During an episode of his 83 Weeks podcast, Eric Bischoff talked about Hulk Hogan turning babyface and returning to his red & yellow attire in WCW in 1999, after his run as Hollywood Hogan.
When asked if Hogan should’ve kept some elements of his Hollywood persona during his return to the red & yellow attire, Bischoff replied:
“No, I don’t think so. I think the Hollywood Hogan is — it was death by 1000 cuts, and we’d gone through 999 of them. It was just not working. And yes, the red and yellow in WCW was anticlimactic at best. Interesting for a moment, not compelling.
But the reason it worked in WWE because this was Hulk Hogan coming home in red and yellow. And because he was coming back to WWE in red and yellow, that mattered so much more. It just had so much more legacy/nostalgia factor, which is important, obviously, and has always worked.
But the fact that was Hulk Hogan coming back. And not only coming back, but coming back in the red and yellow, where it all began? Was the most compelling part of that, and why it works so well, versus becoming red and yellow again in WCW, that makes sense.”
When asked if the Hulkster wanted to do a 3rd gimmick after the nWo, Bischoff replied:
“No. Hulk was a little bit (exhausted) at this point — like everybody, including me. Everybody was kind of exhausted emotionally, creatively, strategically, tactically. It was like ‘God Almighty. We’ve tried everything. Nothing’s working. What are we going to do next?’
I think that with Hulk, it was — perhaps in his mind, I don’t know if he thought he was going to go back to WWE. He may have had conversations with Vince (McMahon), they always had a weird on-and-off love-hate relationship.
My impression, and certainly reflecting back on conversations, was that he was perfectly fine with just walking away from the business altogether. And I think maybe why he wanted one of the reasons, not only one of the reasons why he wanted to close it out in red and yellow and probably one of the reasons why he wanted to involve Nick. A little bit of an act of potential closure.”
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