Survivor Series 2015: The full rundown and why you should care

WWE rolls into Atlanta on Sunday night to present its latest pay-per-view, the 29th annual Survivor Series. Undertaker debuted at this event way back in 1990 and he’ll be in action Sunday, teaming with his brother Kane to take on the Wyatt Family.

The centerpiece of this year’s Survivor Series, however, is the semifinal and final matches in a tournament to crown a new WWE World Heavyweight Champion. The title was suddenly vacated earlier this month when reigning champion Seth Rollins suffered a knee injury that will keep him out of action for 6-9 months. The past two weeks have seen the opening rounds of the championship tournament and it all comes to a head on Sunday night.

So let’s get down to brass tacks: the matches that will be taking place and why you should go out of your way to watch this PPV.

Survivor Series begins at 8 p.m. ET on Sunday night, with a live pre-show beginning at 7 p.m. ET. You can order the event on pay-per-view or watch via the WWE Network.

What am I looking at here? Tyler Breeze is a vaguely Zoolander-inspired male model. He recently made the jump from NXT to the main WWE roster and has aligned himself with Summer Rae, who only backs winners. (Please ignore that Summer Rae was associated with Fandango for a while.) Dolph Ziggler is the world’s most athletic glam rock poodle. Ziggler doesn’t care much for Breeze’s antics, likely because there’s only room for one show-off in WWE.

Why you should care: Both of these guys are great. Breeze is a great character, they’re both great wrestlers and Ziggler has some extra motivation these days as he tries to put distance between himself and an ill-fated feud with Rusev (and Summer Rae). Everything indicates that this match should be a lot of fun to watch.

What am I looking at here? We don’t know! WWE has promised that we’ll see a traditional Survivor Series match on Sunday, but they haven’t told us the participants yet. Best guess is that the three members of WWE Tag Team Champions The New Day will be involved. They’ll likely run up against some combination of The Usos, The Dudley Boyz, Ryback and/or the Lucha Dragons.

Why you should care: Survivor Series matches are fun! Especially when you have a lot of capable wrestlers in there mixing it up. In case you’re not aware, it’s a five-on-five tag team match with single eliminations, lasting until all members of one team have been eliminated. The “survivors” on the other team then get bragging rights, especially in a situation where there is a sole survivor.

What am I looking at here? This is the first of the two aforementioned semifinal tournament matches for the vacant WE World Heavyweight Championship. You can see the bracket leading up to Survivor Series here:

Roman Reigns is a handsome prince who is related to none other than The Rock. Since he’s a reasonably charismatic, larger-than-life specimen of humanity, he’s the guy WWE is hoping will become their next massively marketable superstar. Since they tried to push him to the moon last year and that ended up being a bit too early, he’s spent the bulk of 2015 getting better and better and is finally ready to take that main event spot and run with it.

Alberto Del Rio recently returned to the company, won the United States Championship from John Cena (who is currently taking time off) and is working a fairly confusing gimmick where he and manager Zeb Colter are touting an imaginary country called “MexAmerica” and calling fans “haters.” I believe their deal is that they’re presenting a façade of extreme tolerance but are bad guys because they’re being intolerant of everyone but themselves. I think that’s what is happening. I reserve the right to be super wrong.

Why you should care: There’s going to be a new champion! Tournaments are fun and this tournament in particular has been outstanding so far. Just ignore that the one true stinker so far has been a Del Rio match. Nothing to see there.

What am I looking at here? Dean Ambrose is an unhinged, greasy-haired goofball in designer jeans. Kevin Owens is a violent jerk who wrestles in a T-shirt and is only interested in beating people up for money. They both want to win the world championship, because they’re ultimately reasonable people.

Why you should care: See above. A world title tournament is wonderful. Also, these are two of the best performers WWE has right now. This could be a bit of a breakthrough match for both men, as advancing to the tournament final would be huge for either.

What am I looking at here? Charlotte is the literal daughter of Ric Flair. Paige is her longtime rival and former kinda-best friend. In a strange and emotional segment on Monday’s RAW, Charlotte spoke about how she’s a wrestler in part to live out the dreams of her late younger brother, Reid. Paige then took it upon herself to mock said deceased brother and the two women had a violent, pull-apart brawl.

Why you should care: Both women are extremely talented and this match now has the added drama of real-life emotion, if not bad blood. Worst-case scenario, they have a competitive, entertaining match. That’s often the best-case scenario for a lot of male wrestlers.

What am I looking at here? The Undertaker and Kane are the Brothers of Destruction, a dead guy and a demon related via weird funeral parlor diddling. (It’s complicated.) The Wyatt Family are a cabal of hillbilly cultists who wear sheep masks and may or may not have stolen Undertaker and Kane’s powers of fireworks and indoor lightning. Bray Wyatt will select two members of his four-man stable to face Undertaker and Kane, but the DestructBros won’t know which two ahead of time.

Why you should care: The Undertaker is working his heaviest schedule in a long time (this will be his fourth match of the year) and it’s in his 25th year in the WWE. That’s impressive, no matter how you slice it. His matches are an event, kind of similar to Brock Lesnar matches (but with fewer suplexes). Let’s all gather round and celebrate the Undertaker, even though he and his brother might lose this one.

What am I looking at here? It’ll either be Reigns vs. his best buddy Ambrose in the finals or Reigns vs. supreme jerk Kevin Owens. Both of those matchups would be fun for a lot of different reasons. (Technically, it could also be Del Rio vs. either Owens or Ambrose, but ... no. No, that won’t be happening.)

Why you should care: If it comes down to Ambrose vs. Reigns, it’s possible that one of these two beer-drinkin’ pals could turn to the dark side and align with The Authority to screw over their former Shield brother-in-arms. So that adds a specific level of intrigue to the goings-on.

But this will be a winner-take-all match for the world title. For Reigns, Ambrose or Owens, this would be their first-ever world title reign. That’s a very big deal and it will be exciting to see. Survivor Series is probably one of the WWE PPVs you’ll want to make sure to tune into this year. It might actually end up exceeding the hype.

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