Posts tagged review
Tim Kail's Raw Review, 2/24/25

It’s been eight weeks since RAW debuted on Netflix, and I find myself flummoxed that the organization has done nothing original in all that time. There have been several welcome subtle changes (the announcement of the card at the start of the show, interviews among the crowd, non-seizure inducing camerawork), but no creative big swings. I don’t feel like we’re getting the best out of RAW when we so easily could. Instead, we get the usual fifteen to twenty minute opening promo segment, several midcard matches of varying degrees of significance and quality, an endless barrage of advertisements, backstage segments, interviews, and vignettes.

Some of it, like the Kevin Owens/Sami Zayn rivalry is quite good. But most of it blends into a beige, prescriptive experience. It would be nice to see and feel something largely different from the company if for no other reason than “they can”. What about an episode that consisted of just women. No explanation or pomp and circumstance, just an entire episode of women’s matches and women’s segments. People would love it. Or, the likelier of these two options, what about a roster wide brawl that overtakes the broadcast, plunging RAW into chaos?

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WOW - EP149 - 2017

For the second to last episode of 2017, Work of Wrestling podcast returns to the original three-part format of the show!

For the Lock-Up, I review everything in pro-wrestling that I've seen in 2017. I focus primarily on WWE, discussing some of the highs and the lows, what stood out to me as particularly memorable and what WWE can do better (from The Festival of Friendship to the squandering of Bayley).

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THE NXT REPORT (12/18/14)

This was another strong week for the WWE'S strongest hour, NXT, on the WWE Network.

Coming off of NXT Take Over R-Evolution, this episode needed to push the top narratives forward, but also serve as epilogue to the events of last week’s remarkable pay-per-view. The result was an unexpectedly superb main event, where the intensity of last week both winded down to a simmer, but also contributed to the mythos of Kevin Owens.

Owens’ debut last week, both at the start and conclusion of R-Evolution, is the most impressive debut I’ve had the privilege to see live. And while there are many other wrestlers on the roster who’ve been in NXT longer and conceivably have a claim to the main event and the NXT Championship, Owens instantly feels like the right fit for top heel. And, from the character’s perspective, he deserves that top spot above any of the WWE’s home grown, performance center talents due to all of his work on the independent circuit. And, because of his natural charisma and power, it's hard to deny he's better than a lot of guys on the roster.

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