Toryumon on GAORA 7/9/00
by Digable James Cobo

And lo and behold, there was Buster Time Magazine.

I didn't want to come TOTALLY empty-handed when opening up a new website, so I figured that I better throw something together. Actually, that's a lie; I've had a yen to review this show for a good long while (er, um, about a month, anyway), and today it rained and I was lazy so here we go.

Zero-One's a tricky beast. The only thing that anyone really seems to definitely know about it for sure is that it's a new promotion - except that it's not even entirely correct to call it a promotion. See Zero-One's actually just a giant angle for New Japan Pro Wrestling - a group of rebels tired of the NJ hierarchy who split off and formed this rogue fed. But, just to compound the confusion even more, the trademark "Zero-One" isn't the property of New Japan - it's the property of the fed's (Zero-One's, that is) biggest star, Shinya Hashimoto.

See, the story (from what I know of it, anyway - I love the history of wrestling, but recent NJ history's kinda hard to dig up. Or at any rate, hard for ME to dig up. But I digress) goes back to a common charictaristic in puroresu - the tendency to have a legitimate background before lacing up the boots. It's really VERY common, and some people (myself included, once I heard of it) view it as the root of the reason why puroresu is of consistently higher quality than the American counterpart, where an amateur background is by NO means a prerequisite. In general, it means that the wrestlers have a better grip on what makes a match good, are typically in better conditioned shape, and are plain and simple more comfortable WRESTLING. But of course, just because it's a common trait doesn't mean that it's an iron-clad law. Just ask Shinya Hashimoto, one of New Japan's biggest draws in the second half of the 90s, and a guy generally regarded as one of the best strongstyle wrestlers in the world whenever he wants to be. .

But in 1997, his lack of amateur background would change his life.

Back then, he worked for the aforementioned New Japan Pro Wrestling promotion, alongside a rising superstar named Naoya Ogawa. Ogawa, as you may know, is one of the most well-known and popular members of any roster in any organization in Japan - he won the silver medal in the 95kg-and-under weight class of freestyle wrestling at the '92 Olympics, and these days he's a money-drawing mo-sheen. And New Japan, smelling the huge bucks to be made if Ogawa's incredible reserve of personality and Hashimoto's seemingly innate knowledge of how to tell a story, decided to feud the two. But midway through one of their matches, Ogawa decided that Hashimoto's lack of amateur background was offensive, and started shooting like a sonuvabitch on him. People stood up and took notice; it eventually became one of the defining moments in Ogawa's career. Needless to say, he wasn't punished for it. This, combined with the fact that he DID just get his ass kicked in public convinced him that it was time to back off from wrestling. And that's what he did in 1999, one year removed from participating in one of the most well-recieved G-1 Climaxes of all time (being the 1998 one, b'dur); he lost his retirement match - to Ogawa, which must have stung - and faded off into the background.

Or so everyone thought.

Because all of a sudden, he decided that he WASN'T done with this crazy pro wrestling game after all; he wanted more. So he registered the Zero-One trademark and went around collecting people to join up with him. A combination of the factors that (a) New Japan wasn't doing the best business in the world in 1999 or 2000, and (b) Hashimoto wasn't getting the overwhelming roster that one needs to start a wrestling fed off correctly, the two reached an agreement, and entered a working relationship. Zero-One would exist under the umbrella of New Japan, but would operate independent of the parent company - running shows all on its own, promoting them by themselves, etc, could enter into working relationships with other federations - without giving up the right to use New Japan wrestlers on its shows. A common comparison - and a fitting one - is the old concept that WCW had of running the nWo as a separate fed, with its own shows.

Got it? Me either. But that's basically what set all this up. Well, that's what set up the existence of the fed, anyway.

