WWE DVD Review - Live in the UK April 2011

WWE DVD Review: Live in the UK April 2011


By Phil Allely

This past April the WWE made its first trip to these shores of the year (the Wrestlemania Revenge Tour) and as has become customary they recorded an episode of Raw, Smackdown and NXT whilst in London. Filmed at the O2 this double DVD set brings together all three of these shows.

These UK filmed shows are every bit as good as their US counterparts and in some ways better as the crowds in the UK are inevitably far more excited about seeing their favourite WWE superstars up close and personal than their home country fans. This makes sense really as the WWE continually tour the US, but we UK fans get to see them twice yearly if we are lucky.

From a production point of view RAW, Smackdown and NXT fare well indeed, the shows are slick, the content ranging from decent to average and the match quality averaging the same levels. The absence of a few of the big names does hamper things, but the lower card roster members drafted in out do themselves and the remaining upper tier performers do pull out all the stops too.

On the match front you get a fairly exciting and mixed bag of bouts, these vary in style and pace, but with the added bonus of a hot live crowd even the poorest one still entertains.

Storylines of course do count here (unlike many UK house shows, where the wrestlers forget such things and simply enjoy being there). On the Wrestlemania Revenge front we get a nice CM Punk v Randy Orton brawl, plus a very decent looking Cody Rhodes/Rey Mysterio effort. There are also some nice matches such as R-Truth/John Morrison (#1 contenders match for the WWE Championship), The Miz/Alex Riley versus John Cena/Sin Cara, Kane/Big Show taking on Heath Slater/Justin Gabriel (WWE Tag Titles), amongst many others including a few reasonably involving NXT challenges.

These being live shows there are of course backstage segments, interviews, skits and much more. They all work very well indeed.

On the extras front there is a wonderful (especially since Edge’s retirement) match-up 2001’s Uk PPv event Rebellion, this pitted the (pre) Rated R Superstar against his storyline Brother and real life best friend Christian.

With almost five hours of action over two discs this release has certainly got enough to keep every WWE fan entertained, those attended the events will most likely appreciate it all the more. Whilst those of us who wonder what a UK based recorded show looks like will certainly enjoy the events and no doubt be organising their trip to the next one before the final credits roll.

WWE Live in the UK- April 2011 is on release now, available from www.silvervision.co.uk and other retailers.