WWE Wrestlemania 18 Review - Icon vs. Icon!

well what a year it was for the WWF after what was widely considered the best WrestleMania of all time, one of the biggest stars you have goes crazy, your other biggest star takes more time off to make movies, two of your biggest stars spend a large part of 2001 with injuries that took them off television for several months, then you have the whole Invasion angle that was it, was what it was and now, when it's all said and done, you have Ric Flair and the NWO, as part of what was considered a very youth-oriented youth movement, in the face of promotion, the World Wrestling Federation was now beginning to take a step back, but if it would work, we will find out in the final WrestleMania under the WWF.

Banner, I'm talking about WrestleMania 18 on March 17, 202 at the Toronto Skydome back in Toronto for the first time since WrestleMania 6. This show was nominated by Zack Fender Justin Escoto Zor Rupi Miguel Jr Matt B and Mark C Carroll on patreon. com. Fighting with regret, this show is essentially WWE's victory lap a year after wiping out their competition in WCW and speaking of which, there are very few survivors of the alliance who have made it this far and are getting spots on the card. of Wrestlemania, but there are some and good for them, like I said, it's the final WrestleMania before they take out the F. 68,276 PPV buys are significantly reduced from the million or so that WrestleMania 17 had.

Jim Ross and Jerry Lawler are on commentary here. Check out the set for this year's Mania, which could best be described as a gruesome mash-up of scaffolding, wow, it's so

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ic. I guess you could also call this new show Metal Mania because the forced entry album just dropped and there's a lot of cross promotion with that on this show. multiple live performances by not one but two bands, the show begins with saliva singing the song Superstar, which I actually heard for the first time in the intro of Legends of Wrestling, a very funny little personal anecdote.

I remember I was a freshman or sophomore in high school when I first heard spit on the radio, I think they were starting to blow up at that time and like their first single, they had the DJ on the rock station, uh , he called them spit and then after the song ended, he corrected himself. It's actually spit, so that was my first exposure to spit, the DJ mispronounced the name, there's the opening hype package where all the top guys narrate what WrestleMania means to them, the enormity of the story of it all, the importance of being in the main event of Mania. and so on, very inspiring, very magical, you know, exercise for the second year in a row.

William Regal opens WrestleMania in a match for the Intercontinental Championship. This time he's defending the belt, but oh no, he's wearing it backwards, how did no one notice he's defending? belt against Rob Vanam, one of The Alliance's rising stars, making his WrestleMania debut, one of Regle's best moments in the weeks leading up to this show, has nothing to do with his feud with RVD or the bill this fight. match on Smackdown against Big Show and used the power punch and KO show, but in doing so cost himself the match because Big Show just falls on him.

He crushes him, dead weight preventing Regal from kicking one of the brightest. end of all time, the match begins. Regal immediately goes for brass knuckles, but RVD kicks them out of his hands. Another big kick to the mush that opens Regal up in a matter of seconds. The frog splash attempt fails by the way. I love Kevin Nash is Super Shredder. sign on the hard camera, we get a cutter from Regal, a big high blow to the back from RVD. Vanam is being worked by Willie Reigs over a nice Tiger Bomb. RVD is coming back, but gets caught in a nice suplex.

Regal comes out to grab the brass knuckles again, referee gets it. in the face he takes the knuckles but it turns out that Regals took extra hits but he takes a kick to the face and RVD hits the festar Frog Splash to win and the championship. I give it three stars out of five, it was a pretty solid match. but solid is the highest I'm going to give. I think you know he got too physical for his own good at times, like we saw what happened to Regal's face just seconds into the match, you know, RVD throwing those bakes.

Dads, it happens sometimes, but it was a good story and yes, it wasn't the most fantastic match in the world, but the crowd liked seeing RVD win G, big creepy smile from Christian. Ian García is interviewing him backstage. The recap of last week's show on Raw where Christian attacked DDP after finally breaking his losing streak with the help of Paige Christian says he won that match on his own, there are no more tantrums for him now because he's in touch with his emotions, he says that he will once again become the European champion, let's go to that match now, the last time the European titles defended at WrestleMania as Diamond Dallas Paige defended against Christian Cage, so DDP is the European champion, he beat Christian for the belt several weeks ago and this has been part of a big Christian story where he's just on a huge losing streak, he's throwing tantrums after every match and now DDP comes in after beating him for the belt once before , now he wants to attack and he wants to give you life advice and he wants to be your positivity coach and guide you back to your winning ways, holy hell he's been doing this kind of thing for years.

