Wrestler Spotlight: The Hurricane
When WWE purchased WCW in March 2001, many of WCW's younger talents made their way to WWE. Brought in as the invading WCW/ECW alliance in a war against WWE, many found it difficult to find their place inside the stacked roster. One superstar quickly found a character that set him apart from everyone else in the company and a gimmick that was close to his heart.
Known as Sugar Shane Helms in WCW, Helms debuted in WWE as the WCW Cruiserweight Champion under the name Gregory Helms but in his first match on WWE television, he lost the championship to Billy Kidman right before the Invasion pay-per-view. With options and opportunities not looking prosperous, Helms created a superhero character on the back of the fact that he had a green lantern tattoo and was a massive comic book fan. On an episode of Monday Night Raw, where the Alliance held a Stone Cold Steve Austin appreciation night, Helms announced that his new favourite superhero was Austin. After this, WWE and Helms ran with the superhero gimmick, and he quickly became known as 'The Hurricane'
The Hurricane's first appearance, dressed in a green suit, green cape and his well-known mask, face painted on. He wrestled Matt Hardy for the WWE European Championship on the August 27th Monday Night Raw episode where The Hurricane pinned Hardy to capture the championship on his first night. Shane Helms reflected back on his first win and the initial reaction from the locker room along with his experience of comedy gimmicks from his time in WCW.
“I won the European title in my debut as the Hurricane. Nobody understands what I went through when I put that outfit on for the first time. I was walking down that hall and I could see all the guys looking at me and some of them were like, WTF is this guy doing? That was a lonely night. But I went out and everything kind of worked and over the weeks the fans took to it more and more. They took to it because they knew I was committed. That was the key. I knew that from 3 Count. 3 Count worked because I was committed to me singing and dancing. I didn’t want anybody to think I was laughing at the gimmick. When I was in 3 Count, I was committed to it. I was dancing my ass off and trying to sing. I can’t sing. I can dance a little bit. I had to believe in the gimmick to make the gimmicks work.”
As European champion, he entered a mini-feud with Spike Dudley. This ultimately led to Spike's girlfriend, Molly Holly, taking a knock on the head in one of their matches. The Hurricane carried Holly to the backstage and transported her away on his motorcycle. The following week, The Hurricane turned up, but this time not alone as sitting alongside him in his 'Huri-cycle" was Molly Holly, now going under the name of Mighty Molly. Molly served as Hurricane's sidekick and swiftly kicked Spike Dudley to the curb.
The Hurricane dropped the WWE European Championship to Bradshaw in October and after the end of the WWE-Alliance rivalry, Hurricane re-appeared on WWE television at the end of December, being signed to WWE by Co-Owner Ric Flair. Hurricane appeared in the Royal Rumble match in 2002 in a comedy spot. With Stone Cold Steve Austin and Triple H down inside the ring, The Hurricane made his entrance and attempted to chokeslam both Austin and The Game but the former two-man power trip threw the WWE superhero out of the ring and eliminated him from the match.
The Hurricane appeared at Wrestlemania X-18 and won the WWE Hardcore Championship but lost it the same evening after Mighty Molly turned on her partner and pinned Hurricane to become the new champion. During the brand extension in 2002, Hurricane was drafted to Smackdown to be a part of their Cruiserweight division and he quickly became the WWE Cruiserweight champion, winning a triple threat match against Billy Kidman and champion Tajiri. Hurricane entered a program with Jamie Noble over the Cruiserweight Championship. It was revealed that Noble's girlfriend, Nidia, was an ex-girlfriend of The Hurricane. They met at King of the Ring in 2002 and after distraction from Nidia, Noble pinned Hurricane to win the WWE Cruiserweight Championship.
During the later months of 2002, Hurricane was drafted to RAW and formed an entertaining short tag team with Kane, known as ‘Hurri-Kane’. They captured the WWE Tag Team Championships together by defeating The Un-Americans and held them for three weeks before losing them on their first title defence against the team of Chris Jericho and Christian.
March 2003 led to undoubtedly the biggest moments for the Hurricane character. Now a mainstay on WWE television, mainly as an undercard, comedy character, Hurricane was involved in segments with one of the biggest superstars in WWE history, The Rock. Mocked by the people's champion for looking like the Hamburgler, their segments on RAW over a few weeks were some of the best comedy sketches that WWE has produced. It led to a match between the pair on RAW where the Hurricane picked up the biggest win of his career with a shock victory thanks to interference from Stone Cold Steve Austin.
