8 Ways We Didn't Realise WWE Has Been Re-Living The New Generation

8. A Shift In In-Ring Style

The New Generation movement was famously spearheaded by Bret Hart and Shawn Michaels – two of the all-time greatest to ever step between the ropes. As such, the World Wrestling Federation began to allow its in-ring bouts to follow a different path to what we’d seen for the decades prior.

Before Hart and Michaels, audiences were accustomed to seeing the standard Hulk Hogan-style big man bout of slow, methodical action built around power moves and over-elaborate mannerisms. While Hart and Michaels could slow down the action when needed and both had their own audience-appealing gestures, the in-ring work of the New Generation was vastly different to what we’d seen before. Now, finally, the more junior heavyweight-driven action was accepted as being worthy of the WWE main event scene. The workhorses were more than just your show-openers or your talented hands who could make the main eventers look good; the workhorses were now main eventers in their own right.

To relate that to the current WWE product, after years of seeing the slower pace or brawling approach of Triple H, John Cena, Randy Orton, The Undertaker, etc, we’re now at a place where faster-paced, more athletic workers like Seth Rollins, Kofi Kingston, Daniel Bryan, AJ Styles, Finn Bálor, and Andrade are in or around the main event scene and incorporating a style that maybe wouldn’t have been afforded a regular main event slot a decade ago. Sure, we had Eddie Guerrero, we had Chris Jericho, we had Rey Mysterio, but they were rarities who would sporadically be dipped in and out of the top programs.

Much like the New Generation led to a change in the in-ring wrestling product, we've similarly seen a shift in style over the past decade.