Christian is now being introduced from Tampa, Florida, oo the hometown boy who renounces his inheritance. What a heel move! DDP gets caught in his own pyrotechnics during his entrance, Jim Ross comments on how he technically made his Mania debut in this very building at WrestleMania 6 when he was the rhythm and blues driver in his pink Cadillac. They lose the Irish whip early on, but recover. Good Tilto World Ripper by DDP Corner punches are thwarted by a cheeky low blow. The referee does nothing about it. Truly the spirit of WCW remains alive and well. Paige is thrown off the apron and to the floor.

Paige whips Christian in the corner and makes a good gesture. slide maneuver out of the way of a boot Christian goes up top DDP catches him and we get a single Beal off the second rope DDP goes to The Diamond Cutter a couple of times Christian hits his reverse DDT we get a kick DDP finally hits that Diamond Cutter kicks out chest back calmly to win and retain after the match, takes the microphone and says that even though you lost in front of 67,000 fans, you didn't lose your temper and I'm proud of you, Christian, and that's not a bad thing, That is something good.

Christian threw a tantrum at him. Oh Christian, two and a half stars out of five for me. I think these two made the most of their time, which I don't think was much, but there were some points. in that matchup where there were some really unique moves that I thought, oh man, I wonder if Canyon had a role in helping put this match together or come up with some spots because some of the innovations that you saw Paige use like that World Destroyer tilt like the way where he came out with Christian from the top rope, there are these little things, these little adjustments, things that you don't normally see and that's how Canyon was so defined in his matches, so I wonder if there is a connection there, but of all Anyways I think it was nice to see Paige have a WrestleMania moment considering the disastrous year she had the year before with the invasion Jonathan Coachman in the promo zone with rock rock says he wants Hulkamania to go crazy tonight in Toronto asked him to the coach if he took his vitamins and said his prayers, the coach said he was too busy to pray, so the rock asked the people if they would like to see the coach say that his prayers get a big bang, it makes the coach kneel and say your prayers as you have never said them before. them before the coach goes up G and the rock is completely amazed so he's like what's up G.

I'm like you told him to say his prayers like never before, he predicts the fans will sing for both of them tonight and Hogan it will. he'll do it, he'll do it, he'll smell what The Rock is cooking, complete with shirt ripping, which is an A+ promo from The Rock here, well, a couple of months earlier, this, of course, was the PPV for Royal Rumble which I covered recently. here on the channel and one of the big features of that year's Rumble Match was the return of four stars that we hadn't seen in a long time and of those four guys, this guy here has definitely had the most upward mobility of all of them.

Gold Dust defends the Hardcore Championship against Tough Enough One winner Maven, what an incredible year this kid had, winning Tough Enough, eliminating Undertaker and that

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ic kick in the rumble, they've definitely been putting their eggs in Maven's basket . At this point, they're showing you how seriously they're taking the whole Tough Enough thing and they really want to sell the point that, hey, you know, the winner of this competition gets a lot of recognition and can get a lot of air time and stuff. things. So, Maven, at this point, I think he's doing a good job delivering on that.

I think he's been put in positions and situations where he's allowed to make mistakes and still find places to grow and I think he's filling this role quite a bit. Well, Maven jumped at the beginning and was thrown into the barricade with a big bang. Gold Dust with a nice diving elbow to Maven on the railing, they go for a slingshot into the trash can, he somehow gets out of Maven's way and throws it to Gold. Dust, we got this nasty kick, he didn't get it all. Gold Dust takes over with a golden shovel attack. Maven threw it into the golden trash can.

Both men have a trash can. The caps now knock each other out. In comes Spike Dudley with a Referee, pins Maven now to win the hardcore title, rule 247, y'all indeed, but in comes Crash Holly, who chases through the dust of the arena and Maven is hot in Pursuit. I'd give them a match rating for this one, but I'm just going. to tie it into the overall arc we'll see tonight, more things to come, Drowning Pool are here to quote you, tell you the story of the Undisputed title fight, they're like making one of their songs into a video package here, more or less.

Sad, I was doing research for this show and found out that Ahoging Pool lead singer Dave Williams knew he had passed away a few years ago, but I didn't realize it was so soon after this show that he died like maybe six or seven months. Afterwards it's pretty sad as the hardcore title match continues in the back crash and Spiker fighting until suddenly too and Teddy Long just crashed into a golf cart, literally thank god there were no huge cables to get over this time. Spike thinks he has escaped when suddenly, in the changes, Hurricane latched onto Yes, Flying Kick, Spike, Deck and a new Champion, alongside the Red, White and Blue Machine.

