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00:00Without doubt, the most dominant faction of recent WWE history, and perhaps of all time.
00:06The Bloodline have found themselves at the center of arguably the most compelling long-term saga of the last decade.
00:12But do you honestly feel like you know absolutely everything there is to know about this dominant family of tribal chiefs, usos, and final bosses?
00:20Well, let's find out, eh? Because I am Gareth, this is WhatCultureWrestling,
00:24and this epic video right here is about to take a deep dive into the truly fascinating, secret WWE history of the Bloodline.
00:33Acknowledge me! Or them, either or.
00:36By joining forces almost a decade after they first teased the idea, God we're getting old,
00:41The Rock and Roman Reigns set the wheels in motion for a WrestleMania season like few WWE had ever booked before.
00:46The Rock embraced his beloved Hollywood heel persona and turned the volume, violence, and bad language higher up than ever before.
00:53Meanwhile, the WWE Universal heavyweight WWE Champion of the Universe and the Galaxy also had to up his game, really,
00:59just to try and keep pace with his cousin who was just killing it every time he got in front of a camera.
01:04To be fair, he did slow play it, but knowing in the back of his mind just how well everything was going to play out
01:09by the time he got to night two in the main event against Cody Rhodes.
01:12A night when the spotlight shined brightest on both the champion and the challenger.
01:16By folding all of this together with a literal backdrop of the Bloodline family tree in all its PowerPoint glory for the very first time during the build-up,
01:24WWE were able to weave together the most charismatic performers, the biggest money-drawers, and the deepest familial lore.
01:32All of this made for the perfect one-two punch over WWE's biggest nights of the year.
01:36But the grand finale to WrestleMania XL couldn't have possibly occurred without the, uh, let's say divisive ending to WrestleMania 39 a year earlier, right?
01:45The very long game was actually the preferred pathway for all involved, apart from Cody Rhodes.
01:51What looked and very much felt like a Vince McMahon call on the weekend that he tried to really force his way back into Guerrilla,
01:57yep, we all remember that roar after WrestleMania, don't we?
01:59Well, that actually turned out to be something that he, Triple H, and Roman Reigns all came to an agreement on, weirdly enough.
02:06Rhodes' disappointment that night was as undeniable as his rise, though.
02:10He started his story with a fabulous post-debut promo on the Raw after his WrestleMania 38 return,
02:16and to put a bow on it just a year later was seemingly perfect justification for the bold career move that he made.
02:22The tale, tall as some of it may be, but don't forget, wrestling is and always will be a work, and Cody Rhodes is one of the best workers out there.
02:29Was that he had to make up for a kayfabe crime committed against his father back in 1977.
02:34There, the American Dream had defeated then-WWWF champion superstar Billy Graham by count-out,
02:42and he then excitedly held the title above his head before being reminded of the champion's advantage.
02:48Oh, it's heartbreaking stuff.
02:49The belt was wrestled away before he had a chance to have it for real,
02:53and with that, Cody had a ready-made rationale to right a wrong 45 years later.
02:58That particular feeling was actually painfully familiar for Cody Rhodes in 2023,
03:02and actually in some ways, it was a little bit worse.
03:05He didn't even get a chance to lay a finger on that belt before he was left there,
03:08just sat in the middle of the ring, clutching his knees and trying his best not to make eye contact with a rubber chicken.
03:13The 1970s and 2020s couldn't be any further apart in many respects.
03:17But here, the parallel was brutal, a name with Heritage once again being blocked from breaking new ground.
03:24You hate to see it.
03:25In an odd quirk of fate, though, this was actually a dose of history repeating itself.
03:29In the same year Rhodes was stopped just short of dethroning Billy Graham,
03:32Peter Myvear was making waves of his own.
03:35Initially a well-regarded and visually arresting babyface with half his body covered in tattoo ink,
03:40Myvear was a fearsome heel opposite Bob Backlund,
03:43you know, the person who would actually go on to defeat Billy Graham in 1978.
03:47The links and bonds between then and now go much, much deeper, of course,
03:51as they would for generations to come.
03:53But the High Chief's time at the top would sadly be short-lived.
03:56He passed away from cancer in 1981 at just 45 years old.
04:00Sadly, not living long enough to see the fruits of his labour and blood bond with a Mituani Anuai.
04:05Man, I hope I said that right.
04:07Peter and the Mituani's oath to one another unified the Myvears and the Anuaiis into one massive family unit,
04:14bringing together the wrestlers that emerged in enormous numbers on either side.
04:18A Mituani was the father of Afa and Sika, you know, the wild Samoans?
04:22Yeah, those guys.
04:23This pair won tag gold pretty much everywhere they went, really,
04:26and that's including for Vince McMahon Sr. and Jr. during separate runs in 1978 and 1985.
04:33Impressive stuff.
04:34Cast as, well, barely evolved humans beyond fighting, eating and having hard heads,
04:39Afa and Sika, well, they excelled in the spots.
04:42And they kept kayfabe at all times, ensuring that the audience's fear of the unknown remained the unique selling point.
04:49It was during this time that the family business extended outwards too.
04:52Afa's son Samu joined as alternate Samula before working briefly as a babyface when the Samoans left the company.
04:58And their final tag team title defeat came at the hands of Tony Atlas and a certain Rocky Johnson.
05:03The latter was family by marriage, having wedded Atom Ivear,
05:06with the two of those eventually having a son called Dwayne.
05:10Yep, that Dwayne will get to him later.
05:11And as the decade and company continued to change,
05:15so too did the landscape for what was rapidly becoming a wrestling dynasty in the McMahon territory.
05:20The babyface Tonga Kid was repackaged as Tama.
05:23Tonga Kid was the son of Yaluwalo Falau, Salofa Fatu Sr. and Elevera Anawai.
05:28And he was the brother of Edward Umaga Fatu and Salofa Rikishi Fatu.
05:33And after that Tama change, he would link up with Tonga Haku Fifita to form the Islanders.
05:38They quickly joined the Heenan family to pad out what was perhaps the most stacked tag division in WWE history at the time,
05:45making it onto pay-per-view in the company's enormous Survivor Series tag team match in 1987.
05:50They'd also make it to the show of shows in a WrestleMania 4 showdown with the British Bulldogs.
05:55Haku is of course another person who helps tie the past to the present right now,
05:59because he's the uncle and adoptive father of none other than Tama Tonga who joined the bloodline.
06:04And he would also prove to be a prominent figure with the company until his departure in 1992.
06:09That was two whole years before I was even born.
06:11He was one of several from the company's golden era to depart whilst the organisation was in a state of flux.
06:17But the year was to be one of the most profound for the ever-growing Maivia Anawai family tree.
06:22More and more branches blossomed, and having gained raise for their work as the Samoan SWAT team in Puerto Rico and WCW,
06:28Sulofa Fatu and Samuel Anawai were about to make the biggest moves of their career
06:34and have a transformative effect on the market leader.
06:37But before we get there, I've got a quick question for you.
06:39Who is your favourite member of the entire bloodline family tree?
06:44It's a big tree.
06:45Pick a name.
