Previously on the Best and Worst of NXT UK: TakeOver Blackpool was a success, with Toni Storm winning the Women’s Championship from Rhea Ripley, James Drake and Zack Gibson beating Mustache Mountain to become the inaugural Tag Team Champions, and Walter surprising a victorious Pete Dunne at the end of the show.
Click here to watch the show on WWE Network. If you’d like to read previous installments of the Best and Worst of NXT UK, click right here. Follow With Spandex on Twitter and Facebook. You can also follow me on Twitter if you want.
And now, the Best and Worst of NXT UK from January 16, 2019.
Worst, But Still Pretty Good: Heel Jesus Versus The Babyface Devil
I don’t usually do Best and Worst columns, in part because I tend to be pretty positive about most things (with notable exceptions) so I’m kind of giving this a Worst to prove that I can give Worsts. I liked all three of these matches just fine, but this was the least of them, and I’d feel weird if I said that every match in my first NXT UK recap was the Best. Also, WWE hasn’t put any of this match on their YouTube, which surely doesn’t reflect well on it.
As a longtime fan of masked luchadors in general, I’ve been interested in Ligero from the beginning. Unfortunately, I’m not sure I understand anything about his character or personality beyond the fact that he’s a British guy who loves lucha wrestling so much that he’s become the most English of luchadors, and he has horns. The British Bull, if you will. His red gear and mask does make him look devilish, in contrast to the oft-noted Messiah-esque aesthetic of Saxon Huxley. That guy does seem to have a character, and his character is “big weirdo.” That’s definitely something I can get behind. How can you not like a guy who calls himself the Muscle Cat?
As for the match itself, like I said above, it was fine. Pretty standard Big Man versus Luchador stuff, but it works. I’m more interested in Saxon’s work with Tyson T-Bone, to be honest, because that guy is great. “Brad Pitt in Snatch but a wrestler” is an all-time great gimmick, even if it’s who T-Bone really is. But there you go, I got distracted from the match again, proving I was right to give it the Worst. I expect both of these guys will get Bests from me in the near future, though.
Best: The Rise Of The Fashionista
I never really watched Progress, but I have friends who do and I see gifs and whatnot on the internet of course. So when NXT UK was starting up, Jinny was one of the wrestlers I was most excited to get to know. If you know me, it should be no surprise that a woman wrestler whose gimmick is being very fashionable is right up my alley. Jinny really lives up to that gimmick, too. Not only is all of her gear fabulous, it never looks like what anyone else in women’s wrestling wears at all. Style isn’t just about looking good, it’s about looking distinctly like yourself, and Jinny succeeds at that with flying colors. So I’ve been into Jinny from day one, and so I’m excited by her win here against a former #1 Contender, which seems aimed to elevate her to the title picture.
Isla Dawn has a bit of style herself, but it’s lower brow, more witchy-gothy than couture. I’m a little confused by her gimmick, which is that she’s a witch, even though when she’s in the ring the narrative is all about her physical strength, not her mystical powers. Regardless, I loved watched the physicality of this match, as Isla threw Jinny around, while the more flexible Jinny kept finding ways to wrap her long body around Isla and not let that throwing happen.
Outside of the tag division, which we’ll get to, I often have a hard time figuring out alignments in NXT UK. I had first thought Isla Dawn must be a heel since she’s a witch, but she’s specifically a “white witch,” which presumably refers to more than her Paige-esque complexion, so I’ve come to believe she’s a face. She had her title shot against Rhea Ripley, while Jinny will most likely face Toni Storm before long, so Jinny’s probably a heel, no matter how cool she is. Maybe I’m living in the past even concerning myself with any of this stuff. Regardless of who’s a hero or a villain, these women have some in-ring chemistry that makes them a lot of fun to watch.
Best: Cute Versus Strong
It’s not as hard to figure out the heel/face dynamics with the UK tag teams, because the babyface teams seem to be mostly quirky guys with lots of character, like Mark Andrews and Flash Morgan Webster, while the heel teams are just pairs of big scary strong guys, like Fabian Aichner and Marcel Barthel. That’s not to say that Aichner and Barthel aren’t interesting. Barthel in particular has a very German cockiness that I quite enjoy, especially he does his taunts in the middle of the ring.
These guys all really know how to move in the ring, so this was a really fun match. Sure, a lot of it was the two big guys from the continent just manhandling the Modfather and his skater boy buddy, but sometimes that’s how it goes. Despite getting in some good offense along the way, the good guys lost, which leads to the next chapter of the story. I don’t know if Webster and Andrews will have another chance against this team in particular, but this was a good enough match that I wouldn’t mind if they do.
I’m going to leave you there for this week, but I’m excited to be recapping NXT UK going forward. Without getting ahead of myself, I’m looking forward to talking about Dave Mastiff, Pete Dunne, Mustache Mountain, Toni Storm, and all the other wrestlers who weren’t on this “TakeOver dark matches” episode. So join me next week for more wrestling from across the pond.
