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Oh my... Kane vs. Kane!" What the hell!" And just in time for the column. Personally, I was torn between awe and disgust. Kane's old theme is awesome, but tempered by the fact that an almost pathetic fake Kane is right next to the real one. It does bring up an interesting point though. I find Kane to be supremely cooler with his mask. It's a really good concept but it can only take one so far. In reality it's the man that makes the mask not the other way around. Glen Jacobs is the heart of Kane, and provides that unique something for the role only he can truly play. I don't know how this will all end, but I fear all they'll do is ruin the memory of some great history, ironically part of which is the very subject of this article.

This next section is one of my favourite parts of Kane's career. It was when he experienced his highest sustained status as a singles superstar. And was still the dominant monster we all came to know and love. As I said, my knowledge of WWF had faded away for the last few years, so when I began watching again it was strange seeing how much had changed. I could go on an amusing tangent about exactly what, but I'll let you do the math: I mostly lost touch before WrestleMania 14, and caught up again around No Way Out 2000. Suffice to say I felt like I'd been frozen in time and woke up in a bizzaro future. In fact Kane, with his menacing stride and mysterious control over pyrotechnics, was one of the few things I still fully recognized.

I noticed Kane had altered his theme music slightly, forgoing the initial dark silence and organ music in favour of a big explosion going straight into the "angry" part of it. That gave him the perfect surprise entrance, ideal for a sudden huge pop. Because of this, he was easily perhaps the most entertaining guy to watch appear. It should be noted that despite not having the most overt personality Kane was one of the WWF's top faces, behind only the Rock and the semi-retired Mick Foley. The year 2000 was a positive one for Kane as he really became a more regular, yet sufficiently monstrous, title contender and essentially came into his own. His moniker, the "Big Red Machine" seemed fitting because he struck me as just that - a fighting machine.

When the new year came around, Kane was still feuding with X-Pac and Co. Kane was also one of the 3 favourites for the Royal Rumble along with The Rock and The Big Show. When it came down to it, he was in the final four with them, before he was eliminated by his friend turned nemesis. Soon Kane was struck by another painful betrayal when Tori left him for X-Pac and joined D-X. When I (re)started seeing WWF TV, Kane was engrossed in his feud with them both, and was he EVER pissed. Kane was dedicated to revenge and attacked them at every chance. He was rejoined by Paul Bearer who'd quietly returned to help him through this phase. He was generally cheering Kane on whenever he stalked someone to the ring or tombstoned some sap.

During No Way Out X-Pac beat Kane in no holds barred match via interference, but Kane did gain some revenge on Tori that night when he hit his ex with a vicious Tombstone. His battle with D-X continued: What clued me was that whenever X-Pac would have a match; the contestants would fight for a while before suddenly... "BOOM!" Fire exploded around the ring as Kane came down chasing after X-Pac. His former friend would sometimes try to mount some offence but get flattened or beaten about the ring. Kane destroyed everyone in the ring as X-Pac and Tori fled. Often they would escape, but not always; after all, Tori did gain the nickname: "Tombstone Tori." THIS was a monster. As much as I enjoyed the Rock's and struggle for WWF title against the machinations of the growing McMahon-Helmsly Alliance, my favourite parts of the shows were watching Kane interfere in matches and crush his enemies. A prime example: one match where D-X (Road Dogg and X-Pac) wrestled the Dudley Boys. During the bout, Kane classically interrupted and marched down to the ring, shrugged off a pitiful assault by X-Pac and hit an uppercut that sent him flying! He chokeslamed Road Dogg, and then both Dudleys in succession. They weren't part of all this, but he didn't care. He just caused destruction. It was magnificent really. The next show, he got put in a handicap match against the Dudley Boys, and although they beat on him for a while the match ended with Kane chokeslaming D-Von through a table. Kane got DQ'ed, but so what" He'd proved his point. He made that clear when he set turnbuckles "on fire" after Bubba tried to raise D-Von's limp hand up. Bubba ended up with a scared version of his famous table-trance look on his face. This was dominance - though not "invulnerable", Kane had this ass kicking edginess, which sometimes I feel is slightly lacking today.

Kane also interrupted the huge celebration by Triple H and his allies after Degeneration X helped Stephanie McMahon win the Women's Title. Being embroiled in a war against DX, Kane's path would sometimes cross their leader. Occasionally he'd also get in the face of the only superstar taller than him: Big Show. At times he and the other faces would find themselves temporarily on the same page during brawls with mutual enemies. This was all nice to see and Kane even got a quick WWF title shot before No Way Out, but his main focus was always X-Pac. I didn't mind, but there was this nagging in the back of my head. There were some bigger stars than Sean Waltman, didn't Kane deserve a little more than this"

Kane's rivalry with X-Pac came to a climax at WrestleMania 2000 (16), when he and Rikishi had a tag team match against X-Pac and Road Dogg. Exactly why is a bit of a curiosity. I suppose since Road Dogg was often with X-Pac during his confrontations with Kane, he became more involved; ergo Kane got a partner too. Apparently, though their interaction was rather minimal, Rikishi was their choice. They had a match against each other before WrestleMania which ended with an X-Pac and Road Dogg run in, I guess that is what helped them "bond". It seemed just thrown together and Kane and Rikishi never really became a tag team afterwards. When WrestleMania took place Kane and Rikishi were victorious and Kane ended the rivalry on a high. Soon afterward however, Kane was handcuffed to the ring post and Bull Buchanan "shattered" his hand with a chair, putting him out of action. Though, Kane later beat him in a low key match at Insurrextion.

I kept on watching without him. I still thought it was great TV. All the McMahons (except Linda) put their differences aside and joined Steph and Triple H to form the "McMahon-Helmsly Regime," one of the greatest heel stables ever. Rock and HHH (with a small army of henchman) fought a very memorable rivalry back and forth over the next couple of months, which saw Rock win the WWF title at Backlash. They kept at it through to Judgment Day. I really dug the whole "faces battling against the Regime" storyline, but I began to miss the hellfire and brimstone. More so when I noticed a Judgement Day promo had what sounded somewhat like Kane's music. After Judgement Day had come and gone and Triple H had regained the title when the Undertaker made his stunning re-debut as the American Badass, I was really enjoying the product... but what came next was simply amazing. Unable to celebrate their victory at the PPV due to the torment of a vengeful Rock and a returning Undertaker, the Regime later tried to safeguard HHH's by putting the two in a No. 1 Contenders match on an episode of RAW with a huge posse of lumberjacks surrounding them - their standard tactics. Rock and Undertaker didn't fight each other at all; they seemed to come to an instant understanding that it was better to fight the lumberjacks and dove into the outside. The crowd really got behind the two mega-faces at they fought off many times their number of heel superstars. But eventually the pack proved too great for them and the lumberjacks began to dominate. They proceed to beat down both of them pretty badly and Triple H symbolically hit them both with the title belt. Then, standing tall over their fallen enemies the Regime was about to raise their hands in victory when-

BOOOOOOOOOOOM!