411’s Dark Side of The Ring Report: ‘Becoming Warrior’

-Today is my 40th birthday and also the 25th anniversary of Scott Hall showing up on Nitro. Coincidentally, today is also Eric Bischoff’s birthday. Best way to celebrate is Main Event and my weekly review of Dark Side of the Ring. Warrior week continues as A&E had their Warrior bio a few days ago and now the other side of the story. You can find my review of the A&E one here. Let’s get to it!

-Reminder that the narrator is Chris Jericho.

-Birthday boy Eric Bischoff starts us out and compares Warrior to a bolt of lightning and Jim Cornette says very few have risen and fallen as fast as Warrior. The real man behind the face paint contradicted the ideals of the hero he portrayed. Cornette: “for quite a while there, he was batshit insane.” Just this introduction is already falling in line with ‘The Self Destruction’ DVD but perhaps that tone will change.

-We meet his ex-wife, Shari Tyree, who talks about his insecurities and self doubt as people aren’t always who they seem to be. She doesn’t think it is fair to judge people by one or two things you saw. She was married to Warrior from 1982-1991. She shows off some pictures of them backstage and she says it was a very happy time. She talks about meeting him when he was doing bodybuilding and he had the largest shoulders she had ever seen on a man. She felt he had a lot going on and had big dreams. Their first date she picked him up from a bar where he was bouncing. She watched him toss a man out of the building and then they just sat on his couch talking. He told her he wanted to be a chiropractor. They have old interviews from Warrior as he talks about how his goal was to become a chiropractor.

-Shari tells us Warrior was told that his grandfathers dying in their 50s was a concern and it was something that worried him. His drive was to be rich and famous and was dedicated more than anyone she had ever seen. He told her that he would protect her for the rest of her life. They married in Oct 1982 and Warrior decided to follow through on body building where he ended up meeting Steve (Sting). They decided to give wrestling a go and Jerry Jarrett is the only one to call.

-Jim Cornette introduces himself and states clearly he was not a fan of The Ultimate Warrior. He talks about how awful Sting and Warrior were in their early days in Memphis. They had great charisma, but it was hard watching them in the ring. They were sent to Mid South and “that’s where the future of pro-wrestling was shaped without anyone even knowing.”

-The Blade Runners are born in the UWF and Jim Ross is here to talk about that. He immediately buries Warrior as he mentions “I’ve never met or seen a wrestler with less ability than The Ultimate Warrior.” Damn! He calls Warrior egotistical and he had a great body and smile and wanted to know what else they wanted. “I don’t know, can you wrestle?” Shari says Steve was more trainable and was liked more by the boys. Warrior says that Steve needed to have his hand held. He was more concentrated on what he needed to do. Shari says Steve was all in and Jim wanted to go out on his own.

-WCCW next and that brings out David Manning who was a ref, promoter, and booker for World Class. They created the star they wanted when they brought Jim in as The Dingo Warrior. The producer asks “what is a Dingo Warrior,” and Shari laughs as she has no idea and nobody did. He was given people to slaughter in his first 15-20 matches and that inflated his ego according to Manning which made it harder for people to work with him. Cornette continues the burial as the only place a wrestler like Warrior could find a home in the 80s was the WWF.

-Commercials!

-In 1987 there was no bigger stage than the WWF and Jim was asked to come in June. Shari shows off the letter from the WWF and she knew it was going to change the dynamic of their marriage. He assured her that he would bring her on the road once he made some money. She calls the matches against the jobbers in the beginning rough. Shari claims Warrior wanted her to watch from the crowd and give feedback and she noticed fans were getting up to get popcorn. She says Warrior wanted to figure out his character and gimmick. She knows Vince didn’t like the name ‘Dingo Warrior’ and when he made his TV debut against Terry Gibbs he was dubbed The Ultimate Warrior. Shari says he wasn’t a good wrestler, but he had intensity and carried a bit of a mystery about him. That’s where Parts Unknown came from.

-JR and Bischoff dump on Warrior’s promos for not making sense at best. Shari mentions that Warrior would crack up at the promos as even he couldn’t believe what he was saying. She puts over his entrance music as the catalyst for him.

