The Undertaker On Being His Own Toughest Critic, Watching His Match With Roman Reigns For the First Time on Camera

Speaking with Ed Mylett, The Undertaker recalled his experience watching his match with Roman Reigns for the first time while on camera for his documentary and more. The Dead Man’s documentary series Undertaker: The Last Ride has seen him be open about how disappointed he was with the WrestleMania 33 match. Taker told Mylett about how hard it was to watch the match while he was being filmed for the docuseries and how he’s his own toughest critics. You can see highlights and the full interview below:

On being his own hardest critic: “Yeah, I’m my toughest critic, and I always have been. You got everybody telling you through the course of your career — especially when you’re coming up — ‘Oh man, you’re great, you’re this, you’re that.’ And that’s fine. But you’ve gotta take that and you have to put it aside. It’s like when back when I was coming up and I’d watch my matches back. Good, bad, indifferent, I always had to watch them alone because I didn’t want any feedback from anybody else saying, ‘Oh man, that was great. That was, I mean, how did you do that? That was so cool!’ I wanted to watch, even on the good stuff I wanted to watch and see what I did wrong, you know? I wanted to know what, okay, in that situation, what could I have done better to make that match better. And that’s how you continue to grow.”

On his match with Reigns at WrestleMania: “The Roman match at WrestleMania, that was tough. And what was so good about the doc[umentary] was, that was the actual first time that I watched it back. Being later in my career, at that point when I watched it back, I was pretty much gone. I was just like, ‘I can’t, my body’s given out on me. And I have to start thinking long-term after 30-plus years.’ And so that was, that was really raw and real, because I knew. I knew it was gonna be tough to watch. And then having to do it in that environment with cameras on me.”

On being out of character when he watched it: “Completely out of character, right? So you got what you got as Mark thinking in his head like, there’s a lot of things that I wanted to say, obviously, that would have been bleeped and edited because I was so disappointed. And not just disappointed for me. I was disappointed for Roman in that sense. Because it was my opportunity to give him something that was gonna push him to a higher level. And I didn’t deliver on that, and I can’t make excuses. Yes, I was banged up and beat up, but I was there. So you know, I have a — in my mind, I have a responsibility. If my name is on the page, then you gotta go. And I just, I knew in January I was physically not gonna be at my best. But it was too late at that point. I’d already committed, it’s already down, this is what’s gonna happen. And I was scrambling, trying to figure out how I was gonna make this work. And yeah, I was thoroughly disappointed.”

If you use any of the quotes in this article, please credit Ed Mylett with a h/t to 411mania.com for the transcription.