Or: Booking the Deadman’s retirement

Wrestlemania 31 was an excellent event. Perhaps not the greatest wrestling pay-per-view of all time, but a thoroughly enjoyable evening – better than the previous year’s show by a long, long shot.

One of the highlights for me was seeing The Undertaker back on form. After WM30’s understandably shaky performance, seeing what Michael Cole would dub as “vintage” Undertaker was a genuine thrill.

If you had asked me six months prior if I’d thought Taker had another major TV storyline left in him, I would have probably said no. His in-ring career has slowed down to about one match a year, and as Booker T said in the kick-off show, time off is a wrestler’s greatest enemy. I would have agreed with the consensus that Taker is simply too out of the loop to be able to maintain a long-term TV run, but after that night – I’m not so sure.

With that in mind, I wondered what sort of storyline I’d like to see, if Taker ever did have one last run.

The Kane and Undertaker backstory has always been one of my favourites not just in wrestling, but as a story in general. It’s deliciously dark and twisted, flat-out crazy, and just really cool. I was thinking, how cool would it be if Undertaker came back to WWE to find Kane as he is now – sometimes a corporate stooge, sometimes just sort of hanging around. A whole new rivalry could break out as Taker disapproves of his brother’s apparent selling out.

Yet again, the Undertaker might actually be quite happy about how Kane has turned out relatively normal. He is the way he is, a demented pyromaniac, because of him after all (he burned down their home as children (kayfabe)). So to see him out of the mask and in normal-people clothes probably relieves some of that crippling guilt.

So a friend and I tried to think up of a fitting last storyline for Taker that didn’t involve Kane – which wasn’t easy.

We ended up with this: what if a superstar on the roster wanted to take advantage of the gap in the market left by an ageing Undertaker? What if someone else wanted to walk the path of death and evil to be the next phenom in WWE?

Dean Ambrose could be a decent candidate for this – he already has a sort of Heath Ledger Joker vibe about him – what if he took it one further and went all-out nuts? Then, a tired Undertaker who realises while it may be too late for him to change out of his devilish ways, he can prevent another young man going to the dark side.

When Taker shows up to try and stop history repeating itself, Ambrose (or whoever fits) takes advantage of his presence and becomes the new Undertaker by destroying the old.

It would ultimately have to end with a Buried Alive match at Wrestlemania, with Ambrose (still just a placeholder) ending the original Undertaker once and for all and cementing his position as the new Deadman.

Ambrose (can’t stress enough, Ambrose is not set in stone) could even be rebranded at the end of this storyline as the new Undertaker. Think of it like a Doctor Who regeneration – in commercial terms, the immensely popular and lucrative Undertaker brand would be recast and rejuvenated. Then in another 20 or 30 years, it can happen again – with a new superstar taking over the Undertaker mantle, keeping the character alive forever.

So that’s the idea. Taker loyalists will hate this idea, suggesting you can’t just replace or redo the original. But actually – this idea is probably the greatest testament to Taker’s legend possible. He’s so damn awesome and so iconic, that his legacy would continue in other young superstars deemed worthy to hold the title. I think it’s cool. I know I’d love to hold that title if I were a WWE superstar.