Kurt Angle took on the Big Red Machine with a cane, so Kurt went from fighting Triple H over a shot to number one. The contenders go at it for the No-Way Title, he won that match much like how Big Show beat The Rock No-Way two years earlier, but then instead of being added to the Wrestlemania Main Event as Big Show, he simply lost that place. to Triple H one night later on Raw in a rematch, so now Kurt Angle is feuding with Kane, suddenly these two men have cost each other crucial matches. Kurt has given Kane a head injury that has kept him out for a couple of weeks. the biggest consolation prize for Kurt after basically the great year he had overall in 2001, to begin with, you know, being placed in that main event spot, Stone Cold Steve Austin's Faith, how instrumental that was in the story of The Invasion for better or worse, doing the whole double agent thing, which I still think was dumb and then all that and fighting Triple H and all that and now that he's in this match with Kane it definitely feels like an afterthought.

Kurt on the microphone makes a reference to The Canadian figure skating team and how they won their gold medals at the Olympics at the beginning of the year B was a huge scandal in which it was revealed that the pairs competition was fixed and that's why the gold medal winners were disqualified and the other two teams that were behind them one gold medal each, including the Canadian team, then there is a scandal, it's not Canada's fault at all, but Kurt is making fun of them for winning the gold medals that way, he says, if I won the gold medal in Atlanta the way the Canadian team won theirs, he bit his head, damn, someone was reading Tommy's diary Dreamer at an angle.

Dex came with a bell to start things off rather than the head trauma. Kane keeps swinging, but Kurt hits him with a German Jr with the line that says Kane's brain. They must be scrambled like eggshad breakfast this morning damn angle on offense for a long time just stomping on Kane's Dome and his delicious scrambled brains more suplexes every time there's a suplex Jerry says more head trauma Kurt even hits a flying clothesline All Kane goes for one more but Kane hits him interrupts. Kane goes for a tombstone. Kurk grabs his mask using the distraction to hit the angle and we get a kick.

Angle lock is applied. Kane screams in pain but gets the ropes. Kurt won. I didn't let go so we got an enziguri K up on Kurt trapping him with a suplex on the top rope, angled strike is countered, goozle, counter into a rollup, Kurt puts his feet on the ropes for leverage on the coverage and win. I give it three. Stars and a half out of five. I really enjoyed this matchup. I think this is easily one of the best matches Kane has ever had in his career. You can just look at the story on him and very few matches will tell this type of story. and be that Technical and I think he really pulled it off well, uh not necessarily Kurt's best match, especially for Wrestlemania, but still a pretty solid Endeavor, uh, it's just one of those where they're kind of leftovers .Actually, I mentioned that Kurt, you know, you don't want to see him in this kind of position, but Kane was also pretty pivotal and pretty strong in 01, so it's kind of a consolation match for both of them.

Honestly, backstage, the hurricane is looking for a place to hide, suddenly, a group of Godfather ladies appear, which means that the hurricane has to hide behind that changeling thing, uh, holding a broom handle, There is a silhouette, the lady begins to take off each other's clothes. and comparing breast sizes like you do, we get a boner joke using that silhouette joke as The Godfather runs off to further break up things to come in the hardcore title Saga, by the way, what a strange opportunity to just shoehorn the Godfather in this thing because he's not on this card anywhere, he's not even in the pre-show match, what a tough few months it has been for World Wrestling Federation co-owner Rick Flair making his return to the ring at the Royal Rumble in the match with Mr.

McMahon and then, with no way out, in February we see him cost the Undertaker his match with The Rock and Taker wants a match at WrestleMania in response. Flair initially says no, he's not going to have the match with Undertaker, so Terer starts to get personal and beats Aron Anderson's Inferno defeats young David Flair, Rick finally relents and accepts the challenge at All Madness during a match. Flair accidentally hits a fan played by a young Paul London by the way Flair is arrested and as a result there is an emergency board meeting at WWF headquarters and Flair is temporarily stripped of his power as co-owner for that whole series of scenes on Raw that are a little frustrating to watch just from a storytelling standpoint because Vince is doing all these monologues and all these speeches about how embarrassing it is for Flair to do these things that he himself does as a co-owner, like being embarrassed, being arrested fighting with talent and all that, but it's never mentioned as a rebuttal to anyone.

He ever mentions that Flair never gets a chance to offer any kind of rebuttal in this, like all he's asking him is do you plan on going through with this Undertaker match and he's like, yeah, I do and they do. You're okay, well, you can't be the president, right, you can't be the coer right now and I thought that's what, what a kangaroo court this was, so just for a weekend, essentially, he's a man without power, but they say they have the right to

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that decision after WrestleMania for some reason. I guess fighting Undertaker is too much of a conflict of interest which again goes against the years before and after the narrative of him when it comes to someone. in a position of authority authority having a match at WrestleMania now there is no DQ as the Undertaker faces the flare Rick wastes no time, he runs to the ring and the fight begins immediately spills out and onto the announce table Flair can't get up and up in the corner, they come back to him, although on the outside the flare is bleeding now there is Will Sasso and his friend cheering in the front row the flare is a bloody mess as the catcher continues to throw soup bones at them, a great superplex. by Taker from the outside Flair grabs a lead pipe from Taker's bike and hits him with it.

