• Home
  • Movies
  • Music
  • TV
  • Video Games
  • Wrestling
  • Topics
  • Latest Comments on Cult of Whatever
Search
Cult of Whatever logo
  • Movies
    Featured
    • The Living Daylights: Timothy Dalton as James Bond

      The Living Daylights is still awesome, thirty-five years later

      By Matthew Martin
      | March 28, 2022
      Movie Blogs
    Recent
    • The Muppet Christmas Carol: Michael Caine as Scrooge

      The Muppet’s Christmas Carol remains the gold standard for the book

      By Matthew Martin
      | December 20, 2022
    • Nightmare Before Christmas 1993 1

      2022’s Christmas Movie Watchlist!

      By Matthew Martin
      | December 18, 2022
    • Guillermo del Toro's Pinocchio Poster

      REVIEW: GDT’s Pinocchio is my favorite film of the year!

      By Matthew Martin
      | December 14, 2022
    • Troll: Ine Marie Wilmann as Nora

      REVIEWS: TROLL and TROLL HUNTER -A giant creature double feature!

      By Matthew Martin
      | December 5, 2022
    • Harry with The Hendersons

      Harry and the Hendersons is still awesome, thirty-five years later

      By Matthew Martin
      | December 1, 2022
    • Fantastic Four Poster

      The five best “rogues galleries” in superherodom! (part 3)

      By Matthew Martin
      | November 28, 2022
  • Music
    Random
    • Michael Jackson Bad 2

      BAD is Michael Jackson's best album. Period.

      By Matthew Martin
      | August 31, 2017
      Music Blogs
    Recent
    • The Beatles: Get Back

      What GET BACK reveals about the Beatles

      By Matthew Martin
      | December 15, 2021
    • Simon And Garfunkel at Feyenoord Stadium in Rotterdam1982

      The Boxer is a song about being conned

      By Matthew Martin
      | July 4, 2021
    • Lady Gaga: Chromatica Album Cover

      Lady Gaga’s discography is totally out of order

      By Matthew Martin
      | June 3, 2021
    • Michael Jackson Thriller Album Cover

      Thirty years ago music fans said “Nevermind” to Michael Jackson

      By Matthew Martin
      | March 21, 2021
    • Queen II Album Cover

      On Queen’s The Miracle, and the importance of track ordering

      By Matthew Martin
      | February 16, 2021
    • Linda Paul Mccartney 1976

      50 years ago, McCartney dropped “Lennon” and went solo…

      By Matthew Martin
      | June 5, 2020
  • TV
    Featured
    • Big Sky S03e05: Kylie Bunbury, J. Anthony Pena and Katheryn Winnick as Cassie Dewell, Mo Poppernak and Jenny Hoyt

      Big Sky S03E05 Review: Flesh and Blood - Glamping!

      By Salome G
      | October 22, 2022
      TV Blogs
    Recent
    • Big Sky S03e10: Gang

      Big Sky S03E10 Review: A Thin Layer of Rock – Break time…

      By Salome G
      | December 11, 2022
    • Rick And Morty: S01e03

      Is Beth from Rick and Morty a bigger sociopath than Rick?

      By Jason Collins
      | December 7, 2022
    • Big Sky S03e09: Dedee Pfeiffer and Cree as Denise and Emily

      Big Sky S03E09: Where There’s Smoke There’s Fire – Stalling

      By Salome G
      | December 1, 2022
    • The Guardians of the Galaxy Holiday Special: Dave Bautista and Pom Klementieff as Drax and Mantis

      REVIEW: The GOTG Holiday Special is a sweet prelude to next year’s finale

      By Matthew Martin
      | November 27, 2022
    • The Midnight Club S01: The Gang

      The Midnight Club S1 Review – A series of unfortunate events

      By Salome G
      | November 24, 2022
    • Big Sky S03e08: Reba McEntire as Sunny Barnes

      Big Sky S03E08 Review: Duck Hunting – I love a weirdo.

      By Salome G
      | November 19, 2022
  • Video Games
    Featured
    • Arkham Knight

      Batman: Arkham Knight - A fitting end to a trilogy

      By Tom Farr
      | July 18, 2015
      Video Game Reviews
    Recent
    • Splatoon 3 Screenshot

      A trio of Nintendo Switch reviews!

      By Matthew Martin
      | September 28, 2022
    • Nintendo Switch Logo

      Looking ahead to the Switch 2: Predictions and Wants

      By Matthew Martin
      | August 15, 2022
    • Legend Of Zelda

      Can a Legend of Zelda movie work?

