Moving Monday Night Raw to Netflix makes a certain amount of sense. The color schemes match. After many years of vowing never to do so, Netflix has begun to move into live sports, including NFL game and whatever Mike Tyson/Jake Paul nonsense was. Sure, WWE’s big events and entire archive are over on Peacock, but not everybody has Peacock, while most have Netflix.
The first Netflix show was on Monday, January 6, coming from the new Intuit Dome arena in Los Angeles. The show was glitch-free, professionally produced, and really showcased the new arena. Regarding the quality of its video production, WWE is right up there with the major sports leagues, and that was the case here.
There were strong matches, including a long one between Roman Reigns and Solo Sikoa, a main event clash between CM Punk and Seth Rollins, and a women’s match that had Rhea Ripley winning the title from Liv Morgan.
The debut on Netflix was treated like a big deal, with an elaborate video package playing over Triple-H’s voice-over which, oddly, used former Internet Wrestling Community terms like “face” and “heel.”
It’s Gone Hollywood
A lot of familiar faces from previous eras of wrestling made major appearances, including The Rock, John Cena — who announced he would enter the Royal Rumble as part of his farewell tour — and even the “retired” The Undertaker. The three of them, and Triple-H had wrestling heydays back when Netflix was still a movies-by-mail service.
The Rock, who during his run last year was a heel, indicated that he’s now a good guy, but remains allied with his cousin, Roman Reigns.
But if I had a complaint, it’s that the show was a bit too much about celebrities. Numerous famous people, from old-time wrestlers to Macauley Culkin to Gabriel Iglesias (promoting a Netflix special) to Ashton Kutcher to Bill Simmons, were recognized in the crowd, as were various Netflix executives.
Maybe it was because it was in Los Angeles, but the show was a bit Hollywood-centric, to the point where I felt like I was watching the Democratic convention.
Hulk Hogan
Then there was one prominent speaker from last year’s Republican convention. That would be Hulk Hogan, whose wrestling heyday came entirely before RAW even existed; he was more associated with Monday Nitro than RAW. Arriving to lots of boos, the Hulkster hawked a new WWE sponsorship of his beer brand.
If there’s going to be a WWE great hawking beer, shouldn’t it be Stone Cold Steve Austin? Hogan was associated with saying your prayers and eating your vitamins, not drinking… I’m also wondering if young people who are wrestling fans even know who Hogan is? His prime was about 40 years ago, and even the NWO started almost 30 years ago. When I was a kid, they didn’t feel the need to occasionally drag out Bruno Sammartino on WWF Superstars.
The other pretty bad thing from the night? WWE announced that in 2026, the Royal Rumble will take place in… Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, indicating that the “new era” still involves being in business with a murderous foreign regime.
With its first Monday Night Raw Netflix show, WWE showed that it can keep the steam going for a three-hour show, while also putting on an exciting event for what’s now going to be a worldwide audience. But please: How about a little bit less Hulk Hogan going forward?
