Bret Hart vs Shawn Michaels (Iron Man – WWF – 3/30/1996)

Second. My PWO review from a few years ago:

"One of those matches that has been called overrated by so many for so long that it has become underrated and people are rediscovering it (myself included). For years I was under the impression that this was merely a good match, nothing more, but I rewatched this recently and it holds up as a great match. I have this #3 for WWF in 1996 behind Shawn/Foley and Bret/Austin.

Shawn was really good here and wrestled with great focus but this featured a truly excellent Bret performance. For someone who was apparently unhappy with the result and the booking and what not, he turned in a really selfless performance. He did a great job getting across the fact that Shawn was actually outwrestling him and he was struggling to get a foothold and was getting more desperate. He worked almost like a subtle heel as a result. In fact he didn't have a real control segment until almost 40 minutes in after a huge Shawn bump gave him an opening. There were great micro details as well like Bret breaking a Shawn sleeper by backing him into a corner but the next time he tried that, Shawn just threw him backwards. Both nailed some vicious strikes too. Not something I would watch everyday because of the length but a great match nonetheless. Yet another to add to these guys resumes."

I just watched the entire boyhood dream arc through this match last week, and studying the build and the way the match plays off the build made me realize (and I never had before) that this match is masterclass level stuff.

Bret is presented as the international grand master of wrestling in the build to this - the mountain of all mountains, the recognized, celebrated and legendary "ace." One of the running themes of the match is that after an initial pair of never before seen headlock reverals from Shawn, Bret (the master) counters Shawn on every single thing he tries to do more than once. It takes Shawn 50 minutes to pick up on this before he starts head-faking certain moves before going for others as a way to address that. (Double axe from the moonsalut position, a moonsault following that now that Bret is prepped to counter the double axe instead.)

Shawn has been battling back against life for 6 months, taking crap kickings over (Syracuse) and over (the Owen kick) and over (facing possible retirement) and over (losing his best friend). Bret, in promos, twice said he's going to pound Shawn into oblivion. For the better part of 35 straight minutes, that's pretty much what happens. Shawn had to endure the emotional trial of his life to get to this match, and now has to face the hardest fight of his life to get to the title.

In addition, in the go-home promo Bret (who had fought Shawn for the belt at Survivor Series in his first reign) that all he has to do is sit back and wait for Shawn's mistake, and when it happens, he'll go up 1 fall to nothing. Then Bret says thst Shawn will get desperate and make his second mistake. Here's where this plays in: when Shawn was scouting Bret on Raw (Bret vs HHH), the way Bret beat HHH is near the same way he beat Shawn at Survivor Series 92 - HHH jumps off the second rope for a sledge, and Bret counters by stepping in for a double leg takedown (with HHH still in mid-air), which whips him on back into perfect Sharpshooter position. When it happens, Shawn immediately stands up & walks away before it's even applied & doesn't look back until the match is over, shoeing either A) His character is thinking "I know how that story ends. No way it's happening to me again " or B) The memory of coming up short at Survivor Series in the same way (top rope dropkick attempt, and Bret calmly steps back, catches both legs and counters to the Sharpshooter) still haunts him and it's too painful to watch play out again. NOW, fast-forward to the last 40 seconds of regulation: A desperate Shawn goes for a repeat hunnicanrana into a pin (which almost got the pin 2 minutes prior), ignoring the lesson he finally learned 8 minutes prior about never repeating a move against Bret. Bret steps back, catches the legs, and Shawn is in the EXACT position that cost him the title in Survivor Series 92. If you watch his fight against the hold being applied, it's crazy, everywhere, but directionless. He's living out the manifestation of his worst nightmare and can't think logically, which is a sin punishable by submission in the court of Bret Hart's Ring. HOWEVER, b/c he's just gone through the trial of his life & has proven to himself just how much he can survive, he fights and fights and fights and hangs on - "If I can make it through all that pain, I can survive this kind of pain." And through all of his fighting through, he's given a second chance. (There's additional fun here since the hunnicanrana is a move popularized in lucha libre, and Bret had casually dismissed Mexican wrestlers as not being "tough." What happens? He comes within milliseconds of losing to a Mexican wrestling move.)