-Cornette talks about the super push Warrior received as they disguised his weaknesses and showed off his strengths. Bischoff calls him a living cartoon character. Shari talks about the merchandise and Warrior loved the Wrestling Buddy. He felt he had arrived when he saw that. She talks about their $100,000 home and soon they built on an addition that cost another $100,000. She thinks all the rapid success caused friction with the boys.

-Enter Jake “The Snake” Roberts as he calls Warrior a complete jerk in the ring and difficult to talk to. Cornette says Bobby Heenan wasn’t a fan and he had a bad neck and Warrior broke it. Heenan told Warrior about it and he apparently just shrugged it off. I have heard Cornette tell that story several times as that is a major sticking point for him and I can understand why. Cornette continues, “I am not trying to be a prick here, but he couldn’t wrestle. He couldn’t talk. He got over because he looked like a million dollars and the most successful promoter pushed him to the moon.”

-Shari says it bothered Warrior to hear the boys talk bad about his wrestling and while she thinks some criticism was spot on, other criticism was not. She mentions they didn’t know that Warrior had a sensitive and insecure side. She gives us the back story as Warrior grew up a scrawny kid and his father left when he was a kid. Warrior told her that his dad was cheating with one of the neighbors and that traumatized him. She says Warrior had an anxiety disorder for years. He put a lot of pressure on himself to be the best as he didn’t want to be that scrawny kid anymore and he had to make this work.

-Commercials!

-Hogan and Warrior Face to Face at Royal Rumble! Still awesome! They discuss WrestleMania VI and Cornette says that besides Hulk Hogan, Warrior was the biggest box office attraction in wrestling. I listened to Cornette a few days ago and he stated he has never watched Warrior/Hogan I. Shari says Warrior loved that he was going to be taking Hogan’s spot in the company and she mentions she could feel every bit of that match in the crowd. Back to Cornette as he mentions that Vince felt 6-7 years of Hogan on top was enough and he was worried he was getting stale. JR says that Hogan was tired and beat down and needed a break, so Vince wanted to pass the torch. Hogan does the clean job which never happened and Warrior was the next big thing. That match is still great. JR says that what Hogan did was a miracle as he carried The Warrior to immortality and “he did it live which was more astonishing.” Shari says that Warrior took time after the match to soak it all in as he made it, but then instead of Jim, it was The Ultimate Warrior that came home as she starts crying.

-She says that Jim was not well and just seemed altered. She would call his room and he would not answer. She asked for a wellness check and the guy told her that he was there and he was sleeping. She talks about how women want to sleep with your husband, but it’s the ones that want to steal your life that you have to worry about. She called back and could hear a woman’s voice. She starts crying again as she looked through Warrior’s day planner and found names of women for each town. She told him that when he came home he would be receiving papers as she was divorcing him. “I lost my husband.”

-Commercials!

-By 1991 the 9 year marriage came to an end and then he loses the WWF Title to Sgt Slaughter at Royal Rumble. His relationship with Vince starts to crack. Jake says he was told he was getting paired with Warrior in a Championship run (I call bull on that as Warrior had already dropped the strap by that point). Jake was told to go ask Warrior’s permission which shocked him. He went to his private dressing room and Warrior told him he didn’t care about him, his family, or wrestling as he just wanted to do his shit. He threw Jake out as all he was worried about was his money. Jake says it was like someone pissing in his mouth, but he went with it as he wanted his Championship run. Jake even mentions it was set for after SummerSlam and again, this is 7 months after Warrior dropped the WWF Title.

-Shari says that Warrior moved into a million dollar mansion in Scottsdale and asked her to come out as he had something he wanted her to help him with as he trusted her. He wanted everything Hogan had and had a letter for Vince. She told him it was wrong as he can’t hold up things like TV. She knew it was going to end badly for him.

-They have the letter for this show as well and again, it’s Warrior wanting everything Hogan has or he won’t show at SummerSlam. Shari says that Warrior loved Vince and he just wanted more attention from him. Vince always gave Warrior everything and now he was just tired of him at this point. Vince temporarily placates Warrior as he just wants to give the fans the promised match. Jake is pumped as he thinks he is about to make crazy money and he was standing next to Vince when Warrior came through the curtain. Vince yells to Warrior that he is fired and he needs to get out of the building and then tells Jake he has the worst luck of any human being. Jake says he carried that anger for years as he wanted to kill Warrior.

