25 Best Moments Of WWE Monday Night RAW (Year-By-Year)

By 1996, Vince McMahon realized he needed to inject more edgy, adult-oriented content to compete with WCW. Overall, his philosophy was to gradually integrate more mature themes with subtlety and grace... except in November, when he decided, "Sure, let's have Pillman pull a gun on Steve Austin."

Stuck in his Kentucky home thanks to an injury at the hands of his former tag partner, the 'Loose Cannon' Brian Pillman decided to have backup in anticipation of a rampaging Stone Cold Steve Austin. In a live segment filmed at Pillman's house, Austin barged into the residence, and Pillman, in front of his wife and a WWF crew, pulled out a gun and pointed it at Austin. The picture quickly pulled away and the show went to commercial, insinuating to the audience that a man had just been shot.

While the tangible impact of this segment has been exaggerated in signature WWE revisionist history, "Pillman's Got A Gun" is still an important signifier of how Vince's new approach would look and feel.

It would only get bolder as the Attitude Era came to fruition.