06:46Say which one you like.
06:46Put it in the comments.
06:47In an era where time moves substantially quicker than it ever does now in wrestling,
06:51the Head Trinkers lived a surprisingly full and fruitful life in WWE.
06:54And while it'd be untrue to say that all the familiar stereotypes yet again weren't adhered to,
07:00it'd be reasonable to also add that the more the company tried to modernise the aesthetic,
07:04the less believable it became.
07:06Arriving in 1992 alongside manager and mentor figure Arthur,
07:10Fatu and Samuel made an immediate impact as heels when they were credited with costing
07:14the Natural Disasters the Tag Team Championships against Money Inc.
07:18The disasters were done within months of losing the belt, whereas the Shrinkers went from strength to strength.
07:23Off the back of their influential interference,
07:26Samu and Fatu moved on to the Survivor Series for their pay-per-view debut,
07:30one that contained a victory over Owen Hart and Coco Beware's high energy.
07:35And on the first WWE pay-per-view without one or both of either Hulk Hogan or the Ultimate Warrior,
07:40the impressive work from both units was a temporary statement of intent from the company
07:45that it was finally time to move on.
07:47Kept far away from a lifeless titular Royal Rumble match in 1993,
07:51the Head Shrinkers' Natural WrestleMania opponents revealed themselves in another,
07:55yet another killer doubles opener on the show.
07:58The Steiner Brothers battered the Beverly Brothers,
08:01and then suddenly WWE had two brand new tag team duos just to go to war with each other on the grandest stage.
08:07Now Hulk Hogan's eventual 1993 return would go on to cause, well, greater problems, let's say,
08:13and we will get to them, don't worry.
08:15But one of them impacting Fatu, Samu, Rick and Scott was that their potential outing was now
08:19probably not going to be over the tag team championships.
08:22Hogan's return ostensibly only occurred so he could defend the honour of Brutus Beefcake
08:26after the barber was brutalised by Money Inc.
08:28Ted DiBiase and IRS were still on top at this point,
08:31and consequently the Hulkster was suddenly vying for a different prize,
08:35and the belts were going to form part of a double main event thing
08:38alongside Bret Hart's WWE Championship battle with Yoko Zuna.
08:41Nothing would be as simple as any of that sounds on the night, of course,
08:44but one constant remain for everyone inside of that dolled-up Caesars Palace car park.
08:49The Hedrinkers and the Steiner Brothers were all about beating the absolute bejesus out of one another.
08:54Match of the night on the show of shows by such a margin that it almost embarrassed the rest of the roster and the booking,
08:59the fall worked as daylight turned to dusk but lit up Las Vegas like few others.
09:04There is an amazing spot where Rick just suplexes an airborne Samu whilst he's on top of Fatu's shoulders.
09:10More so than Afra and Sika ever had, and relying less on the cheap heat the Islanders often leaned hard into,
09:15the Hedrinkers were quickly becoming known as one of the company's, rare for the time, work-rate acts.
09:20This was further enhanced by some stellar television singles matches too,
09:24such as Fatu's run against Bret Hart on a pre-WrestleMania Raw,
09:27and Samu's choice effort against Mr Perfect during the company's then still profitable 1993 UK Rampage Tour.
09:34Now the houses at that point weren't exactly getting any bigger,
09:37but just because the company wasn't drawing it didn't mean that opportunities weren't available
09:41for the acts that still continued to connect.
09:43Leading from the front, the Hitman was the embodiment of the philosophical shift the company desperately needed,
09:49but you couldn't do it alone.
09:50Underneath him you had Shawn Michaels who was just as ready for the whole challenge.
09:54And only slightly below him you had the likes of Razor Ramon,
09:57the 123 Kid, Mr Perfect, Bam Bam Bigelow,
10:00and Matt Bourne's incredible turn as doink.
10:03Absolutely all of these were asking more of WWE fans' attention bell-to-bell than at any other point in company history.
10:09In the same vein, Samu, Fatu, and the Steiner brothers stayed at the very tippy-top of the tag division,
10:14with the likes of the Smoking Guns and the Quebecers shoring things up at a London Eath.
10:18Where there was less money to be made per night, WWE just decided to run more nights.
10:22The Killer Calendar was a schedule of events that WWE added to the in-house magazine during the mid-90s,
10:28but the wacky alliteration was strictly the preserve of the sub-editors.
10:31The wrestlers actually named it for how hard life was hitting endless small towns for endless smaller payoffs.
10:37But even now the quality of the actual wrestling, if not all of the booking, holds up.
10:41There was a paradox at play across most of North America, with WCW also struggling.
10:46As box office returns diminished, the wrestlers theoretically never held less value to Vince McMahon,
10:52Ted Turner, and any other promoter who looked to market the world's best pro wrestling.
10:56But making towns and sending fans home happy had actually never been more crucial to the bottom line.
11:01And the best of the 1993 crop promised a substantially better night's entertainment than many of the bloated charlatans that defined the past.
11:09Gimme Brett, Sean, Razor, and 123 Kid bumping around a ring any day.
11:13Unfortunately though, the year was to end on a humiliating low for the head shrinkers.
11:17The reps and the bumps had taken them so far, but the industry was light years behind social norms.
11:23And never was this clearer than in the multifariously embarrassing Four Doinks vs. Team Bam Bam Bigelow Survivor Series match.
11:31As commentator and booker of the damn thing, Vince McMahon referred to the whole scene as, well, a cartoon.
11:36Men on a mission and the bushwhackers donned their face paint.
11:40And they then fooled Fatu, Samu, and their partner Bastion Bugger with distractions that ranged from balloons and scooters to, most insultingly, Thanksgiving turkey.
11:50Yep, that's what happened.
11:52The dated savages stereotype was back for the night, and to such an extent that even Arthur couldn't fight the past.
11:58The three succumbed to their supposed instincts here, choosing to excitedly pick at pieces of raw meat rather than trying to win a match.
12:05It was a grim watch.
12:06It was all done in the worst possible taste, and performed as disgustingly as possible.
12:10Brighter days were ahead, but if ever a match existed to mark the end of something, this at least stood as an early farewell to the head shrinkers' heels.
12:17Linking up with Yoko Zuna, don't worry, we'll get to him later, to help the WWE Champion at the time dump The Undertaker into a casket and retain his championship, proved to be one of their last real acts on the wrong side of the tracks.
12:29After Samu unleashed his terrifying Hankman spot in the 1994 Royal Rumble, and Fatu even made it to the Final Four of the damn thing, Arthur's men were suddenly in the frame with fans as men to respect rather than just simply fear.
12:42Their last PPV match as heels didn't even actually take place.
12:46Let me explain.
12:47Part of the random assortment 10-man tag team match that was cut from the show due to Shawn Michaels and Reza Ramon's ladder match going long,
12:54the contest instead took place on a Monday Night Raw taping cycle that solidified the turning point.
12:58Prolific 1970s and 80s manager Captain Lou Albano was brought into the company with a view of finding his next tag team success story.
13:07Only then formed a bond with Afa on the grounds that the two were both just the right side of insane.
