Power Outages Hurt WWE SmackDown In Saudi Arabia - Major Segments Affected (WWE News)
WWE edited SmackDown's broadcast in the United States following huge problems.
This week's episode of WWE SmackDown aired earlier than usual internationally via Netflix due to Night Of Champions weekend taking place in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. Meanwhile, the United States broadcast on USA Network aired on tape delay, and the company were forced to make some last-minute changes to the show.
Those tuning in live elsewhere in the world would've watched their screens go black whilst Cody Rhodes and Randy Orton were mid-ring cutting a promo to hype their upcoming King Of The Ring final this Saturday. Around 30 minutes later, WWE returned with announcers Michael Cole and Wade Barrett apologising for the unplanned interruption.
A local power outage derailed the show. Fightful Select noted that Randy killed as much time as he could by meeting fans around ringside, taking pictures with them and that sort of thing. Around 25 minutes after the outage, Cody re-emerged to re-shoot the segment.
Later, PWInsider also reported that WWE had to cut time on several matches due to the power problems, but there's no word on exactly which bouts were affected. Matches like DIY vs. Andrade and Rey Fenix, as well as a 'Last Woman Standing' title fight between Tiffany Stratton and Nia Jax, definitely got plenty of time on the night.
Netflix also apologised to fans for the issues.
WWE Edited US Version Of SmackDown To Fix Things
The version of SmackDown that aired domestically back home in the United States was pretty different to the one those tuning into Netflix saw. WWE spruced up the Orton and Cody face to face, but that wasn't the only segment Triple H's production team tidied up.
It seems that the promotion also edited the closing segment between WWE PLE rivals John Cena and CM Punk. There, Punk came out in Cena's old 'Doctor Of Thuganomics' guise and cut a spirited rap on his old foe. He had a lot to remember, so it's perhaps no surprise that Punk stumbled over one or two of his lines - WWE removed the clunkiest one from the US broadcast.
Further, extra crowd noise was added to sweeten the segment and make it seem more impactful. It's understandable that a few of Punk's quicker barbs went right over the heads of those in attendance over in Riyadh. The language barrier excuse could be wheeled out to explain that one, but Saudi's crowd seemed into everything on the show overall.
These production issues weren't In Your House 8: Beware Of Dog bad, to be fair. That May 1996 pay-per-view was blighted with a storm that knocked power out inside the arena. Pivoting, then-WWF boss Vince McMahon decided to plough ahead with matches as best he could then re-film some of them a few nights later so people ordering the PPV got what they'd paid for.
Fingers crossed there are no such problems come Night Of Champions.