Undertaker grabs the throat but Flair takes him to Dick Kick City, the figure four is applied but Taker powers out and hits a choke. The Taker takes out the referee Little n. They're fighting over the lead pipe, suddenly Aon Anderson comes in with a spine. Buster, hell yeah, they cover us and a pitcher hits AR Flair runs in with a steel chair carrier, fights it off and goes for The Last Ride, oh. Never mind, Flair can't do it, a tombstone, then Undertaker wins his WrestleMania streak reaching double digits and from now on the streak is officially a four star out of five thing for me.

I really enjoyed this one, you know, even Flair. At this point in his career where he feels like he's not up to the task of being Ric Flair and has all these self-confidence issues, even when he's not at his best mentally, Flair is still better than a lot people right now. even for his age and I think he and Taker told a great story. I love Aon Anderson's cameo, kind of a reminder of when he got beat up by Undertaker and it's always cool to see AR, you know, get that Buster backbone. It was such a nice moment in time there and seeing him and Flair work together like that was a real Nostalgia hit for sure and, yeah, like I said, this is where the streak finally becomes like this what they talk about.

It's so-so and it's built up as its own kind of separate attraction and, uh, it's just a great physical match, you know, it's hard-hitting, it's bloody, there are no other matches like that on this show and I think it's nice to have a match like that. to separate things and they did it very well Michael Cole is in the promo area with a be ithic to Booker T he tries to pass himself off as very intelligent out there the glasses say that in high school he studied Einstein Cole's theory of relatives he corrects him and Booker gets upset because his mask slips or his glasses come off.

I have to say that Booker says that Edge is not smarter or better looking than him. He says Edge will be the spokesperson for a new book called "I Just Got My Ass Kicked at WrestleMania." five-time WCW champion, too bad they got nervous with Adam Copeland in the end. This sign on the hard camera explains that better than me, they are fighting over the shampoo. It's Booker T who's getting nervous. That's the story Booker T was auditioning for. a Japanese shampoo commercial, you know, which adds to the rich history of wrestlers doing commercials in Japan and, you know, Booker T did that audition and I love his line read to start, the Japanese, but ultimately , Edge is chosen to be the spokesperson for The Japanese Shampoo and Booker T is furious about this and that's why we have a match at WrestleMania.

There are so many other ways you could have followed the plot, you could have built a story of oh, hey, Edge will be in Toronto. hometown as his first singles match at WrestleMania uh he was there in the audience at WrestleMania 6 watching Hogan and Warrior like you could build a story out of that and Booker T wanting to ruin this homecoming for Edge but no, Japanese champion commercial, we don't. I didn't even get a hair fight with a quick start for both guys. Booker drops Edge over the top rope for a nice missile kick in the corner.

Edge goes for a top rope hurricane. They both land awkwardly. each other Booker goes for the scissor kick but Edge counters with his omatic Booker dodging the spear hits the roon spinner we get the kick we get a kick Edge hits his terrible Rooney edge but still ducks, side kick hits the education and wins I give it two and a half stars out of a five, even if your perspective is not tainted by the knowledge that they are fighting over shampoo, the match itself is like eh, okay, it's a match like it's a fight of WrestleMania quality, no. no it's not, I'm not sure maybe doing that route like oh it's Edge da D's homecoming I'm not sure if that would have made the match better, but maybe it would have added a little more heat in the parking lot , the hurricane stopped by the coach for an interview, you can hear Jr in a low voice, don't trust him.

Hurricane says he's not a Hur pervert. Enter Mighty Molly, who dunks Hurricane with a frying pan and wins the hardcore title of her own mentor, next up is angry Steve. Austin will face Scott Hall from the New World Order or How Steve Austin Neutered the New World Order. This was, oh man, I would love to revisit the New World Order in WWE because I covered it years ago and I feel like I could go back to it. now and I try to provide a lot more details about a coup because, man, there are so many things about this story with the New World Order that immediately get it wrong and I think what they do and we'll talk about this a little bit more. in the Hogan Rock showdown is how big the distinction is in the New World Order between Hollywood Hogan and Holland Nash as a unit, those two are simply Riff Raff, they are secondary characters, they are bodies that must be sacrificed in the grand scheme of things. things with Hogan and I think this fight with Austin really shows that Austin is in a rut, he doesn't like where he is creatively, he's in a bad place in his life, he's dealing with a lot of stress and internal turmoil as a result of Hall and Nash are It would seem like we're in a trial period with the WWF because you know there was a contingent of people who didn't want the New World Order to come back and so they're taking a really big risk here and Hall has his demons and everything. always on guard so the New World Order comes in and costs Austin the undisputed title against Jericho in February.

