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Everyone knows, at this point, that Undertaker's entrances at WrestleMania are a spectacle and an event unto themselves; whenever The Deadman has a booking at the Showcase of the Immortals, roughly the equivalent of a lower-card superstar's salary will seemingly be spent making Mark Callaway sometimes appear as if he is ascending from the depths of Hades itself.
That's not to say that other superstars don't get their own grand productions; here are ten times other superstars looked to make as much of a splash as Big Evil with their Mania entrance.
Who is most likely to make this list at WrestleMania 34? Tell us in the comments; Shinsuke Nakamura, Finn Balor, and Asuka, at the very least, seem to have the potential to join lists like this very soon.
#10 Shawn Michaels, WrestleMania XII
Before WrestleMania XII, special entrances onto wrestling's grandest stage had usually been in keeping with a show's overall theme, like the ring carts at WrestleMania III or Ancient Rome-themed transports down the aisle at WrestleMania IX.
At WrestleMania XII, in preparation for his Iron Man Match for the WWF Championship, Michaels decided to up the ante, showing that WrestleMania was not just another pay-per-view with just another PPV entrance; ziplining from the upper deck in a flashy white-and-gold outfit, Michaels challenged every star after him to up their game when it came to making their way to the ring at Mania.
Others would outdo his flair in later years, but the notion of WrestleMania entrances being their own special piece of wrestling tradition begins with the Heartbreak Kid in 1996.
#9 CM Punk at WrestleMania 29
Live performances of superstars' themes are pretty hit-or-miss at WrestleMania; Lemmy from Motorhead notoriously struggled with the lyrics to songs he wrote when the band played them for Triple H's Mania entrances, and Rev Theory nearly put an already-sleepy Superdome crowd to bed by playing Randy Orton's "Voices" at the start of the WrestleMania XXX main event.
Living Colour was decades out of the spotlight when they were invited to perform CM Punk's entrance music for his WrestleMania 29 clash with The Deadman; the walk to the ring itself is pretty no-frills, but the fact that the band nailed the song and didn't slow down the show worked well in Punk's favor.
#8 Ric Flair at WrestleMania XXIV
On the one hand, Ric Flair's walk to the ring for his final WrestleMania as an in-ring competitor is nothing truly special; it's the standard Nature Boy strut with pyro, a fancy robe, and the bombastic strains of "Also Sprach Zarathustra"playing in the background.
What makes this one special is WWE fully utilizing the outdoor stadium setting to its advantage, filling the sky with a fireworks display most cities couldn't afford for even the Fourth of July, as the most resplendent robe Flair had ever donned hung from his shoulders. This entrance, and the match that followed, was everything fans loved about Ric Flair amplified to its greatest degree for Naitch's last stand.
#7 Daniel Bryan at WrestleMania XXX
Like other entrances on this list, Daniel Bryan, really, does nothing out of the ordinary for his WrestleMania XXX entrance (and, in terms of planned spectacle, WWE far outdoes Bryan's sprint to the ring with Triple H's slave girls and skulls entry into the Superdome).
Bryan's entrance here is just his usual entrance with the participation of over 70,000 fans, which is where it becomes an all-time great; few superstars were as universally over with WWE crowds as Daniel Bryan, and the simultaneous "YES!"-ing of those 70,000+ sets of hands is a sight to behold.
#6 Shawn Michaels at WrestleMania 25
HBK's WrestleMania 25 clash with The Undertaker was a symbolic meeting of good and evil; Michaels had been outspoken about his faith and about his new, lighter path in life since his initial retirement in 1998, and Undertaker had always symbolized death, destruction, and the dark side to the WWE Universe.
Entering their first WrestleMania match, WWE made that symbolism literal with a yin-and-yang pair of entrances, HBK descending from the heavens even as Undertaker rose from the fiery depths. The match didn't need extra spectacle to succeed, but these entrances provided it in spades.
#5 The New Day at WrestleMania 31
WrestleMania 31 was The New Day's first main-roster appearance at Mania as a team, for a mostly-forgettable match with the League of Nations. Its only place in wrestling history is for its aftermath, where legends like Steve Austin, Mick Foley, and Shawn Michaels made brief returns to perform their finishers to the delight of many, and this entrance.
As a backstage promo ended, The New Day's trademark entry spiel began with an oversized box of Booty-Os cereal standing on the entryway star; that box would tip, and New Day would emerge from the box in an odd mix of Honey, I Shrunk the Kids! and Dragonball-Z, one of the night's most memorable moments (but not its most memorable entrance).
#4 John Cena at WrestleMania 25
John Cena's character has often been compared to hip-hop superstar Eminem and, reportedly, WWE was in talks to have Mr. Mathers appear at WrestleMania XIX to have a rap battle with Cena's new rap-centric character. While that never happened, Cena would have a few moments reminiscent of the 8 Mile star, such as speeding through the streets of Detroit to take Ford Field by storm at WrestleMania 23.
Most memorably, though, John Cena would take inspiration from Eminem's performance of "The Real Slim Shady" at MTV's Video Music Awards in 2000, where the rapper was escorted to the stage by an army of impersonators. WWE cleared out every Wal Mart in Houston of their supply of jorts to give Cena his own army as the leader of the Cenation prepared to face Edge and The Big Show in a Triple Threat Match.
#3 Triple H at WrestleMania 32
The Game, who could have a Top Ten Entrances list all his own, has followed Undertaker's lead in the 2000s and 2010s in making his WrestleMania entrance the talk of the wrestling internet each year.
Helmsley entered WrestleMania 32 the defending WWE World Heavyweight Champion and, as the unquestioned lord and master of WWE both onscreen and off, the COO opted for a Mad Max meets He-Man theme, as his wife Stephanie McMahon proclaimed his coming in front of an apocalyptic wasteland while an army of skeletal soldiers (really, the members of the NXT men's roster not entering the Andre the Giant Memorial Battle Royal that night) escorted him to the Squared Circle.
#2 Bray Wyatt at WrestleMania 30
Bray Wyatt's first year on the WWE main roster painted him as a wholly unique figure in the world of professional wrestling; embodying everything that made the first season of HBO's True Detective so engrossing, Wyatt was a Bayou cult leader who could surely have any of us killed, were he not down to do it himself (which he probably would be).
Entering his first WrestleMania against John Cena, WWE took every wild aspect of Wyatt's personality up to eleven, bringing in wild dancers, and legitimately scary lighting and imagery as Wyatt and his Family moved to ringside. Typically, live performances of entrance themes (or live music at Mania in general) fall flat, but Mark Crozer nailed it here and made Wyatt's first foray into the Showcase of the Immortals an amazing one.
#1 Rusev Conquers WrestleMania 31
Before Rusev Day, before "Lana is the best, Lana number one," before the nickname "Handsome" Rusev, the Bulgarian Brute was simply another undefeated foreign heel, blazing through the ranks of WWE babyfaces en route to his first United States Championship in the fall of 2014.
His biggest defense of that title came at WrestleMania 31, against the man who, at that time, embodied America and American spirit to many, John Cena; Rusev promised a war, and delivered on that promise from the moment he left the backstage area, practically re-enacting Red Dawn by riding through Levi's Stadium in what appeared to be a Cold War era tank (and, note to D-Generation X: that's a tank; you took a JEEP to WCW).
