10 Hot WrestleMania Openers That Blew The Main Event Away
4. Ripley Vs Flair - WrestleMania 36, Night 2
WrestleMania 36 was incredibly weird at the time and now several years removed it’s kind of hard to watch. Taking place just at the start of the pandemic, fans will remember the feeling of not knowing whether the event would take place at all and, if so, in what form.
As such, the two night event consisted of pre-taped matches from Full Sail University in front of absolutely no one, giving the show a strange aura. It’s hard to describe any matches as “hot” in a traditional sense since there was no audience but all the same it is still possible to talk about quality.
Overall, everyone did their best and the night 2 main event of Drew McIntyre putting down Brock Lesnar to win the title is remembered as a spectacular moment despite the lack of even piped-in crowd noise. However, at just under five minutes, it was a slugfest of finishers and kick-outs and hardly a compelling or original tale. A Beast Incarnate match by numbers.
Charlotte Flair using her Rumble win to challenge Rhea Ripley for the NXT Championship stands out as one of the better non-cinematic matches of the entire weekend. Flair kicked out of Ripley’s finisher two minutes into the match, worked Ripley’s knee and the pair told a great in-ring story of struggle despite the extenuating circumstances.