It would be rare for a whole week of WWE TV to be classified as “must see” but at the very least you can usually be guaranteed as hot atmosphere and a lively crowd when the WWE brings their camera’s to the United Kingdom.
This latest Live in the UK set brings together the episodes of RAW and Smackdown taped in Manchester in November 2013 along with the action from Superstars and Main Event (the latter of which has never been shown on UK TV).
Purely on paper, Raw is a stacked card. The main event sees perhaps the two most popular members of the roster for UK fans in Daniel Bryan and CM Punk teaming up to take on The Shield. It’s nothing spectacular but is a good TV main event and plays forth before a hot crowd. It’s the match of the show for sure.
The rest is standard TV fare for the most part. John Cena destroys The Real Americans despite the 2-on-1 odds, whilst Randy Orton against Cody Rhodes and Goldust peters out once Orton tries to do a runner and is summarily put through a table by the Big Show.
Fandango and Tyson Kidd have a fun little match, sadly one that is built around angles from Total Divas and there is fun for UK fans to see 3MB become the “Union Jacks” for a week. That they take on Los Matadores means we see another fun match, albeit one that doesn’t really matter.
Big E Langston against Alberto Del Rio is ok and Damien Sandow against Kofi Kingston is an adequate TV encounter but Ryback against R-Truth and Dolph Ziggler challenging Curtis Axel for the Intercontinental title are strange ones. The former because Ryback does the j-o-b and the latter because it’s almost as if Ziggler never won the World Title earlier in the year. The least said about Tamina against Nikki Bella the better.
It’s not one of the all-time classic Raw’s and very little of consequence happens, but it is a reasonably fun show and the end confrontation between The Shield and The Wyatt’s goes over very well with the fans.
Disc 2 gives us a good Main Event show. AJ and Natalya have a good Diva’s match; it’s not up there with AJ’s matches with Kaitlyn but it’s a cut above the usual dross associated with the division. Tyson Kidd has a good back and forth bout with Justin Gabriel and show that the WWE could do so much more with both of these talented guys (though I’m not holding my breath). The Union Jacks finish things with a reasonable six-man against the Prime Time Players and R-Truth.
Superstars gives us the two fresh matches that were on that show. The Funkadactyls against Aksana and Alica Fox is as non-descript as you might imagine and the “main event” of The Great Khali & The Uso’s against The Miz and Prime Time Players simply has no reason to exist. You aren’t missing much if you skip this.
Smackdown is a notch below the RAW show. Punk and Bryan team up again in the main event to take on Curtis Axel and Ryback in what is the match of the night, largely because other than The Uso’s against the Wyatt Family’s Harper & Rowan there is very little competition.
John Cena and Alberto Del Rio have an arm wrestling contest, Natalya and Tamina have a dull match that still manages to be better than The Bella’s against the Funkadactyls and Hunico and Camacho make a hugely successful return to TV by getting destroyed by the Great Khali. We also get yet more Union Jacks action as they take on R-Truth and Prime Time Players in another nothing match.
The only thing in the way of extra’s is a Triple H and Undertaker match from 2002’s UK ppv Insurrexion. It’s a lacklustre, phoned-in effort from both.
The main audience for this release will probably be fans who were there in person for one or both of the tapings. There’s little to entice fans who weren’t there live, although the previously unseen on Sky Main Event taping is a fun little show. Raw is decent, Superstars is abominable and Smackdown is largely neither here nor there. Still, it’s a good set for fans wanting a memento of their night out and it certainly packs a lot into the two disc set.
– By Matthew Roberts | @IWFICON
Thank you to our partners, WWEDVD.co.uk and Fetch.fm for providing our copy of WWE Live in the UK: November 2013. WWE Live in the UK: November 2013 is available on DVD and Blu-Ray from 3rd February. You can pre-order your copy from WWEDVD.co.uk now by clicking here.