      By Matthew Martin
      | April 6, 2022
    • Super Mario 64

      Which system had the better launch: A battle of four Nintendo consoles

      By Matthew Martin
      | December 1, 2021
    • Luigi's Mansion

      Happy twentieth to Nintendo’s underrated gem, the Gamecube

      By Matthew Martin
      | November 18, 2021
    • Metroid Dread

      Metroid Dread – Post Game analysis and sequel needs

      By Matthew Martin
      | October 29, 2021
  • Wrestling
    Featured
    • AEW All Out 2022: Keith Lee. Anthony Bowens, Max Caster and Billy Gunn

      AEW All Out 2022 - Review and (wild) Speculation!

      By Matthew Martin
      | September 5, 2022
      AEW
    Recent
    • WWE WrestleMania 38: Cody Rhodes vs. Seth Rollins

      Was 2022 the wildest year in wrestling history?

      By Matthew Martin
      | January 4, 2023
    • AEW Full Gear 2022: Young Bucks and Kenny Omega Elite Entrance

      AEW Full Gear 2022 – A needed reset at the end of a tough year

      By Matthew Martin
      | November 22, 2022
    • WWE Survivor Series 1997: Bret Hart

      The Montreal Screwjob – Twenty Five Years Later

      By Matthew Martin
      | November 8, 2022
    • AEW Grand Slam 2022: Jungle Boy and Rey Fenix

      AEW GRANDSLAM 2022 showcased the present and future of the promotion

      By Matthew Martin
      | September 25, 2022
    • AEW All Out 2022: CM Punk

      AEW All Out Fall Out: All the CM Punk drama that’s fit to print!

      By Matthew Martin
      | September 5, 2022
    • AEW Dark: Ricky Starks (22/09/20)

      The future of the AEW World Championship

      By Matthew Martin
      | August 14, 2022
  • Topics
    • site logo
    Latest
    • Was 2022 the wildest year in wrestling history?
    • The Muppet's Christmas Carol remains the gold standard for the book
    • 2022's Christmas Movie Watchlist!
    • REVIEW: GDT's Pinocchio is my favorite film of the year!
    • Big Sky S03E10 Review: A Thin Layer of Rock - Break time...
    • Is Beth from Rick and Morty a bigger sociopath than Rick?

    Hollywood Hulk Hogan Book Review

    By Simon Lamb
    | April 8, 2004
    Wrestling Book Reviews
    This page contains affiliate links. At no additional cost to you, we may earn a commission if you click through and make a purchase. Learn more

    Last year, everybody’s favourite old man of wrestling, Hulk Hogan, released a book and I happened to be one of the many who had the honour of reading it. Chances are that if you haven’t bought it or read it you’re never going to, but no doubt you’ll be interested to hear whether it was utter drivel like many wrestling autobiographies and what the Hulkster actually said in it. Read on for the review…

    Hollywood Hulk Hogan Book Cover 0

    Well…. What can I say? Hogan’s book obviously didn’t cause a storm at the time it was written because much like the Rock’s, we all thought it wasn’t going to say anything controversial in it. Everyone already pretty much knew the Hulk’s story so there didn’t seem to be much that Hogan could bring to the table to make the book an interesting read. Either that or we all thought he’d talk crap in it. However, wrestling fans wanted to hear Hogan’s side of the story from moments like Wrestlemania VIII and IX. Just for a laugh of course.

    In all seriousness, I have to say that I enjoyed Hogan’s book, although I didn’t pay for it so I can’t say if I feel it was worth the money or not. If you could get it cheaply then I would actually have to give it a strong recommendation just so you can well… have a good laugh at how Hogan clearly doesn’t realise how much of an idiot he is sometimes.

    I kid you not, from the book you get the impression that Hogan just doesn’t acknowledge ANYONE else in the wrestling world as a drawing power, past and present bar perhaps Ric Flair and the Rock. Yet he does it in such a way that I personally just can’t hate him… he doesn’t seem to mean it.

    Personally, unless you hate Hogan with a passion already, I can’t see you coming away from this book feeling anything but a bit sorry for Hogan. It feels as if he genuinely doesn’t realise when he pisses people off and generally causes a nuisance, and that’s the impression you get from other sources as well (such as Bret Hart’s stories from WCW… I too loved that one where Hogan was set to interfere in a Goldberg-Bret Hart match for NO reason whatsoever). He just comes away from the book sounding like a really nice guy who just doesn’t believe that wrestling can exist without him. This is probably why it was no surprise to hear how shocked he was when Vince didn’t use him at Wrestlemania XX.

