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PWINSIDER Q&A: HULK HOGAN, BACKSTAGE AT RAW, KIP JAMES AND MORE

I was wondering the status of Hulk Hogan, is he retired and going with his life? Will he return to WWE and do a month or two scenario, and has Vince ever contacted him to come back and especially for WM25?

Hulk's life is pretty much on display if you spend enough time on celebrity gossip sites like TMZ.com.  I guess he's "retired" in that he currently has no plans to wrestle a match, but he could "un-retire" at any time.  There are no plans at this point for him to return to WWE, and I tend to doubt Vince McMahon is thinking about using him for Wrestlemania 25. Remember, Hogan wasn't part of Wrestlemania 10 or 20, which were also seen as milestone events.

I always read reports you post about wrestlers who aren't employed by WWE being backstage at Raw tapings. My question is how do they get access? Do friends of theirs currently on the roster just invite them or does Vince McMahon have to ok it?

Sometimes it is because of friends in the company inviting them, and other times it is just a case of them showing up to say hello, and WWE giving them the professional courtesy of allowing them backstage.  If someone were to arrive that Vince McMahon didn't want there, they would be shown the door, although I can't think of a specific case off the top of my head where it has happened. 

Personally, I don't like the pairing of The Beautiful People with Kip (Clip) James. I haven't since they first appeared together on Impact! some weeks ago.  They were doing just fine without him. Two vain and consumed  women who can also wrestle. I realize TNA needed to use James in some capacity. Maybe a feud between him and Creed. Anything instead of himself with the Beautiful People. Thoughts? 

It keeps Kip James from wrestling every week, so it works for me!  Honestly, the Beautiful People don't need him, but at the same time, it does give them someone who can interfere that is bigger then their opponents. 

I have a question that has been on my mind a while for some reason. I remember back in 96-97, when ECW was hot, there were a lot of wrestling hotline's in Philly. As a young kid, like 7 or 8, I would attend ECW shows with an independent wrestler from Reading, who somehow knew Paul Heymann, so I would sometimes sit on the top stage where Paul E. was during ECW shows. I remember one night during a show there was some sort of altercation with a hotline host. The name that comes to mind is MJ White. Does that name ring a bell? If so, what was his history with ECW and what is he up to now? I remember calling and leaving messages on his hotline all the time growing up and I was just wondering what he is doing these days.

Sorry, never heard of them.  However, back in the early 90's, there were dozens of people with wrestling hotlines, most of whom would just read items out of newsletters and claim it as "exclusive news". 

With the popularity of the book and movie Twilight (in addition to the other two books and the movies that are yet to come), do you guys think that WWE creative is kicking themselves over having Kevin Thorn drop the vampire gimmick and then putting him on the shelf altogether? Or is Vince so out of touch with pop culture that he isn't even aware of the media frenzy surrounding Twilight? I haven't even read the book but everywhere I turn I see something related to the book or film.

I don't think Twilight or anything else was going to get Kevin Thorne's vampire gimmick over.  It just never connected with the audience, and a film tie-in isn't going to make a difference. 

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