For as long as wrestling has been a popular form of entertainment, there have been debates as to who the best in the business really is. Whether it's kids arguing about Rey Mysterio and Batista out on the playgrounds, thirtysomethings debating the merits of Hulk Hogan and Mick Foley over a beer or even their parents talk about the greatness of Bruno Sammartino and Gorilla Monsoon people like to argue about stuff like this. They always have and they always will. Not only do we know this, but the powers that be at WWE's home entertainment division know this as well, and thus was born The Top 50 Superstars Of All Time, a three disc collection containing a two and a half hour feature counting down the all time greats and two discs of bonus matches.

Let's start with the feature:

First off, there's already been a bit of controversy in certain circles about the top picks in this set and for good reason. Some of the obvious contenders for the number one spot rank in the teens and even in the twenties while some admittedly very talented though less important wrestlers rank higher. It's a bit tough to explain without heading into spoiler territory, and we're not going to go there and that really will ruin the surprise and take a lot of the fun out of watching this, but let it suffice to say that you're probably not going to guess who takes first place. Now, with that said, neither the WWE's packaging nor the 'host segment's that help count everything down really elaborates all that much on what the criteria is for the selection choices - all we're really told is that the votes were cast by the current roster of WWE superstars. You could take that to mean that these guys were chosen on skill, or you could take that to mean that they were chosen on influence, or you could take that to mean that they were chosen based on how nice their boots were - we really don't know. Are we basing this on ability? Title count? Athleticism? Wardrobe? Coolest trademark move? Best in ring trash talking skills? All of the above? There's really seemingly no rhyme or reason to this.

With that complaint levied, it's hard to take this as any sort of definitive statement - so don't. Accept this for what it is, which is basically over two hours of input from wrestler's old and new and in between on who they like in the business and why. You want to know what John Cena thinks about... everyone? You'll find out. You want input from Roddy Piper on who was the toughest? He'll tell you. Maybe you want to know what Kofi Kingston thinks about Rick Flair or what Jerry 'The King' Lawler thinks about Gorilla Monsoon? You'll learn that too. This is really just basically a long round table talk or sorts, a collection of excellent clips from throughout the history of 'sports entertainment' showcasing a selection of the best to come out of its ranks. Don't go into this expecting it to be gospel, because you already know you're going to disagree with large portions of it. Go into it expecting a sort of 'greatest hits' package, because that's what you'll get. You do have to wonder, however, if some of the rankings were affected by certain wrestlers' decisions to leave the WWE at different points in their careers.... And really, in a perfect world wouldn't Mick Foley and Terry Funk be tied for first place anyway?

So yeah, you're going to see a lot of the Wrestlemania clips that you've seen replayed countless times on other DVD releases and highlight shows and you're going to get a lot of input from John Cena whether you want it or not but overall this is a fairly well put together segment.

The fifty-one (yep) wrestlers who appear in this documentary are as follows (and this list does not spoil their rankings, as promised):

Mick Foley / Dusty Rhodes / The Undertaker / Steve Austin / Kane / Buddy Rogers / Bret Hart / Terry Funk / Classy Freddie Blassie / Bob Backlund / Harley Race / Junkyard Dog / Ricky Steamboat / The Rock / Rey Mysterio / "Rowdy" Roddy Piper / Triple H / Jack Brisco / Andre the Giant / Fabulous Moolah / Gorgeous George / "Macho Man" Randy Savage / Jake "The Snake" Roberts / Shawn Michaels / Ric Flair / Edge / Jerry "The King" Lawler / Lou Thesz / Dory Funk Jr. / John Cena / Killer Kowalski / Hulk Hogan / Batista / "Mr. Perfect" Curt Hennig / Bruno Sammartino / Chris Jericho / Ted DiBiase / Randy Orton / Pat Patterson / Eddie Guerrero / The Iron Sheik / Jimmy 'Superfly' Snuka / Kurt Angle / Buddy Rogers / Gorilla Monsoon / "Superstar" Billy Graham / Big Show / Sgt. Slaughter / Nick Bockwinkel / Jeff Hardy / Rick Rude

You can't really argue with the selection, but yeah, you're going to be arguing about the rankings until the cows come home.

Video:

The 1.78.1 anamorphic widescreen presentation, though interlaced, looks pretty decent. Some of the earlier matches are on the soft side and aren't quite as clean and colorful looking as the later day content is but this is generally quite a respectable looking presentation. The material that was shot fullframe is presented that way, with mattes on the sides, so there are no issues with stretching the footage, thankfully. There are times where the lights over the ring make skin tones look a bit off but this isn't a fault of the transfer or the authoring, it's simply the way the material has always looked. Nothing here really looks worse than when it was broadcast on television, and to some eyes it might even look a little bit better.