Now comes the cover artwork — featuring Stone Cold Steve Austin, Triple H, Shawn Michaels, Kane, The Undertaker, Bret Hart and Mankind — and the first match selections too.
Despite the official synopsis (below) sounding somewhat like a match compilation led by a host, WrestlingDVDNetwork.com can confirm that the main feature of the 7 hour DVD (8.5 hour Blu-ray) will be a documentary, possibly with roundtable-style discussion segments interspersed with it.
The year was 1997… Bill Clinton was president of the United States, pop groups like the Backstreet Boys and the Spice Girls were dominating the music charts, and WWE was experiencing an era of great transformation. It was the birth of attitude and WWE was pushing the limits of entertainment like never before.
For the first time ever, Shawn Michaels, Mick Foley, Ron Simmons, The Godfather, and Kane, sit together with host Renee Young and share their behind-the-scenes experiences during those unforgettable years in WWE history.
Witness the rise of Stone Cold Steve Austin, the birth of D-Generation X, the summer of The Hart Foundation, and how The Attitude Era was created with one pivotal year in WWE history. Welcome to 1997: Dawn of the Attitude.
Also featuring The Rock, Undertaker, Sycho Sid, Goldust, Sable, Ken Shamrock, D-Lo Brown, The Sultan & more!
Courtesy of WWE Home Video UK, check out the cover artwork just revealed today!
And exclusively here at WDN we’ve got our hands on a list of the first four matches now confirmed for inclusion in the DVD and Blu-ray content; take a peek right here:
— Bret Hart vs. Mankind Shotgun Saturday Night • January 25, 1997
— Steel Cage Match for the WWE Championship
Bret Hart vs. Sycho Sid RAW • March 17, 1997
— World Tag Team Championship Match
Owen Hart & British Bulldog vs. Stone Cold Steve Austin RAW • July 14, 1997
— European Championship Match
British Bulldog vs. Shawn Michaels One Night Only • September 20, 1997
Get your copy of the WWE “1997 – DAWN OF THE ATTITUDE”DVD on…
– UK/Europe: October 2nd. Pre-order WWE’s new 1997 DVD or Blu-ray soon via Amazon.co.uk.
– USA: October 3rd. Pre-order WWE’s new 1997 DVD or Blu-ray soon here on Amazon.com.
– Australia: TBA. Look for your DVD pre-order announcement coming soon to Madman.com.au.
Today also sees the unveiling of the “Double Feature: Extreme Rules & Money in the Bank 2017” cover ahead of the release of the DVD to the United States in July and the UK in August.
As you can see the artwork features modified versions of the PPV posters.
Get your 2-disc DVD on pre-order now – Amazon.com has it for $19.98; Amazon.co.uk for £19.99.
NEW RELEASE: Speaking of the “Double Feature” packs, the latest one featuring Payback and Backlash 2017 landed this week – in stock now here on Amazon.com and here on WWEShop.com.
Get another look at its packaging in this video, courtesy of Matthew Tremble:
NEW RELEASE: Kayfabe Commentaries latest Timeline DVD was also released this week; “Timeline: The History of WWE – 1990” with special guest, former WWE producer Bruce Prichard!
Preview 6 minutes of it absolutely free in the official trailer:
LUCKY WINNER: Taking home a free copy of the WrestleMania 33 DVD with exclusive artwork is @JamesF_LaceUp – congratulations you just won our latest giveaway!
The alternate cover artwork for WM33 can be found now at Sainsbury’s stores across the UK.
EXPIRING SOON: Heads up, there’s loads of WWE DVD goodies to be found in eBay auctions that all end later today and tomorrow, including these big lots going cheap…
And last but not least a copy of the tricky-to-find original nWo DVD and the granddaddy of them all – the WrestleMania X-Seven DVD in still-sealed condition!
That cover is Photoshopped to hell, haha. Shawn never had green tights, and that Bret top is from ’96 Survivor Series and the bottom looks to be different. Guess they want to emphasize DX pretty well.
Can’t wait for this one, though. 1997 was my year.
