"The 25th Anniversary of WrestleMania": The 10th Anniversary

[Spider2024]

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WrestleMania_XXV

Today marks an actual anniversary for a figurative anniversary that sounded good and looked good on the marquee.

"The 25th Anniversary of WrestleMania" actually took place on the date 5 days after the 24th anniversary of WrestleMania 1.

I'm actually re-watching WM25 right now. It's definitely one of those 'mixed bag Manias' with definitely one great match and at least one or two other good ones. And then that abhorrent main event and the abomination that was the Miss WrestleMania Battle Royal, where 24 women were overshadowed by 2 men (Santino and Kid Rock). Hey though, at least women are main eventing this year's WrestleMania. (So as long as Kid Rock somehow doesn't walk out with a Women's Championship, that match will be a success.)

[Germansuplex]

Still bitter about that main event. Should have been a barnburner with Orton winning.

It was interesting to hear Punk getting booed for winning MitB again.

[Spider2024]

Apr 5, 2019 4:49:31 GMT -5 Germansuplex said:

Still bitter about that main event. Should have been a barnburner with Orton winning.

It was interesting to hear Punk getting booed for winning MitB again.

I'm guessing it's because the crowd overwhelmingly wanted Christian to win.

[Feargus McReddit]

Apr 5, 2019 4:49:31 GMT -5 Germansuplex said:

Still bitter about that main event. Should have been a barnburner with Orton winning.

I’m not a massive fan of HHH at times but even I appreciated the build that match had. That thing should have been No Holds Barred, falls count anywhere, all the smoke and mirrors possible to get the craziest match humanly possible.

But..they locked up. They did holds. They hit finishers. All in the first 5 minutes. Like...what?

[Deleted]

I wasn't watching regularly anymore, but I watched this live. I still shudder thinking about that Undertaker spot (you know the one), but what an amazing match. I also remember Orton vs. HHH being boring. That's about all I can say.

[Spider2024]

Actually, hold up! Allow me to dial back my criticism a tad. Because the reason I said Kid Rock overshadowed the Divas was because his musical performance doubled as the entrance for the women in the Miss WrestleMania battle royal. And both were completely edited out of the original DVD release of WM25, because WWE hates paying for music rights. The DVD just went from the video about WrestleMania Axxess that past week, right to plopping the viewer into a ring with 25 women without any individual introduction. But turns out, the performance/entrance ARE in the Network version. Perhaps they got the rights to that music as part of the deal to put KR in the Hall Of Fame when they did.

[Moppy]

A Wrestlemania that I always thought got a slightly unfair bad rap.

Granted, the 'Miss Wrestlemania' result has to go down as one of their most ill-judged booking faux pas of the modern era. And the main event had that inexplicable 'Triple H can't be disqualified' stip (it should have been No-DQ, if anything!).

But other than that, I thought it was really enjoyable.

[Germansuplex]

Apr 5, 2019 5:08:54 GMT -5 Feargus McReddit said:

Apr 5, 2019 4:49:31 GMT -5 Germansuplex said:

Still bitter about that main event. Should have been a barnburner with Orton winning.

I’m not a massive fan of HHH at times but even I appreciated the build that match had. That thing should have been No Holds Barred, falls count anywhere, all the smoke and mirrors possible to get the craziest match humanly possible.

But..they locked up. They did holds. They hit finishers. All in the first 5 minutes. Like...what?

Gotta say, I loved Orton hitting the RKO first thing into the match. Strange they never did that again.

[Jake, The Jake, Jake]

It really seemed like that Mania was gonna be a home run before it happened. The tag title match getting bumped was disappointing, the MITB was botchy, Matt and Jeff underwhelmed, the Nostalgia battle royal should have been really cool, but...you know, and the main event was a snooze fest. Taker and Shawn killed it and I remember the World Title triple threat being pretty fun, but they really weren’t wnough to carry the rest of the show.

[TGM]

That HHH v Orton match legitimately killed my interest in WWE until the Nexus debut. Orton had long been my least favourite wrestler in WWE but such a good job was done of making him look like a psychopath who wanted to be the top competitor in wrestling. I did a complete 180 on him and was beyond annoyed how things turned out.

Still, we got that beautiful Undertaker vs HBK match, one of the best of all time.

[msc]

I think time has been mostly kind...

The ladder match is fun and is pretty much the "CM Punk is main eventer" moment bar a few hiccups in 2010.
The Miss Mania Battle Royal is a disgrace.
Jericho v Legends is fun once we get rid of Piper.
hardy v Hardy is pretty good.

Obviously Taker/Shawn overshadows all, but its not the worst Mania, even in the last decade.

[MrElijah]

The biggest surprise was Ricky Steamboat turning back the clock to 1994, because holy shit, The Dragon still breathed fire.

[Deleted]

It's kind of a bunch of really great and really terrible moments that add together to create a bad but not unwatchably so show.

There's plenty of good stuff there but it's better off watched in isolation than in context.

[Lt. Palumbo]

Wait...I was gonna try to be funny by saying: I think you'll find it's the 11th anniversary

But it looks like you've already made the joke.

Maths is hard, WWE has my sympy.

Edit: wait, shit, no, the joke works. I'm only just awake, that's my excuse. Maybe that's what happened to WWE. (double sympy)

["Gizzark" Mike Wronglevenay]

Jericho vs. Legends is still one of my all-time favourite Mania matches because I still remember how seeing Steamboat fly made me feel.

[Spider2024]

Apr 5, 2019 8:38:01 GMT -5 Lt. Palumbo said:

Wait...I was gonna try to be funny by saying: I think you'll find it's the 11th anniversary

But it looks like you've already made the joke.

Maths is hard, WWE has my sympy.

Edit: wait, shit, no, the joke works. I'm only just awake, that's my excuse. Maybe that's what happened to WWE. (double sympy)

I actually was thinking of making an '11th anniversary' joke somewhere when I posted the initial thread.

[JoDaNa1281]

Apr 5, 2019 5:11:25 GMT -5 @dax said:

I wasn't watching regularly anymore, but I watched this live. I still shudder thinking about that Undertaker spot (you know the one), but what an amazing match. I also remember Orton vs. HHH being boring. That's about all I can say.

Well, that's only because it came right after HBK/Taker...except it didn't...

[salz4life]

Apr 5, 2019 5:11:25 GMT -5 @dax said:

I wasn't watching regularly anymore, but I watched this live. I still shudder thinking about that Undertaker spot (you know the one), but what an amazing match. I also remember Orton vs. HHH being boring. That's about all I can say.

Yep.... that was one of the first times I was actually annoyed after a Wrestlemania. Sure, I had been a bit let down before, but I truly had a feeling of "that's it? Yuck" after this one. Now... I was a bit "off the wagon" for IX and XI, so I don't count those. LOL Luckily, it did have Taker/Shawn, so that saved the show from being mentioned among those two... but the main event ruined that show, IMO.

[Deleted]

Apr 5, 2019 12:06:57 GMT -5 JoDaNa1281 said:

Apr 5, 2019 5:11:25 GMT -5 @dax said:

I wasn't watching regularly anymore, but I watched this live. I still shudder thinking about that Undertaker spot (you know the one), but what an amazing match. I also remember Orton vs. HHH being boring. That's about all I can say.

Well, that's only because it came right after HBK/Taker...except it didn't...

I still find Orton's quote hilarious, even if it's wrong. "The match suffered because Shawn and Undertaker went out there and kicked out of each other's finishers for 25 minutes" or something like that.

[Gummydavidson]

Becky, Ronda and Charlotte after all the wild buildup need to use the main event of this PPV as an example of what not to do!