Biazzaroworld #1 - The Undertaker

[tiger_rick]

Like several other people in the "Against the grain" thread, I have a love/hate reationship with The Undertaker. So I thought I'd start a thread and perhaps a series of them because there are plenty of divisive characters in wrestling who you love sometimes and hate like a Canadian crowd at others. 

With Taker, I actually think the hate part is easiest. Firstly, the big red elephant in the room, he's a right-wing numpty. In many ways, I wish he'd protected his character forever because then I wouldn't have had to know. I had soured on him long before that all became obvious. His lockerroom leader shit always came across as pathetic. His shitting up of the Invasion angle was classless. His whole "Booger Red" run was terrible. For someone with these exacting standards that he was always keen to hammer others for, he was a willing participant in some of the worst angles and matches in wrestling history, right up until that vegetitive state stuff with Kane that was some of their worst stuff ever. His constant diminishing returns were already sad when I was still an occassional viewer pre-Covid. 

Despite all that, I loved Taker at one point. There's never been a time when he was my favourite but, like the WWF, he was always my number 2 or 3 babyface and I'd generally be into his work, even when he was fighting the most lumbering heels ever.

The real good:

His debut at Survivor Series '90 is still brilliant. I must have seen it a hundred times. He's an instant hit with everyone and you can see why. 

The title win at Survivor Series '91 is a great moment. I dunno when I first saw that, I suspect I rented the tape from the video shop. But I loved him like a babyface by then already. Around that same time, I saw Battle Royal at the Albert Hall and his entrance on that show has always stuck with me.

The face turn. I definitely saw the actual turn, whcih is brilliant, years later, so he was just a face by mid-1992 and I loved that we could cheer him. I just wish there was some reward for it over the next three years. Even though I liked him through the feuds with Kamala, Gonzalez, Mabel, Bundy, etc, there was only really the Yoko feud that offered some proper hope that he'd win the belt and that was squashed pretty comprehensively by 47 heels and some dastardly smoke. RIP Marty.

1996 Taker is great. Mick Foley gets a lot of credit for it, and he deserves it but the Diesel feud and match are brilliant too. Paul Bearer's heel-turn was pretty devastating to me as a teenager which emphasises how much I still liked the big man.

I really liked him in 1997 too. If we graphed out my love for Taker, this would be the peak. Him actually going for titles, being part of incredible business like the final four and the cage match before Mania and being somewhat relatable on interviews like the final 4 was good stuff and then he'd start the best storyline of his career and have the second best match in company history with Shawn at Badd Blood.  The whole Kane angle into and throughout 1998 and then the transition to him and Austin for SummerSlam is so good too.

I'm skipping to 2000 next, because his 1999 was dogshit. He was clever enough to go away for a bit though and I was hyped as fuck for his return. Biker or no biker, that's one of my favourite re-debuts ever. Felt like there were loads in this era, because most of the guys had necks made of weetabix but this might be my favourite. The momentum didn't last long but there were still some highlights like him getting knocked out of the Rumble by Maven and that great match with Lesnar in the cage.

I'm not sure there's much more I love. He went on to have some decent matches but not much that I really liked. That closing stretch of Royal Rumble with HBK was probably the only thing. That was great. Was it 2007? 

I haven't included the breaking of the streak because I wasn't really that in at that point and didn't even see the show for years. Can understand if it's big in other people's fandom, hopefully they'll discuss it.

Let's talk about the good and bad of the Undertaker!

Edited 23 hours ago by tiger_rick

[SuperBacon]

I really, really don't like him as a wrestler but acknowledge that the character, especially the start, was superb, and then all the initial stuff with Kane was great, as was the feud with Mankind. For me though, he just became stale so quickly.

I wasn't watching at the time so I've seen very little of the biker bollocks which always seemed excruciating, even as a wrestling fan!

His matches with Bret Hart at One Night Only and Summerslam 97 are absolutely brilliant as well, but we all know why that is don't we?