They should’ve got someone like Corey Graves to be the host instead of constantly shoving Renee Young down our throats and Graves has a good knowledge of The Attitudr Era!
This has potential to be a good set as long as its not loaded with repeats. I know obviously there will be some but having said that I just don’t see what matches could be put on here that haven’t been released multiple times already. Hopefully there are some Im not aware of.
There are loads of Raw matches that have never been released on DVD. I have the Best of Raw 4-9 VHS tapes (possibly only released in the UK/Europe) and they have stacks of fun matches that haven’t been released since. I’m hoping for lots of those, as opposed to the Bret/Austin WM13 match and suchlike, but I of course understand why those bouts will be included (before someone starts flaming me).
There were eleven volumes in total, starting in July 1996 and ending in April 1998. I’m guessing that they stopped as Raw became more about segments and angles than it did matches.
I still have all eleven tapes, but can’t really be bothered to convert them to DVD. Just a shame SilverVision closed down before they could release them all as tagged classics.
Still a set from the year 2000 would be very cool as only a hand full of matches like Dudleys vs Hardyz Royal Rumble and TLC 2 Summerslam have surfaced on home video. This year gets passed by a lot for some reason and it’s when the era seems to find it’s feet focusing a little more on in ring action than previous Attitude years. I could be wrong.
2000 was when Raw’s ratings hit their all time peak on a regular basis. They were averaging high 6’s and low 7’s every week for several months straight.
Raw was at its absolute best in 2000 as far as continuity goes and consistently good storytelling goes. And almost all of that has to do with Chris Kreski, who was the lead writer after Russo left. Kreski took the ball, didn’t miss a beat, and took WWE to even bigger heights. A big pet-peeve of Kreski’s was when details didn’t make sense. Something that is sorely lacking in today’s WWE. Kreski made sure to go out of his way to ensure that all storylines made sense, that there were no loose ends. Whereas today WWE just drops storylines mid-stream, doesn’t feel the need to explain when things don’t make sense. Kreski didn’t treat the audience like imbeciles. Raw hit its TV ratings peak in the summer of 2000, doing 6.8’s, 6.9’s, 7.0’s. Today Raw is averaging about 1.6’s, 1.7’s.
Never heard of Kreski. Looked him up, read he was a stickler for storyboards which is not WWE’s forte. It’s a shame he’s not better known for his contributions in wrestling as he’s deceased now. . .
WWE has been suffocating themselves over the last decade since they’re struggling to adapt in a growing entertainment industry. The company’s obsessed with repeating the lucrative successes of Hulkamania and the Attitude Era without considering conditions that made these two unique times come about.
This article sums up a lot of what’s wrong with the current WWE product: (I stopped watching regularly in 2011 but still follow events).
Thanks for the kind words. I appreciate it. That article is pretty much spot on. There will be no real changes in creative until Vince(and to a lesser degree, Kevin Dunn) is out of the picture.
there are 6/9 (dvd/bd) matches from that year on “The Attitude Era” alone. the recent “History of the Hardcore Championship” dvd had more matches from 2000 than from any other year etc. etc.
(that doesn’t necessarily mean there might not be one or the other gem that hasn’t been on any release, but the most important matches – maybe except the ones including Benoit – have all ended up on some dvd/bd)
I stand corrected. A lot of 2000 material has made it onto various sets, especially PPV matches. Need to revisit the ol’ wrestling video collection. Thanks for enlightening me.
*Adds “Hardcore Championship” to wish list.
Great concept. I’m looking forward to non blurred blu ray versions of some of my favorite moments and matches. 1997 was the year WWF seemed to finally turn the corner.
Other than maybe the last few weeks of 1997, aren’t all the matches from the year blur-free anyway? The scratch logo was being phased in, but didn’t ultimately kick in fully until the night after WMXIV IIRC.
