WWE NXT UK Review: Episode 28

Reviews

January 30, 2019 – Blackpool, Lancashire

The show starts with a nice video hyping Walter’s in-ring debut, which is good because the segment he was a part of last week was a dud.

Dave Mastiff def. Jay Melrose
Mastiff won this thing in 5:00 with his Into the Void cannonball. This big beard battle was a boring affair, wherein Primate got to show off a bit of his strength against the massive Mastiff before being put down. They lost the crowd because they tried to trade holds, and that’s just not what these two should be doing. At five minutes this felt like an eternity. ½*

Xia Brookside gets a hype video. I’m not mad that she’s going to be featured, especially if it’s at the expense of Isla Dawn and Nina Samuels.

James Drake & Zack Gibson come out for a gab sesh. Gibson says that he and Drake won the tag titles because they focused on wrestling instead of new costumes or a fancy tag team nickname. Have they never been called the Grizzled Young Veterans on TV? I could have sworn they had. That’s some Mandela Effect madness right there. Anyway, he dubs them the GYV now. Human lampshade enthusiast Sid Scala comes out and announces that when NXT goes to Phoenix, Arizona, the champs will face Oney Lorcan and Danny Burch in a title match. Color me aroused.

WALTER def. Jack Starz
I guess WWE is doing the all-caps thing for WALTER, which I frankly find kind of indie-weak. He won in 2:30 with a powerbomb and was very over and looked very impressive. I mean, the big fella does the Jon Woo dropkick. This is how squashes are done well, so well done. After the match, Mark Coffey threatens WALTER in the back. The European Union offers WALTER their support, but he blows them off. N/A

Jinny def. Kasey Owens
Jinny won in 5:10 with the Makeover. Like Dawn vs. Brookside a few weeks ago, this was a notch above the usual lame squashes in this division by showing off a bit of fun on the mat. The crowd barely noticed this though, so Jinny is going to have to work on how well she connects with them. *¾

Earlier today, Rhea Ripley demanded that Scala and Johnny Saint give her a shot at Toni Storm’s title in Phoenix. Saint, who speaks without Scala’s help for a chance, makes the match for three weeks from now. He also books Mark Coffey against WALTER for next week, but does so via Twitter.

Trent Seven & Tyler Bate def. Fabian Aichner & Marcel Barthel
Mustache Mountain won in 13:08 when they hit Barthel with the rebound elbow/dragon suplex combo. It took a little bit for everyone to get into a groove, but once they did we got the balls-to-the-wall action we’re used to from big NXT tag team matches. I’m not sure that Mustache Mountain have won with that particular combo before, but I’m glad they did here because it felt quite brutal and as appropriate an ending as you could hope for. ***½

Everything is building nicely to the series of episodes that will emanate from Phoenix, though aside from WALTER’s match next week, the remaining episode from the UK seems lost in the shuffle. We’ll see if it can deliver next week.

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