25 Most Iconic WWE Ring Entrances Ever
13. Shawn Michaels (WrestleMania XII)
"Hanging from the rafters" was glorious wrestling hyperbole made famous by the late, great Gorilla Monsoon whenever he was was trying to oversell how full the house was, but for one night in 1996, it was one of WWE's more spectacular truisms.
Shawn Michaels' arrival via zip-line at WrestleMania XII would have been the biggest tell yet that 'HBK's "boyhood dream" was going to come true following his 60-minute match with then-WWE Champion Bret Hart, but - much to the 'Hitman's chagrin - the build had made that blindingly obvious anyway. The Iron Man main event had long been predicted as the moment Michaels would ascend the throne in WWE, but the company themselves couldn't have made it clearer when the challenger flew through the skies of the Anaheim Pond to an understandably rapturous ovation mere seconds before Hart had to make a (by comparison) understated walk to the ring. As evidenced by the match itself, there was simply no following an entrance that spectacular.
What goes under-discussed about it is how uniquely calm Shawn Michaels was in the face of a potentially preposterous stunt. Known for his hair-trigger temperature at the time, Michaels didn't lose an ounce of cool in the contraption, treating a literal flight through the air as if it was just another day at the office, showboating his way through every part of the descent. This was in direct contrast to Michaels' biggest supporter Vince McMahon on commentary. In between screams, he blurts an "Oh no! Look at that!", seemingly incapable of forming structured sentences or rational thought in the sheer heady excitement.