Next January, RAW will move to Netflix as part of a huge deal which will see WWE's flagship show land a new streaming home. That's going to bring the product into more homes than ever before, while international fans will also get SmackDown, NXT, and every PLE on the platform.
Thanks to AceOdds, we recently got the opportunity to ask RAW commentator Wade Barrett about the show's move to Netflix. We specifically wondered how he thinks the product will evolve when it premieres on January 6.
After all, much has been said about what WWE will look like without a cable network on hand to censor those "Holy sh*t" chants.
"I think the really exciting thing about wrestling over the past few years has been how completely unpredictable this thing has been. Now I go back in time, 10 or 15 years in my career, it felt at times like the show was stagnant and you kind of knew six months out exactly who was going to be fighting who every week. You knew who was going to be winning. You knew who they were going to be fighting next."
"I have no clue how this Netflix deal is going to work out. I think a lot of the management doesn't really know either. They'll have some ideas but the fact that it's so unpredictable, I have no clue what that first show on Netflix is going to look like. And I have no clue what tricks and bells and whistles they're going to add to the show. And that really excites me as a fan as much as I can, even though I've worked in this industry a long time, and I'm really close to the product and I'm on TV every week, I try to retain a bit of that fandom because I think it's really important not to lose that."
"I did lose that at one point in my career, which was when I left in 2016. To have that back and to have that excitement, I have no clue what Netflix is going to be like. I'm really, really excited about that, and the questions it leaves in my head and the anticipation for it just build up more and more. I can't give you an answer there and I think it's a good thing that I don't know."
It's great to get insights like these from a future WWE Hall of Famer...and to learn that, at his core, he's also still a fan!
While RAW will almost certainly get a new look and perhaps a little more creative freedom in terms of the storyline and violence presented, we don't anticipate WWE moving away from its largely PG approach to pro wrestling, particularly when they have a lot of young fans.
During the Triple H era, we've seen an increase in blood on shows, so it's not as if RAW will become unrecognisable when it makes the move to Netflix in the New Year.
Stay tuned for more from our Q&A with Barrett tomorrow.