[gmoney]

I think my opinion of him as a wrestler and character is fairly typical. I was fascinated by him as a kid from 90 - 93. The walking on the ropes, landing on his feet when being clotheslined out of the ring, the eyes rolling back are mint and skill. I got less and less interested as I got older and most of that stuff is hard to sit through now, particularly all the matches against big lugs. I stopped watching from mid 95 - late 98 so I missed all the Mankind stuff which revitalised him, catching up as a teen I thought it was pretty cool. Nowadays I think the matches are better, but the promos stink. He was lucky to have Paul Bearer with him who is a magnetic promo. Bearer carries the entire Kane feud promo wise as well. Hated biker Taker at the time, still do now. The blend of the two characters was better and he was ale to be carried to some excellent matches by Angle, HBK and to a lesser extent Edge. I enjoyed his Wrestlemania epics, even the ones with Hunter, but I've got no inclination to revisit them. 

As a person he seems like a massive, massive cunt. 

[The King of Old School]

6 minutes ago, gmoney said:

 As a person he seems like a massive, massive cunt. 

Also has the most boring podcast in the entire world.

[HarmonicGenerator]

For the longest time, Undertaker was one of my favourites. At the very start of my fandom, he was one of the characters that stood out in the Ultimate Warrior colouring book I had. He was one of the wrestlers whose name everybody at school knew, and not watching at the time, I equated that with him being one of the best. When I got back into wrestling in 2000, the combo of him being really cool to play as on the SmackDown 1 demo and the way Mick Foley wrote about him in Have A Nice Day cemented him as a favourite.

From that point on I was probably determined to like him despite evidence to the contrary. Bikertaker is probably rubbish if I went back to it now, but then? With the motorbikes and the Limp Bizkit and the Brothers of Destruction squashes and chucking RVD off the stage to win the Hardcore Title? I was here for all of it. I even defended him burying Mike Awesome in a letter to FSM magazine and was torn to pieces by the reply to it. I would still argue Awesome was never going to be a main eventer in WWE, Taker or not, but FSM had a point. I concede now.

I was hyped for the 2004 Deadman return. As were many. It didn’t take long for it to go downhill (I’d argue the shine was off about a third of the way through the WMXX match) and it was clear they had nothing for him past “bring back the Deadman” - Booker T, the Dudleys, Heidenreich by year’s end - but I made myself enjoy the Van Helsing look all the same.

The last time I was properly in the zone of “yes, he’s a favourite” was the WM27 match with Triple H, which I - and others! - wrote about with gushing enthusiasm on here. I was all about that melodramatic overacting stuff! Now, I can look back and see it as the beginning of the end when it comes to WWE main event style, but when Triple H hit the Tombstone and Taker kicked out? Amazing! 

Once the Streak ended, I cared less and less. I’d always wanted to see Undertaker (or rather, his entrance) live but once we got into the ‘10s, I was fine to have not.

Then in the modern day, it’s just as gmoney puts it:

42 minutes ago, gmoney said:

As a person he seems like a massive, massive cunt. 

And I’d struggle to put him anywhere near my favourites. Should have stayed in character even in retirement, I was happier not knowing the guy behind the gimmick.

[Mr_Danger]

Always found him and most his matches quite boring considering. He’s had some belting matches over the years but he’s not dragging much out of a Khali or a Big Show like a Kurt Angle or even a John Cena can. I was always more excited about him coming back than when he was actually back. Massive to the cartoon era of wrestling and somehow managed to get more cringey as a MMA Biker than he was as a zombie patron of the funeral services. 

[FLips]

I always enjoyed him. I started watching in 2000 so he was already a biker by the time I got into it so I have no qualms with his booger red phase as that was my era of Undertaker. By the time he came back as the Deadman I had watched enoigh VHS and DVDs to be excited about it and didn’t particularly care it was half arsed and he had just stuck a coat on.

I think like HHH he’s massively underrated and put on some great matches with some of the best, and for a lot of them kept up with the best. His crap matches always get highlighted over his good ones, or his opponents always get the credit over him in the good matches.

He successfully moved a stupid gimmick from a time full of stupid gimmicks into a modern era and kept it mostly fresh.

Is it outweighed by him likely voting for Trump both times, being in a little dorky biker gang with Yokozuna and Papa Shango and having a crap podcast? Probably not for me. I rate him even if the man behind the gimmick is a braindead yank.

 

[Mr_Danger]

I think his biggest strength in ring was being good at what he did so if he was with the right guy that would work great and he could more than hold his own. When with someone shit he would struggle to work around his opponents weaknesses and could only really do what he did.  I know he’s had some all time shittest opponents but are there any good examples of when he’s had a cracker with an Albert or Mark Henry or someone of that ilk? There must be a few. He was definitely paired with more shitarses than he was Kurt Angles or Bret Harts for a good portion of his career.

