WWE WrestleMania 13 (1997)

Best movie of this year hands down!

The Worst Film Ever

Story: It's very simple but honestly that is fine.

Blistering performances.

1st Match: The Headbangers vs The New Blackjacks vs The Godwinns vs Doug Furnas and Phil LaFon, 4-Corners Elimination Tag match. The match is an OK start, half the teams get eliminated via countout and DQ, so I don't know why they were in the match. There are some good spots, and it did an OK job of getting the crowd into the show, but it feels overstuffed for a tag match. Rating: 3/52nd Match: The Rock vs The Sultan, WWF Intercontinental Championship. The Sultan is Rikishi, just clearing that up. I'm guessing they put Rock against one of his relatives because it'd be an easier match to work, but it's pretty good. The biggest negative the match has is Honky Tonk Man burying The Rock on commentary. All he does is bury this poor kid because he "knows what makes a good champion" since he held the IC Title longer than anyone. Albeit that reign was awful, but I digress. After the match, Sultan, beats on the Rock which calls for his dad to show up and help him clean house. A good moment, but an alright match. Rating: 3.5/53rd Match: Goldust vs HHH. This is the official debut of Chyna, so that's a thing. The match has some good parts to it, but it's kind of obvious that Hunter would win to make Chyna look like more of a threat. The matches so far have been good, but not really "WrestleMania worthy" to me. Rating: 3/54th Match: Mankind and Vader vs Owen Hart and the British Bulldog, WWF Tag Team Championships. This is the best match of the night so far. All 4 guys get some good spots in, and the crowd's into it. The problem is that the match ends in a draw for some reason. I guess it was to make sure both teams looked strong going forward, but ending a match in a draw at WrestleMania is a cop-out to me. Rating: 4/55th Match: Stone Cold Steve Austin vs Bret Hart, Submission match. I've been waiting for this match for a long time. Often considered the greatest match in WrestleMania history, this is the match that cemented Austin as a superstar. The match is brutal, it goes all over the place, there are no DQs, and Austin gets cut real bad. The shot of Austin trapped in the Sharpshooter with blood pouring down his face, inches from the ropes that he can't reach is classic. Even though Austin isn't a technical wrestler, he beats on Bret for days here. This isn't a technical match, this is a straight-up fight. No matter what Bret and Austin throw at each other, neither will quit. Austin passes out due to the pain, but he does not give up. Then on top of that, Bret still beats on him, and they pull a double turn on us. Bret gets booed out of the building, and Austin gets a standing ovation for walking out on his own. I'm 99.99% sure this will be my Match of the Year, because it is THAT good. Rating: 5/56th Match: The Nation of Domination vs Ahmed Johnson and The Road Warriors, Chicago Street Fight. So how do you follow-up a brawl that goes all over the place? Put another brawl right after it. 10 minutes of madness, with the Road Warriors winning in their home town. An entertaining brawl, and a good cooldown match. Rating: 4/57th Match: Sid Vicious vs The Undertaker, No DQ match for the WWF Championship. Shawn Michaels is on guest commentary here. Sid's had the belt for like two weeks I think, and Bret's not happy. He comes out and berates everyone, then gets powerbombed by Sid. Don't worry, he'll be back later. The match is alright, but the crowd is so worn out by the last hour of madness, that they're not really into it. Also, Undertaker is bound to win because I know The Streak continues for another 17 years. Both guys are big, and they do the best they can, but you can't follow Austin/Bret that easily. The same thing happened at WrestleMania X8, the main event is overshadowed by the standout match before it. Bret comes out towards the end and screws Sid out of the belt, so Taker is the new champ. Not a bad main event, but they clearly didn't expect Austin/Bret to blow the roof off the place and be impossible to match. Rating: 3.5/5Final Rating: 7 out of 10. This is often considered one of the worst Manias out there, with only Austin/Bret being considered a redeeming factor. However, there are no really bad matches on the card for me. It's not as good as it could've been, or the Mania before it, but I still like it better than X and XI.

