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Ultimate Warrior On WWE Hall Of Fame: They Need To Tell The Right Story

Posted: Nov 30th 2013 By: CMBurnham

Earlier this week Digital Spy spoke to Warrior, known in his WWF days, of course, as The Ultimate Warrior. After a quick chat about Survivor Series, we talked about the old days, modern pro-wrestling and those rumors of an imminent induction into the WWE Hall of Fame. Here's what Warrior had to say.

Who was your toughest opponent in the ring?

"The toughest for me was the one that brought the best out of me, out of my character. That's different from 'Who's the toughest guy, who's the most badass opponent I ever faced?' The toughest opponent for me would have been Randy Savage, the Macho Man, because his intensity paralleled mine. He became totally caught up in his character, which was a requisite to success in the business at the time. It wasn't something that was frowned upon. It was something that was encouraged by Vince [McMahon] - not so much in things he would say to you directly, but you could read between the lines and you got the message about that. The more you gave to your character the more you actually became this character in all different ways - in your interviews, in your ring actions, the way you carried yourself outside the ring... it really meant something. I loved working with Rick Rude too. I have to mention him because I worked with him a lot in the beginning. I worked with him down in Texas when I was doing the Dingo Warrior thing. That was a great relationship. The concentration was on each of us individually being the most of what our characters could be, but a magical thing would happen in the match where people were just caught up in it, every single part of it."

Your mic skills as The Ultimate Warrior were unparalleled - no-one got it across quite like you - is that element lacking in the company today?

"[Laughs] I think you might be blowing smoke up my ass! You're like the first one that's ever really praised my interviews. I'm not laughing at them because they don't deserve praise, they certainly do! Obviously I'm not afraid to pound my own chest about that. They were creative, they were unique, they were different, they were captivating, they brought the young kids of the time right up to the television screen. Ironically they all knew exactly what I was saying! Even though all the talent that I worked with, they've gone on the record all these years saying, 'He couldn't do a promo, nobody knew what he was saying!' It didn't matter, they weren't buying tickets, they got in free. Certainly there are people who can do promos. There are people who can do promos who don't even have a character that's anywhere near in nature to The Ultimate Warrior. But the reason why I think there's such a nostalgia for those characters back then - not just The Ultimate Warrior - was that the guys themselves were charged with developing their world, their wrestling comic book world. In comic books, every character exists in this comic book world, and the wrestlers were the same thing. They were responsible for creating that world and putting it out there - having the confidence to go forward and do that and behave in a certain way. That doesn't happen today. My understanding is that it's totally different. There are creative writing staff and guys that get in the business are in it for the practical pursuit of a career. It's not something that they really want to do and they're not all the way caught up in the characters. I remember traveling up and down the road and I kept journals during my whole career and I was always making notes about things I wanted to say, words I wanted to create, actions I wanted to do, things I wanted to do to make the character more imaginative and fantastical. When you've got someone just feeding you your lines it's totally different. Especially if you're working under circumstances when you're prohibited... If you're constantly having all that pushed back down inside and you're never allowed to express it, eventually you just sort of give up."

There have been rumors of your imminent induction into the WWE Hall of Fame - how would you feel about that were it to happen?

"The simple answer is they've got to tell the right story. That's a possibility. Being in the Hall of Fame - Ultimate Warrior being inducted into the Hall of Fame, or me standing there at the Hall of Fame participating in it - is not going to mean anything to my goals in my life and the kind of quality of life I'm going to have, what kind of things I'm going to do, how productive I'm going to be as I move on throughout my life. I only get this one life, so I'm not going to sit in my own pile of poop and feel sorry that I'm not in the Hall of Fame. The Ultimate Warrior character relative to professional wrestling or WWE, he's definitely a Hall of Famer. He's a Hall of Famer whether he gets into the Hall of Fame or not. They need to tell the right story. They need to tell the right story for the fans. It's been interesting - years ago they started rewriting the history of the character. Then they came out with the DVD [2005's controversial The Self-Destruction of The Ultimate Warrior]. I see the people who love The Ultimate Warrior. They're grown up now they're out in the world and they've got their own kids. I've seen them, they fight. They don't sit back and take it anymore when people are on a bandwagon and spew out all kinds of stuff that's not based on any factual information or anything like that about what kind of impression the Ultimate Warrior made in the business. So they need to tell the right story, and that would be a way to open the door to talking about doing the Hall of Fame."

Is there anyone in the company today who you'd love to get in the ring with to put on a show?

"Well, I don't watch it, but with the internet it's impossible not to be aware of some of the top talent. Other wrestlers when they're asked this question have specific people in mind to think about how they would work a match... I don't do that. I just don't do it. There's not anybody I can think of, and it's not out of disrespect for them. I'm one of the first guys in recent years that's gone on the record and said to all my colleagues that were in the business at the same time I was that it's time to pack your f**king gear bag and go home. Let the other guys have their chance and get your nose out of their business. People will say Ryback - 'What would Warrior have been like with Ryback?' Or Goldberg. I know why they say those things - because of the intensity and body look, the aggression, the power. Those kind of matches tend to be f**king stinkers, you know? You want to work with somebody who's got a different style. Wrestling is more than just being big. Even when I was on the road and we traveled all over the world, I met so many big, huge guys, great-looking guys, guys that looked like they were carved out of stone. They thought that they could be in the business if they were just given a chance or devoted some time to doing it or learnt the basic moves. It takes much more than that. It takes more than a body or a physique to make it happen."

What one thing would you like the legacy of The Ultimate Warrior to be?

"The legacy thing is up to other people... The Ultimate Warrior was jacked. That word gets thrown around a lot today, a lot of different athletes and everybody else. The Ultimate Warrior was jacked, man. He and that character inspired a whole generation... double generation... still inspires people today. Athletes and people who go out and kick ass in their life out in the world, whether it be sports or something else in their life. It's that intensity. There's an obstacle in your way to getting something done, a wall there. You're not going to go around it, you're not going to go over it, you're going to go f**king through it. Ultimate Warrior was a character like that and made people feel like that."

Ultimate Warrior is featured in WWE 2K14, which is out now on Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3