The Invasion (professional wrestling)

**The Invasion** was a wrestling storyline in the World Wrestling Federation (WWF) that began after the WWF bought World Championship Wrestling (WCW). It involved the WCW wrestlers "invading" WWF television to try to "take over" the WWF.

The idea of a match showing the top 2 shows of the Monday Night Wars was considered to be a "dream match" show in the eyes of many fans, because it let fans to see which show would be superior. The storyline began when Vince McMahon's son, Shane McMahon, said on *RAW* that he bought WCW.

In June 2001, the storyline got more intense as more WWF storylines ended to make room for the central Invasion storyline. WCW and Extreme Championship Wrestling (ECW) merged to make The Alliance and challenged the WWF's control over the wrestling industry. planting the seed for what was considered a lucrative future storyline opportunity. The Invasion did not begin immediately afterwards, as the WWF was preparing for WrestleMania X-Seven, the year's largest show, mere days away.

### The Invasion
The WWF had effectively doubled the size of its roster through its purchase of WCW, and as a result, there was not enough screen time for everyone. The original plan was to find a time slot on TNN to continue running WCW as a separate entity. Polls were even put up on WWF.com and WCW.com to decide the name of the new show. These plans fell through when no TV station would touch WCW because of its reputation for losing money. The WWF eventually carried out a brand extension, effectively reviving WCW under its own auspices and running two separate promotions, each with one of the WWF's two existing televised shows, *RAW* and *SmackDown!*.

As part of its plans, Lance Storm became the first WCW wrestler to appear on WWF programming, by running in during a match on the May 28 episode of *RAW* while a match was being held.  At King of the Ring 2001 on June 24, then-WCW wrestler Booker T interfered during the Triple Threat Main Event match for the WWF Championship and almost cost Stone Cold Steve Austin the title. Also, Austin suffered fractured bones in his hand from the side slam he took from Booker into an announce table. The next night, a confrontation occurred between WCW owner Shane McMahon and WWF owner Vince McMahon. While Vince was in the ring, Booker T came from behind to deliver his trademark scissor kick to Vince.

The WWF eventually began to recognize WCW and tested the idea of a brand extension by giving WCW the final twenty minutes of *RAW* with Scott Hudson and Arn Anderson doing announcing duties in place of Jim Ross and Paul Heyman. During a match between Buff Bagwell and Booker T for the WCW World Heavyweight Championship, WWF wrestlers Kurt Angle and WWF Champion Stone Cold Steve Austin interfered in revenge by beating Booker T up, with Bagwell joining Angle and Austin by attacking Booker T.  A

### Addition of ECW
On the July 9 episode on *RAW*, Kane was scheduled to go into a handicapped match against Mike Awesome and Lance Storm.

### WWF InVasion
At InVasion, the Inaugural Brawl took place between Team WCW/ECW and Team WWF. The WWF consisted of Stone Cold Steve Austin, Kurt Angle, Chris Jericho, Kane, and the Undertaker, who all wrestled against the team of DDP, Booker T, Rhyno, and the Dudley Boys. Angle's title run proved to be short-lived, as Booker T won it back on the July 30 episode of *RAW*.

On that same *RAW*, The Rock returned for the first time since his  suspension on the April 2 edition of *RAW*. The following *RAW*, Debra and Stephanie bought a new truck for Stone Cold, but Angle came up from behind and nailed Austin in the back of the head with a pipe. He put a cinder block and rope in the truck, put Austin in it, and drove away on the truck. He threatened to throw Stone Cold into a river if he did not get a title shot. Austin complied and gave him a shot at the upcoming pay-per-view, Unforgiven. Angle said, however, that Austin was "still going into the water", but instead simply embarrassed Austin by throwing him into a kiddie pool.

The WWF gained even more momentum at Unforgiven, as The Rock retained the WCW Championship against Booker T, and Kurt Angle made Austin submit to the ankle lock, winning the WWF Championship from Stone Cold, putting both belts into the hands of the WWF.

### Jericho and The Rock Feud/The Alliance mounts a comeback
There were several inter-promotional matches after Unforgiven. Furthermore, a crucial plot point formed when, on the October 8 airing of *RAW*, Jericho and The Rock teamed up against Shane McMahon and Rob Van Dam.

The feud between Jericho and The Rock built up to a match at No Mercy on October 21, where Jericho beat the Rock to win the WCW Championship, and Stone Cold Steve Austin defeated Angle and Rob Van Dam to retain his WWF Championship.

On the October 29 edition of *RAW*, Shane McMahon told his father, Vince McMahon, that a member of the WWF would jump ship to the Alliance that night. Later that same night, Kurt Angle backstabbed the WWF by hitting Jericho, The Rock, Undertaker, and Kane with steel chairs. On the November 1 edition of *SmackDown!*, Angle, who originally led the WWF wrestlers, explained that he represented what is great about America—he was a winner, and his defection came from his decision to fight along the winning side. That side included Stone Cold, a man, Kurt Angle claimed, knew how to win.

### The end of the Invasion
On the November 5 airing of *RAW*, Vince McMahon countered Kurt Angle's defection by stating that a member of Team Alliance would defect during a match at the upcoming Survivor Series. Stone Cold came out to confront Vince about it, and Vince stated that Stone Cold would be the one to defect. Because of this announcement, many Alliance members began to distrust Stone Cold, looking at him with suspicious eyes, to which Stone Cold denied the charges and called Vince a liar. Stone Cold went on to interrogate members of Team Alliance, questioning Booker T and sitting Rob Van Dam down in a room with a light shining on him.

