RAW

RAW is WAR is a professional wrestling television program for WWF that currently airs on the USA Network

## Show History

### Early Years(1991-1992)

RAW began airing on 12th August 1991 as the substitute for Superstars of Wrestling, SoW had been always taped in bulk but RAW was a different approach for professional wrestling shows as it was always a live show. The first episode saw the beginning of 1991's G1 with Mr.Perfect defeating Randy Savage, Undertaker defeating Texas Tornado, Yokozuna defeating Papa Shango, Roddy Piper defeating Bret Hart and British Bulldog defeating Haku.

Vince wanted RAW to feel different than any other show and wanted to have fans feel like anything could happen, such things happened on the first year of RAW as Tama returned, Texas Tornado defeated Mr.Perfect to win the Intercontinental Championship, Ringmasters broke up and Money Inc defeated Backlund and Koko to win back the Tag Team Championships.

RAW really started feeling like the show we know now after the 8 week break as every single show mattered leading up to Wrestlemania, during those weeks, the brand split was announced, Vince tried to capitalize on the success that RAW had and started Smackdown.

### First Brand Extension(1992-1994)

RAW had Koko B.Ware as the face of the brand as their WWF Champion but overall RAW was mostly the brand for the older stars that Vince knew drew like Hulk Hogan, Mr.Perfect, Randy Savage, Roddy Piper but this didn't work as RAW started dropping in ratings every week while Smackdown was gaining viewership, Vince still saw Smackdown as a show just to make younger stars legit and then move them to RAW where they could shine so he made a move that effectively made Smackdown look like the B-Brand as he moved SD's Four Horsemen(Ric Flair, Bret Hart, Lex Luger and Shawn Michaels) to RAW in exchange for Empire(Randy Savage, Sycho Sid and Steiner Brothers), this led to the big dream match everyone wanted to see, Ric Flair vs Hulk Hogan who had won the WWF Championship from Koko B.Ware.

Vince's plan worked as RAW had some amazing months leading up to Wrestlemania, Harley Race becoming GM, the Unlikely Trio debuting, the whole shtick of Big Bubba and Nailz and of course Four Horsemen with their great matches while SD was tanking on the ratings, at mania Hogan had his last match on WWF effectively making Four Horsemen the stars of RAW as they all held the title once at Wrestlemania IX ending with Bret as champ in what was the start of the longest WWF title reign ever.

RAW in 1993 was mostly forgettable with 2 champions who were just not gonna drop the title, Owen Hart and Bret Hart, they had feuds that dragged on for a while and Smackdown started getting more viewership again as Doink the Clown was getting over as the face of the brand, there were some hidden gems during this period like Bret Hart vs Ric Flair or Bret Hart vs Rick Martel. The wrestling business as a whole was going down, RAW and Smackdown were tied in ratings at the time and Vince just decided to make both brands even. RAW after the 8 week break was mostly good with Owen challenging Ricky Steamboat over and over again, Quebecers and their hate for The Gookers and Four Horsemen's fallout feud, at Wrestlemania X Bret retained the championship against Lex Luger, Shawn Michaels and Ric Flair to hold the title for a full year but a new problem was arising for Monday Night Raw: Monday Night Nitro.

On the RAW after Wrestlemania X, Nitro debuted as it went head to head against RAW, on the next week Nitro beat RAW in ratings for the first time, Vince knew WCW's product was good and that they had just gotten Hulk Hogan and Ric Flair, two of the biggest RAW guys at that point so he tried to bloat Smackdown with good characters and good wrestling so if Nitro was ever kicking RAW's ass, he'd cancel RAW and make Smackdown the A brand.

RAW was uninteresting during 1994 with Bret as a bad champion, he had great matches but the storylines were lacking, Eric Bischoff called out Vince Mcmahon at Starrcade 1994 for trying to cancel RAW because he knew he couldn't defeat Nitro. This pissed Vince off and he decided to cancel Smackdown and get all of his good ideas on RAW to beat Nitro as the brand split ended.

