10 Most Iconic WWE WrestleMania Images

by Justin Henry

1. Hogan Slams Andre (WrestleMania 3)

In the early 2000s, WWE released a WrestleMania program to newsstands, complete with full color photos of every active performer, each with little factoids. Among the notes for all, each wrestler named their favorite WrestleMania moment. For more than a dozen of the responses, Hulk Hogan picking up Andre the Giant and depositing him to the canvas at the Pontiac Silverdome was the clear choice.

In truth, Andre had been slammed before. Hogan had done so in 1980 at Shea Stadium when Hulk was a villain and Andre a hero. Others, like Stan Hansen, Harley Race, and El Canek had previously done so, but that was all irrelevant in WrestleMania-era WWE canon. For once, revisionist history deserved to rule.

The sight of Hogan lifting and turning a 500-pound man (with cooperation, of course) isn't something you quickly forget. It's the defining image of WWE in its halcyon 1980s glory, of WrestleMania as a decades-old spectacle, and perhaps in the annals of professional wrestling history.

Contributor
Contributor

Justin has been a wrestling fan since 1989, and has been writing about it since 2009. Since 2014, Justin has been a features writer and interviewer for Fighting Spirit Magazine. Justin also writes for History of Wrestling, and is a contributing author to James Dixon's Titan series.