    The stuff he has to say about the earlier period in his career with Gagne and all that was what I found most interesting personally. You will come away with a greater, even if Hogan-tinted, wrestling knowledge after this unless you are already well informed; stuff you might not know like Andre the Giant not being able to fit his ass on the toilet seats in Japan thus resorting to using newspaper on the bed instead comes up in the book. You’ll also hear how Mr. T. almost RUINED Wrestlemania, and how Dennis Rodman was also a total moron. Funnily enough, the fact that Bischoff was obsessed with celebrities never gets mentioned though. Bischoff instead comes off as the nice man we all know and love. The facts speak for themselves in the book though, and you know that Bischoff was out of his depth when WCW became big, a point Hogan even acknowledges.

    Have to mention also a classic quote from Hogan in the book. When Verne Gagne was basically trying to get Hogan into his family by trying to set him up with his daughter so he would never leave the AWA, Hogan says “But I didn’t want to marry his daughter just for some wrestling belt”. Wonder what Hunter thought when he read that. Bwahah.

    What is perhaps the most interesting part of the book is when Hogan gets your sympathy over how badly Vince Russo treated him at WCW. You don’t need myself or even Hogan to tell you how much of a moron Vince Russo was at WCW, but Hogan does attack Russo for stuff other than the David Arquette title win. Hogan criticises Russo’s attempt to ‘out sleaze’ Vince McMahon and the creation of the Millionaire’s club angle, making the fair point that you have to have a mix of young and old talent to make wrestling work. He goes on to say that guys like Ric Flair would make it look like the new blood had stripped them of their pride they put them over so well, yet the crowd would cheer them since they knew it was bullshit and that Flair was still the man.

    Hogan also buries Jessie Ventura in the book, claiming he was jealous, although Hogan complains about how Jessie Ventura actually dared to be a heel and take a dig at Hogan’s low budget film career whilst Ventura was commentating in WCW. I’m sure Jessie was a tad jealous yes, but not the best example by Hulk. He doesn’t say however that it was him who BLATANTLY got Ventura fired by WCW. Also in the book Hogan clears up the rumours about him and Bret Hart and doesn’t actually say anything against Bret, there were never any serious problems between them.

    There’s also an awful chapter on kayfabe, and according to Hogan, us marks won’t understand that when Hogan would shout ‘dizuck’ to an opponent, we wouldn’t know that he was really meaning ‘duck’! Us silly marks! So glad he took the time out to tell us that. Other random things; blame Freddie Blassie for Hogan not selling anything, Hogan was told he sold too much by him, and ironically the finish for No Holds Barred was thought up by Hulk when he was on the toilet. Also, the Big Show was just some nervous Hogan mark who Hogan met at a basketball that Hogan got into wrestling.

    I’d like us all at this moment and time to pause and laugh at Horace Hogan. Just because.

    Also, expect your standard Owen Hart paragraph, and how Hogan was the man who phoned Bischoff to tell Bret that something had happened… because Hogan is a nice man you know. Plus obviously the Ultimate Warrior gets buried too. Hogan apparently stole Warrior’s heat at Wrestlemania VII by making sure he HANDED HIM THE BELT. Woah! You show him Hulk! Hand him that belt!

    Funnily enough though, you don’t hear about Hogan’s disgraceful behaviour in the WWF, holding people like Mr. Perfect back etc. There’s no acknowledging these stories, but he does say that he became moany and hard to deal with in the nineties. He does admit that Vince was right in attempting to move away from Hulkamania, but he does his best to talk down anyone or any idea they had that didn’t involve him at the time.

    Also, a bit random putting this in, but if you don’t already know, you’ll find out that Hogan trained wrestlecrap.com favourite Ed Leslie. Explains EVERYTHING.

    He slams Wrestlemania IV, claiming that the tournament, which he didn’t win, just ‘confused’ and ‘bored’ the fans (ah of course, the knockout tournament can be a difficult concept to grasp), and also slams Wrestlemania VIII, where Vince missed the boat with a possible Hogan v Flair main event. Other notable nonsense; Sgt. Slaughter’s heel turn and Iraq gimmick was his idea. He thought his run in at Wrestlemania IX was a good opportunity for him to ‘pass the torch’ (no I kid you not, he actually says this). Vince McMahon was caught out lying (again) by Hogan and Bret when Bret was told by Vince that Hogan wouldn’t job to him, and they both confronted him… Vince’s excuse? “That was just what you thought you heard Bret”. I always knew Bret was a bit stupid… trusting a guy after he comes up with THAT excuse?

    There’s loads of interesting crap in-between, personally I just find it funny to hear Hogan’s take on stuff. I know I said I enjoyed Hogan’s earlier stuff most, but the WCW stories were just as interesting to read actually.

    Goldberg gets buried for suddenly turning into some moron that just refused to lose when he got the title; you get the feeling that Hogan just sees Goldberg as Warrior II, which I’m sure most people would agree with.

