STW #4: The Ultimate Warrior 

The Ultimate Warrior was my 2nd favorite wrestler as a kid. I was born in 1981, so he was a big part of my childhood. Hulk Hogan and the Warrior were wrestling when I was young.

That Warrior entrance at Wrestlemania 8 was one of the greatest moments in wrestling history. He absolutely rocked that arena. Yes, the Warrior was a hell of a lot smaller.

Yeah I am glad Vince & Warrior reconciled too. I remember seeing a picture with those two hugging and it saying "If there is one thing we leanred this weekend, it's forgiveness." It is a very powerful picture. R.I.P. Warrior.

" The family that i live for only breathes the air that smells of combat. With or without the face paint, I am the Ultimate Warrior "

Who is the genius that told all these wwe executives that if you don’t have a relationship with your father you can’t mourn his death?

This man said he never saw the DVD but said exactly what Bobby Heenan said about warrior and Andre on the documentary. Lol!!! Cmon Bruce

Warrior had a larger than life build, he was charismatic, colorful and 110% animated. His theme music, running to the ring and shaking those ropes was exciting. In those days especially the music set the tone. The warrior, demolition, road warriors, hulk hogan all had iconic themes. Didn't matter so much if warrior wasn't a good wrestler, he won over the audience. Warrior isn't the first to be guilty of this situation. But he was certainly among the most exciting.

I was at WM6, Warrior ruled as a kid

The Andre punch was from "89". Warrior went to do his signature splash and Andre held his fist staight up, right as the Warrior went to land. The video is on youtube. Warrior is wearing pink shorts👍🏼

Starts @ 3:15

12:35 Conrad asks how much that famous entrance music contributed to Warrior's image and success. Bruce rightly says a big part. Jim Johnston is an incredibly versatile and talented composer; I might go so far as to say a genius. When you look at the variety of genres he has created themes in, not just competently but excellently, and how well those themes have complemented, enhanced, and even defined the characters they go to, it's deeply impressive, especially when you consider the lengthy track record of decades of consistent top-level achievement. I remember buying WWF CDs as a teenager and looking at the credits and being amazed at his name being there over and over. How could one man do all that? Later on I also came to appreciate Jimmy Hart, who along with totally getting that "there is no dignity in comedy" and being willing to make himself look ridiculous to get other talent over, was also highly talented musically. Especially when you look at his WCW run making theme music there, he can at least be mentioned in the same category as Johnston. Especially interesting is his apparent detailed knowledge of copyright issues so that he could compose themes for ex-WWF wrestlers that would strongly remind listeners of the WWF Johnston theme, but being JUST different enough to avoid legal challenge. Hulk Hogan's WCW "American Made" song was a great example and sounded great. Unfortunately the Bret Hart theme, while it sounded similar but different enough to (apparently) avoid legal hassles, was awful.

Everyone always screws it up. When Warrior and Sting were the Blade Runners, it wasnt Rock and Sting. They were Rock and Flash.

I know a lot of people knock the warrior but People do need to realise that he was an absolute beast for a 9 year old kid to watch, when his music hit it gave a feeling that NO other wrestler has or ever will give you, the energy was unreal, his look was like nothing else and he was killa on the mic ( even though people hate on the promo) he is a legend and as a kid ring work was NOT a thing we even looked for, it was about the charisma and look and that alone was 10/10 I'm sick of older people hating on him for work ethics when what mattered most to a youth was the wrestler not the politics. He's the best there was as far as gimmick goes. Big up all my warrior youngers from the 80s! R. I. P warrior!

3:30

6:14 That's RICHFIELD, Ohio, there Bruce.

"As skeletons we still walk as ultimate maniacs"

Ho Kogan !!

I love that Prichard's impression of Cornette is basically a filthy-mouthed Mickey Mouse.

Load up the spaceship with the rocket fuel...loaded with the Warriors!

It’s stupid when people say that someone dosent love the business. People don’t have to love the business they are in as long as they are doing the job, and hey some of us are in it for the money or security your certain profession brings.

