Botched Spot

As I mentioned recently in one of my comics, I just started subscribing to Ring of Honor’s Honor Club about a week ago and it’s… pretty good. I went all in on the service at the $120 VIP level, and while I stand by my original tepid excitement of it being a good way to keep up with Ring of Honor, there is definitely some room for improvement.

I’ve followed Ring of Honor off and on since Sinclair took them over in 2011, usually depending on who their top stars were, how far behind the tv show was from their most recent Pay Per View and how much free time I had to watch more wrestling than what WWE was putting out. I’ve always wanted to stay more committed though, and when I heard that RoH recently put out an app for their service I jumped on board.

I’ve subscribed to a few different wrestling streaming services so far, like NJPW and Chikaratopia, but while I enjoy them at first, I usually become overwhelmed with the other wrestling I’m already watching and quickly fall behind. I’m hoping Honor Club will turn that around due to their easy to use app, current content that’s on there, and the quality shows and wrestlers that I’ve come to know and love.

Some I love more than others.

So far what I like the most about Honor Club is how easy it makes it to stay up to date on Ring of Honor. By not only having the TV shows available right away but also pay per views and tours that they’ve filmed, like the recent UK tour, it makes the whole promotion really accessible. WWE had me switching between my Spectrum cable app, Facebook app, and WWE Network app in the weeks leading up to Wrestlemania, but Honor Club keeps things simple and easy.

The one glaring issue with Honor Club is the lack of classic Ring of Honor footage. It’s hard to find much, if anything, on there from before 2011, which is pretty shocking for a company that prides itself on a rich history of helping today’s superstars cut their teeth. While the WWE Network really feels like a celebration of WWE’s history, the Honor Club’s “VOD Vault” section barely has anything other than some matches from 2011 onwards and a few compilations about Bryan Danielson, CM Punk, and Kevin Steen. This wouldn’t bother me as much if Ring of Honor was up front about what’s on there, but on the Honor Club sign up page there’s only a vague reference to “historical footage”. I shouldn’t have to do Google searches and comb through message boards to find out what’s on there, especially when Honor Club doesn’t even have a free trial or anything.

Ultimately though I’m still glad I subscribed to Honor Club because I’ve always been more interested in what’s happening right now in promotions rather than what’s happened in the past. It would be great to watch old shows and I really hope they add them in the future, but to be honest, I rarely go back and watch old footage on the WWE Network so I’m not sure that this would be any different. If a year rolls around and they still don’t have any older content on there I might not renew, but until then I’ll enjoy the new content Ring of Honor puts out.

Maybe I should find this classically historic on tour show I went to.