Did anyone prefer the "pre-attitude" WWE?
i.e pre-1998 WWF. Ultimately I did, even though 1998 bought some pretty exciting changes to the WWE. Undertaker set on fire in his casket, his inferno match with Kane, Mankind in Hell in a Cell 2, Sable's various bikini shows, Vince McMahon's involvement in matches and storylines including Austin pulling a gun on him and causing him to piss his pants. So quickly did they pile on the changes, that pre-attitude WWE seems like ancient history now.

I understand how WWE needed to come up with something to compete with WCW's new direction i.e the nWo. I think in the beginning WWE tried to compete against WCW by taking more pride in their wrestling purism, making veiled criticisms of the nWo angle and WCW's focus on drama rather than wrestling. Fans apparently wern't moved by that. Obviously Steve Austin's promotion to the top and the founding of Degeneration X were WWE's chief response to WCW's new product. WWE really took extreme measures to get back on top again. Personally I think the nWo angle and what it entailed was a lot more tasteful than Austin and D-X. Obviously the nWo angle ran it's course and chances are WWE would have taken the lead again even without the extremism of Austin and D-X.

I think at best the WWE gives little nods every so often to things from pre-attitude WWE.....like tributes to a bygone age though. I guess with WWE's return to PG rating maybe pre-attitude WWE will become cool again. I don't think wrestling necessarily NEEDS to be above PG in order to be entertaining. I guess even PG allows for the odd bit of extremism. In this day and age, probably even under PG, you can get away with more swearing and violence on TV than in the '90s.

The Attitude Era and before was great because of the talent Vince had at his disposal. These days the talent is all the bloody same.

TV orf.

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I am settlemental towards the pre-attitude era aka the new generation in the WWF. That's the era I really got into wrestling. EG. The magazines. WWF Mag, WCW mag, PWI, Powerslam. We would wait 3 months after PPVs to be able to watch them on video. God bless the New Generation.

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I used to love going into United Video and seeing the new In Your House PPV there to rent.

Good times.

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Ha same here..

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The I Love Swanton Club: PrimeTimePlaya, Machine Guns Go Bang, Macclad, Hurricane Girl, Nero, NZPWI Forum Moderator, Syx Seed, Shazza, Ang, James_C, Scott_A, D.Star, Paul and all variations of, bee, Dean, Miss Rass, Go 2 Peep.

I made best friends with the guy who worked at Amalgamated, so whenever the latest Coliseum Video release would arrive, he'd put it on hold and ring me so I could rush right down there and hire it! And then I could tell everyone at school about what the latest wrestling happenings were 'cos I'd seen it before them! Until the stupid internet arrived and eventually it was everyone telling me 'Oh, I heard Rock wins the title at Survivor Series!! Did you know Kevin Nash ended Goldberg's streak?!! Oh, did you hear the nWo Wolfpac reformed with nWo Hollywood!!' Fucking internet. Ruined my reputation.

<3 the 90s!'

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"Why all the pearls? Why all the hair? Why anything?"

I prefer anything pre 98 over anything post 98.

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Everybody has a price, for the million dollar man. HAHAHAHA...

My brother and I used to go to Harvey Norman in Manukau to read the wrestling news, we went nuts when we found out Goldberg had lost to Nash. It was was also heart breaking when my brother bought a print out home from work telling me Owen had died

Wrestling was better without the internet at that time. Wrestling is better without twitter now.

The stop and start booking is killing so much talent right now.

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But I can't tell you from the drugs

Argh I remember the first time I went on the internet, going to wcw.com and it was the week after Nash beat Goldberg. It sucked because on TV we were only in like June or something.

I remember how excited I was when TCM got WCW Nitro. I still remember the first Nitro we got! Hall threw the TV Title in the rubbish bin

<3 WCW


WWE, pre attitude? Meh.

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It depends what you wanted out of the product.

Post 98 is better for the big events, the pay-per-views (although those have declined sharply since 2005 or thereabouts) and better weekly TV with more happening and more personalities featured. A lot of of those developments had to do with increased competition.

Pre 98 had, as stated an amazing depth to the talent. Personally I didn't mind squash matches, as long as some element of whatever feud was going was furthered during the show. 1997 was a great year for WWF TV, probably its best up to that time.

If you look at pay-per-views, especially going right back, some of them were amazing, but an equal amount were poor because the guys had been on the road two months straight.

The 50's stuff I've seen is pretty good, but the 60's stuff is almost exaclty the same and I can imagine that would have been tedious to sit through after a decade without much change. The 70's big events are usually hot crowds, often long dull undercards and exciting main events. 70's WWWF TV is often unwatchable, there's the occasional big angle that's remembered because it stood out from the week to week boredom. Early 80's TV is the same.

Again, it was the talent. When they filled up the show the best guys top to bottom, it became compelling to watch.

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"The plan of these wrestling knaves is to get up an excitement about “grand championship matches” and to have special remarks made in the papers about the “feeling of enmity” existing between certain rival wrestlers. All this is done to get up an excitement to swell gate receipts." -The Brooklyn Eagle, June 18, 1877

"The road will own you." - Buddy Wayne

I loved '90s WWF. I'm glad they evolved from the cartoonishness of the '80s. I think while other things like popular music got worse in the '90s, wrestling got better. My knowledge of pre '80s WWF is limited to a handful of matches. One would occasionally in these matches see a spot that occurs in WWF television much later and that is good for giving these old matches relevance, cause we can see how later wrestlers learned from these guys.

First weekend I got Sky was the Nitro episode where Russo and Bischoff returned and rebooted WCW, stripping everyone of their titles and starting the New Blood vs Millionaires Club feud. My mind was blown! I remember ringing mates that night and being all 'Zomg! Hulk Hogan and Billy Kidman are feuding and Kidman pinned Hogan!!!'

<3 WCW 2000

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"Why all the pearls? Why all the hair? Why anything?"

I loved how someone at school got a copy of WM 5 at school on VHS tape and he shared it around to everyone but it was in black and white. PPV's wern't shown here in NZ. We didn't have a video player them so had to read Savage vs Hogan in the WWF mag a month or so later.