    Russo basically comes off looking just as bad as ever after Hogan’s book, and he continues on to say that Russo’s treatment of him and the insulting shoot he did on Hogan really made him doubt himself and screwed him up. I’d imagine unless you are either a moronic staunch Russo fan or a real Hogan hater you would be moved by the end of the book when he’s talking about how his match with the Rock was his one shot to make it back. I have to admit, when Hogan returned I thought ‘ah he doesn’t really need this does he, I mean he’s doing fine anyway, must just be back for fun’. When you read the book you realise just how important that match with the Rock was for Hogan, and just how much his body was falling apart at that point.

    Thankfully not much is said about the present WWE stuff though since it’d all be doctored, and the only cringeworthy part of the book comes from a couple of pages saying how great a talent HHH is, which just appears too randomly in the book to be genuine in my opinion, also considering HHH was on his comeback run at the time you would have to believe that WWE may have wanted something positive about HHH mentioned. Hogan also talks about his return with Nash and Hall as the New World Order and how they were going to look out for each other in the WWE, before as mentioned earlier going on to talk emotionally about his match with the Rock at Wrestlemania XVIII..

    So overall, Hogan’s book is worth reading I personally believe. And there’s so much more that I can’t cover here because I’d just be re-writing the book if I did. I mean hearing him claim stuff like he invented entrance themes in wrestling is just an example of the type of nonsense he comes out with. I would say though that you shouldn’t end up hating Hogan after reading the book; you might feel a bit sorry for the fool if anything, since he does come across as a very nice guy who does appreciate his fans. You may end up with a different opinion from me depending on your stance on Hogan; personally I’ve never really had anything against him. But he does talk a load of crap sometimes, and the guy has so much to talk about.

    So there you go; surprisingly strong recommendation to read, but don’t blame me if you don’t enjoy it!

    Points: 4/5

    Buy It:

    UK: £11.89

    USA: $18.20

    Share this article:

    Share on Facebook Share on Twitter Share on Pinterest Share on Reddit

    Tags

    Hulk Hogan

    COMMENTS

    Please read our Commenting Policy before you join in with the discussion.

    Note: If you have email notifications enabled, please check your email spam folders to ensure emails are not missed.

    Subscribe
    Connect withD
    I allow to create an account
    When you login first time using a Social Login button, we collect your account public profile information shared by Social Login provider, based on your privacy settings. We also get your email address to automatically create an account for you in our website. Once your account is created, you'll be logged-in to this account.
    DisagreeAgree
    Notify of
    guest

    Connect withD
    I allow to create an account
    When you login first time using a Social Login button, we collect your account public profile information shared by Social Login provider, based on your privacy settings. We also get your email address to automatically create an account for you in our website. Once your account is created, you'll be logged-in to this account.
    DisagreeAgree
    guest

    0 Comments
    Inline Feedbacks
    View all comments

    You might also like

    • Hulk Hogan returns to the world of wrestling

      By The Beltster
      | January 1, 2010
    • Hulk Hogan: My Life Outside the Ring Book Review

      By Dante Spears
      | January 4, 2010
    • Hulk Hogan: The Ultimate Anthology DVD Review

      By Stephen Lyon
      | January 13, 2007
    • Hulk Still Rules DVD Review

      By Dan
      | August 30, 2003
    • Now That’s What I Call Wrestling: The Ultimate WrestleMania Challenge

      By TheBigBoot
      | March 28, 2010
    • Top 10 shocking WWE WrestleMania moments

      By Iron Jung
      | March 28, 2011

    FIND THE TOPICS YOU WANT...

    Wrestling Topics

    Recommended for you

    • Was 2022 the wildest year in wrestling history?

      By Matthew Martin
      | January 4, 2023
    • The future of the AEW World Championship

      By Matthew Martin
      | August 14, 2022
    • Vince McMahon is out as WWE chief. First reactions here…

      By Matthew Martin
      | July 22, 2022
    • Getting AEW to the next level…

      By Matthew Martin
      | May 29, 2022
    • Your WAY TOO EARLY predictions for WWE WrestleMania 39!

      By Matthew Martin
      | April 20, 2022
    • The Curse of the WWE Royal Rumble

      By John Hancock
      | January 27, 2012
    • About Us
    • Contact Us
    • Privacy Policy
    • Affiliate Disclosure
    • Cookie Policy and Settings
    • Terms of Use
    • Photo Credits
    • RSS
    All Cult of Whatever articles, logos, illustrations and graphics are copyright CultOfWhatever.com. All other trademarks, logos and copyrights are the property of their respective owners. © 2021 CultOfWhatever. All Rights Reserved.
    • facebook
    • twitter
    wpDiscuz