17 Ways WWE Has Changed Since It Was The WWF
15. TV-14 To PG
Long blamed by the angriest and most misguided corners of the commentariat for a creative collapse that had in reality happened years earlier, WWE's 2008 move to PG was one of several steps taken to remedy a year that forced large scale transformations the organisation hadn't undergone since Vince McMahon's original 1980s expansion.
The implosions felt from the Chris Benoit double murder suicide in 2007 (and more on that later) spoke to the ticking time bomb the industry had been for decades before it - if WWE weren't really willing to make wholesale changes to their practices - and they certainly managed a few of those too - presenting a strong indication to their paying customers that they were trying. Pulling back to PG from TV-14 was a statement of intent, but it also drew a line under the company's post-Attitude Era identity crisis.
The sex, blood and thunder of the time already felt desperate by WrestleMania X8, but WWE's dalliances with depravity had gone from creative and powerful in 2000 to crude and puerile several years on. A change of pace, even if it meant trying to appeal to children again, was welcome.