Does WWE have anything to show for its post-Attitude Era years?
by Sam Everett, @readsameverett
Last Monday, Shawn Michaels, a blinding supernova during the dark times of WWE's mid-Nineties, and The Undertaker, an iconic fixture of the company who has challenged Hulk Hogan, Steve Austin, and Brock Lesnar in each of their primes, confronted each other in the middle of the ring on Raw. These two faces on WWE's Mount Rushmore were there to promote an October match between The Undertaker and yet another end-of-the-century future Hall of Famer, Triple H. Though the company is set to run an entire pay-per-view event before Triple H and The Undertaker square off One Last Time (use quotations as you feel necessary), recent editions of Raw have been anchored by the mere presence of these three men whose combined age is 155 years. And the segments featuring them have been genuinely intriguing. After all, these men didn't carve out their place in the hearts of professional wrestling fans by being anything but compelling. In fact, if these segments were anymore thrilling, I might have forgotten that each of them secured their legends when "Seinfeld" was still airing new episodes.
Of course, to what other well can WWE go when they need a marquee match to sell to an international market hosting a WWE Network special (Melbourne, Australia, in this case)? Time has caught up to the stars of the Eighties. Trotting out Hogan and Ric Flair for a match might prove to be "One Last Time" in ways no one wants to consider. It would be enough to get a show shut down, not sold out.
And though plenty of stars have come and gone since WWE's high water mark, the Attitude Era ushered in by Michaels and populated by The Undertaker and Michaels (and Triple H, Austin, The Rock, Mick Foley . . . ), how many could prop up an episode of Raw with the promise of an appearance? Truly is there any performer whose heyday was in the aughts, during the post-Attitude years and what has come to be known as the Ruthless Aggression Era, who could energize a crowd for just one segment, and have them salivating at the thought of One More Match, the way Michaels and The Undertaker did last Monday?
John Cena, Randy Orton, Brock Lesnar, and Batista comprise the era's first generation, if not its own Mount Rushmore, each debuting for WWE at different points in 2002. And under difference circumstances they would all make prime candidates to headline a Network special. But Cena and Orton have never really left the company for a period long enough to make a return special. Lesnar famously exited WWE just as the company was poised to revolve around him in 2004, first to try (and fail) at becoming a Minnesota Viking, then to try (and succeed) at taking on and taking over the UFC. But he returned eight years later for appearances just sporadic enough to make him look like a real combat sports champion, but not enough to make his segments momentous.
That leaves Batista, who parlayed a bit role as a devilish preacher's silent muscle into a position as Triple H's enforcer into the Batman to John Cena's Superman into, finally, an impressive Hollywood run (most significantly as Drax the Destroyer for a whole 'nother comic book franchise). Though he's closer to The Miz's A-List than The Rock's, Batista's next appearance would (or, depending on his continued dissatisfaction with Disney, will) be a must-watch moment. And surely WWE would love to center a special event around his facing off against modern stars like Roman Reigns and Braun Strowman. (Of course, I can't help but imagine what great theatre would be produced by matching him against Shinsuke Nakamura, a performer like Batista who has mastered the subtle tics that make his character tick.)
While he had already made a name for himself in World Championship Wrestling among other places, Rey Mysterio worked his first match for WWE in the earliest days of the Ruthless Aggression Era, and the masked luchador quickly became one of the company's most beloved figures. Rumors and a recent Royal Rumble appearance indicate Mysterio is eyeing another WWE run. Were he to appear on Raw with a challenge for the likes of contemporaries John Cena or Randy Orton, one gets the sense it could move the Richter scale. However, the best use of this Ruthless Aggression vet seems to be on WWE's cruiserweight showcase, 205 Live. There's a poetry to the idea of watching WWE's preeminent high-flyer try to keep up with the performers he surely inspired. And while WWE seems to prefer to feature its biggest names on Raw, why can't its Cruiserweight Division enjoy some much needed star power and the intrigue a legend's presence would garner?
Edge is a multi-time world champion who served as a reliable foil to John Cena during the era and was responsible for many genuinely memorable moments. As long as he was healthy, he was almost always orbiting the world title in some way, much as Triple H did years before. Unfortunately, after a career defined by some of the most brutal matches in the history of the sport, his health could not hold up and he was forced to retire due to injury. And to be honest, while he was a solid performer, and WWE would love to have a hundred just like him, he never forged the persona of an undeniable icon. Would viewers tune in strictly on the promise of his appearance? Not likely.
Ditto his longtime tag team partner Christian. Captain Charisma will long be appreciated by fans, and even captured the World Heavyweight Championship twice, but he never came close to carrying the torch for WWE. Even if his career weren't cut short unceremoniously by concussion issues, he isn't likely to produce a segment to put the fans on the edge of their seat. He simply became too synonymous with the midcard, and post-match tantrums, during his in-ring career to be taken seriously. He joins a long list of veterans whose experience gives legitimacy to WWE's pay-per-view pre-shows, but he could really only headline a compelling match against fellow terminally retired canuck Edge. Now, were he to step foot in an Impact Wrestling ring, where he solidified his main event credentials after taking his leave of WWE in 2005, he would be treated like royalty.
