10 Most Controversial WWE Attitude Era Storylines

5. Drunk Hawk

Using reality as part of a wrestling character, angle or storyline can often result in magic, but exploiting somebody’s serious real-life personal struggles is a step too far and never leads to anything good. 

One of the most egregious examples of this was when WWE decided to incorporate Road Warrior Hawk’s spiralling substance abuse issues into a storyline in 1998. 

After the Legion of Doom added a third member – Darren ‘Puke’ Drozdov – to the mix, Hawk’s life began to spin out of control and he would come out for matches clearly ‘under the influence’. 

He was even written out of the story for a while, his onscreen absence attributed to him attending ‘rehab’. 

Though he was simply acting, it was a bit too close to home, considering Michael Hegstrand’s problems at the time. 

Things got even ickier when Hawk began displaying suicidal tendencies and, in one very regrettable episode, climbed to the top of the TitanTron and threatened to jump off. 

Droz climbed up after him, ostensibly to save him, but then appeared to push the Road Warrior off the side, with Hawk falling a possibly fatal distance to the ground below. 

Later, Droz admitted that he had been enabling Hawk’s issues in order to kill him and take his place in the LOD. 

Disgusted with the damage the whole sad affair had done to the team’s legacy, both Hawk and Animal left WWE shortly after.