Undertaker and Triple H perform vile material on TV that has nothing on the reality of the 2000s.
Category
🎥
Short filmTranscript
00:00We all talk about the madness WWE got up to during the Attitude Era,
00:03but what about the time we moved forward and enjoyed Ruthless Aggression?
00:07Widely regarded as the next phase, you would think things switched around
00:10to establish that we were moving on to past as new.
00:13Nope.
00:14And in fact, some of what we did was even more nuts.
00:17So please do brace yourself, my friends, because yeah,
00:20this is the 10 most infamous WWE Ruthless Aggression Era controversies.
00:24Number 10, The Billy and Chuck Wedding.
00:26This should have been a moment in time.
00:28It would have been better if we did it with two homosexual men
00:30to underline that it's perfectly fine for two males to be in love and get married,
00:34but this is what we had.
00:35If nothing else, it would be a fine message to send out to an audience.
00:38And then WWE went the other way entirely.
00:41For those that don't know,
00:42Billy Gunn and Chuck Palumbo did join forces in November 2001,
00:45with the idea being there was every chance they were gay.
00:49This was heavily insinuated without being outright said,
00:51but to get this across, they were overly flamboyant and wore pink.
00:55I mean, that was silly.
00:56We don't need to lean on stereotypes.
00:58The thing is, the company even reached out to the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation
01:02to consult on this storyline,
01:03so there was a little bit of confidence.
01:06Maybe this was going to be a proper finger flip to bigots across the land.
01:09GLAAD, as they're also known,
01:11admitted that WWE had promised to air the Billy and Chuck Wedding too,
01:14which really did have some intrigue behind it,
01:17when we flipped that switch.
01:18Because even though for weeks we did advertise that they were going to tie the knot,
01:21it turned out this was a publicity stunt,
01:24with Billy being scripted to say,
01:26we're not gay,
01:27as if this was a terrible thing,
01:30it is really not cool at all.
01:32Thankfully we would never do this sort of thing today,
01:34but here's the kicker,
01:35we shouldn't have been doing it then either.
01:37Number nine, the Katie Vick angle.
01:39I mean, where on earth do I begin?
01:41If you know you can just stare off into the distance for a while and cry,
01:45and if you don't,
01:45well I suppose I'm going to have to tell you.
01:48Make sure you're sitting down.
01:49In the fall of 2002,
01:51we learned that Kane had killed a woman.
01:54Yep.
01:54This was after Triple H had accused him of being a murderer on Raw,
01:57and in a bid to explain himself,
01:59the big red machine admitted his pal Katie Vick was dead,
02:02but it was because he was driving her car that he wasn't used to,
02:05and crashed.
02:06He survived,
02:07she was dead,
02:08what on earth are we doing?
02:09Hunter then pushed this boat out by telling Kane he had been drinking behind the wheel,
02:12and that's why it happened,
02:13and that when doctors did an autopsy,
02:16they found the masked man's semen in her body.
02:19I am not making any of this up.
02:21This then turned into some awful unrequited love storyline,
02:25to try and get one over Kane,
02:26Triple H did indeed sneak into a funeral parlour,
02:30and pretended to hump a corpse.
02:32I don't know how else to explain it,
02:34the absolute worst bit being this was a real place,
02:37with an actual funeral going on in the next room.
02:39The vision of Trips doing this is burned into anybody's brain who watched it live,
02:43and I tell ya,
02:44I took a break from wrestling after this,
02:46you will be stunned to hear I had no interest watching a man have fake sex with a mannequin,
02:50that was meant to be a deceased human.
02:52I mean,
02:53who the hell could have ever called that one?
02:55Number 8,
02:55Muhammad Hassan.
02:56We are getting into it now,
02:58and I'm crying again.
02:59It's just a question of taste mostly,
03:01although once again,
03:01WWE actually acted like they had a nuanced idea at the start of this.
03:05The world had become a very worrying place after the 9-11 attacks,
03:09and the racism aimed at many Arab Americans was terrible.
03:12Therefore,
03:12why not have a character that calls out the nation for this stance,
03:15and how it has to change?
03:17Yeah,
03:17cool.
03:18Right,
03:18I get that.
03:19Shine the mirror onto people's biases,
03:20and let's see if we can't craft a very deep storyline.
03:23The problem as ever is that it is wrestling,
03:25so within weeks,
03:26Muhammad Hassan,
03:27who had been invented to carry this idea,
03:29was turned into the worst of all stereotypes.
03:32There's that word again.
03:33While Hassan was meant to be received as a persecuted figure,
03:36WWE were soon going back to the old foreign menish tropes,
03:40with the absolute worst part being,
03:42number seven,
03:42the worst angle ever.
03:44That's right,
03:44we bookend all of this because it feels like they deserve their own entries,
03:47and once again,
03:48I'll do my best to explain.
03:50Come 2005,
03:51the Hassan gimmick was full-on controversial and in bad taste,
03:53with nationalism and patriotism taking center stage.
