Before Undertaker formed the Ministry Of Darkness in 1999, he spent the latter part of 1998 developing the initial stages of this villainous persona. He feuded with Stone Cold Steve Austin, who had cost him the WWE title, and Kane, trying to have Austin embalmed and Kane committed to a mental asylum (amongst other things). But by the far the most horrific act was when he 'crucified' Austin at the close of the December 7th Monday Night Raw, a segment that landed WWE in hot water with several religious groups. WWE, who tried to explain that the imagery wasn't meant to be a crucifixion but rather some kind of Egyptian ceremony, were fully aware of the potential pitfalls of going this far in a wrestling angle. In the end, it probably did what they wanted, with the controversy no doubt leading to more eyes on their product, but it was certainly a risky move given the religious connotations involved. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ny75ciSI-44 Interestingly, WWE was not the first wrestling promotion to try such an angle. In October 1996, ECW ran a segment in which Raven crucified Sandman, attaching him to a wooden cross with barbed wire around the wrists and forehead. The reaction from fans was so bad that Raven actually came back to the ring after the show and apologized for offending anyone. Kurt Angle, who had been contemplating getting into the pro-wrestling business at that point, was in the arena that night and was so disgusted that he went to Paul Heyman and threatened to get lawyers involved if his name or face ended up associated with ECW. Whoops!
