Bret Hart Vs. Shawn Michaels Complete History | Wrestling Timelines
December 1, 1993 - Another Trial
Bret defeats Shawn in an abbreviated Steel Cage match on Superstars. It’s best viewed as a trial for the Bret Vs. Owen SummerSlam 1994 main event - but it’s a tense mini-belter on its own terms.
Shawn flying into the cage, taking bumps with no compunction, is as satisfying as you’d expect. With the blood ban long in play, this is an early foray into the WWE cage match - in which suspense drives the action, not hatred. This is best expressed when Shawn makes it to the other side of the wall, but Bret drags him back into the battle by grabbing his opponent’s hair. Shawn, dangling, uses his body to awesome effect. He looks like he’s close to escaping, and to his doom, all at once. Bret wins when Shawn’s leg is caught in the blue bars. Bret will borrow it when it comes time to fight his brother again.
Another Bret Vs. Shawn finish will get a sequel, too…
March 20, 1994 - WrestleMania X
Bret gets the belt back in what is, to that point, the best show in WWF history: WrestleMania X.
Firstly, setting up an excellent if protracted feud, he loses to his brother Owen in the opener. The booking is bold, shocking, purposeful. The match is even better; an unvarnished technical stunner that mutates into a fight when Bret is gradually infuriated by his pesky younger sibling’s cheating. Bret builds this conflict beautifully. The artistry is unlike anything witnessed in a Federation ring. Bret’s early remonstrations with Owen allow him to earn the ass-kicking. Fair’s fair.
Shawn, meanwhile, steals the show against Razor Ramon when the ladder makes its full debut on pay-per-view. In the Observer, Meltzer describes Shawn’s performance as one of the very best individual showings in wrestling history. The ladder is used to brilliant effect throughout, and Shawn’s flying splash launched from atop it is an immortal visual.
Purists prefer the brother-versus-brother war, a match that decades later will continue to appear in best opener ever lists, but the Intercontinental title ladder match is the more spectacular and iconic attraction. It is awarded ***** by WON - a first for the WWF - while Bret Vs. Owen receives ****¾. Shawn, at WrestleMania, first stops the show.
It ends when Razor - in a sight familiar only to completionists who bought Smack ‘Em Whack ‘Em - sends Shawn onto the top rope, perineum-first. Shawn takes Bret’s idea for the finish.
Bret is curt, when describing his feelings towards Shawn in his ‘Hitman’ autobiography: “You thieving bastard”.