A shorter post this week but still going strong with All Japan 1985.
Genichiro Tenryu & Takashi Ishikawa & Haru Sonada vs. Riki Choshu & Yoshiaki Yatsu & Animal Hamaguchi (07/08 aired 07/13): Oh man excellent finish! Yeah this was a really good match. It's not top of the line effort since Jumbo isn't in there but that's an observation and not a criticism. Ishikawa really thrives in these matches since he's functioning as Tenryu's #2 rather than Jumbo's #3.
Ashura Hara v
Back with more 1985 AJPW goodness! Let's get going with April!
Giant Baba & Jumbo Tsuruta vs. Stan Hansen & Ted DiBiase (04/21 - aired 04/27): This from the Roy tapes as well. I needed to get some Stan Hansen in my life. This is a fine way to introduce him and Ted DiBiase into 1985. They make an excellent team (not my first time seeing them together) that has a different dynamic than the Brody or Gordy teams. Ted is more technical and has a calmer more calculated approach that makes
Sorry for anyone who checks in regularly for posts! Got a little overwhelmed with stuff and wrestling wasn't a priority. However I have begun my look into 1985 All Japan as a result. I needed some low stakes stuff to watch and I figured I could chip away at some stuff. That led me to the more substantial stuff and I'm on the project now. Everything Riki Choshu comes from Roy Lucier's '85 AJPW TV. For some reason all of his matches are omitted from the AJPW Samurai Classic tv episodes (although
This is a continuation of my "get through some DVDs I bought a couple years ago" project. Ha! Who am I kidding? That's 90% of my reviews I just can't seem to keep up. I'm starting to put a dent in it this year. This week I'll be looking at some early battles of Bryan Danielson. These ones are lesser known for one reason or another. For folks that are only aware of his WWE or AEW stuff, this might be something you'd be interested in checking out. My guess is you may have seen some of his better
I'm going through more of my DVD library. I'm trying to knock out some odds & ends DVDs I got during the early years of the Covid pandemic. This one was part of a small lot of DVDs from eBay. I always wanted to get into Evolve but never did. So this wasn't the main draw of the lot but it was a nice bonus. As always, I pick & choose what I watched. I will say it is fun to watch Evolve/DGUSA after watching a fair amount of Full Impact Pro. It brings me back to that time
Let's take a
I'm going through my one-off DVDs trying to get some wrestling in while reducing my backlog of unwatched stuff. I've been meaning to watch Reborn Stage 2 for awhile after picking it up for cheap on eBay (longer than I can remember ago). As always with these things, I cherry pick. This is a pretty historically important show so let's begin!
Austin Aries vs Nigel McGuinness vs Jimmy Rave vs Rocky Romero: Aries' big show debut, Rocky Romero's 2nd night in ROH, Nigel's biggest match to date...
My old friend TNA from the 2000's always helps ease me back into watching wrestling. Here I'll review their Best of the Bloodiest Brawls - Scars and Stitches DVD from 2008. In addition to my normal review, I'll give a scars rating for how bloody and extreme the match is. That doesn't always translate into a worthwhile match so be forewarned.
Jeff Jarrett vs Rhyno (Turning Point 2005): This was a good to very good hardcore match. It was a lot fun as it was mainly a bunch of different spots a
Here we are with Part #3 of the very best of GAEA. We are looking at '98 which features a lot of Meiko Satomura and not so much Chigusa Nagayo. Don't think that's intentional just Meiko along Sonoko Kato seem to be the featured in the best stuff.
Etsuko Mita & Mima Shimoda vs Meiko Satomura & Sonoko Kato (01/15/98): Great match with Satomura and Kato getting plugged into the LCO vs young team equation. So this is very much Mita and Shimoda's match with the youngster team hanging on
I'm back with part #2 of the Very Best of GAEA. This time we're looking at 1997 which is a big year in Joshi. The whole landscape changes and you'll see that here with more familiar faces from AJW.
Akira Hokuto & Toshie Uematsu vs KAORU & Kiyoko Ichiki (01/19/97): Wow! That was awesome! For a good portion there they had a classic match on their hands. Things got a little loose with the younger wrestlers towards the end (disruption to the flow and not so much unforgivable sloppiness)
I am really glad to be watching more Joshi this year. I got burntout/jaded a few years back when watching some of the 1996 AJW tag matches with Double Inoue and my 1997 AJW DVD purchases weren't exactly as expected. See the previous post. So I just turned of the whole thing for years. I'd watch a match here and there but other than a couple odds & ends matches, I figured I'd seen what I wanted. Clearly this year, I've found out that I was wrong. 1997, 2000-01 AJW, Megumi Kudo, 1990-91 JWP h
All Japan Women's Wrestling in 1997 is something I've been interested in from a far. It features many matches that have been favorably reviewed but there's something very different than '92-'96 AJW. The roster is pretty similar but they're finally pushing some of their younger wrestlers to the top. Mima Shimoda and Etsuko Mita (Las Cachorras Orientales) go full heel and become the chair swinging baddies. Kaoru Ito and Tokoko Watanabe were always great in mid card tags and 6 mans are elevated as
This post came about by accident but it's been a fun one. KAI is one of my favorite new guys from watching 2010's AJPW. So here we're going to take a look at some of his bigger matches while in W-1. His arc here probably reflects his booking had Muto & his loyal pals not left and formed Wrestle-1. Anyhow all but the last match are readily available on the 'tube. Let's take a look
vs Seiya Sanada (09/08/13): I think this might be clipped a few minutes based on the time they give
I've had some solid themes for the past few months but June sort of ended up being a time that I am using to handle a bunch of single show projects. This is in an effort to actually work my way through my backlog of DVDs. Here we take a look at the AJPW show from 01/02/15. It's my lone DVD for AJ 2015.