Parts unknown , where the air you breath is COMBAT 😂😂

It was called "the destruction of the ultimate warrior" but it wasn't meant to bury him....lmfao

Warrior was always my favorite wrestler! Well him and stone cold who didn’t like stone cold right!

My nightly dose of rumor and innuendo without 50 fucking ad triggers in them. And it's official. You guys are doing the Lord's work

I want a WBF episode and a Lisa Wolfe episode and a Nailz Episode.

Excellent podcast 👍! I have been trying to find out for a little while now why all the old-school wrestlers always say that the Ultimate Warrior was hard to work with. And now I know. Thank you, Bruce, for sharing your memories and stories with us.

I liked the JR interview. Man the salt was flowing

Good Stuff Bruce and Conradas , you guys are the best in the biz.

Native American never crossed my mind honestly. I took it as a barbarian gimmick. Like Connan. Almost a fantasy character.

Great interview and really enjoyed the questioning

Ironic how he claims he never saw the DVD, but yet seems to quote it almost verbatum...

I wish this subject was done later on when you guys did longer episodes. How does Warrior only get an hour and a half, but Jeff Jarrett gets over 4hrs?

The Ultimate Warrior was 1 of a kind. The wrestlers that criticized his talents were simply jealous they never got the pop warrior did. Not Flair, not Hogan and not HHH. When that music played the dead could hear the crowd.

This next one is really good.

'God Damn Pal!'

Very, very few people have been as over as the Warrior was.

I loved the big blue cage . I watched rude vs warrior in the cage in Columbus Ohio at the Columbus convention center. And the Columbus convention center was the best place on earth for a wrestling show .

I LOOOOOVED the Warrior as a kid,I even stopped being a Hulkamaniac to be a Warrior but as an adult,not so much. I appreciate guys like Bret Hart who care about giving the audience the moneys worth...the Warrior didnt leave because of personal “demons” or creative or lack of push or even fucking drugs but all over ego. 1991-1993 is still my second favorite time in wrestling after 97-2000 but if Warrior stuck it out the for fans and carried the belt right we could have gotten so much more.

Thank you very much!

This one should be done again, one hour on Ultimate Warrior isn't right. Give us a four hour deep dive.

he achieved more, made more money, and stayed/cared about... more than most, but because he was someone that was private and stayed away from the partiers. He gets classified as someone that didnt fit or someone who was stuck up or what ever. He was great.

I was never an Ultimate Warrior guy and I grew up in the 80’s. I was gutted when he beat Hogan and all I did was wait for Hogan to get back. But he was a great character in WWE with the best entrance music and an awesome look. RIP Ultimate Warrior.

Jim's face paint makes him look like he's wearing glasses.😎

I loved the big blue cage as a kid. It always seemed so.. imposing. It didn't bend or shake, and it looked like proper hard steel like I saw my dad use to build things. It made it feel threatening somehow.

I think Ultimate Warrior was a pain in the ass. I agree with Conrad, The Self Destruction of the Ultimate Warrior was such a hit job and to bury him as a pain in the ass. His going into the Hall of Fame at Wrestlmania 30 was nothing more than a pr damage control. He made $$ for WWE during his heyday. He might have been a pain in the ass but fans loved him. I swore I thought Vince loved LONG ENTRANCE way cause Vince loved to tire him out than do a 20 minute match. Half the time, his entrance would still be playing and the match would be over.

I actually liked Warrior's return in 1996. His promos became more explicit, making him one of the first wrestlers to plant the seeds of what would become the Attitude era. I believe Warrior would've fit in very well in that era.

R.I.P. WARRIOR Best intro song ever. Off the charts intensity. Top 3 Champion Of All Time

I heard JR say that he witnessed a meeting with Helwig involving Vince and Linda about that "comic book" and Helwig would curse like a sailor in front of Linda.

