Let's be real for a second. Most modern wrestling shows feel like they’re stuck on a treadmill. You have three hours of Raw every week, two hours of SmackDown, and by the time the "Premium Live Event" rolls around, you’ve already seen the main event match four times in various tag team combinations. It's exhausting. But then, WWE Saturday Night's Main Event came back, and honestly, it’s like someone finally remembered how to make wrestling feel like an event again.
The Montreal Grudge: Why SNME 43 is the Must-Watch Show of 2026
We are currently heading straight into the Bell Centre in Montreal for the January 24, 2026, installment. If you haven't been keeping up, the vibes are heavy. The big hook? Cody Rhodes vs. Jacob Fatu. This isn't just another match; it’s being billed as a "Grudge Match" because, well, Fatu basically cost Cody the Undisputed WWE Championship.
It happened just a week ago on SmackDown in London. During that brutal Three Stages of Hell match between Cody and Drew McIntyre, Fatu decided to make it personal. He jumped the cage, laid out Cody, and gifted the title to Drew. Now, Drew is walking around with the gold, and Cody is left with nothing but a very loud Montreal crowd ready to scream "Woah" at the top of their lungs.
But SNME isn't just about one match. The card for Montreal is stacked in a way that regular TV just isn't:
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- Fatal Four-Way for the #1 Contendership: Randy Orton, Trick Williams, Damian Priest, and the hometown hero Sami Zayn. Winner gets Drew McIntyre at the Royal Rumble.
- Women’s Tag Team Championship: Rhea Ripley and Iyo Sky (the most dominant duo in years) defending against Liv Morgan and Roxanne Perez.
- The Return of "The Body": Jesse Ventura has been a staple of this revival, and hearing him trade barbs with Michael Cole and Pat McAfee is basically a fever dream for anyone who grew up with the 80s version of the show.
What Most People Get Wrong About the SNME Revival
People keep calling this a "nostalgia act." They see the old-school blue-and-yellow logo, they hear the synth-heavy Animotion "Obsession" theme, and they think WWE is just playing the hits for the 40-year-old dads in the audience.
That’s a mistake.
The reason WWE Saturday Night's Main Event actually works in 2026 isn't because of the past; it's because it solves the "Prime Time" problem. In the era of five-hour PLEs that start at 7 PM and end when you're ready to go to bed, SNME is a lean, mean, 90-minute sprint on NBC. It’s accessible. You don’t need a specialized streaming subscription to find it—it’s right there on network TV, just like it was in 1985.
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The Legend of December 13, 2025: John Cena’s Final Bow
We can't talk about the current success of this show without mentioning what happened just a few weeks ago. If you were watching NBC on December 13, you saw history. John Cena vs. Gunther. The "Greatest of All Time" against the "Ring General."
It was Cena's final match. Period.
WWE used WWE Saturday Night's Main Event as the stage for the biggest retirement in the history of the business. Seeing Cena leave his boots in the center of the ring while Gunther stood over him was a masterclass in passing the torch. That episode did massive numbers because it felt exclusive. If that match happened on a random Raw, it would have been great. On SNME? It felt legendary.
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Why the Quarterly Format is the Secret Sauce
Back in the 80s, Dick Ebersol and Vince McMahon realized that if you only do something four or five times a year, people will actually pay attention. The 2026 schedule is sticking to that. We had the huge July 2025 show where Gunther retired Goldberg (yes, Gunther is the legend-killer now), the November 2025 show where CM Punk finally reclaimed world gold by beating Jey Uso, and now the Montreal January show.
By keeping these specials quarterly, WWE avoids the burnout of the weekly grind. You get matches that feel like they belong on a WrestleMania card, but you get them for free on broadcast television.
Actionable Insights for the Modern Fan
If you're planning on catching the Montreal show or any future WWE Saturday Night's Main Event specials, here is how to get the most out of the experience:
- Check the Local Listings: While these stream on Peacock, the "real" experience is on NBC. There’s something different about the production quality—the lighting is grittier, and the camera angles are tighter, mimicking that classic 80s aesthetic.
- Follow the Qualifying Matches: Unlike PLEs where matches are just "announced," SNME uses the weekly shows (Raw and SmackDown) to build real stakes. The Fatal Four-Way for Montreal was built through a series of grueling qualifiers on the January 16 SmackDown. If you miss those, you miss the "why."
- Watch the Entrances: This sounds silly, but WWE puts extra budget into the SNME entrances. In London, Drew McIntyre had a literal army of bagpipe players. Expect something equally insane for Sami Zayn in Montreal.
Wrestling is better when it feels like a big deal. WWE Saturday Night's Main Event has managed to take a concept that should have stayed in the 80s and turned it into the most vital part of the 2026 calendar. It’s shorter, it’s louder, and it actually moves the needle.
Make sure your DVR is set for January 24 at 8 PM ET. Whether you're there for the Cody/Fatu bloodbath or to see if Sami Zayn can finally secure a title shot in his backyard, it’s going to be the kind of night that reminds you why you started watching this crazy sport in the first place.