For what has seemed like forever, Terry “Hulk Hogan” Bollea has been a household name. Whether they love him or hate him, people know him, and his stature in the world of wrestling can’t ever be forgotten.

Hogan’s story is beyond worth telling, evolving from a bass player in Tampa, Florida, area rock bands in the mid-1970s into the namesake of Hulkamania, the driving force behind professional wrestling emerging from its origin as a carnival sideshow with a niche audience to a mainstream entertainment phenomenon. 

Hogan’s wrestling career got off to a shaky start when, after being discovered by Jack and Gerry Brisco, he went to train with Japanese legend Hiro Matsuda, who, according to Hogan, intentionally broke his leg. After rehabbing his injury, Hogan continued to train with Matsuda and was off to the races. Following a short stint inthe then-WWF as a heel, and runs in both New Japan and the AWA, Hogan’s return to WWF was shot out of a cannon when he defeated The Iron Sheik on January 23, 1984, for the World Heavyweight Championship and commentator Gorilla Monsoon proclaimed, “Hulkamania is here!”

Legendary rivalries with “Rowdy” Roddy Piper, Andre the Giant, Ted DiBiase, and so many more highlighted Hogan’s time on top but all good things come to an end — as did Hogan’s run as a good guy soon after his debut in WCW with the formation of the NWO alongside Scott Hall and Kevin Nash. As legendary as he was as a babyface, he matched or topped that as a megaheel, terrorizing WCW with his NWO cronies until that legendary storyline fell apart along with most other things-WCW.

Hogan returned to WWE, with the original NWO, in 2002, just in time for an all-time classic against The Rock at WrestleMania X8, where his return to Hulkamania babyface status began. Hogan is a two-time WWE Hall of Famer, inducted on his own in 2005 and as part of the NWO in 2020.

A biopic on Hogan was said to be in the works as recently as 2023, though delays have persisted.