This isn’t something I expected that I would be writing after such an epic weekend in professional wrestling with the 2014 WWE Hall of Fame, WrestleMania 30 and the post-WrestleMania edition of WWE RAW, however news broke last night that Warrior passed away while walking to his car at the Gainey Suites Hotel in Scottsdale, Arizona. He was 54.

Born James Brian Hellwig, the former WWE Champion started his career as a bodybuilder and after winning the 1984 Mr. Georgia crown in bodybuilding joined Steve Borden, who would later go on to be known as Sting in making the jump to become a professional wrestler, floating from promotion to promotion until he found himself on the WWE roster in 1987 wrestling house shows as The Dingo Warrior, before being renamed The Ultimate Warrior, with his first major push coming at the first-ever Summerslam event in 1988, where he defeated The Honky Tonk Man in 27 seconds to capture the WWF Intercontinental Championship, however he will be best remembered for his match at WrestleMania VI when he won the WWF Championship against Hulk Hogan, as well as his match against “Macho Man” Randy Savage at WrestleMania VII, where he forced Randy Savage to retire from in-ring action.

Less than 4 years after joining the WWF, Warrior quit the company in 1991 after a pay dispute with Vince McMahon, who eventually convinced Warrior to return for WrestleMania VIII, however he was no sooner out the door and didn’t return until the WrestleMania XII pay-per-view where he defeated Hunter Hearst Helmsley and once again, as fast as he was back, Warrior was out the door again and decided to jump ship to World Championship Wrestling.

He has done crazy things over the years such as legally changing his name to Warrior. Over the years since his decision to retire from professional wrestling, Warrior has also done a lot of work attempting to clean up his legacy after being painted in a bad light by the WWE: Self Destruction of The Ultimate Warrior DVD. The decision to work with Take Two Interactive for the WWE 2K14 video game surprised a lot of people, but no more surprising was his decision to take up WWE’s offer to enter the WWE Hall of Fame (something he often said that he would turn down if asked) and reunite with Vince McMahon and Triple H after almost two decades out of the company’s radar.

Whether people loved him or hated him, everyone knew that The Ultimate Warrior was a character. May he rest in peace.