-Jim Cornette has the letter Vince wrote back to Warrior and he starts reading through it. There is the famous “legend in your own mind” comment. Shari says that Warrior’s greatest downfall was never seeing things from another perspective as he always thought his way was right.

-Commercials!

-Warrior ends up getting suspended and Jericho mentions over the next 18 months they negotiated before he was fired. I guess we are skipping the return at Mania VIII and steroid issues. Now Cornette and Bischoff mock Warrior for legally changing his name to Warrior. I mean, Rick Rude did the same thing. Shari thinks it was a way to reinvent himself.

-By 1996 WCW is on the rise thanks to Hulk Hogan and other guys that jumped from the WWF. Vince decided to make amends with Warrior. Cornette was part of the meeting in Arizona and we learn about destrucity. JR: “you are probably wondering out in TV Land, what the fuck is destrucity.” Cornette tells us it is the truth between destiny and reality as Warrior thought he was going to be a motivational speaker. That leads to a comic book based on Warrior and JR says there is nothing wrong with any of that stuff if you are capable of doing it. JR mentions he will never get that time of his life back.

-WrestleMania XII: Warrior squashes HHH and no sells his finisher. Cornette mentions he destroyed HHH, but I think he will be okay. He mentions the pop was huge, but only lasted a few weeks because the business had changed. Things were not going his way and JR says Vince made the decision to fire him again. No mention of the dead dad this time.

-Warrior goes back to Arizona and opens a gym where he crosses paths with his ex wife again. She saw a new energy in him and they were friends as they were both dating. She met her now husband at the gym and Warrior met his wife there. They each agreed for her not to be at the gym anymore just so things weren’t awkward. She cries again as Warrior apologized to her and thanked her for being a great wife. He told her he knew she was going to be a great mom and that was the last conversation they ever had.

-Commercials! Jake “The Snake” and his family next week!

-Warrior uses his status to become a conservative motivational speaker. They show him speaking and saying his wife was a conservative and it made him realize he was living a conservative life. Cornette calls him a far right nut wing that hated gay people and we get the video of “queering doesn’t make the world work.” Like the A&E Bio they show text from his blog including “marriage is not for queers. I’m against it. I’m bothered by it.” Also, “These kids – these obviously BLACK-skinned kids—are behaving like animals, savages, less than human, like Rhesus monkeys.” Cornette never understood the first thing about how Warrior’s head worked and takes him to task for the things he said about other wrestlers. We hear Warrior call Terry (Hogan) a real piece of shit. Cornette mentions that all these guys put over Warrior and then he trashes them.

-2014: Warrior and WWE make peace and he is inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame. Jake says he had a roll of quarters in his pocket and was going to beat his ass. Warrior had all kinds of security so he had to wait. Warrior tapped him on his shoulder and apologized to him. Jake says it taught him a lesson. Cornette felt it warmed Vince’s heart more than anyone to see Warrior making peace. He covers that Warrior made a good speech and his family was there for it. The next night on RAW he cuts a promo that people can actually understand. JR mentions Warrior didn’t look healthy that night and something was off.

-Shari says her sister called her to say she was sorry to hear about Jim. Twelve hours after his appearance on RAW, Warrior died from a heart attack leaving his hotel room. Cornette calls it startling as a guy has a chance to make amends and restart things and he dies. JR calls it sad and Shari says she was sad for his family and his daughters. She was sad that people lost something. JR brings up his final words on RAW being about a man breathing their last breath and their heart beating a least beat. You just never expected it to be that quick. Jake ends it by saying, “rest in peace.”

-This was fine, but I enjoyed the A&E Bio piece more and that could be because they had two hours and could go more into detail. This started out like Self Destruction and they ended with everyone feeling sad about the way it ended. I was shocked no mention of steroids and again, nothing on his WCW run. It’s definitely worth a look, but I would say watch the A&E one as well. Thanks for reading!