13:13Yep, that'll do it.
13:14Tag team champions the Quebecers were the unit and the crosshairs, having tried and failed to manipulate the head shrinkers into joining them as a way of just not having to defend their belts against them.
13:23Survivor Series 1993 may as well have been a different universe to the one that Samu and Fatu were now currently occupying.
13:30They were now wise enough to the cowardice and it wasn't long before they became tag team champions.
13:34It was smart and logical booking in the face of characterisations that sometimes inspired, well, low-hanging fruit creative, let's say.
13:42By listening to Albano's advice, Fatu, Samu and Afa were all able to see another way through and were rewarded in kind with the gold they'd crave for nearly two years.
13:52Ugh, they got there in the end.
13:54It was best of time stuff, even if the times had arrived just a little bit too late.
13:58Because Albano's teachings had been vindicated and the pair were now babyfaces, well, WWE deemed the natural next step to be all about Americanising them.
14:06It was a patronising backwards step and the first of many.
14:10The pair defeated Yokozuna and Crush in the King of the Ring in June, but that proved to be their only pay-per-view title defence.
14:17Bit of a bummer.
14:17Exactly one night ahead of taking on IRS and Bam Bam Bigelow in an effort to push back the rise of Ted DiBiase's million-dollar corporation at SummerSlam 1994,
14:27they were just beaten on a house show by Shawn Michaels and Diesel.
14:31Right then.
14:31It was absolutely inexplicable in the context of the tag match.
14:34The SummerSlam pay-per-view opener was completely redundant without the tag belts, but all ultimately became clear as the night wore on.
14:41Diesel lost his Intercontinental Championship against Reza Rahman, but the future dudes with Attitudes now had the double straps to worry about.
14:48And this kept their program red hot even if it extinguished the head shrinker's fire.
14:53Perception is reality more often than not in wrestling, and it was increasingly difficult not to view this run as a bit of a damp squib really after years of grinding away and working their asses off to get the spot.
15:03In lockstep with the loss, years of toil caught up with Samu too.
15:06He departed to physically heal, and WWE just decided to mind whatever remained of the act by adding in a repackaged barbarian going by his real name of Sione.
15:16The new head shrinkers struggled like every sequel act with the prefix typically would, not least when the supposed humanizing of the act extended to far too being confused and frustrated at the presence of wrestling boots.
15:27Their contributions to the success of Michaels and Diesel's act came full circle in 1994, when they found themselves on the wrong end of Big Daddy Cool's rampage through the babyface ranks.
15:36But no payback came their way as HBK and Diesel roared their way into 1995.
15:42Their shrinkers never appeared on pay-per-view for the company again, and they just disbanded with insultingly minimal fanfare in 1995 ahead of Sione heading to WCW,
15:51and Fatou then adding a beanie hat and leather jacket to the pair of wrestling boots that he'd magically become acquainted with.
15:57None of it made a difference despite his best efforts.
16:00His 1995-1997 period was perhaps the weirdest of his WWE runs and seriously thick of the ground and dimpled buttocks that covers.
16:08With little to no attempt to thread the two worlds together, making a difference Fatou found the former head shrinker suddenly just decked out in the neon of the new generation.
16:17All with a backstory that took from his real life rather than, I don't know, everything that audiences had been asked to believe about him in the years prior.
16:23Gone was all the traditional Samoan iconography, and though that was obviously a giant leap forward when it came to stereotyping in wrestling,
16:31the fact that he'd never been booked like more of a loser went against whatever it was they were trying to achieve here.
16:35And by 1996, the former tag team champion was being put into a mask to work as the Sultan.
16:40A character 10 years out of date and even further away from what the industry actually needed.
16:45Perhaps out of loyalty to the Samoan bloodline, or maybe just as a wink and a nod to the people who actually knew who was hiding underneath the mask,
16:53Sultan ended up getting an Intercontinental Championship match at WrestleMania 13 against Rocky Maivir of all people.
16:59After a predictable defeat, he was part of a post-match sequence which also featured Rocky Johnson.
17:05It was a family affair, hiding in plain sight long before both men had their lineages mined for an on-screen feud.
17:11One that would emerge from the most unexpected of circumstances is one way of putting it,
17:16but before exploring how Fatu's life changed forever, it is actually worth delving back into the Bloodline's family album to see where he got much of his inspiration from.
17:24Now, not to define one of the most underrated athletes in WWE history by his size from the off,
17:29but the years in which Yoko Tsunas' physical stature grew alongside his status within the market leader were a sight to behold, folks.
17:35When Rodney Anawahi debuted on WWE television in late 1992 as Mr. Fuji's newest Japanese discovery and an apparent sumo sensation,
17:44the need to highlight the fact that he was, in fact, Samoan was replaced by a desire to just put over how impressive and believably cast he was in the role.
17:52Now, once again, a Samoan wrestler was being reduced to a stereotype, sadly,
17:56but in one of those only-in-wrestling kind of moments, it wasn't even the traditional one anymore.
18:01Years later, and with just about every piece of archive footage purposed and then repurposed to an almost unusable point,
18:07WWE began a process of leafing through the rest of the tape library for dark main events, tape tryouts,
18:13and any other rarities they could polish up and release to the hardcores for us to just gobble up.
18:18Hardcores that I'd always known of, but never actually seen footage that really sounded too weird to be true.
18:23Alongside these gems emerged footage of Ko Kina, Anawahi's working name before he signed with WWE,
18:28just going through the motions ahead of a blocked television taping around six months before Yokozuna emerged,
18:34fully formed on the October 31st edition of Superstars.
18:38He wore many of the awesome Samoan traits here, a meaty frame that looked tough to compete against,
18:43alongside an engine that could run longer and harder than just about anybody else's.
18:47What he was not, until, well he was, was sumo-sized baby.
18:51But my goodness, all of that definitely changed once Yokozuna was introduced.
18:55And like many others during a commercially challenging 1992, his impact was immediate by necessity.
19:01The gasps in the buildings when he flattened feckless idiots into corners with his charging splash were audible,
19:07and the bonsai drop was the exact finisher to give to a man of his monumental size.
19:11Now, the racially problematic connotations were soon to bite WWE in the ass,
19:15but in the short term, every aspect of his presentation was being viewed internally as a bit of a home run.
19:21And externally, people were definitely leaning in for a closer look.
19:25He debuted on PPV at the 1992 Survivor Series, squashing Virgil on a show that had also seen his family members,
19:32the Head Shrinkers, make a similar kind of noise in the tag division.
19:35In their case, it took commentators doubling down on their inherent threat after a win.
19:39But in Yoko's case, his victim spoke longest and loudest about WWE's literal new biggest threat.
19:45Yeah, sure, the late and wonderful Virgil couldn't quite nail the pronunciation of a Yokozuna,
19:50but he nailed pretty much everything else in the pained post-match promo that he cut after being battered by Yokozuna,
19:56cutting most of it horizontal, lying on the locker room bench after being put well and truly through the ringer.
20:01He went as far as to warn WWE Champion Bret Hart that even he couldn't stop the wrath of Fuji's new monster.
