The Undertaker Believes Vince McMahon Had Plans For The Gimmick For Years Before He Received The Role

As previously reported, The Undertaker was recently a guest on The Joe Rogan Experience. During the interview, Taker also talked about the origins of The Undertaker character and how he learnt about the character from Vince McMahon. Taker once again told the story about how he was worried that WWE would debut him as the Egg Man at Survivor Series 1990. He mentioned Vince had the idea for The Undertaker character for awhile and just needed a person to fill that role.

"That's how he introduced the character to me," Taker said. "He called me up, and I had no clue what it was. It wasn't singing in the shower guy, it wasn't egg man. Flew me up to Connecticut the next day, showed me the story boards and the original character is based on an old Western Undertaker.

"You know, the two guys in main street have a shootout, one guy loses, The Undertaker comes out, measures them, does the box. That was the original likeness and the name The Undertaker. He just never found the guy, he had it for years I guess."

Undertaker also talked about his retirement and his last match at WrestleMania 36. The Deadman said he used the WWE Network Exclusive documentary The Last Ride to showcase his journey to find that last match that he was proud enough to call his last match. Taker said he had numerous conversations with people over the years about whether he should retire, including Vince McMahon.

"I was looking for that one match where I could say: motherf***ers, I still got it, I'm out," Undertaker said. "There were lots of conversations [with Vince]. There were people I talked too along the way through my career where I said look, if I get to a point where my skills have diminished and I can't recognize it or at least bring the conversation up. It got to the point where nobody wants to have that conversation, I put a big burden on people. They just couldn't do it.

"Vince, who I have an unbelievable relationship with, [The Undertaker is] a huge intellectual property to Vince, 30 years. I could go out for another few years, knock somebody on their ass, chokeslam somebody but I can't do it personally. I can't because I know there's so many guys coming up that are trying to get that spot. I could say I've got all this equity built up for all these years and I'm going to live off of that."

Taker went in-depth about the Boneyard Match against AJ Styles at WrestleMania 36 and how the filming for that match went. He said after the match, his body couldn't take it anymore and he knew it was time to hang it up.

"We started filming that at about 8 o'clock at night and we rapped at about 5 in the morning," Taker said referring to the Boneyard Match. "At the end of it, I was like f***, I could hardly stand up. I started training for Mania and thought i was going to be in a stadium, in a ring and then f***ing COVID hit and I had to get to Florida just to make sure I was in Florida."

"My training kind of went to sh**, but I was really happy with how it turned out. I knew at the end of it, physically your days done man. As much as I want to do it [mentally], as much as I want to do it [in my heart], the body just can't deliver."

When asked about what's next now that his wrestling career is officially over, Taker admitted that he's not sure. He mentioned being a big fan of the outdoors and mentioned the one thing he regrets not doing after spending over 30 years with the WWE.

"I'm trying to figure that part out," Taker said. "I've dedicated my whole life to this business. There will be times where I'll help out and mentor guys but I've got to find out what I'm passionate about and still earn a living. Right now, my goal is to be the best outdoors man I can be.

"It's always been that carrot dangling, once that career is over you're free, you're going to do this and you're going to do that. I still need to be productive and do things. I love working with veterans, I'm just really passionate about people that serve our country. If I hadn't made it [in the WWE], that's probably what I would've done. I think about it sometimes, it may be my only regret. I wish I would've served [for my country]."

If you use any of the quotes in this article, please credit The Joe Rogan Experience with a h/t to Wrestling Inc. for the transcription.