This thread shocks me. The first 15 manias were boring? That’s a pretty big statement. I’m with some others that think the thread starter has to be young. Probably around 15 years old I’m guessing. I’m not criticizing your opinion. If someone asked me to watch some wrestling from 1970 I’d probably find it pretty boring. If you’re not that young and were a fan during the early manias I can only wonder how you remained a fan all these years if you found the best event of the year boring every year.
I would separate the manias into four groups. Only manias 1 & 2 would be in the first group. 3-8 would be in the second group. 9-16 is the third. 17-26 would be the fourth. The WWF didn’t really find the right mania formula until WM3 as the first two were more experimental. 9-16 were composed of two brief eras in WWE history; the new generation and attitude. WWF was trying to find its niche post Hulkamania. 17-26 is WWE as it is today with the hype machine in overdrive. Mania was always hyped big, but the hype has gone to another level over the last ten years.
To me manias 3-8 were the golden years of WrestleMania. Remember what WWF television was like back then. Everything was squash matches with an occasional feature match. After always seeing matches like Tito Santana vs. Reno Riggins even a match like Hercules vs. Haku at mania was fun to watch. Other than mania, SummerSlam was the only event to give us a card full of feature matches. Even the three of the four SummerSlams during this time had tag matches as the main event. There were two other ppvs, but Survivor Series was always the tag eliminations and the rumble was the rumble. Also a lot of mania matches were built months in advance. Some feuds would start in October and not climax until mania. Now with five ppvs in between (one more on the whole yearly schedule back then) there’s no way we can get a build like that anymore.
The biggest difference between then and now is now everyone is overexposed. As I said back then you had mostly squash matches with no name jobbers. There were only four ppvs a year and two were gimmicks that didn’t feature singles matches. There was an occasional Saturday Night’s Main Event. Those were cool, but if Hogan was on it he would wrestle against someone to conclude his feud meaning they had already had their climax or a less worthy lackey of the person he was feuding with such as Bob Orton instead of Roddy Piper. For mania it was Andre, Savage, Warrior, etc. If raw was around in 1991 the last one before mania probably would have had Hulk Hogan & Ultimate Warrior vs. Sgt. Slaughter & Randy Savage. I don’t like how WWE does stuff like this now. I prefer television being used to advance the story and the opponents don’t meet up in matches until mania.
Now we have six hours of WWE programming every week with matches that all would have been considered features twenty years ago. There is also a ppv every month. It’s hard to keep things fresh. One of the best things about the old manias was how all the stars were together at one show. Now that happens every week. It’s also hard to get excited about one big show when there’s another right around the corner. I’m not saying I don’t get excited about mania now, because I do, but it’s not the same as the old days. Of course I was ages 7-12 during WM 3-8 so that has a lot to do with it. Everything is more exciting when you’re a kid. In my opinion no mania over the last ten years can match the excitement for the main events of manias 3, 5, & 6 in terms of big name matches.
