13 WWE New Generation Moments That Led To The Attitude Era

May 2024 ยท 10 minute read

The New Generation Era of WWE has often been derided as a bad period for the company. It was packed with scores of stupid characters, some bad pushes and titleholders and 1995 was one of the worst financial years in WWE history. Yet there was some good stuff there, various talents breaking out into bigger deals down the road, leading to the Attitude Era kick-off in late 1997.

Related: 10 WWE New Generation Era Storylines That Didn't Live Up To The Hype

Yet the seeds for the Attitude Era were laid in the New Generation Era in various ways. There was the start of blurring some lines between what was real and what was kayfabe, as well as a few bits shocking for the time but would become regular material later. The Attitude Era didn't come out of anywhere, it needed some seeds planted from the New Generation era to work, as these moments were critical to making the Attitude Era work as well as it did.

UPDATE: 2022/09/27 16:30 EST BY Eric Blattberg

While there was a ton of silly gimmicks and concepts during The New Generation Era, the mid-nineties in general also reflected this silliness. In a way the yuppie sitcoms of the eighties gave birth to the super saccharine sweetness of TGIF sitcoms like Boy Meets World and Full House . The WWE was no different in that regard trying to further their own success of the eighties by attempting to break new ground with some of these characters - obviously it didn't work, but having Voodoo Priests and evil clowns were pretty dark ideas. In just a few years time during The Attitude Era, those strange gimmicks and others could have been terrifying.

13 Vince McMahon: "The Audience Is Tired Of Having Its Intelligence Insulted"

Over 25 years later and it's easy to forget just how pivotal the success of Monday Nitro was to the WWE completely rebranding. As sanitation workers, pig farmers, and Mantaurs were populating Raw, Eric Bischoff famously did all he could to differentiate himself and WCW from what the WWE were doing. Minus a few missteps (the timing of Glacier for example), WCW largely was a completely different product than WWE. There's a reason that his podcast is called 83 Weeks - that was the amount of how many straight weeks Nitro defeated in Raw in the ratings. Thanks largely in part to the WCW being more realistic and edgy with their product, WWE was forced to follow suit, of course branding their product "Attitude."

12 Shawn Michaels' Infamous In-Ring Promo With Jim Ross

On the road to In Your House: Badd Blood and the first ever Hell In A Cell match with The Undertaker, Shawn Michaels arrived to Raw. It was a rare occurrence where Vince McMahon wasn't there and neither was The Deadman. Michaels spent several moments during the interview, bouncing up and down with a stuffed appendage getting shoved in Jim Ross' face.

Related: 5 Best Managers From WWE's New Generation Era (& 5 Worst)

He also called out The Undertaker, knowing full well that he wasn't in the building to come out and answer the challenge. While Vince McMahon was ticked off about the whole situation, he also looked at the temperature of the Sports Entertainment business and flat out said that the WWE needed more of that kind of attitude.

11 Bret Hart's Angry Promo On WWE Raw

At In Your House: Final Four, Bret Hart was able to capture the WWE title for the fourth time. But one night later on Raw, thanks to all sorts of chicanery involving Stone Cold Steve Austin, Bret would lose the title to Sycho Sid.

In a rematch weeks later, The Undertaker would interfere in a cage match between Hart & Sid to ensure Sid won (thus granting Taker a WWE Championship match at WrestleMania). Vince McMahon, then not really known as the owner (just as a commentator) tried to interview The Hitman after the match when all hell broke loose.

Hart launched into a profanity-laced tirade decrying and denouncing everything that had happened to him over the past few months and how he kept getting screwed. Despite always wanting to be the hero, it was clear that Hart might be turning a little bit into a villian.

10 The Fall Of Classic Babyfaces

It took a while, but one thing about the New Generation Era was how the classic babyface champion presentation wasn't working.

First, the attempt to turn Lex Luger into a hero with the Lex Express failed as fans didn't respond to him as a new Hogan. Diesel took off as a tough guy boasting of his greatness but making him into a guy in a suit talking about being a role model ruined his reign. Likewise, Shawn Michaels got over with his cocky attitude but his first title run marred by making him too much of a good guy.

It finally sunk in that fans weren't reacting to the traditional babyface anymore, which played a big role in the champions of the Attitude Era.

9 Jake Roberts Vs Jerry Lawler

In 1996, wrestlers tried to keep their real lives separate from the storyline and WWE almost never raised the curtain on the truth. That changed with Jake Roberts returning to the company and being frank on his past addictions.

Related: 5 New Generation Era Wrestlers Who Would Have Been Better Off Today (& 5 Who Would Have Flopped)

This led to a feud with Jerry Lawler mocking Roberts for his drinking, which even included pouring real alcohol down Jake's throat, which Jake wasn't expecting. While that crossed a line, the feud was one of the first times WWE acknowledged a wrestler's real problems and made them part of a storyline. That would be repeated in various ways in the Attitude Era, with Jake setting a new tone on his struggles.

