5 Uncredited Architects Of WWE's Attitude Era
3. Bret Hart
Bret Hart is today mostly known as the man whose exit ushered in the Attitude Era - but he as much as anybody else laid down the foundations of it.
In a seminal promo from March 17th 1997, Hart expressed his frustration at his position in the WWF in which, setting the tone for months and years ahead, he infused real life emotion into proceedings. Having just lost an opportunity to claim the WWF title, Hart's actual tensions boiled over.
Pushing Vince McMahon flat on his a*se months before Austin would make a weekly trope of it, the Hitman responded to Vince's opening gambit of "You must be extremely frustrated over what's just happened..." with a resounding "Frustrated isn't the godd*mn word for it! This is bullsh*t! You've screwed me! Everybody's screwed me! And nobody does a godd*mn thing about it!".
Seeking and receiving boos to foreshadow his heel turn, Hart in this revolutionary promo told a ringside fan that if they didn't like what he had to say, then "Tough sh*t!".
His expletives were infectious. Sid, who Hart accused of being involved in the conspiracy against him, marauded to the ring proclaiming "I don't know sh*t!".
Hart would turn the airwaves crimson a week after turning them blue during his legendary Submissions match against Bret Hart at WrestleMania 13.
Entering the match as a face and leaving as a heel, Hart first drew the ire of the crowd by working Austin’s leg in a manner more malicious than tactical. Playing expertly off the wider frustration storyline, his hatred for and jealousy of Austin was such that he, in one of the match’s myriad astute decisions, busted him open.
The crimson mask is used as a means of generating audience sympathy for the babyface, and generate it they did; the now iconic image of the heroic Austin bleeding like a stuck pig was as important to the WWF’s Attitude Era success as the bout’s frenetic arena-wide brawl template.
Though he wasn’t around to reap its financial rewards, the Attitude Era would not be possible were it not for Bret Hart.