I just feel like they’re squeezing too much juice out of this Attitude Era thing now. I don’t even consider most of 1997 to have much to do with the Attitude Era to be honest, and I usually just see it by and large as one of those depressing ‘New Generation’ years. Stone Cold/Bret, the formation of DX and the screw job. That’s about it. I get that it was the transition year to Attitude, but it still doesn’t mean it was a great year of TV to watch.
first of all, citing the biggest angles and then saying “that’s about it” seems weird.
but also, the WWF was generally moving towards a more “risky” direction – the gang wars, the first instances of sexy Sable, the Pillman/Goldust/Marlena angle etc.
I take your point, I probably was dismissing it a bit to harshly, but I still felt that in 1997 that the WWF was a company that didn’t know what it wanted to be, and I just feel there was a lot of inconsistency there. It just seemed like a company that was panicking due to WCW’s success. While a few, if not several, awesome things happened in 1997 that ushered in the Attitude Era, I just feel like they weren’t fully up and running with their new identity until WrestleMania 14, so I don’t really see it as having much to do with the era itself. Just my opinion.
1997 is one of my favorurite WWF years of all-time, and I thought it was universally loved. You had the true emergence of future main-eventers like Austin, Rock, Triple H and Mankind, the birth of Mr. McMahon, the epic USA vs. Canada feud and the ongoing Bret/Shawn rivalry, Montreal, the WM13 submission match, the first ever HIAC and Kane’s debut, the ECW Invasion, some fantastic PPV matches (Final Four, Canadian Stampede, One Night Only etc), the Rumble in a dome (which was quite a spectacle), and lots of great workers like Owen, Davey Boy, Goldust and so forth filling out the mid card. Even the ‘lost my smile’ promo and all the title changes at the start of the year made it an interesting time. Oh, and how about that Bulldog/Owen match from Germany? And the formation of DX?
This must be one of the most transitional years in the company’s history, and to me, it blows away anything that came after it in 1998 and 1999. Incredible year and I’m glad it’s finally getting a set.
Stone Cold and Foley was about all there was to 1997. The early DX stuff is completely unwatchable and WWE trying to push Shawn as the greatest WWF Champion of all time (just as a dig at Hogan, who was with the competition) was irritating AF. Most of the TV they had that year was terrible. They even tried copying the cruiserweight thing but it came off like a dollar store knockoff. The ECW invasion thing was okay but too short lived. Tbh WCW and ECW were the best in U.S. wrestling in ’97. WWF was pretty horrendous at the time. Pass.
Ha ha ha!! I noticed it too!! They clearly photo shopped them to green. HBK didn’t even wear that style of tights then, he stopped wearing them at around Wrestlemania XII time, and went with a wider design inside the hearts on his tights.
He had black tights with green hearts at one point, but you’re right, the totally green ones above are definitely photoshopped. I think they’re just trying to make it obvious that he’s on there to represent DX.
regarding the release itself: seems like a neat concept, if done right this could be a great release.
(although I’d argue that then they pretty much covered everything there is about that timeframe. I mean, the “actual” attitude era has been chronicled so often, I can hardly imagine that “1998” or “1999” sets wouldn’t be something we have seen (more than once) before)
“WrestlingDVDNetwork.com can confirm that the main feature of the 7 hour DVD (8.5 hour Blu-ray) will be a documentary, possibly with roundtable-style discussion segments interspersed with it.”
this is btw what I was talking about when the issue of bluray bonus features was brought up.
in theory there should be bonus content in addition to the dvd content. but in practice it seems as if this is another one of those releases in which the dvd is basically cut short and the length of the bluray extras results in the runtime being similar to a dvd-only release (e.g. the Kurt Angle or the Seth Rollins dvds, which are both approx. 9 hours long).
Love getting Shotgun Saturday Night matches on DVD. Great to have the Cage Match finally released. This one is probably going to to half new and half repeat footage. There are some things in 1997 that just HAVE to be on there:
*Shawn/Bret SS97
*HIAC #1
*Most likely Owen/Bulldog 3/3/97 European Title
Hopefully we get more Shotgun matches from the nightclub era. Those were really original. Finally they show the infamous Bret Hart meltdown as well unless its edited out.
