When all is said and done, Terry Gene Bollea, better known to the world at large as Hulk Hogan, may very well be remembered as being the biggest, brightest and most popular wrestler ever to set foot between the ropes. Whats more, Hogan, more than any other talent, is directly responsible for the creation of the National or Pay Per View era in which we now find ourselves. We all know the story, but for completeness sake Ill repeat it here. Since the late 1940s, the NWA had watched over professional wrestling as a governing body of sorts. Although rife with dirty politics and in fighting, this loose collection of promoters working in tandem with one another had been effective both nationally and internationally for around three decades. The NWA Board of Directors would choose the World Heavyweight Champion and that champion would then travel around all the regional territories, challenging the areas biggest stars. It was a fairly simple setup, and, for the most part, it worked. Many of these regional promotions had attached television shows, broadcast via local stations, which sold the storylines and stars of the region, as well as promoting the NWA as a whole. Enter firebrand promoter Vince McMahon, Jr. Having purchased his fathers (ex-NWA) WWWF promotion, McMahon initiated his swift and decisive war against the NWA by putting his new WWF show on cable TV. Via cable, every American home, regardless of territory or region, potentially had access to the WWF product. With the WWFs funky blend of incredible production values and a veritable menagerie of larger-than-life, child-friendly stars, the NWAs old-style house shows simply couldnt compete. The old guard, too fearful of uniting under one banner, (lest they relinquish power over their particular regions), were too old, too slow and too set in their ways to react quickly enough to these radical changes. WWF ticket sales were good, so local venues were eager to align with this hot new product, but Vince insisted that doing so meant that rival wrestling shows could not stage events in them for a period of time following a WWF event. In working this way, Vince McMahon quite handily won his war, becoming the most influential wrestling promoter of all time in the process. However, despite hiring the biggest stars from the regional territories and building a superb talent roster, Vinces plans would have likely not gone very far at all were it not for the star power and drawing ability of Hulk Hogan. Fresh from a star-making turn as the wrestler Thunderlips in the movie Rocky III, Hulk (he was named for the comics character) defected from Verne Gagnes AWA (American Wrestling Association) and returned to the WWF, where he had worked as a heel for Vince sr in 1979. Now, Hogan was the complete star. Tours of Japan (where he feuded with Antonio Inoki) and his time in the AWA (where he learned from legends like Classy Freddie Blassy and Nick Bockwinkle) had rounded him out, shaped and sculpted him. The Hulkster was ready to take over the world. Once Hogan bodyslammed Andre the Giant at WrestleMania III, his transition to immortality was assured. Hulk Hogan subsequently appeared in movies and cartoon shows, as well as on lunchboxes and in toy lines, in short, he was everywhere. Hulkamania was runnin wild, brother. These days, people forget how truly great he was in his prime and how massive his influence has been on professional wrestling. He really was nothing short of a cultural phenomenon. In later years, his legacy has been tarnished to some degree by steroid scandals, divorce, dodgy reality TV experiments, home-made sex tapes, and his (well-earned) reputation as a backstabber, as well as plenty more besides, but when all is said and done and the annals of pro wrestling are finally collated and written down, Hulk Hogan may yet be remembered as the greatest of them all.
I am a professional author and lifelong comic books/pro wrestling fan. I also work as a journalist as well as writing comic books (I also draw), screenplays, stage plays, songs and prose fiction.
I don't generally read or reply to comments here on What Culture (too many trolls!), but if you follow my Twitter (@heyquicksilver), I'll talk to you all day long!
If you are interested in reading more of my stuff, you can find it on http://quicksilverstories.weebly.com/ (my personal site, which has other wrestling/comics/pop culture stuff on it).
I also write for FLiCK http://www.flickonline.co.uk/flicktion, which is the best place to read my fiction work.
Oh yeah - I'm about to become a Dad for the first time, so if my stuff seems more sentimental than usual - blame it on that!
Finally, I sincerely appreciate every single read I get. So if you're reading this, thank you, you've made me feel like Shakespeare for a day! (see what I mean?)
Latcho Drom,
- CQ