03:56Vince McMahon then decided The Undertaker would be a great opponent for Muhammad to defend America,
04:01when Hassan and a group of masked men turned up on SmackDown,
04:04and beat up the Phenom,
04:06and it was made out like it was a terrorist attack.
04:09Now this would have been horrendous anyway,
04:10but the real shock to the system is the fact this happened just days after the London bombings.
04:15We are now talking next level offensive.
04:17The backlash was loud and angry as it should have been,
04:20and unsurprisingly,
04:21TV network UPN told the company to get this off the show instantly.
04:25I think at this stage,
04:25even WWE realized they screwed up,
04:28and poor Mark Capone,
04:29who had been cast in this role,
04:30never wrestled again.
04:32It wasn't his fault,
04:33it was just doing what he was told.
04:34Either way though,
04:35this was bottom of the barrel nonsense.
04:37Number 6,
04:38Triple H vs. Booker T.
04:39It's only fair to say that Booker T has spoken out about this angle,
04:42and he gets to have the final say on this matter.
04:45He was in it,
04:46it was his story,
04:47so anything that comes out of my mouth moves into a lesser position.
04:49If we are talking about moments that left people reeling though,
04:52you do have to throw it in there.
04:54And the major reason for this was because WWE decided to make it about race.
04:59Yep.
04:59I'm not going to get into how they approached this,
05:00because as ever there was no nuance to it.
05:02And instead we had lines that were meant to sound like Triple H and Ric Flair,
05:06thinking a black man shouldn't be in the position of a world champion.
05:09It really was quite astonishing.
05:11To try and give some back and forth to this,
05:12Bruce Prichard said on his podcast this was designed to bury WCW.
05:16But if that's the case,
05:17I'm not sure why we throw in lines like nappy hair.
05:20That to me feels abusive and rude.
05:23There was also the frequent use of the term you people,
05:25which turns my stomach to be honest,
05:26but I tell you,
05:27even if this is what WWE wanted to do,
05:30there would have been a perfect out when we got to WrestleMania 19,
05:33and Booker T just whipped the game's ass.
05:36You're damn right.
05:36Teach the world that you can't be prejudiced without serious consequences.
05:40And then we got to that day,
05:42and Triple H won.
05:43Ah, no.
05:44Even right now,
05:45I don't get why we did this other than silly backstage politics,
05:48because even if you do get rid of all of the above,
05:50at WrestleMania,
05:52just have the good guy go over.
05:55This wasn't cool.
05:56This wasn't cool at all.
05:57Number five,
05:58the Eddie Guerrero exploitation.
06:00Once again,
06:00I want to make it clear that people like Rey Mysterio have spoken out about this.
06:04They get the final say.
06:05We were just the watchers.
06:07As a fan viewing this,
06:08though,
06:08it did feel very uncomfortable after the tragic passing of Eddie Guerrero in November 2005,
06:13mostly because we kept on going back to it.
06:16I don't think anybody minded Rey Mysterio winning the 2006 Royal Rumble
06:19and dedicating it to Latino Heat.
06:21That was emotionally heartbreaking.
06:23But it was the other side that raised eyebrows.
06:25For example,
06:26given that Randy Orton was feuding with Mysterio at the time,
06:29he was scripted to say that Eddie was in hell.
06:32I mean,
06:32I now feel rotten having to repeat that.
06:34And let's be fair to Randy too.
06:36He told everyone backstage he didn't think this was right.
06:39What could he do?
06:39I suppose the best way to underline it is that we went too far into almost using Guerrero's passing
06:44to sell stories as opposed as having them as a loving tribute.
06:48And sure,
06:48maybe Eddie would have wanted this,
06:50which was the constant defense,
06:51but many fans still felt like it was in bad taste.
06:54They didn't want to see it either way.
06:55The real sore spot was even though it was there to send Rey to the moon,
06:59WWE never really pushed him properly.
07:01And even when he was the champion,
07:02it was something of a damp squib.
07:04Just got beaten over and over again.
07:06Not really the greatest idea when you're fighting for the memory of a friend
07:09who is no longer with us.
07:11Number four,
07:12the JBL character.
07:13Let's get it straight before we go on.
07:15JBL was a heat magnet.
07:18In 2004,
07:19I don't think anyone thought the former Bradshaw had this in him,
07:21but he made the necessary changes and became an awesome bad guy world champion on SmackDown.
07:26People hated him.
07:27When you jumped into the internet discussion,
07:30however,
07:30the controversy came in the fact that WWE had literally taken him from the APA
07:35and made him the guy from nowhere.
07:37That is true.
07:38And if you need an up-to-date version of this,
07:39it would be Jinder Mahal.
07:41Just one day woke up and boop,
07:43the guy who had been presented to us as no threat,
07:45all of a sudden had a major title.
07:47It was jarring.
07:48I think the main reason JBL gets in here is because of the direction we went in.
