10 Reasons 1997 Was The Weirdest Year In Wrestling History

For years prior to 1997, Vince Russo was just the editor of the WWF’s magazines.

However, through gumption (or brown-nosing, if you’re Jim Cornette), he managed to find a seat at the creative table. He didn’t have much sway at first, with Vince instead listening to the likes of Cornette, Pat Patterson, and Bruce Pritchard. However, this began to change, as a wretched episode of RAW taped in Germany with low production values and no storylines drew a dismal rating. McMahon was desperate for someone to give him fresh ideas, and Russo, who had been sounding off countless ideas and incorporating some of them into the magazines, was that someone.

Russo’s ascension in the creative team could be felt throughout 1997, as the WWF gradually morphed into what fans associate with the Attitude Era. Aside from the previously mentioned “reality-based” angles, fans were greeted to increasingly edgy programming that included racial gang wars, Marlena becoming Brian Pillman’s sex slave, Goldust morphing into the infamous “Artist Formerly Known as Goldust,” and of course, D-Generation X. In addition, the booking began to resemble Russo’s signature Crash TV style of writing, complete with run-ins, DQs, and a host of shenanigans that made clean finishes rarer and rarer. All of this made it so that by the end of the year, the WWF was fairly unrecognizable from where it was in the beginning.

What’s so strange about Russo’s rise to creative head is the lack of precedence. Here was Vince McMahon – the captain of the ship, the man who guided the WWF with his vision alone – so desperate to compete with WCW in the ratings, that he started giving the reigns to a magazine writer who, as Jim Cornette will rant about, had not even been next to a ring as a match was occurring before his run in creative.

It only could have happened in a year when the WWF thought they had no other option. It only could have happened in 1997.