Gimmick Some (Wrestlemania) Lovin': RestholdMania!

Earl lets the competitors know that, if they refuse to break a count of five, or if he's ordered to do so by his boss, he'll ring the bell.

This image, which defined my childhood wrestling fandom, is tainted quite a bit with knowledge of what Michaels was like at the time (and what he said about Hart upon being handed the belt).

My Rating

Back when I originally opened up my Netflix streaming account, the first movie I selected was one that I'd considered my favourite non-Star Wars film as a child, Jim Henson's David Bowie-starring epic Labyrinth. What I didn't realize was that a spellbinding film for an elementary school-age child and an entertaining movie for a graduate student were two wildly different things, and it was hard to look past the film's glaring flaws and inconsistencies to truly enjoy it.

The Iron Man Match is my wrestling Labyrinth; for most of the 22 years since it was performed, I'd considered it my all-time favourite, and looked forward to covering it here with a great deal of anticipation. I'd wanted to believe that the 10-year-old HBK mark was still alive enough in me to last 60 minutes with two of the greatest in-ring performers of all time.

My 32-year-old self, knowledgeable as he is about the realities of the industry both in 1996 and today, could not look past the match's flaws to consider it anything other than a sentimental love; I don't think I can keep it as a favorite because of what it accomplishes as much as what it represented for me when it occurred.

Bret Hart sets Shawn Michaels up for another astonishing gap in logic, as Hart broke a countout at NINE to deliver this backbreaker.

Most of the match is less professional wrestling and more participatory yoga; Hart and Michaels spend 30 minutes stretching each other in various holds with no real endgame in sight. It's not really until the final 20 minutes that it really feels like either man is actually attempting a fall, and the match is truly hurt by the gimmick: had the match simply been an hour Broadway with the sudden death addendum, history might treat it more kindly, but the fact that subsequent Iron Man matches have featured exponentially more falls, more moves, and greater drama causes this one to fade in retrospect.

The logical breaks are unforgivable in that context; those times when Michaels or Hart broke countouts, regardless of any ascribed honour for doing so, would be akin to a baseball player opting not to cross home plate because he wanted to "earn" his run more. Given Piper's and Hebner's setup of the rules and the apparent unwillingness of either man to eat a pin or submission, those countouts could have at least added something to the scoreboard before the buzzer.

The Shawn Michaels Wrestlemania Collection available on the Network shows clips from a series of HBK sitdown interviews before each contest; in talking about this one, Michaels says that the 0-0 regulation finish was by design to build drama. Others insist that the lack of decisions within the first hour of the match were a product of the two men's egos: neither man would deign to take a fall, regardless of the structure of the match type.

If I have to wait 62 minutes for a finisher, don't promise me a match where I might see multiple finishers and falls.

Again, were this a traditional singles match with a one-hour time limit that went the distance without a fall, that would be forgivable; we were promised, and most later Iron Man matches delivered, a series of falls and dramatic attempts to even and increase the score. The commentary echoes this disappointment, transitioning throughout the hour from "who will win the first fall" to "when will we see the first fall" to "maybe soon we'll see a fall" (not to mention Lawler having difficulty deciding which man he's cheering harder against).

In a reversal of expectations from the last contest we covered, I expected to reinforce my love of my all-time favorite match, and was ready to bask in its successes once again, but in retrospect can't muster anything more than a middling reaction. Its high spots are still fantastic, and the action is quick and engaging in places, but the match is so at odds with its gimmick that it overall fails to deliver: either lower the time limit, increase the falls, or remove the Iron Man setup, and my score dramatically increases.