### Monday Night Wars(1995-2001)

RAW was amazing during the 8 week break leading up to Wrestlemania XI but after Bret Hart defended the championship again, people just weren't interested in wrestling anymore, WCW was also pulling off lackluster shows during this time, Mr.Perfect finally ended Bret's 847 day WWF title reign at Summerslam 1995.

RAW tried to get a bit more edgy in 1995 with the debut of Goldust and formation of D-Generation X and DX especially was really working with the crowd but they never seemed to go all out with them, at WAR 2 we had the WWF Screwjob that oficially kickstarted the Monday Night Wars on a whole other level as WCW signed a lot of WWF talent, this all led to Nitro 100 where the women's champion Alundra Blayze debuted and put the championship on the garbage, Razor Ramon cashed in his WWF MITB to win the WCW Heaviweight Championship and Diesel beat up the commentators while still holding the Intercontinental Championship, soon Mr.Perfect, X-Pac and HHH would also debut for WCW and Hogan would turn heel to form the new world order as WCW interest skyrocketed.

Nitro defeated RAW in ratings for the next 63 weeks as RAW went on a transitional year with 1996 with things like the ECW Invasion and their first ever TV14 rating PPV event, Vince being acknowledged as the owner of WWF and Vader vs Mankind in a falls count anywhere.

In 1997 things started changing immediatly with their first show, Royal Rumble as we had Bret Hart sharpshootering Stone Cold and refusing to get out of it until he passed out causing a double turn, RAW was even more edgy with Bret cursing out Vince Mcmahon and Vince acknowledging Earl Hebner and the WWF screwjob live at Wrestlemania XII. After Wrestlemania XII, RAW was completely revamped from the ground up as Vince did a promo saying that he knew the fans were tired of having their intelligence insulted and now RAW would be more era appropriate, RAW became 2 hours, got a new stage, got a new intro, was named RAW is WAR and while the first hour was mostly building up undercard wrestlers and more wrestling related matches, the 2nd hour was War Zone where they had most of the main eventers and the edgy/entertainment stuff.

With this revamp, WWF started capturing eyes especially at Summerslam 1997 where we had Undertaker dropping Mankind out of a 50 feet cell and for the first time in 60+ weeks, RAW tied with Nitro after this show, 2 weeks after RAW finally managed to beat Nitro in ratings, they built up new young stars like Mankind, Stone Cold, The Rock, Kane who were the final 4 on 1998's Royal Rumble, they hyped up Mike Tyson on RAW is WAR which got even more mainstream attention and Austin finally won the WWF Championship at Wrestlemania XIV.

After Austin won the championship, RAW started getting even with Nitro again beating them most of the time and in 1998 they just blew up in every cilinder making amazing RAW shows and amazing moments like Kane putting X-Pac on fire, Vince screaming on Austin's face, Shane Mcmahon falling off 50 feet, Mankind and Austin taking out all of Ministry of Darkness during a RAW, the start of the BWO Civil Wars, Austin exploding Vince's mansion, Shawn Michaels SCMing Vince Mcmahon, The Rock beating Stone Cold, Jim Cornette becoming co-owner, DX returning and their promo on Madison Square Garden, Mankind winning the Royal Rumble, Austin stunnering Linda Mcmahon, it was just moment after moment after moment which got wrestling bigger than ever as they were now tripling their viewers from the start of 1997 until the end of 1998, they got 10 million viewers for the first time ever with Stone Cold returning after being gone for 5 weeks.

In 1999, WCW started pulling off even worse shows and RAW just continued on capitalizing on that as for the first time ever they didn't have an 8 week break and would hold RAWs during late January and February, on the RAW after Wrestlemania XV, they achieved their biggest rating of the monday night wars with 15.6 as Mankind defeated The Rock to win the WWF Championship.