on sale on July 21 via Ticketmaster. During Crown Jewel on November 4, it was announced that the 2023 event would retain the WarGames concept, thus marking the fourth Survivor Series to not feature a traditional Survivor Series match, after the 1998, 2002, and 2022 events. It also made the event the second time the Allstate Arena hosted an event centered around the WarGames match, after the 2019 edition of NXT TakeOver: Wargames.

Storylines

The event included five matches that resulted from scripted storylines. Results were predetermined by WWE's writers on the Raw and SmackDown brands, while storylines were produced on WWE's weekly television shows, Monday Night Raw and Friday Night SmackDown.

On the October 30 episode of Raw, Intercontinental Champion Gunther was supposed to be a guest on The Miz's talk show, "Miz TV"; however, Miz was interrupted by Gunther's Imperium stablemates Giovanni Vinci and Ludwig Kaiser, who stated that Gunther would not appear. After some arguing, however, Gunther came out and stated that he did not respect Miz, as he viewed Miz more as an "entertainer" than a serious wrestler, with Miz then saying that he himself was the one who had made the Intercontinental Championship prestigious and could do it again. After Imperium began to destroy the "Miz TV" set, Miz attacked Imperium, but Gunther got the upper hand, turning Miz face for the first time since January 2020. Later, Miz asked Raw General Manager Adam Pearce for a championship match against Gunther, but Pearce declined as there were others who also wanted a title match. A fatal four-way match was then scheduled for the next episode to determine Gunther's challenger for the Intercontinental Championship at Survivor Series: WarGames, which Miz won.

At Crown Jewel, Zoey Stark was part of a fatal five-way match for Rhea Ripley's Women's World Championship, which Ripley retained. On the following episode of Raw, Stark won a battle royal to face Ripley for the title one-on-one at Survivor Series: WarGames.

Since June, Seth "Freakin" Rollins, Cody Rhodes, Jey Uso, and Sami Zayn had all been involved in various rivalries with The Judgment Day (Finn Bálor, Damian Priest, and "Dirty" Dominik Mysterio) and their associate, JD McDonagh, encompassing matches for Rollins' World Heavyweight Championship and Bálor and Priest's Undisputed WWE Tag Team Championship. At the conclusion of the November 6 episode of Raw, a brawl ensued between all eight men. Fed up with the constant chaos caused by The Judgment Day, Raw General Manager Adam Pearce announced that Rollins, Rhodes, Uso, and Zayn would face Judgment Day and McDonagh in a WarGames match at Survivor Series: WarGames. The following week, Rhodes and Priest were revealed as the leaders of their respective teams while McDonagh was made an official member of Judgment Day. At the end of the night, Drew McIntyre, who had been talking with Rhea Ripley and had his own past issues with Uso due to Uso's involvement in The Bloodline, helped Bálor and Priest retain the Undisputed WWE Tag Team Championship in a rematch against Rhodes and Uso. On the next episode, McIntyre was added to Judgment Day's WarGames team and later that night, he defeated Uso to earn the WarGames advantage. The fifth member of Rhodes' team was then revealed to be a returning Randy Orton, who had been out with an injury since May 2022.

At SummerSlam, Bianca Belair defeated Asuka and Charlotte Flair in a triple threat match to win the WWE Women's Championship, but immediately lost the title to Iyo Sky, who cashed in her Money in the Bank contract. After the event, Damage CTRL (Bayley, Sky, and Dakota Kai) began feuding with Asuka, as well as Flair, who sided with Asuka. Damage CTRL also sidelined Belair with a knee injury. Sky subsequently retained her championship in matches against Asuka and Flair thanks to interference from Bayley and Kai. After Belair made her return in late October, Sky retained the title against her at Crown Jewel after a returning Kairi Sane (in her first appearance since July 2020) interfered. On the following SmackDown, Sky and Kai said they brought Sane in to make their group stronger, with Sane praising Bayley for her leadership and also said that she forgave Bayley for attacking her back in July 2020. They were then interrupted by Belair, Flair, and Asuka. A six-woman tag team match then took place, which ended in a no contest after Asuka turned on her team, subsequently reuniting with Sane and joining with Damage CTRL. Shotzi attempted to make the save, but was also laid out. The following week, Damage CTRL (represented by Bayley, Sky, Asuka, and Sane) challenged Belair, Flair, Shotzi, and a partner of their choosing to a WarGames match, which was accepted. SmackDown General Manager Nick Aldis gave Belair's team until the end of the night to select their fourth member and they chose Raw's Becky Lynch after Damage CTRL took out the other women on SmackDown. That same night, WWE announced that a Ruffles-sponsored fan vote would be held to determine which team would receive the WarGames advantage.