This card itself is an interesting one as well. See, since Zero-One and New Japan were in essence two differnt companies, New Japan had no obligation to give Zero-One a TV show or airtime to promote it. So what Hashimoto had to do was literally build this show on the back of word-of-mouth and non-wrestling-traditional avenues like press conferences. And in order to get either of those going, he had to have BLOCKBUSTER angles. And like all wrestling promoters, he knew that the best way to blow the roof off in terms of interest was to incorporate real life into the mix. So he basically promoted (well, implicitly, anyway) the show as the total antithesis of New Japan - there was a shootboxing match on the card, there was PLENTY of shootstyle influence, Shinjiro Ohtani made his return to Japanese soil (and as a heavyweight, no less), and most importantly, he worked with Mitsuharu Misawa's NOAH promotion (in contrast to the working relationship that New Japan had established with All Japan, the company which spawned NOAH when Misawa and compatriots left in mid-summer of 2000). And they ran PLENTY of big angles - Ohtani's return! And he'd be fighting Kazunari Murakami, another one of Japan's legit-fighting stars! The debut of the Zero-One guys in their new fed - Hashimoto, NJPW's Tetsuhito Takaiwa and Tadao Yasuda, and BattlArts' Alexander Otsuka - should be interesting! And how about Mitsuharu Misawa and Jun Akiyama - the number two face (and owner) and number one heel of NOAH, respectively - teaming up to take on Hashimoto and NJPW superstar Yuji Nagata?

It was shaping up to be an interesting night of wrestling. So let's get to it.

I should point out that my tape has the INTERMINABLE pre-show. In my review of the inaugural NOAH show, I mentioned something to the effect that the time used for promos and angles is quadrupled when the promos and angles are being delivered and set up in a foreign language. And considering that this particular preshow runs about forty-five minutes, it went on FOREVER. Although, to be fair, it did feature the kickass segment setting up the Murakami/Ohtani match, where Murakami confronts Ohtani in the middle of training, punching the fuck out of him and causing him (Ohtani, that is) to blade hellaciously. IN A SKIT.

I should also point out the bizarre SkyPerfecTV logo in the upper right-hand corner; it looks like a speech bubble with two dots inside. As a bonus result of its placement, throughout the night it looks like wrestlers are thinking ". .", which is exceptionally cool/weird. And it REALLY works when Misawa's on the apron in the main, but that's a different story altogether.

But eventually, we get past the jibba-jabba and on to the actual PPV. We get Thus Spake Zarathrusta, we get Hashimoto, we get thanked by him, WE GET MATCHES!

1. Naohiro Hoshikawa (Osaka Pro) vs. Naomichi Marufuji (NOAH) And what better way to start off a PPV than have a WHOOP-ASS match between two of the best juniors walking? I can't think of two guys I'D rather have start off my fed, anyway - they're both HUNGRY TO ACHIEVE. Marufuji's been around for at least a few years (he was on the AJPW Giant Baba Tribute Show back in '99), but he only started to blow up in 2000, when he partook in a decent match on the inaugural NOAH show, a good match with the Great Sasuke on a REALLY great MPro show, and...this match. Hoshikawa, on the other hand, has been around seemingly since before Christ. He was a staple of Michinoku Pro all throughout their glory days of '95 to '97 before fading slowly off the charts. In recent times, he's risen again in Super Delfin's Osaka Pro, but left in late 2000 (probably over money - the only guy in the world who makes less money than the Great Sasuke promoting wrestling shows is Super Delfin). This would be his return match, akin to Daryl Strawberry getting a slot on the Yankees after "coming back" from crack - did he still have it? Was he still all that?

In a word, yes.

Lord knows I hate to ruin the match for you, but this match is seriously fucking great. It's ALLLLLLL story - it's the story of the everlasting combat between shootstyle wrestling (epitomized by Hoshikawa) and prostyle wrestling (captured QUITE well by Marufuji), and how they interact when forced to coexist. The whole match keeps on this central, rock-solid theme - Hoshikawa repeatedly gains control with RIDICULOUSLY hard kicks (I watched this match with Doron and Danny, and made sure to note Danny's comment that Hoshikawa's kicks look better than Low-Ki's [the Super 8 2001 was the tape du jour at the time] because they weren't wrestling kicks - Hoshikawa was really kicking him), and keeps control by stretching Marufuji beyond all logical reason with generally simple but devatstatingly effective holds. He does EVERYTHING to the nth power - nothing looks weak - to the end result that towards the end when he locks on an inverted dragon sleeper, it's TOTALLY credible, and Marufuji is a BAD ASS for getting out. And his kicks! GOOD GOD, I can't say enough about his kicks. He threw out back brain kicks that would kill a lesser man, and he threw 'em out in remarkable concentration.