20:07And as announcers continued to marvel at his squash wins, a stipulation crept into the promotion of the 1993 Royal Rumble
20:15that was about to change Rodney Anuahi's life.
20:17Entering its sixth year as an attraction and fifth on PPV, that year's Royal Rumble actually stood a good chance
20:23of being the least bought in the show's history.
20:25I mean, it was the second supercard in a row not to feature Hulk Hogan or Ultimate Warrior or, by then,
20:30a raft of the stars that had defined Dodobee's Big Four to that point.
20:33WrestleMania 8 marked the end of that specific era, and while the Arandi Savages and Mr Perfects were still in pretty prominent spots,
20:40the turnover had still been huge enough to force the company to go with Bret Hart and Shawn Michaels in a pretty big way.
20:46WWE was under scrutiny for what would later morph into steroid distribution charges and the 1994 trial of Vince McMahon,
20:54and had barely managed to get past appalling abuse allegations that came to light in parallel with the government's drug investigation.
21:00The apparent smaller guys that could wrestle were in.
21:03I mean, they weren't really that small, were they?
21:04And the wrestlers with ginormous muscular physiques suddenly started to shrink or just disappear from television entirely.
21:11Vince McMahon always liked what he liked though, didn't he?
21:14And he had a steadfast belief that bigger was always better in between his ropes,
21:18and Yokozuna subsequently squared a rather difficult circle for him.
21:21He was absolutely massive, but he passed airport tests in public and drug tests behind the scenes.
21:27Win-win.
21:27He was getting rocket strapped, and right around the time that he was being spoken about as the favourite for that year's Royal Rumble,
21:33WWE revealed that for the first time, whoever won that match would actually get themselves a spot in the main event of WrestleMania 9.
21:41Virgil was ultimately prescient in warning the hitman.
21:44If Bret Hart did manage to hold onto that gold all the way to the show of shows,
21:47there was a pretty strong chance he was going to come face to face with a monster.
21:51That proved truer than anybody could have forecast, but, you know, more on that later.
21:55Yoko did win the Rumble, of course, and the booking couldn't have really done more with the limitations of the field to get him over in the body of the match too.
22:02He took out Earthquake just to make it very clear that he was the new bull of these woods.
22:06He was kept far away from The Undertaker in the knowledge that that programme was rainy day stuff, and there could very well be several of them ahead.
22:13And perhaps most notably, he was given a relatively fresh Randy Savage to dominate and eliminate during the closing stretch.
22:20One that made the Macho Man look overwhelmed to the point of stupidity before being eliminated via pinfall attempt kick-out.
22:27He got what he deserved.
22:28Zuna was in every sense unstoppable and a big ol' problem for the excellence of execution to solve.
22:34With the match as good as set then after Hart had managed to see off Razor Ramon at the Rumble, WWE decided to turn the heat upon Yoko Zuna.
22:42Though Bret Hart was, you know, Canadian, Vince McMahon liked what he liked, and promoting a xenophobic heel was safe ground at an unstable time for the company.
22:51The gimmick was to pivot hard into an anti-American stance.
22:54The rhetoric was dated and not even in keeping with any global social unrest McMahon had typically had no problem promoting in the past.
23:01But Fuji and his, uh, Japanese monster were now interested in more than just dominating the World Wrestling Federation and all of its babyface stars.
23:10They wanted to crush the US of A, too.
23:12Jim Duggan, one of the last patriotic holdovers from the bygone era, wanted to do something about it, because of course he did.
23:19But Yoko Zuna's aura was so well-established and worth protecting at this point that the two didn't even build a match on television.
23:25It was merely a knock-down challenge on account of the fact that the number one contender couldn't even be floored during a singles match.
23:31And while Duggan was more than up for knocking down Yoko Zuna, he was mainly just in it to stop his opponent knocking down America.
23:38A nervous fire simmered in the cautious opening stages, but appeared to be extinguished when, after a couple of attempts, Duggan did the impossible and knocked Zuna on his ass.
23:48The live crowd went absolutely berserk, subjectively suggesting that the people were actually buying into the whole package.
23:54But the joy was short-lived as the number one contender moved to assuage his embarrassment.
23:59He cut short Duggan's flag-waving celebrations by throwing a big bucket of salt at him and then hitting him with a suplex and a leg drop, as you do.
24:05And after that, the blinded and unconscious Duggan was left for dead after not one, not two, not three, but four bonsai drops.
24:13Including a final one in which the American flag was draped over his lifeless body.
24:18It's just not cricket.
24:18On the surface, it couldn't have really been more effective.
24:21One emerged, no matter how dated it might have been, was the shared understanding that Yoko Zuna hated America,
24:27that his finisher was the deadliest kill shot in the company,
24:30and that he wasn't afraid of using salt as a shortcut should anybody get close to putting him away.
24:35These were all things that factored into the original main event of WrestleMania 9, of course.
24:39Right down to Hart being blinded by Fuji's salt when he had the monster's legs locked in a sharpshooter.
24:45The foreshadowing was for naught when Hulk Hogan just trampled over both of them moments later annoyingly,
24:50but they were actually lucky to get there with the story still in one piece.
24:54Complaints about both the representation of Japanese people and the desecration of the American flag
24:59moved some networks to heavily edit or even remove elements of the angle.
25:03Unaware that this was only the beginning of the content that would ultimately define WWE's main event scene for the next 12 months.
25:09Scraping through the protests, WWE repurposed the bit slightly with a more direct goal in mind,
25:15having Yoko ram a table into Bret Hart's ribs during a contract signing as a shortcut to flattening him too.
25:21Now crucially, the cameras stuck around to find the hitman gamely getting back to his feet.
25:26But never had a babyface champion looked in such jeopardy heading into the biggest show of the year!
25:31The concern was well-founded and after Mr. Fuji's aforementioned chicanery,
25:35Bret Hart was left painfully squinting at the Nevada sky.
25:39Oh, what's happened?
25:39For less than a minute that is before Hulk Hogan just arrived and squashed the new champion after he
25:44stupidly accepted an impromptu match there and then.
25:47I mean, what were you thinking, Yoko?
25:48McMahon had pressed the red and yellow panic button at possibly the worst time ever,
25:52completely hijacking both his new babyface and heel in service of Hogan's ego and what remained of his drawing power.
25:59That, thankfully, wasn't enough to maintain their fraying relationship.
26:02And while Hart definitely should have been the person to win the belt back,
26:05Hogan was just too shrewd to pass the torch to his obvious replacement, wasn't he?
26:09Not a chance, brother.
26:11Yokozuna got the nod instead, and with it a rare pinfall victory over the Hulkster at King of the Ring 1993.
26:17And though political games might have been at the heart of Hogan's decision to lose to the sumo heel,
26:22the victory itself was shockingly definitive, save for a cheating cameraman shooting fire into the champion's face.
26:29Only in wrestling.
26:29Yokozuna kicked out of the leg drop, pinned Hogan with one of his own,
26:33and after all that, then dragged him into the corner for a post-match bonsai drop,
26:37as the commentators candidly spoke about the possible death of Hulkamania.
