10 Times WWE Best Used Blood

10. Bret Hart Vs. The British Bulldog (In Your House 5)

Let’s start things off with one that doesn’t get looked at too often. From a business and creative standpoint, 1995 was nadir of WWE's history. Kevin Nash was the lowest-ever drawing champion at the time, the company was having to cut back on house show dates and talent, and during the year, WCW premiered Monday Nitro as a direct competitor to RAW, meaning Vince McMahon now had serious opposition on a national level.

1995 is also the peak of WWF’s cartoonish absurdity. Characters such as Isaac Yankem DDS, King Mabel, and Jean-Pierre Lafitte (who if you don’t recall was a pirate), flooded the company with their goofy gimmicks and storylines in an attempt to reach a younger audience, but were met to increasing fan apathy and derision. By December, Bret Hart had won the WWF Championship from Diesel. Knowing that he was just a placeholder until WrestleMania where he would drop the belt to Shawn Michaels, Bret decided to make his reign good while it lasted, starting with a title defense against brother-in-law Davey Boy Smith at In Your House 5.

While not in Philadelphia (the show took place over in Hershey, PA), the area was certainly under the spell of Paul Heyman’s ECW, and Bret, knowing this, decided to up the ante. Over halfway into the match, he had Davey throw him into the stairs, and while the camera was away from him, he bladed, giving himself a nice crimson mask. This was something you just didn’t do in mid-90s WWF, and the sight of blood puddles on the bright blue crash mats was quite jarring.

Still, it got what Bret desired. The men in the audience starting chanting “He’s hardcore,” and turned what was already a good title match into a brutal, captivating affair, one of the high points of an otherwise dismal year. Better yet, since the camera didn’t show any blading occurring, and thus giving credence to the idea he just cut his head on the stairs, Bret got off scot-free. Hooray for plausible deniability!