But it wasn't all Hoshikawa - Marufuji played the role of the End-All Be-All of Pro-Style Junior Work to a T. His biggest asset is that he appears to be a total natural athlete, so he's able to get the most out of his moves and make them look fluid when he does them. It's the little things - like getting ridiculous elevation on a slingshot elbow drop, or getting maybe seven feet off the ground for a top-turnbuckle dropkick, or being able to flip out of a top-rope superplex without looking awkward - that separate the greats from the goods. And he's certainly not afraid to swing for the fences with his strikes - the finish was a superkick RIGHT TO THE FACE followed by his Shiranui finisher (get in the Diamond Cutter position, but run towards the turnbuckle, run up the ropes, and flip backwards). But most importantly - he knows how to get the story across. He knew that the prostyle moves were his for the taking - like the diving somersault senton from the top turnbuckle or the segment where Hoshikawa tried to get him in a German Suplex only to have it countered and put on him instead. Great, great, great.

But I loved this match for more reasons than just that story. The match legitimately felt like a return to the 1994 NJPW junior sensibilities, where the important thing wasn't the moves - it was the PACE. Because that's what this match had in SPADES BABY. Both Hoshikawa and Marufuji knew that they had the moves to wow the crowd, but elected to hold off on doing the big moves like the Shiranui or the back brain kicks, knowing full well that anticipation makes the heart grow fonder. As a result, when Hoshikawa hits a murderous standing kick to the head or Marufuji busts out a huge frogsplash, they come across as being credible since they're the most impact-rich moves in the match thus far. And then of course when they DO bust out the big moves, the crowd just goes berzerk. IIIIIIIIII say that if this is the direction that Marufuji and Hoshikawa want to lead the junior weight class down, GOOD FOR THEM.

This match blew my mind, and might as well have blown other parts of my anatomy as well. It is, quite frankly, everything that a good wrestling match should be. I'm not saying there aren't flaws - some sequences looked a little off, and other were a little too intense to warrant a kickout - but it's not very easy to see how this match could be improved in terms of story told or driving philosophy. In five years, people could be pointing to this match the way they point to the final of the '94 J-Cup. ****1/2. It's a beautiful thing.

2. Akitoshi Saito (NOAH) vs. Tadahiro Fujisaki (Wrestle Yume Factory) The federation that gave us Tadahiro Fujisaki - Wrestle Yume Factory - is run by Masayoshi Motegi. If that's any barometer of how good this match is going to be, then DUCK AND COVER. If you need any additional information to get a clear picture of Fujisaki, imagine that Gilligan, of the Island fame, became (a) Japanese, (b), chubby, and (c) utterly dejected by the entire world, as that's exactly what he looks like. And wrestles like, too. He's one of those guys who, for whatever reason, LOVES HIS HEADBUTTS (I have no idea why there are so many of these guys in puro); he tags Saito with about ten of 'em over the course of the match, including three in one minute when Saito's on the ground...achieved by charging him (Saito) headfirst IN A SPEEDY CRAWL. And speaking of Saito, he doesn't seem without worth; he sure kicks hard enough for two, and has some nice moves to boot (which Saito, like any true Motegi protege, neglects to sell). What this match is TOTALLY lacking in, however, is transitions - there just plain aren't any. It flows like this - Saito's drilling Fujisaki, then Fujisaki's suddenly headbutting Saito with all the force his sad-Gilligan ass can muster, then Saito's nailing Fujisaki with a sitout chokeslam and a BIGASS back body drop for the win. It wasn't totally without worth - like I said, Saito kicks hard enough for two, and there's a move or two in there - but it certainly wasn't anything over 1/2 * Worth fast-forwarding over.