To correct something said in the show about cage matches: The first WWWF steel cage "escape" match was Bruno vs. Ivan Koloff in the 1970s (probably 1975). The original match had a "logic" to it. It was an anything-goes fight with no pinfalls. The heel would try to escape (run away). The babyface would not try to escape (because he wanted revenge on the heel). The heel would eventually be beaten down to a point where he could not get up or fight back. He would be bloody and unconscious. Then the face would look at him with contempt and walk out the door. In the 1980s, they changed how they booked the cage matches. The faces started trying to escape too and the match stopped making any sense. I would guess that they changed things up because they could no longer do the old-style blood and violence anyone. The old-school WWF cage match works as an angle if its booked right. One guy has to be obsessed with getting even and one guy has to be obsessed with running away. Its only when both wrestlers spend the match trying to run away that it doesn't work.

I always thought of the warrior gimmick as take on native Americans. Not in a negative way but to hear helwig talk later in life, I don’t think he thought highly of any race besides his own. But yeah, the face paint, the running in place, the taking power and thunder from the heavens type motions he made. I can’t see how Bruce or anybody with eyes didn’t see that.

Ultimate worrior is a legend

so funny how the relationship has developed & dynamic has changed between Conrad & Bruce since this time period

Just for the little anecdote about them eating big plates of food with Hogan trying to match Warrior, and then finding out Warrior had no match that night, it was worth a listen.

Then 6/7 years later HOLLYWOOD HOGAN BROUGHT THE WORLD TO ITS KNEEEEEEES

58:00 Oh yeah Warrior talks about this on his shoot DVD. He goes over with trips what I assume was "his plan" for the match with him under the assumption that he thought Trips was a random jobber. Afterwards trips tells Briscoe what was happening and Briscoe comes to talk to Warrior about how the match should be layed out, Warrior looks right at Hunter and says "If you ever have something to say, you tell it to my face! We're done!" then walks out.

Yeah as a kid my dad took me to an event with Andre vs warrior in it and saying it took 30 sec is being generous. It took warrior longer to run to the ring than the match and before my mind could process what just happened warrior was running back to the locker room. As a kid I could see Andre wasn't doing that great but I was still saying to myself "What the f*ck was that?"

That career match between warrior and savage should hav been a title match . It was far a better match than hogan slaughter . Also Rick Rude vs Hogan would have been a great story . Rudes talent was never given the credit it deserved . I would not have minded a champion rick rude .

A lot of the wrestlers who hate on the Warrior would never have had a career without the warrior. The warrior brought in the fans.

"With or without the face paint!! I am the ultimate warrior"

I’m not close with my pops but best believe I’ll be at his funeral, it’s not about you sometimes when you lose someone. You show up for the rest of the family and be of service which sounds like the man I’ve seen all over shoot RU-vid videos for a decade. Other than that, he did sound extremely difficult and selfish.

My ring tone is Warrior's entrance music 💪💪💪💪

You're really gonna like it I think.

R.I.P. 🙏

Thay bash the warrior but kept bringing him back paying him millions they just never could get control of him Rip warrior

This guy just hates Warrior

The only Ultimate Warrior promo of any sort of value, to me personally, is the Wrestlemania promo he talks about taking the controls of the plane and sending it into a nose dive. It was fucking hilarious and quite entertaining.

I went to a house show once and saw the Warrior vs Andre the Giant. It was the last match. Andre came out and the crowd awed. Warriors music hit, he came out, shook the ropes, clotheslined Andre 3 times, splashed Andre, and it was over. They all left the ring, house lights came on, and everyone in the auditorium in unison said.... WHAT THE FUCK??!!

Hard to listen th o Bruce's B S on the warriors destruction dvd.

Not at liberty to say....lmao 92 was steroid scandal season. 93 was the legal fight for rights to the Warrior name....iirc Might as well of just said 'Google it"

Respect.

My favorite wrestler growing up wasnt the best wrestler but he was more like a superhero type

I've listened to this email while lifting weights for months now & just realized the man Bruce is speaking to isn't JR. I will add this is a great show!

