10 Ways WWE Could Revive The Attitude Era (Even With A PG Rating)
8. Gimmick More Gimmicks
The Attitude Era diversified the very fabric of wrestling through the creation of several iconic, new gimmick matches. Like much of the WWF around this time, Hell In A Cell and Tables, Ladders and Chairs matches did so much to refresh the general aesthetic of the company. The violence proffered married beautifully to the blood red rope set-up and the pitch-black backgrounds designed to disassociate fans from the colourful, cartoonish days of old.
Now, those gimmick matches are diluted and marketed conveniently, where, once upon a time, the most volatile and chaotic of rivalries were so inconvenient to the general running of the TV shows that, when matters became so intense, only the most sadistic of battlegrounds would do. Diluted with some necessity by the PG rating, those matches even at their best are pale imitations of what came before them. As an alternative, WWE should once more attempt genuine creativity, and thus introduce at least two new concepts to allow us to revere the present - something that was so easy in 1998, at which time even the three years prior felt like a decade ago. Much as nostalgia is fun, there is nothing like anticipating something in wrestling.
Even something as simple as the modernised WarGames gimmick, two rings and all, would provide some sort of new identity to a company that hasn't drastically altered its aesthetic in over two decades.