3. Takeshi Tobou vs. YU-IKEDA This would be the shootboxing match referred to in the intro. Tobou comes out to Bad Religion. YU-IKEDA is tall and has a weird-ass name. THIS IS THE MOST NOTEWORTHY THING ABOUT EACH GUY, a fact which the crowd publicly points out by giving them the Most Aneimic Pop in History (YU-IKEDA, crazy name and all, got NOTHING). And yet... while ordinarily I can barely muster the involvement to type the words "I don't care about shootboxing", this actually wasn't that bad, mostly because it was mercifully short. It went two rounds, sorta like this:

ROUND ONE: Clubberin', clubberin', clubberin'. Tobou gets MY interest when he does a cool inverted back body drop that has the ultimate effect of dropping YU-IKEDA *right* on his face; Y-I responds by throwing some HUGE bombs, which is to be expected as he must have at least six inches on Tobou. But it's still pretty even at the end.

ROUND TWO: Clubberin', clubberin', clubberOH HOLY FUCKING SHIT, YU-IKEDA's fucking TATTOOING Tobou. He's just STICKING him here, getting him dazed and catching him in a front guillotine. The tap is, to say the least, academic.

And that's the way it ends. Not the most exciting thing in the world, but there were those backdrops, and they really were punching each other right in the craw. I don't have a shootfighting rubric to hold this up to, but it certainly kept my attention. Sorta.

4. Gary Steele (NWA Hammerlock) vs. Yoshiaki Yatsu (SPWF) Well, this should be different - WHEN NWA HAMMERLOCK (the UK branch of the NWA) AND SPWF (best known for Survival Tobita, the man who fights monsters. And The Pervert.) COLLIDE! I'm INSTANTLY rooting for Yatsu on the basis of his use of the theme to Back to the Future as his entrance music. Oh, and on the basis that Steele couldn't look more like a Toothless Fort Bragg Date Rapist. TO ANYONE WHO THINKS THAT I'LL RATE A MATCH HIGHLY BECAUSE OF A FEW STIFF STRIKES: you are WRONG. This has a FEW stiff strikes (by Steele), but they aren't nearly enough to compensate for things like the World's Worst Backdrop, the World's Worst Figure Four Reversal (a direct quote from my notes: "KILL ME NOW."), and the World's Worst Punches and Kicks (all done by Steele). Yatsu, realizing that he's in the ring with a true Artist of Shitty Wrestling, elects to do essentially no moves whatsoever for nearly the entirity of the match until hitting Steele with something like eight backdrops in a row at the end, all of which (except the last) are no-sold by Gary Steele. BLEH BLECH ICK POO BAH and, say it with me, *FNYEH*. DUD. Now let us never speak of it again.

5. Kazunari Murakami (UFO) vs. Shinjiro Ohtani (Zero-One) MY GOD, the people love Murakami. And the really funny thing is that the pop he gets here is NOTHING compared to the one he got at PRIDE 10. But I'm not watching this match for him; I'm watching it to see how Ohtani does as a heavyweight. You see, as a junior, Shinjiro Ohtani was one of the five best wrestlers in the world at any given moment; he had it ALL DOWN, simultaneously epitomizing and prefiguring the cocky asshole heel that we'd get in the form of CIMA Nobunaga and the best incarnation of Koji Kanemoto. He was funny, intense, cool, and a badass - ALL AT ONCE. And on top of that, he could WRESTLE. There are plenty of people who call his match with Ultimo Dragon from the J*Crown a ***** affair (myself included); there are even some that call it the greatest junior match ever. And then there's his stupendous matches with Liger that I need to see, or his stupendous matches with Koji... hell, I even saw him have a ****ish match with Takaiwa on a tape from 1997, when Takaiwa was, to put it diplomatically, really fucking shitty. And he gave ALL of that up in 2000, sacrificed himself to the shitty booking that WAS Riki Choshu's reign, and left when he spoke out against it. So this is his return match, but considering how new he was to the heavyweight style, it might as well have been his debut.