26:41Had the industry at large been a bit hotter, this would have probably been a bit of a shockwave, really.
26:45As it was, though, the scene just played out as an effective,
26:48but inevitable case of a dated legend being put out to pasture once and for all.
26:52On the same show, Bret Hart worked three times in three totally different matches to win the titular tournament,
26:58and also kickstart a series with Jerry Lawler that was to keep him busy until around, I don't know, Royal Rumble season.
27:04And in the absence of a top babyface,
27:05Yokozuna just decided to challenge the entirety of the United States of America.
27:10Pretty bold strategy.
27:11The July 4th, 1993 Stars and Stripes Yokozuna Body Slam Challenge was a textbook example of how dynamic WWE could still be,
27:21even when things had never been worse for the market leader commercially.
27:24Set to the gorgeous sunshine of New York City,
27:27a host of wrestlers and sports stars all lined up to try and, well, body slam Yokozuna.
27:32There was the implication that a title shot might beckon for the winner,
27:35but this wasn't like a Royal Rumble or Money in the Bank kind of situation, it wasn't guaranteed.
27:38This was merely athletes lining up for the good of Uncle Sam, damn it.
27:43And honestly, the entire thing was presented so damn well,
27:45it did genuinely feel like Yokozuna was crushing the spirit of the entire nation every time someone failed to pick him up.
27:51This had actually been another excellent offshoot of the Hogan match.
27:54Hogan always got his opponents up and over for the slam,
27:57it didn't matter how big they were or how impossible the feat seemed.
28:00Toppling the evil earthquake in 1990, for example, came with the promise of a slam just baked in there.
28:06I mean, this was the dude that slammed Andre the Giant,
28:08he could do anything.
28:09This was just how monsters were vanquished in WWE and Yokozuna was proving to be the most dangerous of them all
28:14for being too big for even the Mighty Hulkster or anybody to do that job.
28:18Even Randy Savage, relegated to a hosting job most of the day,
28:22failed alongside fellow former WWE Champion Bob Backlund
28:25and collegiate standouts the Steiner Brothers.
28:28Crush was months away from embracing Mr. Fuji and Japanese culture
28:32in a story that was started with his confidence being absolutely wrecked here,
28:36along with some of the muscles in his back.
28:38The whole scene just called out for a hero when none were forthcoming.
28:43But it fell to a heel who suddenly decided that the one thing more important than marvelling at his own biceps
28:48was that star-stangled banner.
28:50Lex Luger landed via helicopter and just shoved his manager Bobby Heenan out the way,
28:55denoting that he was about to turn.
28:57One flex of those famous biceps and a hip toss later,
29:01well, Lex Luger was on his way to SummerSlam, baby!
29:03With the hopes and dreams of millions of Americans,
29:06or perhaps more accurately, like hundreds and thousands,
29:09resting on his chiseled shoulders.
29:11And if the Body Slam Challenge hadn't been audacious enough,
29:14Vince McMahon's bananas plan to create an instant replacement for Hulk Hogan
29:18was next-level jingoism.
29:20Luger rode a call-to-action campaign bus across America throughout the summer,
29:24ostensibly electioneering for the title shot,
29:26but in reality just looking to garner support where just a few weeks earlier there'd been none.
29:30Oh yeah, and SummerSlam 93 had a poster of Yoko Zuna
29:33jumping on the American flag with the tagline,
29:36somebody has to stop him!
29:38As if he'd more from heel champion to national recognised threat.
29:42For a man with familial roots in the wrestling business running way deeper than Luger's,
29:46it surely had to be amusing from Rodney Anuai's side.
29:49But he performed gamely in the role too,
29:51doubling down on his hatred of the USA,
29:53and even adding Jim Cornette to his fold as a more acerbic mouthpiece and kayfabe legal eagle.
29:59The stage was seemingly set for the champion to fall,
30:02but in a, let's call it a choice of an ending at SummerSlam,
30:05he did, but via count-out.
30:07As the narcissist, Luger had used an elbow strike
30:09with his surgical steel plate inside as his finisher.
30:12He'd been forced to wear a pad to supposedly offset the damage as a heel,
30:16but as a babyface, he decked it in the flag along with every other inch of his body
30:20and tried his best to have a fair fight.
30:22And when the match inevitably broke down,
30:24Luger took a chance and cleaned Yoko's clock.
30:26C-C-Clock.
30:27But then the title holder collapsed to the floor and lost by count-out.
30:31It was a bizarre non-committal of an ending, really,
30:33but played out as if the Lex Express and everything after July 4th
30:36had been leading right to this Pyrrhic victory.
30:39In real life, Vince McMahon was just suddenly a little bit uncertain
30:42about Luger's, well, precise potential in that spot.
30:46So he just elected to potentially delay the crowning until WrestleMania instead.
30:50This was at least a tacit show of approval to Yoko Zuna as champion, too.
30:54And he was about to enter into a far more appealing program
30:57now that Hart and Luger were both potentially in the frame
31:00for a grandest stage showdown at Madison Square Garden in March.
31:03For the first time in nearly four years,
31:06the ever-present and ever-dominant Undertaker
31:08was about to be written out of storylines.
31:10In a memorable transition of the heat from Luger to the Deadman,
31:14the Survivor Series found The Undertaker stepping in to replace Tatanka,
31:18who lost his undefeated streak and pay-per-view spot
31:21thanks to the injury sustained at the hands and posterior of Yoko Zuna.
31:25Ludwig Borger had been the one to decisively pin the Native American,
31:28and the elimination match pitting the All-Americans
31:31against the foreign fanatics climaxed with a Borger-Luger showdown
31:34in order for the babyfaces to prevail.
31:37Well, it ended with that at least.
31:38It really actually climaxed when The Undertaker,
31:41a completely nose-saw being slammed face-first into the steel steps,
31:45and Yoko's face was a picture.
31:46It was incredible.
31:47It was a money moment at a time when nothing really drew,
31:50and the two worked a casket match at the 1994 Royal Rumble
31:53to capitalise on the genuine emotion
31:55and set the stage for The Undertaker's hiatus.
31:58Having solved enough fear for the casket itself
32:00that fans could actually buy a title change,
32:02Yoko, Fuji and Cornette enlisted the help of pretty much
32:05every single villain on the roster
32:06just to try and beat up Taker and stuff him in a casket.
32:09Notable here was a brief moment of solidarity between the Samoans,
32:13as Yoko, Affa and the Hedge Shrinkers made a carving-up gesture
32:16that the cameras caught just enough of to acknowledge the bond.
32:20The road from one WrestleMania to the next
32:22had been full of some earnestly sensational twists and turns,
32:26but Yoko Zuna's impact within that time had been undeniable.
32:29He'd put Hulk Hogan and The Undertaker down and out of the company,
32:33staved off Lex Luger, Randy Savage and other big hitters,
32:36and had survived a television title defence against Bret Hart
32:40in a manner that suggested that he'd be able to do it again
32:42if they met down the road.
32:43That meeting came at WrestleMania X,
32:46and with it the beginning of a very protracted end.
