"Wellllll, well it's the Big Show/ Yes it's a big bad show tonight / Yeah, it's the Big Show/ Come on crank it up and turn on all the lights..."

After a stint with WCW as The Giant, Show signed for WWE back in 1999 and has won pretty much everything going in the last 15 years.

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He'll attempt to win back the Intercontinental Championship this month at SummerSlam, but could this be his last title match as he moves into the movies with Vendetta?

You shut down Michael Cole before Battleground when he said the "R" word - retirement - but is Vendetta where you start to wind down your in-ring career and do more movies?
"I think absolutely. I've had a fantastic career - I'm still competing on a full-time schedule, but nothing good lasts forever. So eventually I'm going to have to transition out of this industry and do something else that's entertaining and exciting for me.

"I think a natural evolution for me would be to try to transfer over into the film and TV world and start playing different characters. Hopefully that way I can keep entertaining my fans that are fans of me, in different avenues and different spotlights. It's a natural evolution.

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"Am I a little sad that my wrestling career is towards its end? Well, yeah, because this has been my life for 20 years. But I think I can continue to help some of the younger guys get over and develop and find out who they are then find a pleasant transition for myself. I'm not quite in the old folks' home yet, I've still got more to do."

You've been in the main event for a long time and have been an ever-present. Do you think because you're always there people take you for granted?
"I think so - I think the uniqueness and the special things that I bring to WWE is sometimes a little bit downplayed because you see me every week. I think that's one of the things that will happen to me eventually. I'm going to start not being on our programming as much, not being on TV every week.

"Hopefully when I do get a chance to come back, I'll be able to have a little bit more impact and a little bit more fun. That's part of what I should have been doing my whole career anyway. I think quite frankly I have been on TV too much, but part of it is necessity and part of it's ability.

"I'm able to work, I am able to get other talent over. I am able to carry storylines. When you're good at what you do you're going to work. That's a good thing. But from the standpoint of being an attraction, sometimes too much isn't good. So it's a difficult fine line.

"I've had a great career with it and been very happy, I'm not complaining, but I think as I'm getting older - I'm 43 now - I don't wanna be on the road five days a week anymore. I really don't.

"It's one of those kind of things. I have time left on my contract here and I'll work that out, and when that contract ends I'll always be a part of WWE as long as they want me, but I think I'll go into more of a limited role.

"Who knows? Maybe even go into commentating or something like that. Maybe I could do pay-per-view commentating or something - special event commentating. I've only got three moves! I've only had three moves for 20 years so I don't think I can do much more."

Talking commentary, I loved the promo you cut on Ryback the other week on SmackDown - I couldn't stop laughing.
"I got to have fun with that. I'm trying to get some excitement going because Ryback's had this injury, this staph infection which is really serious. He's very positive and motivated on being back for SummerSlam.

"I thought it was fun and a gas with him to have some some fun with the promo. It got a lot of good reception, so now knowing my luck I'm going to have to do all kinds of promos... I'm my own worst enemy."

As a man who's beaten The Beast what do you think of Brock Lesnar vs The Undertaker at SummerSlam - I'm excited but some people aren't as hot on it - what are your thoughts?
"You've got Lesnar - he's such a monster right now. He's coming off the stuff he did in MMA in the UFC and how well he did there, and the dominant Superstar he was before he left. Since he came back they've done a really good job of making Lesnar everything that he is.

"He is a tremendous athlete, a guy that is strong, fast and powerful, and knows how to wrestle, and has a mean streak. They've been able to capitalise on it and the biggest thing is trying to find opponents for Lesnar that are credible. Let's face it, you can't put Brock in the ring with just anybody. It's got to be somebody credible or else everybody's going to know right away that it's just not going to work.

"The fact that Lesnar broke The Streak, who is the only guy that should have, or could have ever broken The Streak - personally I would never have liked to see The Streak broken ever - but all good things come to an end. The Streak got broken.

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The Undertaker's WrestleMania streak in pictures

"So now you have Undertaker who's making his comeback. I think Undertaker's going to be hopefully a lot more involved, and doing a lot more with us. So this should be exciting to see what those two guys pull out at SummerSlam.

"You've got Undertaker who's without a doubt the greatest big man of all time, versus Lesnar who's without a doubt one of the best shooters of all time. So it's going to be really interesting for me as a fan, as a friend of both of them to see what kind of match they put on at SummerSlam. It should be absolutely amazing."