It's not a bad way to debut, if you think about it - Murakami isn't the best wrestler, but what he lacks in ability, he makes up for in intensity, so that'll be present. And really, that's what this particular match is all about - INTENSITY. It's so fucking deeply intense that you could cut it with a butter knife. Ohtani, usually nigh-comic in his pre-match disregard for everything, is ALL BUSINESS before this one. Hell, it kicks off with Ohtani taking it STRAIGHT to Murakami, fast and FURIOUS. Whole 'lotta headpunchin' goin' on. So Murakami rolls out of the ring, and when he gets back in, starts beating the crap out of Ohtani. I think you can figure out what kind of match THIS is gonna be. ANyway, punching, punching, punching - although the intensity's still there; they had me believing that these two guys hated the shit out of each other - Murakami starts throwin' BOMBS, and Ohtani works a backdrop in... but then Ohtani goes down, and Murakami smells blood. Punchy-punchy, then a choke - game. Tap. **. Disappointing. I so wish that I'd never seen this - it was impressive, and I CAN'T UNDERSTATE THE INTENSITY, but it was just depressing. Ohtani got close to nothing - a flurry in the beginning, a backdrop out of nowhere, and a sleeper, and really that was it - the whole match, and did the Japanese equivalent of a stretcher job (he got carried out by ring boys) to boot. And to Murakami? He's got heat to spare. This was entertaining, but didn't really need to happen.

6. Takao Omori/Yoshihiro Takayama (NOAH) vs. Alexander Otsuka/Tetsuhito Takaiwa (Zero-One) The NOAH boys are better known as Team No Fear. Takayama in particular's been doing pretty well - he made it to the finals of the tournament crowning the first NOAH champion (losing to Misawa, the booker - I'm as shocked as you are) and even got on the most recent PRIDE show to challenge for NJPW's highly-respected IWGP title in a match with champ Kazuyuki Fujita (what the title was doing being defended on a PRIDE show, I'll never know, but think about this: Vegas issued odds for their match. That meant that people were BETTING ON PRO WRESTLING. Quick tip, folks: next time you want to bet money on pro wrestling, just send it to me instead). Takayama is also notable for sucking the meat missle pretty regularly. Omori's pretty good, and could easily be considered REALLY good in a year or so. On the face side, there used to be nobody on earth that I hated more than Takaiwa, as he sold like the Big Show and managed to have bad matches with JUSHIN LIGER, but apparently he's changed. Otsuka, on the other hand, is one of my favorite wrestlers walking; he loves what he gets to do, and it shows in the final product. He can work with anyone on earth, and tries his hardest to do just that.

So it's fair to say that I had mixed expectations regarding this match. And they didn't do anything to assuage the bad ones going in - Takaiwa hit a BRUTAL DVD about a minute in, and Team No Fear hit a double-team move that could pass for a finisher (backdrop & lariat). But then we suddenly enter bizarro-world, where TNF does things that make sense (dominte Takaiwa with tag-team moves, like the locomotion elbow drops, and use illegal moves like chokes) and TAKAIWA SELLS. CONSISTENLY. Granted, it's very much in an extended-Rock sort of way, but beggars can't be choosers. And then, to appease the early-90s WCW mark in me, they decide to have Takaiwa get pinned by Takayama, but then not have the decision count BECAUSE TAKAYAMA'S NOT THE LEGAL MAN~!. I am STOKED. A LOT. And that gets even hotter when Takaiwa tags in Otsuka, who busts out the 1992 Scott Steiner Memorial Frankensteiner about a minute into his section of the match. If there was any doubt in my mind about Otsuka, it's all gone in a segment where he's got Omori in an ankle lock, and Takayama comes in to break it up by stomping Otsuka, but instead of doing like everyone else on the planet and dropping the hold at the first stomp, Otsuka not only holds on to the lock but also releases it TO COVER HIS HEAD. FUNDAMENTALS BABY. And Omori's definitely worth my time; he's pretty strike-intensive, but when his strikes are this good (cf. his superkick to Otsuka's face), WHO CARES!? Of course, that parade gets trashed when Takayama and his Andre-the-Giant-but-without-all-the-talent-ass tags in, BLECH he's no good. And of course Otsuka decides to scare me by tagging out to Takaiwa, who proceeds to AGAIN not suck by dropping a nice elbow, then throw some decent strikes, and demonstrates a willingness to take something resembling a Takayama beating (which looks roughly as painful as being hit with a medium-sized stuffed-animal sheep). He goes for the Endless Powerbomb combo, but can't get Takayama's oafy ass up, so Takayama tags out to Omori, and OMORI gets to eat the Endless Powerbomb combo, with a HUGE lariat at the end to punctuate it. And then there's a pinning attempt, and everyone runs in, and somewhere in there a double Black Tiger Bomb-y thing is done by the heels... then Otsuka gets dumped out, Axe Bomber on Takaiwa, pin me, pay me. You'll notice that there was a LOT of match recapping in that review - that's because there was very little to actively complain about. I mean, the match isn't going to set the world on fire or anything - it's probably about **3/4 or *** - but considering that it featured both Takaiwa and Takayama, I by all right should have been describing a giant black hole of suck. Otsuka was barely in, but he worked for two while he was. Too bad Takayama sucked enough for three. But you give me Omori vs. Otsuka, and I'll give you my time. As it was, what I got wasn't anything to really bitch about.