32:49After losing the WWE Championship at WrestleMania,
32:52Yoko Zuna teamed with Crush to lose to the Hedge Shrinkers.
32:55He then spent the rest of the year setting up a return loss
32:57to The Undertaker that came at the Survivor Series.
33:00He'd disappear then until WrestleMania XI the following spring.
33:03In the first of several breaks designed to help him lose some of the weight he gained
33:07since hitting the road with the company full-time way back in 1992.
33:11The story sadly repeated itself multiple times between then and his tragic passing in 2000,
33:16though, as Yoko Zuna's size visibly increased on screen.
33:19As Owen Hart's surprise tag team partner,
33:21he served a fun purpose throughout most of 1995,
33:25but the physical limitations were showing even when he wasn't required
33:28to work the entirety of a contest.
33:30Breaks in 1996 were yet again thrown in to try and help him shift a bit of weight,
33:34but he continued to miss more targets than he hit.
33:37And he wrestled just two matches in the last few months of the year
33:40before another departure that proved make or break.
33:42As 1997 became the year that everything changed in WWE,
33:47one truly domineering figure, well, he missed all of it.
33:50Numerous stories suggested that Yoko was destined for the Hart Foundation
33:54during their anti-America peak.
33:56Having previously worked alongside and against Bret Hart, Owen Hart and Davey Boy Smith.
34:00But the numbers on the scales only got bigger and he was officially released in 1998
34:05when multiple state athletic commissions would not clear him to compete.
34:09After working independent dates where he was able to perform,
34:12Rodney Anuai passed away in October 2000 during a UK tour with All-Star Wrestling.
34:17He was just 34 years old and that is, that is no age at all.
34:20Though there had been whispers of a comeback to WWE during his final years,
34:24his legacy was actually being brilliantly honoured by none other than former ally Fatou.
34:29When Rikishi Fatou burst back onto the screens in the summer of 1999,
34:34he was met with equal doses of warmth and shock.
34:37The face was instantly recognisable and WWE weren't trying to obscure it.
34:41The name was even a nod to the former head shrinker,
34:44but updated in another Sign of the Times attempt to squash the new generation into the Attitude Era.
34:49The recognition collided with just how much Fatou had increased in size and how WWE were choosing to exploit it.
34:55Rikishi was a dangerous and imposing man, of course,
34:58but a sense of humour clearly lurked under there if he was willing to put his buttocks out there for the masses,
35:03hidden only by a thong sumo attire hybrid.
35:06And this was an outfit that paid unique tribute to Yoko,
35:09while simultaneously encouraging fans, commentators and wrestlers to, er,
35:14crack jokes about his massive arse.
35:16Like so many others who broke big during this era,
35:19he had the benefit of the doubt from a lot of brand new eyes.
35:21Those that might have seen some clips of the head shrinkers over the years,
35:25but wouldn't recognise making a difference Fatou if he'd done a say no to drugs talk at their school.
35:29WWE was white hot in 1999,
35:32and the difference in perceptions for performers that may as well have been mainstays was apparent.
35:37The magic moment for Rikishi came when he was linked up with Too Cool Bibi,
35:41alongside fellow recently repackaged regulars,
35:44Bryan Christopher and Scott Taylor.
35:46When you look at the characters Too Sexy and Scotty Too Hotty,
35:49you break them down, they were pretty much goof heels, weren't they?
35:52But the pair played their roles with such gusto that fans just gravitated towards the silliness of it all,
35:57and can you really blame them?
35:58Rikishi was theoretically good muscle for them,
36:01but because the act as a trio instantly became a babyface one,
36:04well, the script flipped.
36:06And it all became about him doing their bits rather than the other way round.
36:10When the monster dropped the facade and sported the shades for a post-victory dance,
36:14the money-drawing act was complete.
36:17Considered to many a shorthand for the fabulous creative freedom that was on show throughout this period,
36:22Too Cool and Rikishi's act was the sort of thing that could have only gotten that over in a hot time.
36:27But the three experienced workers made sure to maximise this amazing moment in the sun.
36:32They constantly added in-character choices to big spots to enhance the value for the live crowd.
36:37Sexy rubbed his ridiculous goggles before hitting his hip-hop-drop-leg-drop.
36:42Scotty famously incorporated the worm into his comebacks as a sort of mid-card people's elbow.
36:47And Rikishi, well, Rikishi shoved his arse in people's faces.
36:51The stink face was quite a disgusting and fundamentally flawed piece of offence, yes.
36:56But over's over and the sport is still over a quarter of a century later
37:00that wrestlers can start entire Twitter storms just by unleashing one on a house show.
37:05You know exactly what I'm talking about.
37:06And looking back, it definitely got the right kind of heat as well.
37:09Evolving from a mid-match comedy spot, it eventually became like the ultimate punishment for a heel.
37:14Gross-out comedy was huge in 2000 and WWE now had an upper mid-card babyface
37:18that was incorporating it into his act in a way that even the likes of Steve Austin and The Rock couldn't.
37:23The number one and two babyfaces respectively in WWE by 1999,
37:28and the same but awkwardly reversed in 2000.
37:32That summer though, having strapped up his working boots for matches against Triple H,
37:35Kurt Angle, Chris Benoit, Val Venus and many more,
37:38Rikishi actually somehow comfortably found himself in the third place babyface spot.
37:43In a woefully misguided attempt to capitalise on his popularity
37:47and deliver a bombshell payoff to the biggest angle of the prior year though,
37:51WWE just killed his babyface momentum dead by having him reveal himself as the person that ran over Steve Austin,
37:57so his cousin The Rock could ascend.
37:59The kayfabe rationale hung together until, well, it didn't.
38:02Rikishi reasoned that WWE were never going to let a Samoan wrestler be the top guy,
38:06so he stepped in to help The Rock get to the top of the mountain.
38:09His own rise, he noted, had been a supplemental benefit.
38:13Now, Rock was unquestionably the top man on the show as Austin recovered,
38:16but the racism reasoning didn't really hold enough water for years
38:20and five WWE Championship reigns into The Rock's run.
38:23Following the reveal, Austin gobbled up Rikishi in revenge brawls.
38:27And a feud with Rock himself didn't salvage the turn either, really.
38:30Rather than acknowledge the scale of the screw-up though,
38:33WWE just performed emergency surgery on the whole thing,
38:36by making Rikishi nothing more than a hitman doing Triple H's dirty work.
38:40He was sadly marginalised from there,
38:42and never was that clearer than when he was thrown into a heel tag team with Ha-Q
38:46after he'd just come back from WCW in 2001.
38:49And then by the end of the year, he was a babyface once again.
38:51And if you fancy a bit of Only in 2000's WWE trivia,
38:55then do I have the trivia for you.
38:56Rikishi's run as an Attitude Era relic on SmackDown undercards
38:59lasted three times as long as his 2000 peak before he was, you know, let go in 2004.
39:05With The Rock also parting ways formally with the group around the same time,
39:09the last remaining Samoan with visibility on the main roster was Matthew Anuai,
39:14son of Sika, brother of Roman Reigns.
39:16He was working as Rosie, the Hurricane sidekick, you remember.
