Kane Tombstones Daniel Bryan off WWE television before Extreme Rules

The opening segment of this week's Monday Night Raw was the first time in a long while I was legitimately open-mouthed during the hours of 8 p.m. to 11 p.m. on the USA network. Once Kane snuck to ringside to attack Daniel Bryan, I thought, "Okay, he'll lay him out and that sets up the match at Extreme Rules."

Then things turned brutal.

Firstly, I was just psyched that Kane brought back the Tombstone, which affected me more in light of Undertaker's first WrestleMania loss. So that was enough to make me react.

The first Tombstone on the outside of the ring was solid enough.

The second one on the steel steps dropped my jaw.

The third one on the announce table was almost too much to watch, especially after the nice touch of his pulling Bryan off the stretcher.

I know the whole segment was designed to get Bryan off the show as quickly as possible so that he could be with his family in the wake of his father's unexpected and untimely passing, but it was still an extremely effective way to build to the match at Extreme Rules for the WWE World Heavyweight Championship, which in all honesty seems like a placeholder until the company has something more interesting to do with the champ.

I actually didn't hear about his father's death until after the segment aired, so I went back and watched the whole thing from the top. It's clear that Bryan was looking to the sky during his two Yes chants and it looked like he even wiped a way a tear or two. All credit to him for insisting that he go out there and perform for the people, and all credit to WWE for devising a way to support their champion AND use it to further the story. As I said in my Raw recap, condolences, thoughts and prayers go out to Bryan Danielson and his family during this time of grief.

Now, let's get snarky with some wrestling logic. Bryan is able to survive The Shield for months, gets to WrestleMania, beats Triple H (and Stephanie by extension), essentially has one arm, gets into the main event against a fresh Randy Orton and Batista, gets through crooked referees and triumphs to win the title.

But Kane demolishes him by himself.

That's not a problem WWE can fix, and it's not even really a problem. More of a quirk that made me chuckle.

Anyways, it's not clear yet if Bryan will return for the go-home Raw next week, but given the circumstances I say let the guy take as much time as he needs. It would be a bit odd in that he wouldn't have said a word about the feud before Extreme Rules but again, these are special circumstances. Plus, Stephanie and Kane can do enough talking to keep it alive until next Sunday, and we've seen one-sided buildups work in the past (ex: CM Punk vs. Chris Jericho at Payback 2013).

On a related note, Stephanie McMahon is amazing. She is doing some of the best promo work of her life in the past several weeks. She's got the same qualities that made everyone hate her during the McMahon-Helmsley Regime era, but now she's added the "scary mother" component to make it even more terrifying. She's part Vince McMahon, part mother hen who will pluck your eyes out if you cross her.

I'll touch on this more in the future, but this booking of Cesaro is turning my brain into jelly. Somehow he, Paul Heyman, Jack Swagger and Zeb Colter are all heels (I think) but sort of faces (I think) and getting booed and cheered at the same time (I think). No one has any clue how to react when the Swiss Superman does anything now, which could prove problematic especially because Heyman spends 90% of his screen time repeating "MY CLIENT BROCK LESNAR BROKE THE STREAK!" like he's a malfunctioning computer and ignoring Cesaro's presence.

As always, we need to give this story time to play out (Heyman and Cesaro have been a team for less than a month), so perhaps something greater is in the works for the rising star.

We'll break down the Extreme Rules card next Thurday, but here are a few random thoughts to end this week's column:

-       I'm not as outraged by the Emma/Santino pairing as some others, but turning Emma into quite literally a female version of Santino does nothing to help anyone. Also, could they fight someone else besides Fandango and Layla?!

-       MY CLIENT BROCK LESNAR BROKE THE STREAK!

-       Paige is actually getting to work some longer matches, which is great for the Divas division. I'm genuinely looking forward to her match with Tamina at Extreme Rules.

-       MY CLIENT BROCK LESNAR BROKE THE STREAK!

-       The Shield vs. Evolution buildup moved forward this week, but I'm curious which team will look stronger heading into their match next week.

-       MY CLIENT BROCK LES...oh, the hell with it...

Questions? Comments? Concerns? As always, please leave your thoughts in the comments below and we'll talk again next week!