Austin responds by kidnapping Scott Hall and torturing him all over the arena by pouring beer on him with a stunner and then, in raw, the New World Order blows up Austin's leg with a cinder block. We also see Austin shoot Kevin Nash with a pistol. network that doesn't go off the first time they have to edit it, that's a lot, you just know that Steve Austin is a one-man wrecking crew against most of the NWO Scott Hall. wants a match against him at Mania, but is there any doubt where this is going? Hall makes his entrance and he's not alone, here comes Kevin Nash, who probably hasn't had such an easy payday at Mania since issue #10, um, the reason I always heard that.

Nash wasn't booked in a match at WrestleMania because it was sort of a backup plan if Scott Hall couldn't perform for any reason on the broadcast with Austin, so Nash could be slotted in right there if Hall wasn't there. I can't get Austin's punches in first and he's all over Hall to start things off. What opportunity flows like Steve Weiser? Austin also takes Nash down, unprovoked, Nash breaks up a turnbuckle. Hall throws Austin into him. Hall hits that big Fall Away Slam, we get a two. Cue Nash taking those cheap shots throughout and Austin manages to land a stunner, one of four he's going to hit on Hall in this match.

Nash pulls the referee out of the ring and starts yelling. Austin Hall brings a chair to the ring. finishes Austin breaks free hits back to back stunners referee jack dome slides but Nash hits him with the elbow he has crushed Scott goes for his Edge but is thrown out of the ring finally a legion of referees comes out and tells Nash to leave Back in the ring he hits his own stunner, Tim White's back makes the count. Austin kicks out, hits two more stunners and we finally get the Big Bounce from Hall. Austin wins at Main Eventing, possibly the biggest mania of all time to wrestle someone he's not. even at the top of the depth chart in the New World Order in a midcard game, yeah, if I were Austin, I'd be mad too.

I give it two stars out of five, this is a match that didn't really showcase the strengths of either of these men. I mean, like they weren't in bed, it just wasn't a very exciting match and like I said, it was a foregone conclusion. Austin had been running around the New World Order steadily for the past few weeks and wasn't feeling it. as if this time was going to be different as a result of frustrations with him Austin not appearing on TV tapings after Mania, technically it's his first outing, it's the one before the one we all know he was supposed to be about do that week. fight Brock Lesnar in that King of the Ring qualifying match, this was the first while the brand was split and the draft was discussed for the first time after Mania, we get a recap of the fan access event, one of the most highlights for me was seeing a fan in an RVD knit sweater thatis commitment, they also have a statue cast of Stacy Ker's legs and butt, which is simply the worst four-way elimination match for the tag team titles as Billy and Chuck defend against The Hardy Boys, the APA, and The Dudley. who along with Stacy Keebler are brought to the ring by spit playing their forced entry theme, it's actually my favorite Dudley boy entrance, which I know saying out loud is a very strange category to classify, but it's what I think of every time I think of the Dudle.

I think about this entry I think about the spit version of the song I think about, you know, Stacy Keeler dancing with the lead singer I think about Bubba Ray banging his head and hitting that symbol that Trump put up I just think it's a really cool entry for them, but what is that noise that Lawler makes when they finish a song? Billy and Chuck defeated Taz and Spike Dudley shortly after, leaving them with no way out to become the new champions. They had this little microprogram with the APA before Mania got involved. attracting Bradshaw and Farooq to the friendly tap that was owned by Tim White, but they were all a bunch of guys in Drag and all these gay stereotypes and everything it really was, although I'll reiterate what I said in my Rumble O2

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In general, I like it. the general introduction of Billy and Chuck The ambiguously gay duo. I think it's very entertaining. Stuff like this with a friendly feel is pretty bland and ages absolutely poorly now, but I think overall I think I liked Billy and Chuck before. They jumped the shark and added Rico B and G working the APA early with a lot of bodies in the ring, but everyone is able to avoid each other when Bradshaw tags in Billy with the Hell 3D clothesline to Bradshaw and the APA is out. the resistant ones. with a double team move Devon Dudley is setting up a table while the other two teams fight Jeff hits whispers in the wind and takes off his shirt Stacy walks over to the apron with the distraction Jeff slaps and kisses the baby's face Bubba yells it's time to die Jeff Hardy Bubba working on Jeff for several minutes does the super cock stomp but gets knocked out of the ring hot tag to Matt and Bubba Bubba misses a senton but Matt hits the leg drop Devon goes up top but Billy just pushes him off and crashes into his own table Nick Patrick looks over A twist of fate and Swan Ton sends the Dudle back to the showers.