39:19It was undercard fluff for Anuai,
39:21following the collapse of an intriguing heelrun as part of 3 Minute Warning.
39:25A team alongside Eddie Jamal Fartu that debuted in 2000,
39:29before then being ended in 2003,
39:32after Eddie was fired for his part in a bar fight.
39:34Anuai was then released in 2006,
39:36but interestingly, not before 3 Minute Warning actually reunited in a dark match in January,
39:42when Fartu was rehired.
39:43Anuai sadly saw the door before the team could gather steam again,
39:47but Fartu was given a new gimmick that rolled the clock back several decades to the days of the wild Samoans.
39:53Such stereotyping, understandably, drew derision before the character was rolled out
39:57on the post-WrestleMania 22 edition of Man in Our Raw,
40:01but as the newly christened Umaga prepared to work the biggest match of WrestleMania 23,
40:06just like a year later,
40:07well, those critics were forced to eat their words, weren't they?
40:09And a taped-up thumb.
40:11Against the grain and against the odds,
40:13the Samoan Bulldozer actually turned out to be one of the biggest success stories of the decade.
40:17Umaga burst onto the scene the night after WrestleMania 22
40:20by battering Ric Flair on behalf of his manager, Armando Alejandro Estrada.
40:25And WWE loved his brutality so much,
40:27they just decided to go route one on his push.
40:30The character might have looked, and even felt, a little bit out of date at first,
40:33but fans back winners,
40:34and that is exactly what Umaga did week after week after week during his first year.
40:39Shrewdly kept away from John Cena for much of that,
40:42he was often deployed as hired muscle on Estrada's behalf,
40:45which helped him mix in with some of the other major heels when alliances were acquired.
40:49January 2007 then saw his streak ended by a banana skin loss to John Cena, of course.
40:55But then that all set up an epic last-man-standing match at the Royal Rumble.
40:59It's one that many consider to be the best match that either man ever had,
41:02and possibly the best in the stipulation's history.
41:05It was a gloriously bloody war, and how was Umaga awarded?
41:09Well, he was connected to the organisation's biggest feud they had coming into WrestleMania.
41:14He was to be Vince McMahon's in-ring avatar
41:16against Donald Trump's chosen representative, Bobby Lashley, in a battle of the billionaires.
41:22The bout was refereed by Stone Cold Steve Austin,
41:24and it all ended with McMahon getting his head shaved.
41:26Wonder what that feels like.
41:27It drew the house, as it were, and the Samoan bulldozer was right there, front and centre.
41:32Three major defeats were unfortunately three too many for a gimmick
41:36that was always riskily one-dimensional, though.
41:38Further losses alongside Vince and Shane McMahon
41:41and should have fed into a babyface turn for the well-liked monster,
41:44particularly after fans went wild for the makeshift team of Umaga and Cena
41:48during a random episode of Raw that summer.
41:50Alas, he was turned heel because another babyface needed him on that side of the divide.
41:55Triple H returned from injury at SummerSlam,
41:57and Umaga was deemed the perfect foil for the game for much of the second half of 07.
42:02After bouncing around the mid-card between 08 and 09,
42:05he was then released in June 2009,
42:07when it emerged that he'd refused to enter rehab after a failure of the company's wellness policy.
42:12Rumours did trickle through that he was potentially set to return at the 2010 Royal Rumble,
42:16but reality had a different plan.
42:18Umaga passed away in 2009 at just 36 years old,
42:22another one of too many tragedies of wrestlers dying way too young,
42:26but not the first from the iconic family tree to pass away before their time either.
42:30With such a big family obviously comes love and legacy,
42:33but also significant loss.
42:34More of the wrestlers mentioned in this list have passed than those that remain around today
42:38to see the very real successes of the family.
42:41Rocky Roads have persistently resulted in incredible outcomes for the family too,
42:45I mean, just ask Roman Reigns and The Rock.
42:47The positions they currently hold at the very tippy-top of professional wrestling
42:50were not arrived at with any kind of ease,
42:53even when WWE were looking to make the path as smooth as humanly possible.
42:56If anything, both suffered the consequences of the company rolling out the red carpet for them as babyfaces.
43:01All because they'd seen the quality of the work and the real-life people
43:04and just assumed that audiences would too.
43:06I mean, how wrong they were.
43:08When Umaga's run was such a surprise hit,
43:11it also unlocked a new compromise between old values and new that could now be reached.
43:16Day-to-day representation of the Samoan family tree
43:18sits primarily with the latest incarnation of the bloodline and the excommunicated Usos.
43:24Sons of Rikishi, Jimmy and Jey Uso,
43:27who are known as Jonathan and Joshua outside of the ring if you didn't know,
43:30eventually became integral to the success of the bloodline between 2020 and 2023,
43:35with Jey's bold exit from and Jimmy's desperate re-entry into the group
43:39driving a WrestleMania 40 match between the two brothers.
43:43Now, it was a bit of a bad match, sadly,
43:45but the journey the pair had been on to get to that point over a decade after their debut,
43:49while that may one day claim its rightful place as the real cinema behind the endless superkicks.
43:54Their 2010 debut on the main roster was about as non-committal as, well,
43:59anything else on the show at that point.
44:00They were heels alongside Tamina Snuka,
44:02and more than a few illusions were made to their lineage,
44:05but it was all still a bit half-in-half-out.
44:07They'd take their thumbs like Umaga without ever really deploying Samoan spikes.
44:12They'd borrow the head shrinkers slash snooker finishers
44:14for what would ultimately become known as the Uso Splash.
44:17They incorporated historic iconography into their aesthetics,
44:20but they were never really given promo time to flesh the characters out
44:23beyond the commentators drilling down the family bonds every week.
44:26By 2010, this simply wasn't enough either.
44:28WWE had attempted to make legacy a thing audiences cared about.
44:32Remember, they were like a group of second and third generation wrestlers altogether.
44:36But the WrestleMania payoff that year between founder members Randy Orton,
44:40Cody Rhodes, and Ted DiBiase Jr. played out to virtual silence.
44:44That stable hadn't exactly done right by Bloodline lore either.
44:47Afa Anawaii Jr., son of Afa, brother of Samu,
44:50was, in kayfabe as Manu, deemed too useless to hold down a permanent place in that group.
44:55The Usos then toiled for years in what was effectively the worst spot on WWE's main roster.
45:00Vince McMahon historically hated tag team wrestling,
45:03and the majority of the time the Usos weren't even fighting for the belts.
45:07This also robbed them of spots on WrestleMania's main card for a period of time that beggared belief.
45:12Despite debuting in 2010, they had to wait until WrestleMania 34,
45:16eight years, and multiple tag team title reigns into their run on the show
45:20before they got a spot on what was then a seriously bloated show of shows.
45:24It was overdue reward for a series of cult classic matches between 2013 and 2016,
45:29with those matches coming against the likes of The Shield,
45:31The Wyatt Family, Tyson, Kidding, Cesaro, and The New Day.
45:35The latter unit were actually key to Jimmy and Jay making that next move up the ladder.