8 The Bret Hart Head

While he had some good feuds in WWE, Bret Hart had his rougher ones too. He and Hakushi had some decent matches, but the feud was thrown for a loop by Jerry Lawler's accusations of Bret being prejudiced against Japanese people.

Then Hakushi threw a wrinkle into things by holding up a fake severed head of Bret (complete with sunglasses) as a warning. That was far more jarring than just the usual threatening promos with some uncomfortable implications. Yet it also showed that things were changing in presenting a feud as a truly wicked rivalry.

7 Mankind Vs Undertaker Buried Alive

While the Undertaker had always been sinister, there was still a "family-friendly" aspect to his dark side. That changed with his brutal feud with Mankind that included a Boiler Room Brawl and Paul Bearer turning on Undertaker.

Related: The 10 Worst Feuds Of WWE's New Generation Era

Their Buried Alive match was a wild turn as caskets are one thing but burying a guy in a grave was something else. The final shot of the Undertaker's hand clutching out of the dirt like a horror movie was jarring and showed a darker side to WWE that the Attitude Era would expand on.

6 Vader Crushing Gorilla Monsoon

For years, it was an unwritten law in WWE that the "President" of the company was off-limits. That went for Gorilla Monsoon when he took over for Jack Tunney as the on-air President in 1995. But in early 1996, after Vader was crushing a jobber, Monsoon suspended him.

Vader went on the attack with Gorilla hitting a few chops, but Vader then crushed him with a Vader Bomb. It was an excuse for Vader taking time off for surgery, yet it was also stunning to see the on-air authority figure laid out like that. Which was an idea the Attitude Era would perfect nicely as time went on.

5 Brian Pillman's Gun

Granted, it's a moment that nearly got WWE thrown off TV. However, in terms of blurring the lines between real and fiction, few made it work like Brian Pillman. Already handling his "Loose Cannon" act, Pillman was attacked by Steve Austin to excuse his leg injuries.

Related: 10 Things WWE Wants You To Forget About Stone Cold Steve Austin

Austin then stalked Pillman to his home where Pillman brandished a revolver to hold him off. The cameras showed Austin bursting in and then cut to black as a gunshot went off. It may have crossed some serious lines but presenting the heat between them as something so real was an idea WWE would use a lot in the next few years.

4 Working With ECW

Desperation can often bring about genius. Such was the case when WWE reached out to the more renegade ECW for a few appearances. The first had Tommy Dreamer and Sandman presented as "crashing" a WWE show and mentioning this "outlaw" promotion.

Later, a full RAW in New York had ECW stars invading for some memorable appearances. It would help spark WWE while proving their fans would respond to rougher action from the ECW guys. It also showed a WWE audience would respond to the ECW hardcore antics and set the tone for the wilder stuff to come in the Attitude Era.

3 The Entire Character Of Goldust

Looking back, Goldust getting on the air at all in 1995 is amazing. Somehow, Dustin Rhodes was brilliant at making this bizarre character work with stuff that was truly shocking to see at the time. It was a strange act with his movie references and behavior, not above doing "mouth to mouth" on Ahmed Johnson amid other strange angles.

Related: 5 New Generation Wrestlers That Would Succeed In NXT 2.0 (& 5 Who Would Flop)

Yet it led to success as Intercontinental champion and adding Marlena sparked up the act more. Goldust set the tone for more of the outrageous characters of the Attitude Era that broke WWE from its family-friendly roots.

2 The Curtain Call

One moment was all it took to change the course of WWE, and all of wrestling, forever. If, on that fateful night in Madison Square Garden, Shawn Michaels beat Diesel in a cage match and simply left it there, so much would be different. Instead, the Kliq came out to hug as a goodbye to the departing Kevin Nash and Scott Hall.

This shattering of kayfabe meant that Triple H took the blame to lose his King of the Ring spot to Steve Austin. However, it also blurred the lines with the Internet speaking about it and the changes it wrought would shake things up for a long time.

1 Austin 3:16

While most point to Austin 3:16 as the start of the Attitude Era, it wasn't as big a deal at the time as most think. Austin was still in the mid-card for a bit before breaking out but his speech after winning King of the Ring went from typical heel boasting to something else.

Austin was now a "cool heel," someone fans could cheer for his attitude even as he beat guys down. That trash talking got attention as Austin could click wonderfully with the popularity that finally took off in time for the Attitude Era and make him, and WWE, incredibly successful.

Next: 10 Wrestlers You Loved As A Kid (That Weren't That Great)

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