[Chico Torres]

I thought Undertaker from when he joined until he died at Rumble 94 was great. Great gimmick and he was fully committed to the bit, never showing pain, stuffing jobbers into a body bag. Never broke character and Paul Bearer was a great part of the act. Enjoyed his feud with the Warrior and locking him in a coffin, helping out my boys the Triangle of Terror, the alliance with evil Jake and then getting in the mix with Hogan.

And after he turned babyface I did enjoy the first wave of monster of the week nonsense with great characters like Kamala, Berzerker, Kamala, Giant Gonzalez, Mr Hughes etc. When our Ludwig took out Tatanka from the Survivor Series team and they replaced him with The Undertaker and he even had his tailor sew in a nice American flag on the inside of his coat…I loved it and even more so when he tangled with Yoko the champ, felt like our Rodney had finally met his match. Obviously loved the Rumble resurrection nonsense as well.

After that though, I thought he was mainly shit, starting with fake Undertaker and the less than inspiring feuds with the likes of Kama, Bundy, IRS.

The best thing he was involved in after he died was when he was as brought in to SMW to face New Jack and The Gangstas because New Jack cutting promos on the Undertaker is a thing that happened and was awesome as pretty much everything that New Jack did was

 

[Jazzy G]

The first time I saw an Undertaker match was against Kamala at Summerslam 92, then again in the coffin match at Survivor Series. It always felt like they were using him to deal with the monster of the moment like they used to do with Hogan while Bret, Shawn, Owen etc did all the technical wrestling stuff during the steroid scandal stuff. He was given some proper suffers during that time. Kamala, Giant Gonzales, Yokozuna. Him sitting up was nowhere near as explosive as Hogan hulking up was, and arguably his repertoire of moves was even more limited. 

The Taker Vs Fake Taker stuff made for an interesting time but again the "methodical" pace he wrestled at was never going to make for a fiery exciting PPV main event which is why he was usually stuck in the middle of the card but front and centre on the poster. He was arguably the face of the WWF through the 90s while other stars came and went around him. Vince built the company around him to an extent as a reward for his loyalty and, more likely, to try and avoid losing him to WCW and us seeing Mean Mark in the nWo week in, week out. 

When Foley came in and the Mankind feud started it breathed much needed fresh life into him. He had to change things up to hang with Foley, but the bells and whistles helped, and this allowed him to be out into matches with Bret, Shawn, Austin etc which were very different, and he even worked differently against big men like Lane. 

Him coming back as Biker Taker was a much needed change as I think he would have looked ridiculous doing his dead man schtick around the likes of Angle, Jericho, Rock, DDP. and the much more realistic style that was coming through at the turn of the millennium.  I got excited when he came back at the end of the iron man match and was fascinated by the idea that he had a new gimmick. It was laughable though, the facial expressions, the bright ginger hair, the snakeskin pants, the Jim Johnston music. It was really bad, but it was so fun. It felt like a massive joke that he wasn't in on as he played this role as seriously as he could. He looked like he loved finally getting to inject a bit of his own personality into his character, but all the punch kick, that dreadful "choke hold", the elbow to the leg, which my mates and I would react to by saying "shit move, brother" while he's convinced that he's a great technical wrestler. Did he try and get the dragon sleeper over at one point? He did have some great brawls with Lesnar during this time including a Hell In A Cell if I remember? The match against Tripper at Mania X7 was good, his match against Flair at 18 wasn't great, but it was two very incompatible styles and Taker's no Barry Windham when it comes to Flair wrestling taller guys. 

A couple of my friends were at MSG when the dead man came back at Mania 20 and said it was a spectacle, but it felt a bit like after the return of that gimmick there was a bit of a regression to the "monster if the month" format just to try and keep him on TV, but as he blended more of his biker moves and character in he did end up in different feuds and getting carried to some decent performances. He seemed to be capable of telling a story in the ring, but he needs somebody to do the rest of the work around him. His Mania matches were mostly great. I do wonder how differently the Lesnar match would have been if he didn't get the concussion he said he got early doors. The matched with Shawn and Tripper were great performances, and after the second match against Trips when he was getting stretchered out I honestly thought that may have been it. 

