BRM Reviews the 1/7/2021 NXT UK

[Big Red Machine]

#1 CONTENDERSHIP MATCH: Jinny vs. Piper Nivens- 4.5/10
Piper’s ribs got worked over but she made a comeback. Joseph Conners came out and got involved, first getting in the way of a Piper Niven dive to protect Jinny and later tripping Piper up to allow Jinny to roll her up and pin her. I believe this is the first time we’ve had more than one gender involved in a storyline in NXT UK.

PRETTY DEADLY PROMO- fine
They want the tag titles and think Gallus are afraid of them.

AOIFE VALKYRIE VIDEO PACKAGE- good
This was one of those video packages that tells you “we’re going to start pushing this person now.”

TYLER BATE PROMO- GREAT… but also weird
Bate said that as long as he learns from his mistakes, he is “liberated from the pain” of any loss. He went on to say some kind of weird stuff like “pro wrestling chose me” to “expand” the “artform,” and that he feels that so long as he absorbs everything and “reacts” “authentically” and “free of fear,” destiny will help him do that. This could go a lot of different ways.

SAM GRADWELL WATCHES TYLER BATE’S PROMO AND BURIES IT- Okay… but who was filming him/who was he talking to here and why?

SUPERNOVA SESSIONS WITH SPECIAL GUEST BEN CARTER- bad
Dar purposely screwed up Carter’s last name as “Carpenter” and ran with the joke. Carter said he was here to face the best in the world, which brought out Jordan Devlin, who is annoyed at Dar for not having him on yet when he is clearly the best. Carter put Devlin over as well and asked for a title shot tonight. Devlin was fine with it. They kept hammering home that Carter’s in-ring debut was supposed to be next week and thus he won’t be ready tonight. That feels like BS to me. Devlin has just as much notice, and every wrestler should know to be ready to wrestle on any given week.
Sid Scala showed up and said he would call Johnny Saint and see if they could move some matches around to get this done.
This was a weird segment. Everyone was still in character, but the face/heel dynamics seemed to be constantly zig-zagging just to mess with us. Dar was a lot more polite than you’d expect from a heel talk-show host, when the other heel showed up to get in the face of his guest, Dar defended him, and Dar seemed very happy for Carter to get a title shot instead doing what you’d expect from a heel and trying to show-horn himself into the match, too.
Carter was clearly a babyface, but when he challenged Devlin to a match, he came off as heelishly arrogant, and Devlin didn’t explode into the heel anger you’d expect in this situation. It was all very strange.

KAY LEE RAY PROMO- This was a strangely babyface promo on Jinny coming from someone who has been the top heel in this division for the past year and a half.

DAVE MASTIFF vs. SAXON HUXLEY- 4/10
Mastiff won a short match cleanly. Can we please be done with Saxon Huxley now?

WALTER VS. A-KID VIDEO PACKAGE- tremendous build for next week’s NXT UK Title match.

NXT CRUISERWEIGHT TITLE MATCH: Jordan Devlin(c) vs. Ben Carter- 8/10
Awesome. This was pretty clearly designed to get Carter over as a babyface by letting him show off his stuff and look valiant in defeat, and it did that perfectly. Early on in the match I found myself thinking that they probably should have found some way to clue us in on what Carter’s finisher is so we know what to look for, but as the match went on, I found myself enjoying it more not knowing, as every big move he hit felt like it could be the finish.


This was a very up and down episode of NXT UK. There was some awesome stuff, some pretty bad stuff, and very little in between. Next week’s show looks pretty stacked, including WALTER vs. A-Kid, so I’ll be watching that one as soon as the Rangers game is over.