Chuck distracted the referee and allowed Billy to defeat Jeff with the title belt, the cover in victory. B and G retain. I'm going to give this three stars out of five. I think this was an above average match with so many teams in the ring elimination rules, it can become a bit of a bracket or it can be a situation where you know it's not very balanced, you know in terms of which teams are doing and how much. but I think all four teams worked together pretty well and I think they all played a role in each other's eventual eliminations.

There was enough crossover action between all four teams where it really felt like it was Lively and everyone was getting involved without being too busy backstage with Nash and Hall Scott reiterating that Austin got lucky hitting him with four stunners and that they're ready to unleash their aggression. on the Rock, but Hollywood Hogan appears and tells them to hang back so he can hit Rocky alone just like he did with Rocky Balboa, the heel somewhere else. Powerful Molly walks right into a door, it's Christian, stand back, there's a new champion on the way, come on, she covers Molly and pins her to become the new champion, oh what a bastard.

Next up is icon versus icon and it is without a doubt the biggest match on this show. It absolutely should have been the last one as the main event. It's Hollywood Hogan facing The Rock. Hello Hogan, I only have one thing to say: what are you going to do on the Monday after No Way Out, Hulk Hogan had a speech alone where he said that the fans turned their back on Hogan that's why he left the WWF and why he turned evil and became part of the New World Order. The Rock comes out and says that people believed in him, but at some point something went wrong and he says that you've headlined WrestleMania after WrestleMania, how about one more with the rock?

Time stops and we have this incredible confrontation with the two of them, they look like panoramic. on the left they look to the right and we get that reaction from the crowd, it's great, the fight is accepted and then the New World Order just hit the rock, hit him with a hammer, got him an ambulance and stopped him from leaving. Hogan climbs into an 18-wheeler and crashes into the ambulance, beating up his crippled brother. uh, Rock, by the way, was fine after he lived, he would turn out to be fine, they wouldn't scratch him when he came back on TV, so we.

Got this match now Hogan is supposedly working with a broken rib and a 103 degree fever while this show is going on, however Hogan lies about a lot of things so who's to say we got that big ovation from the crowd before that they connect the hodgepodge of opportunities? and yelling to create this giant wall of sound it's pretty surreal there's the blocking, the pushing, the posing, the pop, oh my god the crowd is already taken off and going crazy for Hogan, it was a complete shock and everyone says no one could have seen this coming. but honestly, if you look at the programming in the weeks leading up to this, they weren't going to cheer for Hogan like everyone knew that that narrative with Steve Austin and Bret Hart, Double T Mania 13, just happened that night and oh my god, it just happened.

It came out of nowhere, but if you really look at the schedule in the weeks leading up to it, you'll see that all the signs are there, that the double shift already happened before Mania and that match is the exclamation point, that's how I feel about it. They're made to believe that, oh my god, they had no idea they were going to cheer for Hulk Hogan even though after the whole thing with the TR semi and the ambulance, they spent the next three weeks like they did nothing but tell you Hey, it's really Hulk Hogan. Awesome, look at all these great things he did when he was here before, in red and yellow, the company was hyping his ion status and they were doing it very seriously and genuinely like, wow, he did really cool things for us and yeah, the fans .

They probably missed him, WWF fans deep down wanted to cheer him on even though he was a bad guy and yeah, they were in Toronto which is going to be that Bizarro World thing and they're not going to react, they're going to react. The opposite way the WWF wants them to react, so all this, oh, who could have foreseen this? Hogan would have been applauded and changes all of our creative plans, as you know, it seems like you yourself were making that happen as if not. by accident, each man trades tight lines, the rock hits one and the fans just boo him now Hogan fights on the first Rock Bottom attempt, the crowd shows up for Hogan doing multiple back rakes.

I love that at this point the fans are just applauding everything Hogan does, booing everything the rock does, they fight by the announce table for a moment, a referee hits the rock with this terrible sniper against Big Booze, we get a visual touch, but the referee is still down, man, the paint on Hogan. The boots are just moving out. The Rock's entire body looks disgusting. Hogan with a low blow and The Rock Bottom covers the kick. He slips out of his weight belt and starts screaming. Rock grabs the BT and whips him back. We get a rock bottom.