In my eyes he's the face of the WWF/WWE as he was the one who was there most consistently. Others came and went for their various reasons, but he was always there unless he was injured. Never jumped ship. 

None of his matches are going to be in my facourites list, he's not going to be carved into my mount rushnore, and I don't think his podcast is ever going to be a regular listen of mine, but like Hogan I have respect for what he's done with his career in the ring. 

[air_raid]

I always thought he was a great character but crap to watch unless it was a comedy match like beating up The Mountie or a squash like he had with Jake The Snake. No jeopardy, the fucker never really lost unless it was a silly finish. And when he started losing to Mankind it didn’t matter because the matches were mostly boring until Survivor Series. It wasn’t until he was wrestling Bret and Shawn that I decided he could be decent on his day (funny that) but in the years that followed I still thought he was usually shit. His matches with (examples) Vader at Canadian Stampede, HHH at Mania XVII or Kurt at No Way Out 2006 were usually outliers amidst endless Khali, Mark Henry or Kozlov stinkers and/or him turning or, getting turned on or teaming with Kane long past the point of me caring. The Streak was shit too, especially after they started letting regular blokes kick out of the Tombstone for false finishes. I think vs HHH at Mania 27 was the last match of his I got really into which is remarkable given how I’d considered both of them rubbish for ages - most people think the Cell match at 28 was better, but they’re wrong.

Great character but by and large, to steal a phrase… shame the damn bell had to ring.

[TibBo]

Where did his MMA overconfidence come from? His Hells Gate gogoplata attempt is fucking terrible. Why try to use it as a finisher if you don’t know how to do it, or you aren’t flexible enough to get in the right position?

Lesnar could literally just stand up and walk away

[westlondonmist]

I'm sure he's said if he wasn't a wrestler he'd be a fighter. I'm guessing he's just a deluded weirdo. He was a basketball player wasn't he?

 

Always wondered how well would someone else have gotten on with the gimmick. Because I'm certain Calloway amounts to fuck all without it. I'm guessing someone else could have gotten it over with Bearer's help.

[Jazzy G]

Why not just do a triangle choke? I remember him having a match against somebody, I want to say Albert on an episode of Smackers, and while Taker's on the mat on his back Albert goes to grab him, but does it in the most unnatural way with his arm right up above his head practically feeding him for it. It was dreadful. Albert was a much better opponent for Kane.

[BomberPat]

10 hours ago, westlondonmist said:

I'm sure he's said if he wasn't a wrestler he'd be a fighter. I'm guessing he's just a deluded weirdo. He was a basketball player wasn't he?

It's interesting that the people who seem to have most immediately seen right through his tough guy act were Tracy Smothers and Brian Pillman, both of whom knew him pre-WWF; he had a reputation in WCW, apparently, for being a bit of a wet blanket, never travelling with the boys, and so on, none of which really matters, but is a real contrast to the "conscious of the WWE" locker room leader schtick he laid on thick later on. Like a lot of older wrestlers, he's done the "if MMA existed when I started out, I'd have done that rather than wrestling" spiel - but like you say, it's not like he couldn't have been a fighter; he was never a boxer, or an amateur wrestler, never to my knowledge did any martial arts training, he was a college basketball player.

If I'm writing alternate history, and Mark Calloway is off the table, Barry Windham is my guy for the Undertaker gimmick, leaning more into the original presentation of it as a Wild West vibe. I think it's a mix of things - I don't think Calloway gets over without the Undertaker gimmick, but I also suspect nobody else gets over with the gimmick.

I can't think of anybody else who wrestled at such a high level for such a long time that, even by the standards of cartoonish '90s dross, had so few good matches to show for it - and so many actively dreadful ones. I don't think there's another wrestler who has ever been afforded more opportunities, when anyone else would have been binned off. My criticism of Triple H is that if his role was as The Guy To Wrestle The Top Guy, or as a gatekeeper heel to make new stars, then it's a damning indictment that you can list the stars he made on one hand, and the same goes for the number of people who had their best match against him - for The Undertaker, for years his role was as the guy to establish new monster heels and giants by working against them, and the vast majority of those opponents never amounted to anything, disappeared without a trace, or had actively bad matches with 'Taker. Even the ones who made it and stuck around - Yokozuna, Kane, Big Show - none of them did their best work with Undertaker.