5 things we miss about the Attitude Era

No time or era in pro wrestling is as romanticized by fans as the Attitude Era. Fans look back at this period with rose tinted glasses and reminisce the time period when wrestling was probably the coolest thing on the planet. As WWE strayed away from the kid-friendly content of the New Generation Era to an edgier and grittier product geared at the young-adult demographic.

The days of the squeaky clean babyfaces that told children to eat their vitamins were gone and replaced with beer-swilling, foul-mouthed anti-hero’s who rebelled against the system. Violence became a major part of WWE’s offerings as fans gathered in droves to take in the hottest period in the history of pro wrestling.

It's undeniable that WWE’s rival promotions at this time, WCW and ECW helped shaped the direction of the Attitude Era to an extent, especially with WWE signing a host of former ECW originals like The Dudley Boyz and Rhyno, later followed the hardcore legend and ex-WCW star Mick Foley. The Monday Night Wars led wrestling to a period when it was a huge part of pop culture and as they say, competition breeds excellence.

Let’s take a look back at the most popular era in pro wrestling and check out the top 5 things we miss about the Attitude Era.

5: Violence & Profanity

The Attitude Era took violence in pro wrestling to a new level.

The basic concept of wrestling, at the end of the day, is a fight between opponents which is inherently going to be some level of violent. The Attitude Era, however, took this violence to the next level. During these days, we were spoilt with over-the-top violent content on a regular basis with all kinds of hardcore and gimmick matches coming to us on a regular basis. The wrestling quality might have suffered a little from all the gimmicks and weapons but as an entertainment medium, at least for casual fans, it couldn’t get any better than these days.

Profanity is something that has disappeared from WWE programming almost altogether to the extent that Brad Maddox was fired last year for calling the audience “pricks” during a backstage promo. During the Attitude Era, the WWE was like the wild west of entertainment with profanity being the norm, rather than the exception. Insults, verbal abuse and obscene gestures were the flavor of the era and as much as we hate to admit it, that had its own unique pull.

4: Blood

No matter how much people may disagree, blood definitely adds to a match – just take a look at the match between Samoa Joe and Finn Balor at NXT TakeOver: Dallas. Now, don’t get me wrong, I’m definitely not advocating for blading which was a horrific practice but we definitely miss blood on current WWE programming. Blood automatically makes a match feel important and visually helps take feuds to the next level.

Instead of blading or wrestlers stiffing each other to induce bleeding, WWE could just use blood packs like they did for Roman Reigns’ feud with Triple H in the lead up to WrestleMania 32. As for the fans, instead of criticizing blood packs they should realize that wrestling, as an industry, has evolved beyond that kind of barbarity.

3: The Monday Night War

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The Monday Night War changed pro wrestling forever.

We can directly attribute the birth of the Attitude Era to the content the World Championship Wrestling was putting out at the same time, which was edgier content that was geared more towards young adults and adults than to the younger demographic that WWE targeted during the New Generation Era. WCW’s New World Order angle which was taking place around that time, which is one of the hottest storylines in pro wrestling history, also helped convince the WWE to expand the horizons of their content.

Monday Night Raw and WCW Nitro went head to head on Monday nights during this period and with the competition so stiff, it pushed both companies to new creative heights and forced them to mix up their product on a regular basis in order to keep fans hooked. It was no longer just about pay-per-view buys once a month but ratings on Monday nights took a position of prime importance. Never again will we see such compelling programming on free television on such a regular basis.

During this era, the problem of unimportant midcard matches was never a problem, with cards stacked on a nightly basis due to the weekly tug-of-war for ratings between WWE and WCW. Everyone on the roster had their role and they knew that they were part of a team fighting for supremacy in the ratings.

2: Unpredictability

The fact that anything could happen, made the Attitude Era must-see-tv.

One thing that no one can take away from Vince Russo is that the stuff he wrote was unpredictable. It was utter rubbish at times but it was always unpredictable. He helped WWE hold their own during the Monday Night War before eventually jumping ship to WCW and sinking them beyond recognition.

One factor that has definitely hurt unpredictability is the prevalence of the internet and the rise to prominence of the dirt sheets. This wasn’t a problem during the days of the Attitude Era where you never knew who would interfere in a match, which wrestlers would face each other on any given night or whether a WWE or WCW star would jump ship to their rivals.

Another great thing about this period is that the shows never had any given formula or format unlike nowadays when we are almost guaranteed that Raw will begin with a 20-minute promo. There’s also the other little things that make the show so easy to predict.

1: Taking the fight outside the ring

During the Attitude Era, fights had the possibility of going anywhere and everywhere.

The Attitude Era definitely took wrestling out of the box it had been confined in for years. Matches nowadays are just confined to the ring but fans of the golden era of pro wrestling will recall matches spilling into the crowd, backstage, boiler rooms and sometimes even the streets outside the arena. Who can forget the iconic backstage brawls and hardcore matches help during this era, not to mention the 24X7 rule for the Hardcore Championship and Stone Cold beating the daylights out of Booker T in the supermarket.

Fans miss the days when fights were unpredictable and could break out anytime or anywhere, be it backstage, in the locker room shower or even a local drinking establishment. Nowadays, the action we get is almost always in the ring and almost never goes backstage.