WWE enters new era as wrestling giant streams ‘Monday Night Raw’ on Netflix

Nick Khan’s prediction turns into a actuality on Monday night time.

The World Wrestling Leisure govt mentioned throughout incomes calls prior to now that he noticed a day when Netflix would proceed to evolve and enter into dwell programming, a lot to the consternation of Netflix officers.

Nonetheless, Khan noticed the hires that Netflix was making together with the streaming service’s choices that might enchantment to all members of the family.

Now, a kind of choices is the WWE.

The 1,650th episode of “Monday Night time Uncooked” from the Intuit Dome outdoors of Los Angeles formally kicks off WWE’s 10-year partnership with Netflix. The settlement, reached final January, is price in extra of $5 billion with an possibility for Netflix to increase for an extra 10 years or decide out after 5.

“We attempt to enchantment the WWE to all 50 states and to international locations globally. We predict Netflix does the identical factor,” mentioned Khan, who’s WWE’s president.

Netflix – which has 282.3 million subscribers in additional than 190 international locations – turns into the unique dwelling of “Uncooked” within the U.S., Canada, the UK and Latin America, with extra international locations to be added over time. The larger element for Netflix although, is that the streaming platform will carry the entire firm’s reveals abroad – together with “Smackdown” and “NXT” – in addition to premium dwell occasions like WrestleMania, SummerSlam and Royal Rumble.

Within the U.S., “Smackdown” moved to USA Community from Fox and “NXT” from USA to the CW three months in the past. Peacock has a contract to hold WWE’s premium dwell occasions by means of March 2026.

“Uncooked” started airing on Jan. 11, 1993, and is the longest working weekly episodic sequence on tv. Most of that point had been on USA Community with a run on Spike TV, now often called Paramount Community.

“It has nice storytelling, characters together with memorable and stunning tales. And the thought of mixing this sort of intense fandom with these characters and our attain globally simply appeared like such an incredible alternative,” mentioned Bela Bajaria, Netflix’s chief content material officer. “What we additionally love is the multigenerational fan base. On the finish of the day, we now have nice issues that our members love and this completely delivers on the entire issues that we would like. And to do it 52 weeks a yr is tremendous thrilling.”

WWE’s world attain has expanded in the course of the previous yr, with almost half of its premium dwell occasions happening abroad. The corporate can even embark on an prolonged tour of Europe in March to construct momentum for WrestleMania 41, which takes place in Las Vegas April 19 and 20.

Khan mentioned WWE first approached Netflix about its rights in 2018, however Netflix wasn’t prepared to start carrying dwell occasions. The streaming service has ramped up its efforts in the course of the previous yr, not solely with sports activities occasions, however with Chris Rock’s comedy particular and the roast of Tom Brady.

Brandon Riegg, Netflix’s vp of nonfiction sequence and sports activities, mentioned the social media buzz round “Uncooked” every week in addition to the secure viewers WWE gives made it a pure match this time when the corporate approached Netflix final yr.

In flip, Riegg thinks Netflix can assist broaden WWE’s viewers the best way it did with Formulation 1 and the “Drive to Survive” sequence.

“It actually was simply becoming in to the entire image of we’ll do these large occasions just like the Tyson-Paul combat and the NFL on Christmas,” he mentioned. “However then all year long, if we are able to have a gradual drumbeat of these wonderful dwell moments and dwell motion and spectacle, that is what we’ll get with WWE.”

In line with Nielsen, “Uncooked’s” last episode on USA Community averaged 1.6 million viewers regardless of going towards the “Monday Night time Soccer” matchup between the Detroit Lions and San Francisco 49ers.

Khan and WWE chief content material officer Paul “Triple H” Levesque have additionally burdened that the three-hour weekly present won’t harm its score resulting from being on a streaming platform. “Uncooked” was recognized for toeing the road on dangerous content material in the course of the late Nineties in what WWE referred to as the “Perspective Period,” however that has modified through the years.

“It isn’t pushing anyone away of what they need. It is a protected place for households and all people to have the ability to view. That won’t change, however you do not have to alter that to broaden and enhance what you do,” Levesque mentioned.

WWE’s storytelling and character improvement continues to excel even throughout exterior challenges. Former chairman Vince McMahon resigned final January after a lawsuit claiming sexual misconduct. In 2023, WWE was purchased by Endeavor and merged with Final Preventing Championship to create TKO Group Holdings.

In line with WWE, there have been 44 sellouts for TV reveals and 66 general, together with home reveals and premium dwell occasions, in 2024.

WWE champion Cody Rhodes credited Khan and Levesque for maintaining the corporate on monitor, together with scaling again on a number of the non-televised dwell occasions to ensure prime expertise doesn’t get burned out in the course of the yr.

Levesque mentioned Monday’s present will likely be on the extent of a premium dwell occasion. John Cena, who’s retiring from WWE on the finish of the yr, begins his farewell tour with three principal occasion matches on faucet. It additionally would not be a shock if Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson makes an look.

Roman Reigns, who will participate in one of many principal occasion matches, mentioned he’s all the time making an attempt to place his finest foot ahead, however he additionally is aware of how large Monday night time is for the corporate.

“There isn’t any hiding that that is Netflix and that is large and that is going to be on a worldwide platform with lots of people watching. I am unsure precisely what that viewers goes to appear like. It is going to be loopy, I do know that.”