Undertaker Bio - The Lord of Darkness Era

by Jack Windham
April 1 , 2008

We're going to start our bio series on various wrestlers. Instead of doing a quick one, we're going to expand it and cover various parts of their career.

After a series of bad feuds with horrible opponents, the Undertaker was finally moved into programs with quality opponents.

Royal Rumble 1996

The Undertaker, who was still being managed by Paul Bearer at the time, received a title shot against Bret Hart at the Royal Rumble.

At the time, WWE was setting up a huge WWE Heavyweight Championship match at Wrestlemania between Bret Hart and Shawn Michaels, who was the winner of the 1996 Royal Rumble.

Undertaker was still in need of an opponent, so they switched things up and started a feud between him and Kevin Nash (known as Diesel at the time).

In order to get the feud going, Kevin Nash interfered in the title match at the Royal Rumble.

Kevin Nash pulled out the referee as he was about to count out Bret Hart, who had fallen victim to the Tombstone Piledriver.

That infuriated the Undertaker, and the two would go on to battle at Wrestlemania 12.

The Beginning of Mankind

Around this time, Mick Foley had signed on with WWE. He was given the gimmick of Mankind, a deranged creature who would pull his own hair out for fun.

WWE brilliantly made the decision to put him immediately into a feud with the Undertaker.

In order to give Mankind immediate credibility with the audience, they had him pick up the win over the Undertaker at the King of the Ring pay per view.

The moment was made even more shocking to fans as Mankind knocked out the Undertaker with his Mandible Claw finisher.

WWE gave the red hot feud even more of a boost when they had Paul Bearer turn on the Undertaker during a Boiler Room match.

The Undertaker seemingly won his feud against Mankind when he threw his opponent down into an open grave during a Buried Alive match.

Bearer's Boys

After his feud with Mankind ended, the Undertaker spent the next several weeks engaged in battles against Paul Bearer's wrestlers.

His first battle didn't last long as he made quick work of the masked Executioner (Terry Gordy, the legendary father of current WWE star Jesse).

Vader was the next opponent that Paul Bearer would throw at the Undertaker. Vader actually picked up a surprising win over the Undertaker at the Royal Rumble thanks to interference from Paul Bearer.

...TO BE CONTINUED