The end of regulation time is also foreshadowed perfectly in the first face-to-face promo, as Roddy Piper says something like "We're going to have a winner" casually in the middle of a rant about something else, but never spells out that he's definitely not allowing a draw. In addition, when Bret starts explaining to Shawn about the champion's advantage, the first words he says are "You know, a lot of people misunderstand things," which is perfect dramatic irony since he ultimately misunderstood what Piper meant. (And Bret gets to keep his beef b/c Piper didn't correct him. It makes sense, but narratively feels more like retrofitting from fan-friendly president Gorilla Monsoon, who would want to give the fans a winner.)

Next, Bret breaking the 10 count on a count-out win and Bret's battle against himself regarding caring what fans think. In promos, Bret had said that for the first time he feels "a huge wave of momentum against (him)", and that Shawn has an ever-growing fanbase in "The Kliq," but counters with "I have my fans, and I think I have the best fans in the world," before concluding the thought with "This isn't some popularity contest. This is about who the best wrestler in the entire WWF is." FF to his go-home promo, where he says he has "no choice but to pound Shawn Michaels into oblivion...(yelling now) and I know a lot of people are going to have a problem with that...(calmer again) but I'm sorry. I have my fans and I am not about to let my fans down." NOW, in the match, there is a point where Bret has Shawn layed out outside the ring & tells the ref to start the count-out, which he does. When this happens, the fans start booing, and the boos grow increasingly louder as the count goes on. Bret pauses (intaking it), and has a change of heart & breaks the ref's count. While it's been established that he doesn't care if The Kliq is against him here, he does care about how his own fans feel, and seemed to realize that his fans (who believe he's the best) wouldn't want him to take fall 1 with a count out, but to give them the win in the middle of the ring. To his ultimate detriment, Bret listened to the fans. (And then turned on them a year later when he felt like they were siding with other wrestlers over him.)

Lastly, the finish in overtime is also the 3rd act conclusion of a side story in the match. The background here is that, in promos, Bret had admitted that Shawn is a bit faster than him, but countered by saying that he is smarter than Shawn. Early in the match, Bret throws Shawn into the turnbuckles & jogs in. Shawn catches Bret in a headscissors and throws him outside the ring. FF a few minutes. Shawn does a leapfrog off an Irish whip, then goes for a second. Bret, learning from the headscissors counter, speeds up to a full run on his rebound, and catches Shawn's second leapfrog attempt and turns it into a spinebuster/Sharpshooter attempt. To Bret, this shows that while Shawn is faster, he is fast enough to catch Shawn on a jump. FF to the finish- Bret throws Shawn into the turnbuckles and Shawn goes to counter with the jump over. Bret speeds up and doesn't get caught in the headscissors, but also (learning from a blow earlier in the match) stops himself before hitting the buckles. Unfortunately for him, he would've been better off hitting them, as Shawn catches Bret as he turns around with the superkick.
Shawn, in line with his character, then takes the ultimate risk when he sees Bret is still struggling to his feet, and does the one thing that hasn't worked the entire match: he repeats the spot. "All I need is for this to work once, but it has to be now." Fortunately for him, Bret is still dazed from the first superkick and takes the second square on the chin.

Shawn turns over, weeping at what is about to become his reality. Bret stays just long enough to see his belt presented to the man he felt that he had beaten, and then storms off, still not ready to metaphirically leave (which he outright stated in the last training vignette).

And that is why this match is poetry. Symmetry, rhyme, symbolism - it's all there. It took me watching the build to get all of the layers (commentary only catches a handful), but watching it after that - LOVE it. It's moving way up from where I originally thought I would have it.

Yeah awesome review right there. Last time I saw this, almost a year ago, I was completely in love with this. It's 100% a chess match. Actually, while I get why they did them, I hate those couple of "OMG" moments at ringside (the SCM on the announcer for example), because they do not serve the story being told in any way and does not change the tone after them, they're just obligatory fireworks after fifteen minutes. Other than that, and some inevitable filler, this is a wonderful match that I seriously consider for my top 100.

The commentary did not age well but the match has. Great storytelling and physicality here. I remember a friend (non-fan) who thought that they would call the match off while in progress due to fans’ short attention spans. That could have happened with some WWF participants of the day but these guys made the most of the format. It was also gutsy to take a gimmick that could have eaten into the attention span deficits but instead do what was somewhat of a sixty-minute draw. The sudden death period still felt intense 27 years later. I’m glad I took the time to watch this, which might have been the first time since I watched it live.