7. Jun Akiyama/Mitsuharu Misawa vs. Shinya Hashimoto/Yuji Nagata The cliffs notes intro: ALL FOUR GUYS ROCK. Well, Hashimoto ALLEGEDLY rocks; he's really strike-oriented and doesn't sell as well as he could, and Misawa's best days are EONS behind him, but Akiyama and Nagata are, on any given day, two of the five best wrestlers in the world. And because the Wrestling Gods are smiling upon us today, they're the two who get to start, and they have a KICK-ASS five or so minutes. The interesting thing about this match is the number of concurrent storylines that they play up within it. To wit:

1. Superiority. This is clearly the most important storyline going on in the match; every segment with any two wrestlers is almost one-sided. The Nagata vs. Akiyama segment is, of course, the most back-and-forth of them all; the original one starts out with them grappling for position, and being unable to get a definite advantage over each other (with the epitome of this storyline being the spot where Nagata teases an Exploder, which Akiyama counters into a teased exploder of his own). But there's elements of it in all the other segments, too - Misawa vs. Nagata establishes Misawa as the better of the two, Misawa vs. Hashimoto shows Hashimoto eking out a narrow edge, and Akiyama vs. Hashimoto depicting Hashimoto just KICKIN' DAT ASS. Thus, they establish a totem pole of Hashimoto is better than Misawa is better than Akiyama is better than Nagata. Which is REALLY cool, because towards the end, when, say, Nagata is able to do enough damage to Misawa to break up his Tiger Driver or even kick out of one, he's not just kicking out of the move, he's moving up the food chain. And they do that tango all throughout the match - Misawa gets a little up on Hashimoto, or Nagata gets an in on Akiyama, or Akiyama finds a way to hurt Hashimoto, or SO ON AND SO ON - and if you're paying attention, it's REALLY COOL TO WATCH. That's why I love puroresu - it rewards you for paying attention. And there's also a very strong undercurrent of seniority, too - early on Misawa can literally brush off Nagata's chops because he's been taken moves that are a BILLION times worse, but by the end, seniority is OUT THE DOOR BABY. Of course, the ending undoes a lot of that, but let me get back to the ending in a second.

2. The heel-face structure. Of the four participants in the match, Akiyama is the only one who's definitely over as a heel; the rest are all getting face reactions. And it comes into play a lot in the match; early on, Nagata's able to get a leg up on him when he stops to taunt Hashimoto in the corner by German Suplexing him into tomorrow. But Akiyama's also not afraid to dish it out like a madman; midway through when he tags in against Nagata, he gets Nagata in a piledriver position, and while holding him TURNS TO FACE HASHIMOTO'S CORNER just to rub it in. But there's a more subtle one, too - his and Misawa's mistrust for each other. They're feuding in NOAH, you see, and Akiyama's LOATHE to tag in Misawa. So we get Misawa blind-tagging in a lot, or Akiyama staying in (usually against Hashimoto) longer than prudence dictates that he should. The criterion moment of the story, however, has to be when Hashimoto first tags in against Akiyama; he sends Akiyama to the floor in short order. Akiyama's response? Stay on the floor and milk the count so that he neither has to face Hashimoto or tag out to Misawa. Just beautiful stuff. And I can't for the life of me figure out why they didn't work it into the finale of the match; it was interesting and fit in with continuity. Mysteries of life, I s'pose.