Speaking of royalty, the former king himself, Booker T, never got his One More Match in WWE. And wrestling has nary seen a more Rocky-like folk hero than Booker during the build-up to his World Championship match against Triple H at WrestleMania XIX. O, but were he always portrayed as such. Too much of his run saw him acting the overly cowardly heel and speaking with a bizarre, aristocratic affectation while adorned with a ridiculous crown and cape, reducing and condemning this truly gifted performer to a comedy act in the eyes of history. Between his in-ring skill and his robust and captivating demeanor, he could have been a cornerstone of Ruthless Aggression and a prime candidate to represent the era now. But WWE worked successfully to make him a cartoon villain instead, sapping him of the gravitas that would befit a king.
Chris Jericho did his part to hold down the era, but he is wrestling's William Shatner. He's always up to something. He'll be wrestling on Elon Musk's Lunar Getaway Shuttle in the 2030s. He never really goes away, and certainly not long enough for a match on a Network special to feel, well, special. (See also: Angle, Kurt)
Cruelly, the two performers who would almost certainly illicit the response Michaels and The Undertaker enjoyed last Monday are no longer with us. It's easy to picture an alternate, and far less unsettling, reality in which Chris Benoit is the special attraction competing (out of physical necessity) only a few times a year attempting to coax his old friend, Eddie Guerrero, out of retirement and into a ring in front of tens of thousands of screaming Aussies. Alas, it's a scenario not meant for this universe or Universe.
If the Attitude Era lasted half a decade and produced at least half a dozen talents who could have their own wings in the WWE Hall of Fame, much less turn back the clock twenty years and make fans forget they're watching two AARP members sell them a final encounter that already happened, in roughly the same amount of time the Ruthless Aggression Era was responsible for . . . one? In Cena? Given that Lesnar and Batista can attribute their star power to their non-WWE ventures, and no one else really reaches their level?
Perhaps it's too much to ask for greatness from such an uninspiring period. The Ruthless Aggression Era is where the old Cruiserweight Championship went to die around the waist of a leprechaun. It's where the Women's Championship metamorphosed into the butterfly bedazzled Divas Championship. Talent may survive amid mediocrity, but very rarely does it thrive.
Or perhaps enough time simply hasn't passed. Perhaps it'll take another five years, and a prolonged absence, but the WWE Universe will be on the edge of its collective seat at the prospect of another Cena versus Orton match. Sure, they've already had their final match against each other, but if we can take anything from last Monday's chants for "One More Match" out of the retired Michaels, it's that the WWE Universe will forgive a promise broken by an icon.
Of course, to what other well can WWE go when they need a marquee match to sell to an international market hosting a WWE Network special (Melbourne, Australia, in this case)? Time has caught up to the stars of the Eighties. Trotting out Hogan and Ric Flair for a match might prove to be "One Last Time" in ways no one wants to consider. It would be enough to get a show shut down, not sold out.
And though plenty of stars have come and gone since WWE's high water mark, the Attitude Era ushered in by Michaels and populated by The Undertaker and Michaels (and Triple H, Austin, The Rock, Mick Foley . . . ), how many could prop up an episode of Raw with the promise of an appearance? Truly is there any performer whose heyday was in the aughts, during the post-Attitude years and what has come to be known as the Ruthless Aggression Era, who could energize a crowd for just one segment, and have them salivating at the thought of One More Match, the way Michaels and The Undertaker did last Monday?
John Cena, Randy Orton, Brock Lesnar, and Batista comprise the era's first generation, if not its own Mount Rushmore, each debuting for WWE at different points in 2002. And under difference circumstances they would all make prime candidates to headline a Network special. But Cena and Orton have never really left the company for a period long enough to make a return special. Lesnar famously exited WWE just as the company was poised to revolve around him in 2004, first to try (and fail) at becoming a Minnesota Viking, then to try (and succeed) at taking on and taking over the UFC. But he returned eight years later for appearances just sporadic enough to make him look like a real combat sports champion, but not enough to make his segments momentous.
That leaves Batista, who parlayed a bit role as a devilish preacher's silent muscle into a position as Triple H's enforcer into the Batman to John Cena's Superman into, finally, an impressive Hollywood run (most significantly as Drax the Destroyer for a whole 'nother comic book franchise). Though he's closer to The Miz's A-List than The Rock's, Batista's next appearance would (or, depending on his continued dissatisfaction with Disney, will) be a must-watch moment. And surely WWE would love to center a special event around his facing off against modern stars like Roman Reigns and Braun Strowman. (Of course, I can't help but imagine what great theatre would be produced by matching him against Shinsuke Nakamura, a performer like Batista who has mastered the subtle tics that make his character tick.)