The Rock: "Ever since the Rock came into town, everybody tried to bring him down. Canadians have no class, that's why they can kiss the people's ass."
The Hurricane: "Holy letdown! The Rock, you used to be an idol, an icon, loved by millions... and millions. Yet, tonight you come out and you trash the people. WHASUPWITDAT?"
The Rock: "Who in the green hell are you? Oh, no, don't answer that. The Rock knows who you are, yeah. The Rock knows exactly who you are: Green shirt, H on your chest, green mask—oh, you're the Hamburglar! Yeah, you're that cat that works for McDonalds. Go, get me a cheeseburger, get The Rock a cheeseburger—no ketchup! Aaaah, no—as a matter of fact, don't go nowhere. The Rock knows exactly who you are. Oh yeah, yeah, you're the resident super hero, The Hurricane. The Rock knows who you are, my man. Don't you ever bust in The Rock's door like that again, you hear? But ey, what's more important than that: The Rock reminds you of somethin': You ain't nothin'. You understand that? Every super hero can whip that ass, every single on of them! Every single one of 'em: Superman, Batman, Aquaman—oh yeah, Aquaman, that dude that talks to the fish; he'll whip that little candy-ass just like that."
The Hurricane: "Well, I know one super hero who I can definitely beat."
The Rock: "This is a joke. Who?"
The Hurricane: "The Scorpion King!"
The Rock: "Oh no, you—you—no—no—no! There is no way you can beat The Scorpion King."
The Hurricane: "Brendan Fraser beat The Scorpion King."
The Rock: "Da—da—dat—no, he did not, that was a special effect for the movie for Christ—The Scorpion King is the most powerful—"
The Hurricane: "Let me ask you one question, Rock, just one more: Can The Rock fly?"
The Rock: "You've just smoken them funny cigarettes? The Rock can fly and whip this candy-ass and—"
The Hurricane: "Well, good, because tonight The Hurricane is gonna send your candy-ass flyin' over the top rope in that battle royal!"
The Rock: "It was a special effect for the movie!"
After his small run with The Rock, Hurricane found himself a new tag team partner in Rosey. The former Three Minute Warning member became The Hurricane sidekick, known as a Superhero In Training, or S.H.I.T. At Backlash 2003, Hurricane won the World Tag Team Championships once again, but this time with his superhero partner, Rosey. They held on to the titles all summer before having to defend them against Lance Cade and Trevor Murdoch. During their match at Unforgiven, Hurricane was injured at the hands of Cade and Murdoch and they defeated the superhero team to become the new World Tag Team Champions. After losing a few matches and their rematch for the tag titles. Hurricane became angry at losing all the time and in a character development moment, he removed his mask.
In another chance for Hurricane and Rosey to win back their tag team titles, Hurricane no-showed but later turned up on the stage as Rosey was battling Murdoch and Cade alone. Hurricane announced that he was sick of the crowd making fun of him and carrying Rosey in their matches. He informed everyone of his real name 'Gregory Helms' and would go by that name from now on. Helms defeated Rosey in a match that ended this run of the Hurricane character.
The man behind the Hurricane looked back on his Hurricane character and what championship wins meant for him.
“Of course, the European title was a title to help the audience realize the company was behind me. There are some titles you work for and when you do get them it is an accomplishment because there is a competition. The competition is backstage, and I think that’s where the championships meant the most. We really did our business a disservice by flipping the titles around as much as they have sometimes. My favourite championship I ever one was with me and Rosey because I don’t think it was ever in the plans for us to be the tag team champions. We worked so hard. I got him out of that S.H.I.T. costume. Me and an artist designed the new outfit for him with the big R. We worked hard to come up with all these new moves. We got over and we were killing it on house shows. We were doing good merchandise. When they finally did put them on us, we came to the back and the whole locker room was there waiting for us. There are moments when you do win those championships and they do mean something.”
Helms never returned to the Hurricane character until he was released by WWE and worked on the independent circuit. Gregory Helms has enjoyed success with the character away from WWE but has also brought the character back for small appearances in WWE, such as the Royal Rumble 2021.
Beyond his championship accomplishments, The Hurricane is a well-remembered, fun, comedy character within WWE and while primarily an undercard talent, he had several moments in the spotlight which garnered attention.
Stand back, there’s a hurricane coming through.