45:39Big E, Xavier Woods, and Kofi Kingston's tremendous talent and sheer force of will
45:44have just injected this division with a much-needed new burst of energy.
45:48And at long last, the Usos actually stood a chance of being able to benefit from all their hard work.
45:53Prior to mid-2016, the only reward afforded to them really was, well, job security,
45:58but the pair wanted to thrive rather than just survive.
46:00Fierce in-ring consistency during the era, alongside a pivot to an aesthetic that mirrored
46:05elements of their Samoan heritage, ensured they were two of the more vital spokes on WWE's ever-changing wheel.
46:11But the return of WWE split rosters was a door they aggressively superkicked down.
46:16Drafted to SmackDown Live, a loss in a tag title tournament to American Alpha
46:20resulted in the veterans snapping on the NXT call-ups.
46:23After this, they then threw out a promo on the much-missed Talking Smack post-show.
46:28And it was here when they explained that the play-hard-in-the-paint smiles
46:31might have to take a back seat to them earning respect through violence.
46:35With that came a new look one week later, a new and far superior entrance the week after that.
46:40And in less than six months, they were SmackDown Tag Team Champions
46:43on a show they ostensibly owned.
46:45They were cooking.
46:46The biggest and best challenge they'd ever face emerged following a post-WrestleMania shake-up,
46:51though, as the New Day arrived on the blue brand as beloved babyfaces.
46:55What followed was a summer series of undercard classics.
46:59Comfortably the company's best feud of the year from an in-ring point of view,
47:02they took their contests from pre-shows to pay-per-views,
47:05trading the belts in blinding efforts at Battleground and Hell in a Cell,
47:09on SmackDown itself in a Sin City street fight,
47:12and most notably in a Match of the Year contender on the SummerSlam kick-off.
47:16The kick-off!
47:17By year's end, the two teams had built up such mutual respect that Jimmy and Jay were now babyfaces once again.
47:23And the aforementioned WrestleMania 34 debut saw them enter that show as tag team champions.
47:28About damn time.
47:29They'd then work tag title matches on the card every single year until their WrestleMania 40 single showdown,
47:35including, fittingly, the night one WrestleMania 39 main event against Sami Zayn and Kevin Owens
47:40as the Bloodline Saga ruled the wrestling world.
47:43It was an incredible full-circle moment for the brothers, the Angle itself, and the Samoan wrestling dynasty,
47:50headlining both shows with overlapping stories that continued to carry WWE on past WrestleMania to even greater heights.
47:57Roman Reigns and The Uso specifically were the acts that best exemplified Samoan heritage,
48:02entering its perfect final form after decades of close calls and near-misses.
48:06Even when briefly cast as a babyface bloodline at various points between 2015 and 2019,
48:12the trio never really felt as dominant as their headline spot suggested.
48:16They were a bit naff, let's be honest.
48:18An image of them covering Baron Corbin in Dog Food during the January 31st 2020 edition of the show
48:24scanned as a big win, but was in fact all three at something of a low ebb.
48:29And though Roman was heading back to the main event and likely a chorus of boos to boot,
48:34there was nothing but more tag team treadmill stuff in Jimmy and Jay's future.
48:37The pandemic resulting in Roman's exit was everything for the three.
48:41With it came the subservience of Jay after two brutal defeats at Clash of Champions and Hell in a Cell 2020,
48:48and the folding in of Jimmy in 2021 resulted in the subsequent rise and fall of Roman's empire.
48:53They were the real-life best and the kayfabe worst of times for the family.
48:58And with big matches and pivotal spots yet again key to WrestleMania's success in 2024,
49:03what felt like the finishing of a story at WrestleMania was in fact just a continuation of a much bigger one
49:09featuring several of this current generation's main characters.
49:12Cody's mantra had been wrestling has more than one royal family from the very second that he stepped away
49:18from the McMahon version of it.
49:19And he returned in 2022 to prove his point, but he had not accounted for just how right he was.
49:24At WrestleMania 39, he had to take down Roman Reigns and the Usos,
49:28acting under instruction from the Elders from back in 2020,
49:32before being felled by a hooded Solo Sokoa.
49:35It took an army of babyfaces to help him ascend at long last one year later.
49:39And had it not already been the case,
49:41Philadelphia well and truly confirmed itself as a cursed location for The Rock and Roman Reigns
49:46following the events of WrestleMania.
49:47The city of brotherly love had been a cauldron of hate in 2015
49:51when the cousins stood side by side at the conclusion of a Royal Rumble,
49:55which many classed as probably the worst in the company's history.
49:58The chill, the chill that just went up my spine.
50:00The Rock was by then an unflappably popular special guest.
50:04But the sheer venom directed towards his cousin as the organisation's chosen one
50:08was reflective of a changing tide that even his raised eyebrow couldn't arrest.
50:12In fact, it was The Great One's confused and frustrated look towards the Wells Fargo crowd
50:16that pretty much defined the ugly scene.
50:18That building had actually booed him before.
50:21But even when he came up against Stone Cold Steve Austin at WrestleMania 15,
50:24they were charmed by his antics.
50:26The same could not be said for the crowd in 2015 though.
50:28They were hating what he stood for in hating him,
50:31and The Rock was not coming back to WWE to be hated.
50:34Not then anyway.
50:35It wasn't a misread of the room by The Rock,
50:37so much as a misunderstanding of the creative problems within the company.
50:40All thanks to a Vince McMahon growing even more stubborn the older and more out of step he became.
50:45The Roman Reigns push had been a disaster with multiple tendrils.
50:49The two cousins coming together should have been a dream moment to eventually foreshadow a dream match,
50:54and instead, a nightmare just overwhelmed everything.
50:57Sound familiar?
50:57Lol.
50:58In 2024, fans once again rejected The Rock and Roman Reigns.
51:02And it frankly doesn't bear thinking about how Philadelphia would have reacted
51:05if WWE had stuck to the original plan of having The Rock challenge Roman Reigns for the big belt at WrestleMania.
51:10They would have gone mad.
51:11But The Nightmare was one of a much different kind this time around,
51:14and it was the result, thankfully, of some good booking rather than bad.
51:17Cody Rhodes' story just needed to be finished.
51:20And The Rock's return very nearly destroyed all that before an all-timer of a pivot occurred,
51:25six days after it looked like Reigns and Cody's rematch had been put on ice
51:29just so the Tribal Chief could fight his cousin.
51:31Back within the realms of kayfabe,
51:32the Tribal Chief and newly christened final boss were now being booed
51:36because that was all part of the plan, rather than being a protest.
51:39And as both looked up at the bright lights and the filly night sky following the pain of defeat,
51:44the dawning of a new chapter in this rich history was inevitable.
51:48If history informs the future,
51:50the most recent crop of Samoan family members will yet again have to subvert stereotypes
51:54and force their way back into the conversation.
51:57But with the silent backing of Rock and or Roman,
52:00committed booking and strong, believable work that has defined generations dating back decades,
52:05as you've just seen in this video,
52:07it'd be naive to assume they won't be next in line to justify the historic blood oath
52:12and make their elders proud.
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