While he had already made a name for himself in World Championship Wrestling among other places, Rey Mysterio worked his first match for WWE in the earliest days of the Ruthless Aggression Era, and the masked luchador quickly became one of the company's most beloved figures. Rumors and a recent Royal Rumble appearance indicate Mysterio is eyeing another WWE run. Were he to appear on Raw with a challenge for the likes of contemporaries John Cena or Randy Orton, one gets the sense it could move the Richter scale. However, the best use of this Ruthless Aggression vet seems to be on WWE's cruiserweight showcase, 205 Live. There's a poetry to the idea of watching WWE's preeminent high-flyer try to keep up with the performers he surely inspired. And while WWE seems to prefer to feature its biggest names on Raw, why can't its Cruiserweight Division enjoy some much needed star power and the intrigue a legend's presence would garner?
Edge is a multi-time world champion who served as a reliable foil to John Cena during the era and was responsible for many genuinely memorable moments. As long as he was healthy, he was almost always orbiting the world title in some way, much as Triple H did years before. Unfortunately, after a career defined by some of the most brutal matches in the history of the sport, his health could not hold up and he was forced to retire due to injury. And to be honest, while he was a solid performer, and WWE would love to have a hundred just like him, he never forged the persona of an undeniable icon. Would viewers tune in strictly on the promise of his appearance? Not likely.
Ditto his longtime tag team partner Christian. Captain Charisma will long be appreciated by fans, and even captured the World Heavyweight Championship twice, but he never came close to carrying the torch for WWE. Even if his career weren't cut short unceremoniously by concussion issues, he isn't likely to produce a segment to put the fans on the edge of their seat. He simply became too synonymous with the midcard, and post-match tantrums, during his in-ring career to be taken seriously. He joins a long list of veterans whose experience gives legitimacy to WWE's pay-per-view pre-shows, but he could really only headline a compelling match against fellow terminally retired canuck Edge. Now, were he to step foot in an Impact Wrestling ring, where he solidified his main event credentials after taking his leave of WWE in 2005, he would be treated like royalty.
Speaking of royalty, the former king himself, Booker T, never got his One More Match in WWE. And wrestling has nary seen a more Rocky-like folk hero than Booker during the build-up to his World Championship match against Triple H at WrestleMania XIX. O, but were he always portrayed as such. Too much of his run saw him acting the overly cowardly heel and speaking with a bizarre, aristocratic affectation while adorned with a ridiculous crown and cape, reducing and condemning this truly gifted performer to a comedy act in the eyes of history. Between his in-ring skill and his robust and captivating demeanor, he could have been a cornerstone of Ruthless Aggression and a prime candidate to represent the era now. But WWE worked successfully to make him a cartoon villain instead, sapping him of the gravitas that would befit a king.
Chris Jericho did his part to hold down the era, but he is wrestling's William Shatner. He's always up to something. He'll be wrestling on Elon Musk's Lunar Getaway Shuttle in the 2030s. He never really goes away, and certainly not long enough for a match on a Network special to feel, well, special. (See also: Angle, Kurt)
Cruelly, the two performers who would almost certainly illicit the response Michaels and The Undertaker enjoyed last Monday are no longer with us. It's easy to picture an alternate, and far less unsettling, reality in which Chris Benoit is the special attraction competing (out of physical necessity) only a few times a year attempting to coax his old friend, Eddie Guerrero, out of retirement and into a ring in front of tens of thousands of screaming Aussies. Alas, it's a scenario not meant for this universe or Universe.
If the Attitude Era lasted half a decade and produced at least half a dozen talents who could have their own wings in the WWE Hall of Fame, much less turn back the clock twenty years and make fans forget they're watching two AARP members sell them a final encounter that already happened, in roughly the same amount of time the Ruthless Aggression Era was responsible for . . . one? In Cena? Given that Lesnar and Batista can attribute their star power to their non-WWE ventures, and no one else really reaches their level?
Perhaps it's too much to ask for greatness from such an uninspiring period. The Ruthless Aggression Era is where the old Cruiserweight Championship went to die around the waist of a leprechaun. It's where the Women's Championship metamorphosed into the butterfly bedazzled Divas Championship. Talent may survive amid mediocrity, but very rarely does it thrive.
Or perhaps enough time simply hasn't passed. Perhaps it'll take another five years, and a prolonged absence, but the WWE Universe will be on the edge of its collective seat at the prospect of another Cena versus Orton match. Sure, they've already had their final match against each other, but if we can take anything from last Monday's chants for "One More Match" out of the retired Michaels, it's that the WWE Universe will forgive a promise broken by an icon.
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