I’m pretty sure the first HIAC match has never been released on Blu-Ray (quite surprising), so would more than welcome it on this set. Pleased with the content listing thus far.
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That cover is Photoshopped to hell, haha. Shawn never had green tights, and that Bret top is from ’96 Survivor Series and the bottom looks to be different. Guess they want to emphasize DX pretty well.
Can’t wait for this one, though. 1997 was my year.
They should’ve got someone like Corey Graves to be the host instead of constantly shoving Renee Young down our throats and Graves has a good knowledge of The Attitudr Era!
This has potential to be a good set as long as its not loaded with repeats. I know obviously there will be some but having said that I just don’t see what matches could be put on here that haven’t been released multiple times already. Hopefully there are some Im not aware of.
There are loads of Raw matches that have never been released on DVD. I have the Best of Raw 4-9 VHS tapes (possibly only released in the UK/Europe) and they have stacks of fun matches that haven’t been released since. I’m hoping for lots of those, as opposed to the Bret/Austin WM13 match and suchlike, but I of course understand why those bouts will be included (before someone starts flaming me).
that “Best of Raw” series definitely hasn’t been released outside the UK.
I have volume 1-10. Can’t remember if they did more? Some nice tapes for sure.
There were eleven volumes in total, starting in July 1996 and ending in April 1998. I’m guessing that they stopped as Raw became more about segments and angles than it did matches.
I still have all eleven tapes, but can’t really be bothered to convert them to DVD. Just a shame SilverVision closed down before they could release them all as tagged classics.
Nice cover but I don’t wanna listen to what godfather, ron simmons and kane have to say.
personally I think it’s nice to see someone different rather than the “usual suspects”.
True, but listening to somebody like Kane would sound weird (especially to those who only remember watching him as the beast in the red mask)!
Plus now I heard he wears a suit w/no mask on
That is awesome cover of the dawn of the attitude era looking forward to this amazing set in oct !
One aspect we can all look forward to about this set is that there will be no Brawl for All matches!
And for those who thoroughly enjoyed it you have my warmest sympathies.
We could all use laugh
I love the Attitude Era as much as the next fan, but I hope this is the last DVD we’ll ever have from that Era.
Still a set from the year 2000 would be very cool as only a hand full of matches like Dudleys vs Hardyz Royal Rumble and TLC 2 Summerslam have surfaced on home video. This year gets passed by a lot for some reason and it’s when the era seems to find it’s feet focusing a little more on in ring action than previous Attitude years. I could be wrong.
2000 was when Raw’s ratings hit their all time peak on a regular basis. They were averaging high 6’s and low 7’s every week for several months straight.
I knew it was high but not that high! What, did Raw get that many formerly loyal WCW viewers turned off by Turner’s wrestling promotion in 2000? Whoa
Raw was at its absolute best in 2000 as far as continuity goes and consistently good storytelling goes. And almost all of that has to do with Chris Kreski, who was the lead writer after Russo left. Kreski took the ball, didn’t miss a beat, and took WWE to even bigger heights. A big pet-peeve of Kreski’s was when details didn’t make sense. Something that is sorely lacking in today’s WWE. Kreski made sure to go out of his way to ensure that all storylines made sense, that there were no loose ends. Whereas today WWE just drops storylines mid-stream, doesn’t feel the need to explain when things don’t make sense. Kreski didn’t treat the audience like imbeciles. Raw hit its TV ratings peak in the summer of 2000, doing 6.8’s, 6.9’s, 7.0’s. Today Raw is averaging about 1.6’s, 1.7’s.
Never heard of Kreski. Looked him up, read he was a stickler for storyboards which is not WWE’s forte. It’s a shame he’s not better known for his contributions in wrestling as he’s deceased now. . .
WWE has been suffocating themselves over the last decade since they’re struggling to adapt in a growing entertainment industry. The company’s obsessed with repeating the lucrative successes of Hulkamania and the Attitude Era without considering conditions that made these two unique times come about.