He kicks Hulk and the fans go nuclear, punches, boot, leg drop, he beat Andre the Giant with that move and we get a kick, he goes for another bootleg drop combo but can't get it with another Rock Bottom . another, people's elbow, cover and count, Rock wins and gets this passing of the torch the moment we get sportsmanship, all of a sudden Hall and Nash come out and it's like you shake Rock's hand , that goes against everything we stand for, they beat up Hogan, but Rock makes the save, they clean house and then pose at length. I give it four stars out of five, it's not a technical masterpiece by any means, but my goodness, find me another combo with reactions like that and I'll be reversed every time, just that wall. of the sound like I said really made things special and unique with this um.

I think hearing that they had to change the match on the fly based on these reactions is a great testament to both guys, that's some old school in-ring calling. You know, I think they were able to navigate it really well, gosh, it was just a fun combination for that true story. I actually saw this Mania at the Scrambled PPV. I think it's the last Mania I saw that way. but hearing those reactions was like the radio, you hear the reactions and you say you can't believe it and for me, someone like me who has talked about this before my wrestling education, I didn't really appreciate or understand Hulkamania or Hogan or any of those things at the time I started watching, so this was a big revelation to me as I was still a relatively young fan who didn't know much about the backstory of that period of wrestling yet, but this was just, yeah, a crazy match, but again they shouldn't have been surprised that the crowd was going to do what they did in that one, we see the Big Show at WWF New York WrestleMania Baby Woo, wow, what a great moment for him, well, there follow him, ladies.

Next up, we have a triple threat match for the Women's Championship as the Jazz defenseman against Lita and Trish Stratus, the home country girl wearing Team Canada colors. By the way, this is Lita's only Mania match that she will participate in as a competitor until Mania 39. last year in Los Angeles, that's an insane statistic. Jazz dominates both of his opponents. Early, half a crab to Trish and the Buster implant to Lita. Trish puts the jazz on her shoulders, unfortunately there is no doomsday device. Trish hits Lita with a bulldog, but Jazz breaks it up. Trish and Lita finally. she knocks Jazz down for a moment before they focus on each other Lita punches Jazz and Trish goes for her moonsa just wants a punch to one person anyway but Trish gets her knees up Trish goes for another Bulldog but gets pushed back the corner has her leg tied up in the corner which looks like it could have ended very badly Jazz with an incredible top rope fisherman suplex on Lita the cover and the win for Jazz to retain I'll give it a half star out of five, you know there was something Decent action in this one, but it wasn't given much time, it was obviously just the relegation match between Rock and Hogan and the main event, a certain death spot for all three ladies, you know, I said this before about an in-match above they did the best with the time they were given, which wasn't much in the parking lot.

Christian celebrates that he has survived and escaped with a hard title, loads his taxi and is ready to leave until Maven shows up and takes the title back. from him and takes his taxi, at which point he closes the circle. That said, I give the hardcore title Saga on the night three stars overall, it was like candy, you know, it's fun and entertaining, but it doesn't stay with you for long and I think. This is one of the last gasps of rule 247, being something fun or really novel, showing it that way, you know, on this show it's in a different way than they showed the last three years, the hardcore Mania title, that's all.

It's been a little different, you know they had a tough match in 2000, you had the triple threat match with Kane, Big Show and Raven in 17, a more straight match, you know, and then you bring the 24/7 back here and I think it was necessary, it was fun in your main event for the undisputed Championship. Chris Jericho with Stephanie McMahon in his Corner defends against Triple H with Drowning Pool taking him to the ring. I'll tell you what the structure is for this confrontation. It's not as bad as me. Remember that It's worse, so Triple H won The Rumble in January and then officially split from Stephanie shortly after he left her at the altar when they were going to renew their vows because it was revealed that Stephanie lied about being pregnant.

H then lost a number one. The contenders face Kurt Angle with no way out, as I mentioned, they defeated him a night later to regain the title. Jericho has now joined forces with a jilted Stephanie and those two are supposed to be this two-headed monster that you know finally works together next. All the time they spent, you know, tearing each other down, all the nasty things Jericho said about Stephanie, now it's all a thing of the past and they're working together for that common goal, the united front of taking out Triple H, you know, Jericho is taking the credit for you.

Knowing Triple H's quad injury last year, he mentions putting it on Jericho's walls at the announce table after Triple H already tore his quad, so he put it on the shelf more, but that's pretty much the only amount of heat they give to Jericho. only when it comes to this Triple H thing because men like you watch it every week on TV and it's just pathetic how Jericho who is the champion has both belts and he's supposed to be the biggest guy in the company. standard and he isthis total woolly Gopher for Stephanie McMahon, like he does a great healing job for Stephanie, but man, you've completely neutered your top heel by default, he's your heel champion, he's your top heel and you make him look at this total nonsense because he runs off to get lotion and coffee for Stephanie.

