5 Current stars who would have been great in the Attitude Era

Pro wrestling fans of yesteryear tend to reflect on the Attitude Era as a golden age for the business. Indeed, it’s a time when WWE put on some of its most compelling episodic television and promoted some of its most iconic stars like Stone Cold Steve Austin, The Rock, Triple H, and Mick Foley. Some of WWE’s success from that period owes to luck and the sheer talent available. It’s also important that competition with WCW compelled them to push the envelope with edgier, more violent, more adult-oriented programming.

Nowadays, WWE skews family friendly, with kid-friendly advertisers and merchandising toward young people some of the key business considerations for the company. There’s little sign of WWE changing directions any time soon, but it does raise the question as to which contemporary stars might thrive if they were recast in the very different Attitude Era. This article looks at five WWE Superstars who would be specially equipped to succeed.

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#5 Dean Ambrose

Ambrose's eccentricities and penchant for violence would have played well in the Attitude Era.

Dean Ambrose is one of the top stars in today’s WWE, his more cartoonish antics like assaulting a dummy to represent what he wanted to opponents as a face, and walking to the ring in a gas mask as a heel point toward the hardcore, the edgy star being awfully neutered by today’s PG standard.

Ambrose has shown glimmers of his hardcore sensibilities in various plunder filled matches for WWE and worked a more bloody, violent style prior to signing with the company. If he were permitted to cut loose and show more of his natural personality, he may well connect on another level—not only one of the bigger stars on the roster but the man. Ambrose’s recent heel turn was likely as not a step in the right direction for letting him show his best self as a sports entertainer, but it probably pales in comparison to what he could accomplish as an Attitude Era star.

#4 John Cena

It's easy to forget Cena started his rise up the card has a more Attitude-style persona.

John Cena is the poster child for WWE’s PG Era, for his kid-friendly antics and herculean physique that facilitate him coming across as an All-American good guy, superhero type. However, for all of Cena’s success and the degree to which he has defined the WWE product over the last fifteen years, it is worth remembering that he didn’t make his initial rise through the ranks with such a squeaky clean image.

In particular, Cena’s first heel run in WWE was largely defined by his freestyle rap antics which would often skew pretty dirty. Indeed, the big face turn that would ultimately lead him to become the face of WWE was still anchored around a combination of making lewd jokes about his heel opponents and using a steel chain to cheat to win against overwhelming heels like The Big Show.

Cena’s the kind of star who probably could have adapted to thrive in just about any historical period of wrestling. In the Attitude Era, he could have stuck with the skills that ‘brought him to the dance’ and may never have faced the hardcore fan backlash he did for his more wholesome persona.

#3 Bray Wyatt

Bray Wyatt's character could go

darker,

and be all the better for it in the Attitude Era.

The Attitude Era had its share of great matches, but more than in-ring action, was largely defined by huge personalities who owned the mic. As such, a guy like Bray Wyatt would be set up to thrive in that period of wrestling. Just as The Undertaker skewed darker with his Ministry of Darkness faction, Wyatt and his Family could be a special act as legitimately sinister heels, with a license to perpetrate more genuinely violent or horror inspired acts of evil than they can in a PG environment.

Of course, some of Wyatt’s shortcomings today have owed to his limitations as a performer and inconsistent booking by the powers that be at WWE—issues that the Attitude Era wouldn’t instantly solve. Just the same, the character and the worker beneath it would have greater opportunities to succeed in that environment.

#2 Elias

Elias's musical promos could be even better with some Attitude edge.

Elias is a big guy with a fairly distinctive look—qualities that could get him a foot in the door with WWE at just about any time. He is a competent, but not a spectacular worker from bell to bell, which has limited his progress and kept him firmly in place as a mid-card act. However, unlike other middle of the pack guys, Elias seems to have good job security and a groundswell of support from fans on account of his musical promos. Playing the guitar and singing songs about the local crowd, his opponents, and his partners has lent Elias a distinctive persona.

In the Attitude Era, Elias’s song stylings would be all the more prone to set him up for a big run as an upper mid-card face. No, he probably wouldn’t ever compare to stars like The Rock or Steve Austin, but he could carve out a nice niche on the scale of someone like The Road Dogg or The Godfather—iconic characters that fans remember well to this day.

#1 Kevin Owens

As a skilled talker and a specialist at brutal attacks, Owens has

Attitude

Era written all over him.

Kevin Owens has overachieved at every turn in his WWE career. When he first showed up in NXT, rumor had it that he was the kind of talent WWE didn’t see main roster potential in, but rather would be a steady hand to help prospects the company did see futures in hone their craft and have good matches with. Owens not only rose to the top of his NXT class, but went on to the main roster where he promptly went fifty-fifty with John Cena and wound up the longest reigning full-time Universal Champion to date.

At the end of the day, Owens is a highly skilled worker in the ring, and more than that an exceptional talker. His mic game would play particularly well in the Attitude Era. More than that, though, Owens’s most iconic moments have come when he performs a level of violence at the outer limits of what the PG Era allows for. Whether it was his initial NXT turn on Sami Zayn, crushing Chris Jericho at the end of the Festival of Friendship, or assaulting Vince McMahon, Owens is a guy who positively thrives on violence and would be better served in the Attitude Era.