I don't buy Prichard's story of how Vince came up with the Ultimate Warrior gimmick for a minute.
its pretty clear Jim Helwig (warrior) did.
why?
Because in a court of law, Warrior won the rights to the name, character and likeness.. - he beat the WWE in court.
chances are, he created the character and was apparently able to prove it.
if you notice on the Warrior DVD, the bottom of the screen at the end says 'Ultimate Warrior etc are trademarks of Ultimate Creations Inc."
the WWE got owned by warrior in court
lol
Helwig didn't develop the name, per se; remember that he was still known as the Dingo Warrior, when he arrived at WWE. And, they were going to ditch the name altogether.
Plus, it was McMahon who helped market the character and his employees (Jim Johnston, in particular), who came up with his now-famous theme music.
If Helwig made up the character and had the rights to the name from the start, he wouldn’t have had to change his name to “Warrior”, in the first place. That was his attempt to co-op the character without the WWE’s permission. If it were his from the beginning, he could have gone right to WCW, after he got fired again in 1992, as the Ultimate Warrior. Instead, he changed his name in 1993.
As I recall, the issue had more to do with his return in 1996. I think Warrior wanted, as part of the agreement, the eventual rights to the name and the promotion of his wrestling school, Warrior University, in Arizona. The reason McMahon claimed he fired Warrior then is because Warrior missed several dates where he was scheduled to appear, using his estranged father's death as an excuse.
Warrior claimed that McMahon was using his likeness and certain trademarks, while leaving him out of the equation (hence the reason for his no-show, combined with the issue regarding his father). McMahon claimed that, by not showing up where he was advertised, Warrior breached his contract. Therefore, McMahon didn't have to give him the rights to the "Ultimate Warrior" character.
As for being "owned", that's a bit of a stretch, especially when he went to WCW, only to last a few months, before being released as well.
"The Ultimate Warrior, in WCW, was out of control and uncontrolled; there was no supervision for him. At WWE, Vince called the shots; the agents that worked with him with promotions and one thing and the other, had him under control. So, on the one hand, you had this wild man at WCW, who has no direction. And on the other hand, you have this wild man in WWE who DOES have direction and who also had success." - "Mean" Gene Okerlund
"He thought he was going to make a fortune, when he got from under the WWE umbrella. That didn't happen. Hopefully, he looks back on his career and thinks, 'You know. Maybe these guys really helped me a lot more than I thought.' " - Vince McMahon
Warrior, last time I checked, was wrestling in some bush-league organziation in Spain.
