Bruce Prichard discussed WWE’s decision to do the Self-Destruction of The Ultimate Warrior DVD during a recent edition of Something to Wrestle.
Many people considered the DVD to be a hit piece on the WWE Hall of Famer when he was on the outs with WWE. Here is what he had to say:
Bruce Prichard on Road Warrior Animal’s death: “Shocking, I guess would be the word. I was up late when John got the news and John texted me. Yeah, I think was just shocking to everyone. It was tough. It’s one of those that…..OK, yeah it happened, but I don’t know if it’s I haven’t accepted it or I still just don’t believe it’s real. So, I don’t know how to process it. People may say it’s a weird comparison, but it’s like Eddie Van Halen. I don’t know – Eddie Van Halen and Road Warrior Animal, in my head anyway in their respective businesses, are two of the greatest that will never be forgotten. They were innovators in their own way. I said to my wife, I don’t know how to accept that Eddie Van Halen is gone. It’s just weird. It’s really, really weird to me.”
On whether he regrets WWE’s decision to do Self-Destruction of The Ultimate Warrior DVD: “You never say never in this business, so when you look at things like that, that a lot of times are done almost in a knee-jerk reaction. This was not done in a knee-jerk reaction. This was discussed because so many times – I don’t know that there was a more polarizing person than Jim Hellwig and The Ultimate Warrior that you had to think public perception and with all the lawsuits and everything that were going on, that it lent itself to something like that. What I mean by that is – to first answer you’re question, would I want to take it back? Yeah, probably so. Again, perception and your presentation of a character and what you have worldwide for so long, it becomes ‘Well, wait a minute, you told us way back here that this was this great, great guy and he was The Ultimate Warrior and he was this, and now you’re telling us he wasn’t that good.’
“It wasn’t The Ultimate Warrior that was really being deconstructed, it was Jim Hellwig. That’s who people were talking about as far as doing business with him and things of that nature. I think that hindsight being 20/20 when you look at it in 2020, that it was the best thing to do. But it was done, it was put out there as sort of a public service announcement more than anything I guess to say ‘OK, here’s the guy we presented but he’s the guy he was.’ We’re an entertainment company, and we create characters, and we portray characters in a certain way. So, I think it’s best to portray them in the most positive way that you can. If I had to do it all over again, and I wasn’t a part of it as far as that decision, but I think if we had to do it all over again……maybe not do that.”
H/T to 411 Mania
