9 Times WWE's Attitude Era Broke The Rules Of Professional Wrestling

2. A World Of Good Guys And Bad Guys

Shawn Michaels Triple H Curtain Call
WWE

October 6th 1997 was an immensely strange night in professional wrestling. It was the night after Kane's debut, and Raw is War opened with Vince McMahon solemnly informing the audience that Brian Pillman had died, as the superstars of the World Wrestling Federation had put aside their differences to stand on top of the ramp as the bell was tolled 10 times.

The show proper opened D-Generation X heading ot the ring to gloat about Shawn's victory inside Hell in a Cell, but more importantly to set the stage for the upcoming Montreal Screwjob. Instead of showing footage of that famous match with The Undertaker, the Titantron showed the infamous 'Curtain Call' incident from Madison Square Garden.

Michaels and Hunter responded with mock shock, openly referring to previous alignments by stating 'I was as good guy! You were a bad guy!'. Vince Russo would take this idea and run way too far with it, but the days of good guys being good and bad guys being bad were over.

The story of good vs. bad is one of the true pillars of professional wrestling, and by introducing shades of grey the Attitude Era took a hammer to it.

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Born in the middle of Wales in the middle of the 1980's, John can't quite remember when he started watching wrestling but he has a terrible feeling that Dino Bravo was involved. Now living in Prague, John spends most of his time trying to work out how Tomohiro Ishii still stands upright. His favourite wrestler of all time is Dean Malenko, but really it is Repo Man. He is the author of 'An Illustrated History of Slavic Misery', the best book about the Slavic people that you haven't yet read. You can get that and others from www.poshlostbooks.com.