Ranking Every NXT TakeOver From Worst To Best

5. Brooklyn

Finn Bálor Samoa Joe
WWE

Sasha Banks' NXT Women's Championship loss to Bayley was probably the most important moment of the decade for WWE.

It concluding a beautiful match highlighted a Brooklyn card that signalled NXT's move away from Full Sail supercards to main roster-adjacent epics. It stole the f*cking show and year by returning evocative physicality to the company's burgeoning women's division and pure, throat-draining emotion to WWE's output full-stop. It wasn't even the first to do so, but it was fitting that the payoff to a road paved by several clashes elsewhere in this list shone a spotlight on two of the performers most responsible for it.

A card greater than the sum of its parts, Brooklyn offered this and a bruising ladder main event as excellent epics but saw potentially passable matches made truly, earnestly great by a crowd falling head over heels for the brand. Blue Pants got the pop of her life as The Vaudevillains' antidote to Alexa Bliss' interference during a Tag Title switch with Blake and Murphy, whilst Jushin Liger's one and only appearance under WWE's auspices came as part of an awesome alternate universe opener against NXT favourite Tyler Breeze.

Part celebration part inauguration, NXT grew beyond this relatively humble card, but rarely felt quite as epic.

Contributor
Contributor

Michael is a writer, editor, podcaster and presenter for WhatCulture Wrestling, and has been with the organisation nearly 8 years. He primarily produces written, audio and video content on WWE and AEW, but also provides knowledge and insights on all aspects of the wrestling industry thanks to a passion for it dating back over 35 years. As one third of "The Dadley Boyz" Michael has contributed to the huge rise in popularity of the WhatCulture Wrestling Podcast and its accompanying YouTube channel, earning it top spot in the UK's wrestling podcast charts with well over 62,000,000 total downloads. He has been featured as a wrestling analyst for the Tampa Bay Times, GRAPPL, GCP, Poisonrana and Sports Guys Talking Wrestling, and has covered milestone events in New York, Dallas, Las Vegas, Philadelphia, London and Cardiff. Michael's background in media stretches beyond wrestling coverage, with a degree in Journalism from the University Of Sunderland (2:1) and a series of published articles in sports, music and culture magazines The Crack, A Love Supreme and Pilot. When not offering his voice up for daily wrestling podcasts, he can be found losing it singing far too loud watching his favourite bands play live. Follow him on X/Twitter - @MichaelHamflett