3. Hashimoto Hates New Japan. This one's REALLLLLY subtle - hell, it may be so subtle that I'm making it up. But I couldn't help but notice that yes, there appears to be a LOT of apprehension about working with New Japan on the part of Hashimoto. For example, he doesn't tag Nagata's extended hand - he BLIND tags in, which shows HIM taking control of his destiny. And his style? It's UTTERLY not NJPWish, especially not the newer style. The newer style, from what I can gather, is typefied by Nagata - submission and WRESTLING based, with reliance on kicks, but not totally dependent on them. Hashimoto, on the other hand, is a STRIKING FIEND; he doesn't do anything else until the final segment, when he hits two DDTs. Other than that - all strikes. Granted, the strikes are WICKED, but it stands out. Moreover, he doesn't even engage in many tie-ups - he's not even going to try to go that route. It's really subtle, and the best part is that it actually does tie into the end, which is what makes me think that it was intentional.

And that thrice-referred-to ending? Hashimoto is beating up on Akiyama in the corner, when out of NOWHERE Misawa sneaks up from behind and German Suplexes Hashimoto...BADLY. It looked weak; it looked like Hashimoto's body weight shifted in midair and changed his course. And Misawa goes for the cover...and gets the three. I mean, it totally ignores the superiority storyline, which is just confusing as hell to me - they had segments of Misawa TAGGING Hashimoto with some BITCHIN' elbows, but this was just out of the blue. And more importantly, it didn't even look convincing. Suffice it to say the ending dropped the rating. The match was probably about ****, with the Akiyama/Nagata segments possibly hitting ****1/4, but that ending S-U-C-K-E-D SUCKED. And the worst part was that it should have been SO MUCH BETTER - the talent was there, but the intangibles weren't.

Post-match, Hashimoto swings up like a Weeble, and the four tangle, and HOLY SHIT a lot of people have to hit the ring to restrain them...

AND HERE'S NAOYA OGAWA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Never let anyone tell you that Ogawa doesn't have anything going for him, because he's got charisma out the ASS. He's like Murakami's intensity times a million billion. And of course, he's talking shit to Hashimoto, but Misawa takes offense, so the three of them start trying to tangle, and again, HOLY SHIT there's a lot of people in that ring. What a great way to cover up for that weak-ass ending to the last match.

Is It Worth It?

I mean, come on. It's typically a good idea to pick up any fed's debut show on general principles, since as a rule the first show is loaded. And this one proved to be no exception - two **** matches (the main event and the JAW-DROPPINGLY GREAT opener), a shocking *** match, an intense Ohtani match... hell, even the shootboxing match didn't suck TOO much. I mean yeah, OK, the Steele/Yatsu match was like four kicks in the crotch and the Saito/Fujisaki match was ass-some, but (a) they combined for probably fifteen minutes of the whole show, and (b) there are PLENTY of good PPVs with a bad match or two.

But I think I need to qualify that reccomendation a little. I'm calling this PPV a COOL one, not a GREAT one, and there's a pretty big difference - it didn't really set my world on fire. I mean, the ending angle was MASTERFULLY executed, and I can't sing the praises of the opener enough, but everything else had a very resonant woulda-coulda-shoulda feel to it - the Ohtani match coulda been better, the NOAH/Zero-One tag shoulda had Takayama and Takaiwa OUT, and the main event might have hit ****1/2 if they woulda planned it out better. And of course, there are those other three matches. The 1994 Super J-Cup is a GREAT show. Canadian Stampede is a GREAT show. When Worlds Collide is a GREAT show. They all knocked my dick in the dirt - not individual matches, but the overall show. This one... well, it started with a mindfuckingly great match and ended with a minfuckingly great angle, but everything else in between was... well, it was what it was, not what it could have been.

But make no mistake - this is a VERY cool show. I enjoyed it, feelings of disappointment and all. It was a lot of fun to watch almost everything on it, and there's plenty of good wrestling to be had. Reccomended.

(Thanks to Doron Diamond and Stuart's Wrestling Viewpoint and Strong Style Spirit for help on the background of Zero-One, the Hashimoto/Ogawa feud, and wrestler feds.)

Digably Yours,
Digable James Cobo
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