Wrestlemania 13 was a bit of a mess heading in. WWE Champion Shawn Michaels had been injured in February and forced to forfeit the title only days after winning it from Sycho Sid at the Royal Rumble. Bret Hart had then won a four man battle royal, last eliminating the Undertaker, to win the vacant title at In Your House 13: The Final Four in February. One day later he lost that title to Sycho Sid after Steve Austin knocked Hart out. The Undertaker was then installed as No.1 contender as he'd been the last man eliminated in the Battle Royal, while Hart would get his chance for revenge on Austin in a submission match. There was another chance for Hart though, six days before the event as he faced Sid for the WWE Title in a steel cage match. If hart won, he would defend the title in a submission match against Stone Cold, while if Sid won, he would face the Undertaker (who he'd already meant on RAW several times) for the title. Austin tried to aid Hart, Undertaker tried to aid Sid, and Sid won.And so, after a ridiculously complicated build up in which the title had changed hands three times in two weeks and had been defended 5 times in a month, Wrestlemania 13, an unprecedented, and given the build unsurprising, financial disaster for the WWE. Though it wasn't all that bad a show and did include, IMO, the greatest match ever to happen in the WWE.The night started off with a fourway elimination tag team match with the winner to be named No.1 contender for the WWE Tag Team Championship. The Headbangers (Thrasher and Mosh) won an overly long and not overly good match. Their opponents, in order of elimination, were The New Blackjacks (Bradshaw and Barry Windham:Windham was DQ'd for attacking the ref) Phil Lafon and Doug Furnas (Furnas was counted out), and The Godwinns (Phineas and Henry: Phineas was pinned after a senton cannonball from Thrasher).The match saw Rocky Maivia (later known as The Rock) make his first ever Wrestlemania appearance defeating the Sultan (later Rikishi) to retain the Intercontinental Championship. Rocky not really a great worker at this stage, passable match.Next saw the continuation of the rivalry between Hunter Hearst Helmsley and Goldust, with Helmsley getting the pin after his body guard Chyna, distracted Goldust by attacking his wife Marlena at ring side. The rivalry had been going on since the Royal Rumble. Ignore some of the myths, Triple H was going nowhere fast until he joined DX.Next match was the best one of the show so far as Own Hart and British Bulldog put their WWE Tag Team Titles on the line against Mankind and Vader. What you'd expect with a lot of brawling, the good guys Owen and Bulldog were able to retain their belts despite cheating from the villains, their rule breaking coming to nothing following a double count out.The next match was arguably the very best ever to happen in a WWE ring as Bret Hart kicked Steve Austin's ass all over the arena in a fantastic submission match. Hart turns heel inside the actual match, while Steve Austin was cemented as the hottest star in the company. The match was officiated by UFC star Ken Shamrock, who challenged Hart to a fight after he beat into an already unconscious Austin. Shamrock was not a bad wrestler, but never really reached great heights in the WWE through a two year run, eventually ending up back in the octagon.Next up saw the returning Legion of Doom (Hawk and Animal) teaming up with Ahmed Johnson against the Nation of Domination (Farooq, Crush and Savio Vega) to get a victory in a junk match. LOD, who were a great tag team in the NWA and had a mildly successful run with the WWE in the early 1990s, were well past their prime by this point. Hawk passed away a few years later.Brings us to our main event, which was six days in the making! Undertaker capitalised on interference from recently turned bad guy Bret Hart, to hit Sid with a tombstone and win the WWE Championship. This was not a very good match, but was hardly the train wreck some claimed, just a standard match with a muddled build.So somehow Sycho Sid got himself on the list of people who've been in the Main Event match at multiple Wrestlemania matches (He had wrestled Hogan in a retirement match at WM8). Steve Austin had fully arrived as a megastar, Bret Hart had gone to the dark side, and the Chicago crowd had seen one of the greatest matches of all time. Not a great PPV, certainly lacking in atmosphere, but hardly worthy of some of the criticism it's received as being the worst Wrestlemania ever.

I was at this Wrestlemania live in Chicago. As most wrestling fans know this was set to be the long awaited rematch between Bret Hart & Shawn Michaels from the previous years Wrestlemania. Shawn pulled out of the match some time earlier claiming a "career ending" knee injury. This may have been some kind of "blessing in disguise" as in it's place we had Steve Austin taking the place of Michaels,and one of the greatest matches in Wrestlemania history (if not THE greatest)ensued in a Austin/Hart submission match,with UFC veteran Ken Shamrock as special guest referee.What was most interesting about this match was the infamous "double turn" of both participants. Hart was the baby face,or good guy heading into this bout,with Austin as heel,or bad guy. By the end of this match the roles had been reversed which is something not easily done over the course of one match.While Austin's popularity was on the rise prior to this match,it was this night that he really cemented himself as a big time,main event guy.Aside from this match there wasn't a whole lot else going on here,at least nothing of note,other than The Undertaker winning his second WWF title from Sid Vicious,with some assistance from Bret Hart.Definitely worth viewing strictly for the Austin/Hart match,which really is one of the greatest matches in this events history.

Gee, where do I start? The only two good matches were the Chicago Street Fight and Bret/Austin. Everything else blew. Hell, The Free For All match was better then most of the card! The Rock/Sultan match was so boring that I would of rather had a root canalNOT RECOMMENDED.