He was forced to walk Triple H's dog. Lucy, who is hit by a limo off-camera, breaks her leg. You already know. Champion stuff, it's absolutely ridiculous and you know, maybe there's a little bit of bias in me. Because of my love for Jer at the time as a fan and my disappointment that his run as Champion wasn't as good as it seemed, I just felt like a complete regression of his character. I'm not against the idea of ​​Jericho and Stephanie working together it's a good idea on paper, but you have to present them as equals, as if it doesn't make any sense that Jericho, the champion, is completely subordinate to this woman who technically has no power kayf, even if you're not. a Jericho fan at this point, how does this feel like a WrestleMania main event?

World title, whatever the show is right now, because the story is not a Championship Challenger chasing the champion, it becomes Triple H and Steph are having a match and Jericho, the champion, it just happens. being there for me this whole third wheel thing on the level of whether the question is whether this story forces me to buy a ticket or buy the PPV or whatever, I would probably put it just a level or two above the fight . On a fun fact about a Japanese shampoo commercial, Bret Hart was apparently asked to be the special guest referee for this match during the entire tie in Canada, but he turned it down, remember this was before fixing things with the Federation , at this point he was him.

He didn't want to give fans the impression that he had forgiven the Federation for everything that had happened because he hadn't, my goodness, do you think Stephen Jericho would have at least considered coordinating their looks to give the appearance of a cohesive unit that didn't have? They don't even have highlights of the same color in his hair, unfortunately, in a matter of seconds, part of Triple H's tan has rubbed off on Jericho. Triple H is already taking care of his bandaged leg. Jericho continues attacking that limb. We get a little more back and forth. Shin Breaker for the game, he puts on the figure four, but Stephanie rips his eyes out.

Triple H grabs her, we get this accidental collision between her and Jericho. He wants to give Steph pedigree, but Jericho hits him with the missile kick. Steph slaps the man before Jericho does his thing. figure four Around the ring after Trip tries to fight but seems to hurt his leg every time Jericho wants to take a backbone, Buster but H isn't ready so they do it again. The H man is thrown out of the ring and is in a lot of pain on the table Jericho goes for his walls Triple H fights and wants to hit the pedigree but his back fell through the Spanish commentary table Jericho brings the chair to the ring with the referee distracted but it backfires horribly Stephanie takes the chair but is stopped by Hebner who allows Trips to finally get his hands on his kayfabe soon-to-be ex-wife and gives him the pedigree to the delight of the fans, At least this time he didn't fall out of his shirt like he did on TV last week.

Jericho hits H in the face off the chair, but we kick Jericho. goes for a flight nothing the most expensive flight nothing Triple H catches him and reaches the pedigree to win the undisputed title I'm going to give it three stars out of five, you know this match shouldn't have continued in the last period And I think uh, it felt throughout the rest of the night after Rock and Hogan, there was a vibe to the whole last part of the show where it was like, oh, the show's already over, this is just some kind of window address and, um, I think I know the match itself wasn't terrible, it was just poorly positioned and it was also the end result of a horrible story that, in my opinion, was not a story worthy of the WrestleMania Main Event and also did its best to bury for complete. halfway through that match made it a foregone conclusion who was going to win my qualification for Wrestlemania 18, the last one under the WWF banner is a B minus.

I think there are some standout moments or matches on this show that make it good. Mania in general, if you only see one match on the show it's Hogan Rock, maybe Taker Flare is second and I like the hardcore title Saga, like I said there's a lot of average on this show, a lot of average matches, a lot of things really shitty. justification for WrestleMania matches in the first place, on all ends of the spectrum, from the midcard to the main event, there are some really weak reasons to have WrestleMania matches in these supposed blood feuds or whatever, and that keeps the rating a little low, but It's overwhelming overall, it's a positive WrestleMania, it's just strange, it's a big setback, a big setback from the previous year, no doubt, but what did you think of Mania 18?

What were your favorite matches and moments on the show? Let me hear it in the comment. section below, be sure to like the video if you like it, subscribe to Wrestling with Regret, hit the Bell icon for all notifications. Now, in a few weeks, we'll be back with another classic review. Let's go back to the year 1989. For a little story arc here now, one of the biggest rivalries that the late great Terry Funk had was his fight with Ric Flair for the world championship and we're going to find out how we got to Clash of Champions which eh, it's iconic. match let's see what happens when Ric Flair regains the title and triggers that feud with the funker with the wcw War 89 match but until then I'm Brian Zayn and I'll see you next time.