WWE made its long-awaited transition to Netflix, and it was three hours of soapy wrestling goodness if that’s something you’re into.
While it was light on the actual wrestling, it was heavy on the nostalgia and even heavier on the fun. It decided to forgo the typical RAW product and deliver something more on par with a lower-level pay-per-view event than a weekly program.
How you felt about that may depend on your fandom. Either way, the inaugural Netflix RAW was a success by all accounts, but can it continue to live up to the hype?
WWE RAW was a staple on the USA network for a long time, but with audiences changing viewing habits, it was only a matter of time before wrestling started to branch out beyond broadcast and network television.
You’re seeing it more and more with professional sports.
Where in the past, you could watch your favorite team play on a local station or a cable network like ESPN, you can still do that, but at least a few times during the season, you’ll have to have a streaming app to watch one of the games.
That’s just how the tide is turning now, so it wasn’t a shock when news hit that the WWE would be taking their talents to the biggest streaming service of all.
Netflix has been getting into the live sporting event arena, with the Mike Tyson vs. Jake Paul fight being the biggest one that comes to mind.
If you decided to stay up for that one, like myself, you know it was a tough night. Not only was the fight lackluster, but there were many buffering issues throughout the evening, making it a very unpleasant viewing experience.
The good news for WWE was there were no widespread complaints about the buffering, and the show went off without a hitch.
If you’ve ever attended a WWE event, then you know that they run a tight ship. And the first RAW of the new year was no exception.
The show flowed nicely from start to finish, even if you really started to feel the three-hour run time towards the end.
The show was wise to kick things off with Triple H, the Chief Content Officer, and then The Rock, who came out to essentially be a voice for the company and thank the beloved Netflix for allowing their program to grace its prestigious app.
Both wrestlers are well-known in the history of the company. If you ask a random person on the street if they could name three professional wrestlers, then chances are The Rock will be in there, and Triple H will get some love as well.
But the thing is, Triple H’s wrestling days are long behind him, and he only comes out nowadays to make an official announcement or on a show with many eyeballs. And The Rock.
Well, The Rock does whatever he wants, but if you tuned into this first episode thinking you’ll see him every week like it’s 1999, you will be disappointed.
They treated this first episode like it was the biggest day of the year, a means of getting casual viewers who maybe don’t check out the product every week and those who do to buy into this new iteration of RAW.
That’s all well and good, especially considering this episode deviated from the norm, but it’s important to remember they were pulling out all the stops for this one, and it likely won’t be like this every week.
An average RAW episode will have at least five, if not a few more matches, and this one had four. Four wrestling matches on a three-hour wrestling show isn’t exactly sustainable.
Aside from the nostalgia of years past with cameos by The Rock, Triple H, The Undertaker, and John Cena, there was also a curious decision to bring Hulk Hogan on board, which resulted in a resounding chorus of boos that sounded LOUD in my living room.
Appealing to the past wasn’t a bad idea, but Hulk Hogan will never be someone you want to be the face of anything now.
The actual wrestling during the evening ranged from fun to forgettable, but it was also a solid showcase of what this version of the WWE has to offer, albeit with a tiny sample size.
Roman Reigns versus Solo Sikoa was a meeting of two powerhouses within an influential and longstanding wrestling family.
At the same time, Rhea Ripley versus Liv Morgan was a way to put two of the most prominent women wrestlers front and center with a championship on the line.
Things dipped a bit when Jey Uso and Drew McIntyre took center stage, if only because the stakes were low and the wrestling was slow.
But ending the night with Seth Rollins and CM Punk brought energy back into the crowd and the show.
They treated the evening like it was an event.
Whether or not you were watching WWE for the first time, have seen it in passing over the years, or spend your hard-earned money to attend shows and watch the products weekly, you most likely found something to enjoy.
So, was it a success? In the broader sense, it was. It got people talking, and that’s exactly what an event like that should do.
But where do they go from here?
Well, for starters, they probably shouldn’t try to replicate this particular episode anytime soon because they won’t be able to, though it may be jarring for new viewers who tune in next week to see something completely different from the spectacle that was this first hour.
But they’d do well to spend some extra time introducing all the players in various storylines, perhaps with extra video packages detailing who they are and their current feud.
And they’d do well to actually put some decent matches on the card.
Now, I don’t think they’re actively trying not to do that.
But they have such an opportunity to grow the WWE with this worldwide platform, and they’ll have to do that off the backs of the current wrestlers, not The Rock and John Cena of yesteryear.
Put your top babyfaces and heels on full display during episode two, and allow them the chance to win over the new viewers tuning in.
In many respects, the company has never been hotter, and they now have a chance to showcase what their product is all about to people all over the world.
WWE RAW on Netflix is here to stay.
While it started off hot, it’s important to keep it that way by allowing viewers to get a peek into what it has to offer outside of the throwbacks, celebrity appearances, and flashy set pieces.
This will be far from the last time audiences will get a large-scale WWE production, but in the interim, it’s time to lean into what’s made them so successful right now and trust that they’ve done enough to get people interested in what they have to offer.
What did you guys think about the first RAW of the new year?
Was it overstuffed?
Or stuffed just right?
Let us know in the comments!
You can watch WWE RAW on Netflix on Mondays at 8/7c.