This article sums up a lot of what’s wrong with the current WWE product: (I stopped watching regularly in 2011 but still follow events).
http://www.cracked.com/blog/5-writing-changes-that-would-save-pro-wrestling/
You have some of the most informative posts on this site. Keep it up! You know your stuff.
Thanks for the kind words. I appreciate it. That article is pretty much spot on. There will be no real changes in creative until Vince(and to a lesser degree, Kevin Dunn) is out of the picture.
only a handful of matches?
there are 6/9 (dvd/bd) matches from that year on “The Attitude Era” alone. the recent “History of the Hardcore Championship” dvd had more matches from 2000 than from any other year etc. etc.
(that doesn’t necessarily mean there might not be one or the other gem that hasn’t been on any release, but the most important matches – maybe except the ones including Benoit – have all ended up on some dvd/bd)
I stand corrected. A lot of 2000 material has made it onto various sets, especially PPV matches. Need to revisit the ol’ wrestling video collection. Thanks for enlightening me.
*Adds “Hardcore Championship” to wish list.
Great concept. I’m looking forward to non blurred blu ray versions of some of my favorite moments and matches. 1997 was the year WWF seemed to finally turn the corner.
Other than maybe the last few weeks of 1997, aren’t all the matches from the year blur-free anyway? The scratch logo was being phased in, but didn’t ultimately kick in fully until the night after WMXIV IIRC.
exactly. I just checked, even at the Survivor Series, the scratch logo wasn’t used for the broadcast and the turnbuckles.
I just spotted on Best Buy’s website some new double feature additions of past WWE video releases and they are as follows via the links below:
http://www.bestbuy.com/site/wwe-bret-the-hit-man-hart-dungeon-collection-wwe-owen-hart-of-gold-dvd/32982187.p?skuId=32982187
http://www.bestbuy.com/site/wwe-wrestlemania-xxix-wwe-wrestlemania-xxx-dvd/32982178.p?skuId=32982178
http://www.bestbuy.com/site/wwe-summerslam-2015-wwe-summerslam-2016-3-discs-dvd/32940786.p?skuId=32940786
http://www.bestbuy.com/site/wwe-the-best-of-raw-and-smackdown-2013-wwe-the-best-of-raw-and-smackdown-2014-2-discs-dvd/32845333.p?skuId=32845333
We reported on them once or twice. As you say, just double packs of past releases.
I just feel like they’re squeezing too much juice out of this Attitude Era thing now. I don’t even consider most of 1997 to have much to do with the Attitude Era to be honest, and I usually just see it by and large as one of those depressing ‘New Generation’ years. Stone Cold/Bret, the formation of DX and the screw job. That’s about it. I get that it was the transition year to Attitude, but it still doesn’t mean it was a great year of TV to watch.
Oh, and first HIAC with Kane, but this is all later on and getting towards ’98. Just not buying it.
I vehemently disagree with that.
first of all, citing the biggest angles and then saying “that’s about it” seems weird.
but also, the WWF was generally moving towards a more “risky” direction – the gang wars, the first instances of sexy Sable, the Pillman/Goldust/Marlena angle etc.
I take your point, I probably was dismissing it a bit to harshly, but I still felt that in 1997 that the WWF was a company that didn’t know what it wanted to be, and I just feel there was a lot of inconsistency there. It just seemed like a company that was panicking due to WCW’s success. While a few, if not several, awesome things happened in 1997 that ushered in the Attitude Era, I just feel like they weren’t fully up and running with their new identity until WrestleMania 14, so I don’t really see it as having much to do with the era itself. Just my opinion.
1997 is one of my favorurite WWF years of all-time, and I thought it was universally loved. You had the true emergence of future main-eventers like Austin, Rock, Triple H and Mankind, the birth of Mr. McMahon, the epic USA vs. Canada feud and the ongoing Bret/Shawn rivalry, Montreal, the WM13 submission match, the first ever HIAC and Kane’s debut, the ECW Invasion, some fantastic PPV matches (Final Four, Canadian Stampede, One Night Only etc), the Rumble in a dome (which was quite a spectacle), and lots of great workers like Owen, Davey Boy, Goldust and so forth filling out the mid card. Even the ‘lost my smile’ promo and all the title changes at the start of the year made it an interesting time. Oh, and how about that Bulldog/Owen match from Germany? And the formation of DX?