As a man who was a serious player in WCW and the then-WWF, what do you think of the way the history has been told by the winners in the Monday Night Wars Vol 1 series and DVD?
"Yes - the winners always write the history books. That was a magical time, because you had so many amazing Superstars, especially in WWE. At the same time working every night you had The Rock, 'Stone Cold' Steve Austin, The Undertaker, Kane, Mick Foley, Triple H, APA, the Hardys, Edge and Christian, New Age Outlaws - there was just so much talent in the ring at once.

"Everybody was comfortable with their characters and who they were, and there was experience in there and it was just a great time for everyone, because it was wide open. We were just making the rules up as we went.

"As things mature and our company matures, and our brand responsibility matures, we've become responsible to our audience and younger viewers and stuff like that. The wild and crazy Attitude Era stuff had served its purpose and went away.

"Now we're developing a whole new crop of talent. You've got some amazing stars coming up now, Roman Reigns and Dean Ambrose and Seth Rollins and Bray Wyatt and all these other guys. There's a lot of guys that you haven't even seen yet that are coming up through the developmental that in a few years you're going to be talking about what fantastic stars they are.

"I'll be a footnote in history! The business goes through evolution and for every guy that's a fantastic Superstar, there's a lot of guys along the way that made him to help him get to that point where he can carry the ball and make the product better, make everybody better.

"My footnote in history, I'm gonna stick to it, whether anybody likes it or not, I'm the greatest giant that's ever been in this business and that's my attitude."

Does the WWE miss that competition it had from WCW - that guy running at pace alongside you pushing you on?
"I think competition is the best thing for everyone. Competition is what makes us evolve, from when we were itty bitty little tadpoles in prehistoric times to what we've turned into now. Competition makes us evolve and makes us push ourselves better.

"The biggest problem right now is we did such a good of being competitive that we really don't have any competition. We have to create competition for ourselves within our own company - we have our brands.

"There was competition between Raw and SmackDown, and now there's NXT guys coming up which is stimulating a lot of the other guys too. There's young, fresh talent coming up that's got exciting ideas and creative matches and exciting characters so it motivates a lot of us in the locker room to step up our game.

"I think everything runs in hills and valleys. I think that Attitude Era was a magic time because there really was a good versus evil - there really was somebody - there was competition. Now you have to try to strive to put a better product out and create your own competition.

"Who knows? Would it be great for the fans if there was another production that could come along with the ingenuity and the money and the way Vince built WWE, this incredible, global product? Sure, that would be fantastic, but the way things are now, I don't see how it's feasible.

"I really don't see how it's feasible with the limited talent that's out there. With the entire billions of people on the planet, there's probably only 100, 120 guys that are really good at this - that are worth watching on TV. Out of the billions of people in the world, that's pretty slim margins for being successful."

Back to Vendetta, what was it like going head-to-head with Dean Cain - Superman!
"It was fantastic working with Dean Cain, he's done so much television and has so much experience. He's such a good dude to work with, but this was a great character change for Dean Cain, because he always plays the good guy, clean cut, pretty boy role.


"To come bat against me in Vendetta he gets a little bit dark. It's a different side that I think fans haven't ever seen from Dean Cain before. He gets really gritty and kind of grim.

"I know I walked on set one day and his hair was done up and it didn't really look like Dean Cain - it look like some kind of crazy guy. I think it was a lot of fun for him to dig into some deeper character stuff and do something a little different for him."

You've been a bad guy in the ring, but not like your role here - 18-rated in the UK - which is way beyond PG! What was it like for you to go so dark?
"It was a little disturbing, to tell you the truth. My first big film role was Knucklehead, which was a very comedic, loveable character with a good heart. There's nothing likeable about Victor Abbott, my character in Vendetta, nothing likeable about him at all.

"He's a very vicious psychopath. Trust me, if you watch Vendetta, you will not like my character in the first 10 minutes of the movie. In the first 10 minutes of the movie you're gonna want to kill me. It was pretty disturbing.

"We got to go a little bit higher in the rating with this. It's directed by the Soska Twins, so there's a lot of blood and a lot of violence and it was a change for me which is something I was looking for.

"I don't get the chance to do a lot of films and TV like I want to, so to try to show the difference between Knucklehead and Vendetta was such a difference in character, so hopefully it shows some range."

Vendetta is available on Digital Download on August 17 and DVD on August 31.

SummerSlam airs at midnight on Sunday, August 23 on Sky Sports Box Office and WWE Network in the UK and at 8pm ET/5pm PT in the US.

WWE Live returns to the UK and Ireland in November.