Did the nWo have to be Hall, Nash and Hogan?

Publish date: 2024-05-15
I see the early success of the nWo as a combination of three major factors and I do not think that other stars could have made it work as well as Hogan, Hall and Nash, with the possible exception of Bret Hart.

a) Due to their contract circumstances and the fact that they had been high profile competitors in "New York" made their invasion seem credible at the outset. It established the doubt in the more knowledgeable fans' minds that these guys might actually be outsiders. This was extremely important and the only way to garner this impact was to have recognisable faces from the other company. It probably helped even more than both Hall and Nash had competed for WCW so they could be seen even more as McMahon-endorsed insurgents, having gone to WWF and "seen the light."

b) It really goes without saying that the Bash at the Beach was pivotal to the progress of the nWo. For the Hero of Heroes to turn on the fans and the company he worked for, again with the hint of him working for McMahon, gave the nWo all the momentum it could possibly need.

c) I think one of the major things that Hall and Nash had going for them was their size. They looked dangerous and more than capable of bullying others around the way they were going to. When their numbers were low, you had to believe that the nWo could handle themselves physically and with Hogan, Hall and Nash, all well over 6ft 5in and built like brick shithouses, they had that in abundance.

Whilst not the most menacing looking superstar, I think that Bret Hart could easily have stepped into the leadership role that Hogan assumed at a later date. He had already proven himself a capable leader of a heel faction with the Hart Foundation in its feud with Austin and of course, despite the Screwjob, he had long standing ties with McMahon. Indeed, the Screwjob could have been played up as this epic swindle to get Hart into WCW to tear it down from the inside.

However, I do not see the "cool" factor of the nWo to be a positive, particularly in the long run. Short term, it sold t-shirts and may have made the company some cash but at the same time it was creating something that was not only an uncontrollable monster but also a crutch. The creative control that the success brought the likes of Hall and Nash were ruinous to WCW and the "coolness" of the nWo meant that it stayed around far beyond it's welcome and WCW would see it as a "full-proof" way it increase ratings but the continued reincarnations were destructive.

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