50 Greatest WWE Raw Moments Ever
39. The Undertaker & Triple H Silently Set The Stage (February 21st, 2011)
One of the few occasions Triple H benefited from an understated comeback rather than the overblown superhuman recovery journey, his silent stare-down with The Undertaker told the best possible WrestleMania story without even saying a word.
When 'The Game' came back to WWE in February 2011 following a long layoff, it wasn't to tie up a storyline loose end with Sheamus - the midcarder who was the one responsible for putting him on the shelf - but to walk right into arguably the biggest spot on that year's card. 'The Deadman's own Raw return had been promoted for weeks with a series of odd vignettes showing a shadowy figure entering a rainy shack (hilarious speculation online saw people analysing a chin and wondering aloud if it could belong to Sting or Shawn Michaels), but a tacit undermining of the moment before he'd even uttered a word was a powerful motivation for the two to do battle on 'The Grandest Stage'. Neither man ever had much of a grasp on nuance, but they didn't need any here. Stare at each other, stare at WrestleMania sign, stare back at each other, generate enormous buzz. It was, for once, the best way to use part-timers.
Unknown to the crowd that night, their WrestleMania contest would serve as the third in a quadrilogy of contests in which 'Taker laid Hunter and his best friend Shawn Michaels to rest in an 'End Of An Era' arc.