This must be one of the most transitional years in the company’s history, and to me, it blows away anything that came after it in 1998 and 1999. Incredible year and I’m glad it’s finally getting a set.
Stone Cold and Foley was about all there was to 1997. The early DX stuff is completely unwatchable and WWE trying to push Shawn as the greatest WWF Champion of all time (just as a dig at Hogan, who was with the competition) was irritating AF. Most of the TV they had that year was terrible. They even tried copying the cruiserweight thing but it came off like a dollar store knockoff. The ECW invasion thing was okay but too short lived. Tbh WCW and ECW were the best in U.S. wrestling in ’97. WWF was pretty horrendous at the time. Pass.
I am gonna love this DVD/Blu Ray set already!! I will be owning it.
I’m glad to hear somebody say that with lots of happiness as I haven’t brought a WWE set in ages now since ‘The True Story of the Royal Rumble’!
It’s all cause of the very small amount of blu-rays being released now
I just hope that this one will be worth buying as much as the Attitude Vol 1 & 2 blu-ray sets giving us great matches & moments to look forward to!
To the best of my knowledge, Shawn never wore green tights. I can’t believe that was the first thing I noticed.
Ha ha ha!! I noticed it too!! They clearly photo shopped them to green. HBK didn’t even wear that style of tights then, he stopped wearing them at around Wrestlemania XII time, and went with a wider design inside the hearts on his tights.
He had black tights with green hearts at one point, but you’re right, the totally green ones above are definitely photoshopped. I think they’re just trying to make it obvious that he’s on there to represent DX.
True, I only remember him wearing the green ones a few years ago when he reformed with HHH back in 2009-2010
Hope they include the post Match with Bret snapping and hope it’s uncensored
Me too but since its wwe, they’ll censor it
Which match is this you’re talking about?
Its from the Bret Hart vs. Sid – Steel Cage.
The cage match with Sid.
It’s uncensored on the Network so they might include the uncensored version on this release.
regarding the release itself: seems like a neat concept, if done right this could be a great release.
(although I’d argue that then they pretty much covered everything there is about that timeframe. I mean, the “actual” attitude era has been chronicled so often, I can hardly imagine that “1998” or “1999” sets wouldn’t be something we have seen (more than once) before)
“WrestlingDVDNetwork.com can confirm that the main feature of the 7 hour DVD (8.5 hour Blu-ray) will be a documentary, possibly with roundtable-style discussion segments interspersed with it.”
this is btw what I was talking about when the issue of bluray bonus features was brought up.
in theory there should be bonus content in addition to the dvd content. but in practice it seems as if this is another one of those releases in which the dvd is basically cut short and the length of the bluray extras results in the runtime being similar to a dvd-only release (e.g. the Kurt Angle or the Seth Rollins dvds, which are both approx. 9 hours long).
Good, people should put on their big-boy pants and buy a blu-ray player.
how did you get that from my comment?!
Now that’s a cool cover. Plus you know things are getting real when The Sultan is advertised for a DVD.
Can believe they name-checked The Sultan in the synopsis, lol.
Great cover.
Love getting Shotgun Saturday Night matches on DVD. Great to have the Cage Match finally released. This one is probably going to to half new and half repeat footage. There are some things in 1997 that just HAVE to be on there:
*Shawn/Bret SS97
*HIAC #1
*Most likely Owen/Bulldog 3/3/97 European Title
Hopefully we get more Shotgun matches from the nightclub era. Those were really original. Finally they show the infamous Bret Hart meltdown as well unless its edited out.
I’m pretty sure the first HIAC match has never been released on Blu-Ray (quite surprising), so would more than welcome it on this set. Pleased with the content listing thus far.
True! & yes, it’s about time they release the first HIAC on blu-ray!
uh, 2 repeats already…
dude those matches havent been released in forever and arent on bluray
And past releases were probably blurred…