07:52As he was feuding with Eddie Guerrero,
07:54Bradshaw headed to the Mexican border
07:56and basically shouted about immigrants in the most racist way possible.
08:00If you were indeed Latino yourself,
08:02this probably left your jaw on the floor.
08:04Kurt Angle addressed this on his podcast too and said something similar.
08:07He felt like Eddie could have spoken to management about this,
08:10but instead saw Guerrero use it to his advantage to get as much sympathy as possible.
08:14Again though,
08:15maybe we just stay away from this stuff.
08:18There really is no need.
08:19Number three,
08:20Dr. Heine.
08:21Oh no.
08:22Let me just tell you the truth.
08:24Vince McMahon loved taking shots at Jim Ross on air.
08:27I don't know why,
08:28fans don't know why,
08:28not even JR knows why.
08:30He has spoken about this on his podcast
08:32and it just feels unnecessary and sometimes mean.
08:35It is a testament to Jim that he was able to basically shake this off and carry on regardless,
08:39but in 2005 when Ross underwent a colonoscopy,
08:42McMahon thought it was so funny,
08:44he was going to do a routine on Raw.
08:47Now I don't know about you,
08:48but even before anything else,
08:49I don't want my boss telling people that I just had a colonoscopy.
08:52This gift itself was just bonkers too,
08:54as Vince dressed up as Dr. Heine
08:56before telling his scantily clad nurse friend
08:59to start removing massive objects out of JR's ass.
09:03I'm not even kidding.
09:04This went on for about 20 minutes.
09:05So not only did Ross have to sit through that,
09:07but his friends saw it,
09:08his family saw it,
09:09and if you were a fan tuning in,
09:11you got it too.
09:12Bruce Pritchard again has defended this,
09:14saying it was done out of love and respect,
09:15but I defer to Jim's late wife on this one.
09:18By all accounts,
09:19she was in tears after this,
09:21so once again,
09:22just don't do it.
09:23Number two,
09:24the Chris Benoit double murder-suicide.
09:26I do not like talking about this.
09:28Maybe that makes me a coward,
09:30but it is up there
09:30as one of the worst moments in wrestling history,
09:33and another time where I just stopped watching for a while.
09:36Sports entertainment didn't feel that fun anymore.
09:38It does feel important to keep the conversation going,
09:40out of respect for Nancy Benoit and son Daniel though,
09:43because if nothing else,
09:44their memory should not be forgotten.
09:45Nancy too had an incredible career in pro wrestling,
09:48deserves to have a spotlight shone on it.
09:50Nothing created as much controversy as this though,
09:52as it went far outside the world of wrestling.
09:54Major news outlets everywhere were covering it,
09:57which soon turned into an accusation of steroid juice,
09:59CTE and all manner of issues.
10:01It was just horrendous.
10:03In case you don't know,
10:03the headlines are that Chris Benoit murdered his wife and son
10:06before taking his own life,
10:07and ever since,
10:08the story has unraveled.
10:10The amount of drugs Chris was taking,
10:11the damage to his brain,
10:12the grief he had over the death of best friend Eddie Guerrero.
10:15I am certainly not saying any of these are excuses,
10:17it was just a narrative that continued to grow and expand.
10:20As the response to any mention of this is always,
10:22but he should still go into the Hall of Fame,
10:25I would just like to say,
10:26that is a mad reply.
10:28No matter what you did within a wrestling ring,
10:30it pales in comparison to such a needless and shocking tragedy,
10:33it shouldn't,
10:34and will never happen.
10:35Number one,
10:36the sad amount of deaths.
10:37This is the reason that modern day wrestling wins.
10:39Even if you think it was better way back when,
10:41during the ruthless aggression era especially,
10:44so many stars passed away too young,
10:46it almost became the norm,
10:48that should never be the case.
10:50A lot of it was due to the drug use that was prevalent at the time,
10:52which was one of the reasons Eddie Guerrero passed away.
10:54He had cleaned himself up by 2005,
10:57but ultimately the damage he had done to his body was way too much.
11:00Kurt Henning was another,
11:01as was the likes of Crash Holly,
11:02Tentz and Lance Cade,
11:04but it was the statistics that really got people.
11:06The average life expectancy of a pro wrestler
11:08who starred in the United States across the 18s and 90s
11:11was below any other occupation in the land.
11:14As of 2015,
11:16the mortality rate was 2.9 times greater
11:18than the wider male population.
11:20Now we all know that wrestling is an incredibly hard industry
11:22that does a number of those within it,
11:24but this was just too much.
11:26That's why it's so important we did clean things up,
11:28and when you look at it today,
11:30yeah,
11:30it all seems much better and healthier.
11:33You can't put a price on that.
11:34If you did enjoy that too,
11:35you will see that a video has just popped up
11:37for 10 times wrestling heels were secretly the baby phase,
11:40which will be much more fun than this list.
11:41But thanks for watching,
11:42and goodbye.