All of this led to a "Winner Take All" match at Survivor Series 2001, which pitted Team WWF (The Rock, Chris Jericho, The Undertaker, Kane, and The Big Show) against Team Alliance (Steve Austin, Kurt Angle, Booker T, Rob Van Dam, and Shane McMahon).

## Aftermath
 was later unified with the WWF Championship to form the WWF Undisputed Championship. Here, Triple H holds both belts.]]
### WCW
After The Alliance was disbanded, the WCW World Heavyweight Championship would be simply renamed the World Championship, and later unified with the WWF Championship to form the WWF Undisputed Championship.  The Undisputed Championship was originally represented with both the original WWF and WCW title belts, as the champion would carry both belts around, until being replaced with a single belt.  At the beginning of the WWE Brand Extension, the champion would appear on both RAW and SmackDown! until then champion Brock Lesnar took the title to Smackdown. Eric Bischoff would reward Triple H with the former WCW championship belt, as he was the last person to have it, renaming it the World Heavyweight Championship.  The Undisputed Championship would be renamed the WWE Championship, as having two world titles contradicted the term "undisputed."

Another WCW championship, the WCW Cruiserweight Championship, was rebranded as a WWE title and replaced the WWF Light Heavyweight Championship as the WWE Cruiserweight Championship. The build-up to this one-shot event featured former ECW talent putting over the virtues of the brand versus the WWE product and appearances by several former ECW wrestlers not under contract to WWE. In 2006, it was announced that WWE would be reviving ECW as its third "brand" (to complement *RAW* and *SmackDown!*). The second One Night Stand, held on June 11, 2006, led to the official debut of the new ECW the following Tuesday.

### Other
Test won the Immunity Battle Royal, which granted him immunity from being fired for an entire year, beginning a storyline in which he would bully other wrestlers simply because he could.  Every Alliance member who held championships were also immune from being fired, such as Christian, the Dudley Boyz, and Rob Van Dam.  William Regal got his job back by being the first to join Vince McMahon's infamous Kiss My Ass Club. The remaining Alliance members (with the exception of RVD) would associate themselves with Vince, who immediately turned heel, against Austin, who immediately turned face.  Kurt Angle remained a heel, despite being the one responsible for the end of the Alliance. It was during this storyline that Stone Cold Steve Austin coined the "What?" catchphrase, which fans continue to chant to this day.  Ric Flair would make a return and become the kayfabe co-owner of the WWE with Vince.

## Reaction
The Invasion angle was a large storyline that spanned for almost half of 2001 and brought about financial success for the WWF, such as the InVasion pay-per-view being one of the highest non-major event buyrates in the history of pay-per-views.  However, the Invasion storyline has come under criticism by wrestling fans and wrestling media, with the storyline being called a flop. Other media refer to the storyline as "one of the most poorly handled, ego-filled storylines in wrestling history."  Smash Wrestling alleges that WWF wrestlers needed to defect to make the Alliance appear to be a credible threat. In addition to this, the Stone Cold versus Vince McMahon feud was to start again when Vince McMahon hit Austin in the back of the head with a chair at No Mercy. As stated by a Slam! Wrestling synopsis of No Mercy 2001:

''For fans who didn't catch it the fifth, tenth or twentieth time they've run the angle, "Stone Cold" Steve Austin and Vince McMahon are about to feud once again... First up was Vincent McMahon labeling Austin with a steel chair as he was waiting to put a dazed RVD away... Three minutes later, it was Shane McMahon's turn to hurl Kurt Angle out of the ring and into a steel ring post. Vince tackled Shane over the announce table and the two began pummeling one another.  Back in the ring, Austin laid a "Stone Cold" Stunner on to retain the belt as a disgruntled Vince scowled. Gee, how many times have we seen that scenario play itself out before? Austin wins. Vince fumes. Fans snore. Whatever.''

It has been argued that the Invasion angle may have been more successful if Paul Heyman and Eric Bischoff were perceived as controlling ECW and WCW, respectively, instead of Stephanie and Shane McMahon.  Others, such as Hulk Hogan, Kevin Nash, Scott Hall, and Goldberg, were not signed until well after the storyline finished. Although both WWF and WCW featured talents who had worked for both companies, wrestlers such as Stone Cold had their greatest success in WWF and were seen by fans as WWF wrestlers. Kurt Angle had never wrestled a match for either WCW or ECW, but was a main player for the Alliance towards the end of the storyline. In fact, despite both being viewed as prominent WWF wrestlers, they ended up not only being main players of the Alliance, with Stone Cold being the leader that carried championship gold, but also playing a bigger role than the WCW and ECW stars during the Invasion. For example, the final two Alliance members were Stone Cold and Angle at Survivor Series 2001—Booker T and Rob Van Dam were eliminated only after Shane McMahon.

Several top WCW and ECW talent who were top superstars in their previous company such as Diamond Dallas Page, Justin Credible, Raven and Tazz were put down into low-mid card matches, while lesser-ranked WWF wrestlers who defected to the Alliance, such as Test, were given a greater push.

## References
## Other websites
*In My Opinion the reasons why Pro Wrestling took a fall in the early part of this century  by Darrell Mays