Rick rude not being main event and world champion is a fucking disgrace. He killed himself to get warrior over

I remember randy and jim called each other mach chicken and the ultimate chicken haha

I have a question about 51:00 Sometime around Warrior's passing some letters and court documents were released showing that a few months prior Warrior asked for a huge raise which Vince agreed to. Now what I wonder is, did Vince give Warrior this raise and then Warrior asked for more money after the raise or did Vince just say this in reference to the huge raise he gave Warrior with the intention of wanting to fire Warrior anyway after the advertised match?

I think the gimmick was more like a Conan the barbarian gimmick with the neon of the late 80s early 90s

Where they talk about Ultimate Warrior being an Indian gimmick........No.....Tatanka already did that and did it well. Its not surprising the similarity between the two superstars either. Both were over in my opinion for their time and Ultimate Warrior got a gigantic push. Right place, right time.

I do wonder what would have happened if Warrior didn't leave before The Mega Maniacs angle at Survivor Series. Was he supposed to lose to Bret eventually?

The warrior doesn't think he's better than every wrestler and promoter out there , he knows he's better ;-)

I swear people underrate Slaughter all over RU-vid. Go back and watch the matches. He was amazing.

so all in all, how many ultimate warriors were there?

Cincinnati. Shout out

Did i hear something about a "photoshop" job done on the Self-Destruction DVD? ...If so, does anyone know where?

I don’t recall ever seeing the Warrior bleed in a match. Anyone remember if he ever bladed?

The Hell Wig Warrior !!

Seriously...gotta say...Ultimate Warrior may have been a looney but he was hella entertaining. Unlike some of the current talent he never made me fall asleep listening and watching his schtick.

"Hundreds of cases"....."Thousands of cases"....LMFAO

A lot of the younger wrestling fans need to hear the end of this podcast. Lots of criticism has been heaped on Warrior over the years, but he was one of the biggest things going in wrestling for a time. Warrior did what most wrestlers can only dream of doing.

theres no video of the Andre warrior face punch. its a BS story

sheikh tugboat lmao what i wouldve given to see that character design

I thought 💭 Warrior came in ‘85 of WWF

It's funny listening back to the early episodes of this podcast and hearing how miserable Bruce was. They obviously told him to lighten up and at least sound like he can tolerate recounting these stories, rather than sounding like he's sinking into depression talking about 90s wrestling.

I think when the subject is about Warrior, Conrad always gets over emotional and doesn't look at it from a realistic perspective, look I used to be a Warrior fan until I learned about arrogant, over inflated opinion he had of himself. Conrad says the Self destruction DVD was a hit peice, it's not a hit peice when It just people in the business being honest and telling folks what the saw/ experienced and how they felt. He had a entertaining and captivating entrance. His matches were the shits the only reason had a good match is because the other guy carried his blown up, no skilled having ass. And people shit on Cena, THIS was the first 5 moves of doom.lol Clothesline Clothesline Shoulder tackle Splash 1,2,3. He didn't have any skills cause he didn't want to learn anything from the veterans in the dark side of the ring episode he even shits on his at the time partner Sting for listening & taking the veterans advice, calling him a puppet. The guy was a prick and he only got over cause of Vinces obsession with appealing physiques & the folks who helped him in the ring because they didn't want to cross the boss.

How do you not understand Bruce?

Sting was a much more polished and professional version of this gimmick I think.

I remember getting a copy of the comic book with my monthly WWF Magazine as a free bonus....anybody else

is the heat between conrad and prichard a work? seems strange that they seem to have such a contentious vibe but with JR and Arn it is nothing but love...makes me think it's a work

Came for the Cornette impression, left for the Ric Flair mark not shutting his fuckin horn

Who cares if he didn't get on with his father. You don't know how you're going to react when your father died. Pretty shitty by WWF in that regard.

Warrior looked 80 lbs lighter but also 3 inches shorter when he came back in 92