Bret Hart Announced for WWE Backstage This Week

This week’s edition of WWE Backstage on FS1 will receive a visit from a WWE Hall of Famer as Bret Hart has been announced as a guest on the show. The appearance coincides with the airing of the 1996 WWE Survivor Series on the network prior to Backstage. With the live stage in Los Angeles continuing to be closed due to the COVID-19 pandemic, FOX has continued to branch out on these shows by bringing in guests via Zoom call. Hart is the latest of these guests and certainly not the last.

With WWE Backlash airing on Sunday night, there’s likely to be some discussion on the quality of the card. Hart has been known to be a harsh critic in the past, which isn’t surprising given the stellar career that he had. The best performers are always the harshest critics. What kind of criticism might Hart have for the PPV? That should be some must-see television.

Hart’s last appearance on a WWE project was as part of Steve Austin’s Broken Skull Sessions show on the WWE Network, a longform sit-down interview between the two legends which is an excellent watch, specifically for the discussions on their 1996 and 1997 feud which helped usher in the boom period known as the “Attitude Era.”

Speaking of that feud, the pair’s first television match was at the aforementioned 1996 Survivor Series at Madison Square Garden, so expect some more discussion on that during Backstage. Though Hart and Austin had worked on some house shows earlier during 1996, the Survivor Series match was Hart’s official return to the company after a television hiatus that followed his loss to Shawn Michaels at WrestleMania 12 earlier in the year.

Hart’s return was met with a great amount of fanfare as he considered joining rival WCW during 1996 while he was away as his WWE deal had expired. Though WCW offered him more money per year, Hart opted to stay with the WWE and signed a 20 year contract out of loyalty to Vince McMahon. One year later, McMahon broke that agreement due to financial hardships he cited at the time. On Hart’s way out of the company, we had the famed “Montreal Screwjob” at the 1997 Survivor Series. He wouldn’t return to WWE television until WrestleMania 22 weekend in 2006 when he was inducted into the Hall of Fame.