The Attitude Era had a much more legit threat in WCW; they tried to pull anything shocking off just to out-rate their competition. Wrestling was huge for that reason alone, we've all seen countdowns and DVD's and all that jazz for era.
The PG Era seems to focus more on storyline over shock culture. They don't need ridiculous segment and outrageous moments anymore, today's competition does not pressure WWE. The WWE can focus more on a character's progression and casual build. Making it all work is up to the talent, which is more or less a different story but generally the WWE simply doesn't need to plant 10,000 WTF moments anymore. It's not needed.
It's all preference. If anything, the superstars need to step up and Creative needs to get, you know...creative.
This cannot be a serious assessment. WWF from 1998-2006 had serious character building, and were at their peak for storyline building. You either didn't grow up during the period or forget how in depth WWE was back then.
Today's WWE is a joke compared to back then. It is well known knowledge that back in the day, Vince Mcmahon had a VERY SMALL circle of trusted writers. Him and Pat Patterson would spend time together with the talent coming up with months of storyline progression in adavance. To say that the attitude era got over on shock value alone is a completely ignorant statement coming from someone who only knows what they hear and was most likely not around for the actual content. The reason why the Attitude Era was the most successful era was because the storylines had the audience hooked and the Character development was unmatched. The wrestling wasn't always the best, but now WWE has neither the storylines nor the in ring pro wrestling, so its worst off now than ever before.
Just a few Attitude Era storylines that absolutely destroy anything WWE has produced since 2006:
The Vince vs Austin storyline
The Corporation storyline
The Corporate Rock Storyline
The Rock and Sock Connection Storyline
Bret Hart vs Shawn Michaels storyline
The Kurt Angle vs Chris Benoit vs Chris Jericho Storyline
The Rivalry between Chris benoit vs Jericho
The storylines between The Hardys, Dudleys, Edge and Christian
Undetaker Vs Kane
The Rock vs Mankind
The Right to Censor Storyline
Brock Lesnar vs Kurt Angle
Eddie Guerrero vs Rey Mysterio
HHH vs Batista
Eddie Guerrero vs JBL
The Evolution Storyline
ect.
But I guess some people think prematurely killing off the Wyatt stable is SMART BOOKING huh? How about Cesaro building up tremendous momentum but then WWE choosing to end the Superman Swing and kill off everything they built up, more SMART BOOKING? How about the Start...stop....start...stop....start for Dolph Ziggler? SMART BOOKING? Zack Ryder building up a cult following but ignoring he even existed? SMART BOOKING? Forcing Roman Reigns into a position he wasn't ready for, only to stop his push and put him into a fued with Big show, who he's beaten over and over and over again already on television 1000000 times.. SMART BOOKING? Big Show and Kane in the main event EVERY WEEK? SMART BOOKING? Turning the US/Intercontinental titles into toys over the years.. MORE SMART BOOKING? Dean Ambrose was white hot a couple months ago, what did they do with that momentum?...SMART BOOKING? Having the Miz in the main event of WrestleMania and WWE champion when he never should have cracked the main event...SMART BOOKING? How about Jack "No Charisma" Swagger as champion? SMART BOOKING? I could go on and on.... How about the Divas compared to yesterday? No comparison, there are no Trish Stratus's, Lita's, Jaqulines, or Ivory's on the roster. The ratings speak for themselves really but to say today's WWE is better than Attitude and Ruthless aggression eras? Lmfao yeah ok.