It seems that 90% of my social media feeds are all about Star Wars this week. Perfectly understandable, and the reports have been good enough that I’m booked in to see the film with my dad early next year.
The thing that I’m raving about this week? NXT Take-Over London.
Like many wrestling fans, I subscribe to the WWE network primarily so I’ll have access to the NXT brand. It started out as a small show where the ‘E trained up their newer wrestlers, but it’s evolved into the wrestling show that delivers on the potential of the medium, week after week. It’s grown from a show filmed on a university campus in Florida to a show that attracts a live crowd of 10,000 people in London.
It’s good, is what I’m saying.
But NXT TakeOver London was fricken’ outstanding. It was the kind of wrestling show where everything was thought out, where every match and every result felt like it mattered, and the suspension of disbelief was easy.
It’s the show when two of the three best matches featured female performers, in a company that has a history of treating its women’s division as eye-candy (at worst) or an afterthought (at best).
Wrestling, like writing, is a place where the little things matter. You don’t notice them when they’re done well, but you’ll find yourself loosing interest when they’re handled in a clumsy fashion.
NXT, in this instance, gets the little things right. It may be the show that will convert you into a wrestling fan if you’re not already interested, but if you are a wrestling fan and you’re not watching this show, get the fuck out there and rectify that.