Kotaro Suzuki & Ryuji Hijikata vs. Masanobu Fuchi & Yoshinobu Kanemaru - There's a couple matches before this but this is the real start of the show. Fast paced opening with Kanemaru
This is a small project that I've been pushing back for awhile. No big plans for June so let's take a look at the Briscoe Brothers in NOAH.
Briscoes vs Yoshinobu Kanemaru & Takashi Sugiura (01/07/07): I'm not sure if the fans knew what to make of The Briscoes. This looks like it might be their first appearance in NOAH. They dominated the home team early on with their high energy offense and team work. Eventually the NOAH team has their chance for some payback. The fans are into this and
Here we are in June and it is time for the Best Matches Watched of 2023 so far. I've been trying to stick to different themes/projects each month so I thought it right to organize my list accordingly. If you want to go back and read the reviews then this should help you out. Plus there's a lot of very good and great matches you'll be able to explore as well. A plus sign (+) means its an all time classic match and a contender for Best Match Watched for '23. HM stands for Honorable Mention and is
I'll be looking at the breakout year for Michinoku Pro - 1994. This is the year where the Great Sasuke won over fans during the Super J Cup in NJPW. Many consider that to be one of the best shows of the 1990's. From 1994, we continue to see the wrestlers of Michinoku Pro featured in New Japan, AJW, WAR and FMW. Eventually many will make it over to the U.S. in ECW, WCW and WWF. That's pretty amazing when you consider M-Pro was a regional promotion with no big nationally known star to anchor the p
This installment covers Christopher Daniels/Curry Man in M-Pro or representing M-Pro. This is from the RF video DVD set but there's a Curry Man set out there that has many of the stuff.
Christopher Daniels & Pablo Marquez vs Magnum Tokyo & Kendo - This one Daniels appears as The Fallen Angel instead of Curry Man. My guess is that this takes place early 1999 as Marquez was doing M-Pro then and Curry Man hadn't yet appeared. I can't find this on Quebrada or Cage Match though. Anyhow,
I'm going to be looking at Michinoku Pro Wrestling for the rest of May. Much like FMW, it's one of the first Japanese promotions I really was familiar with. In some part this has to do with Kai En Tai DX coming over to WWF around when I got back into wrestling as a teenager. Then from there its probably WCW vs The World on PS1 where they had TAKA, Shinzaki who I remembered as Hakushi (but also from clips of he & Hayabusa vs RVD & Sabu shown on ECW) and the Great Sasuke who I saw very bri
I'm just going to jump on in!
Brody & Hansen vs Terry & Dory Funk Jr. (12/08): An absolute all time classic match in my book. The sense of chaos and animosity is as high as its been in all of 1984 All Japan. Terry and Dory Jr. against Brody and Hansen finally is the culmination of one of the main themes of the year. Dory and Baba have faced the absolutely dominant monsters on a few occasions. They have hung in there but never truly were able to match the intensity and ferocity of Br
Sorry for the delay! Busy week last week so I missed my self imposed Sunday deadline. But made my Wednesday deadline We're getting to the end of '84 and you know that means Real World Tag League stuff. Excited for that! Let's begin!
Rick Martel vs Jumbo Tsuruta (10/11, aired 10/13): Joined in progress but we get the majority of the match (it seems). Very technically orientated match that stresses their equality. Eventually things get cooking and we get more high stakes action. We get a
Let's keep going with 1984 All Japan!
Brody & Hansen vs Baba & Dory Jr. (08/26): This was fought like a gang fight more than a wrestling match. Absolute furious pace with a stiffness you could hear. A near classic match but with the post match brawl this is a classic. There's a part of me wants to call this an all time classic if you're counting entrance to exit. Did I mention Terry is at ring side?
Team Grandpa!
Rough necks is scared!
-----
At
Let's take a look at more of 1984 AJPW. We've got a really good batch!
Jim Brunzell & Greg Gagne vs Dory Funk Jr. & Kerry von Erich (04/24, aired 04/28): These next two are Roy Lucier's 1984 AJPW TV episodes and not the Retro Classics that were broadcast in the late 90's. These technically should be with Part #2 but I'm putting these here. I'll try to work new ones in chronologically as I go on. A big reason for expanding beyond just my DVD set was I noticed that there were a couple
Here we are with week # 2 of AJPW from 1984. It's a pretty good one. Let's take a look!
Billy Robinson & Brad Rheingans vs Steve Regal & Kevin Kelly (03/04): Wouldn't it be funny if it was the Steve Regal and Kevin Kelly you thought it was? Its not But it's 1984 AWA via AJPW Classics. I thought this might be a boring match but it was quite fun. Regal & Kelly bumped really well for Billy and Brad. I thought they had some good chicken shit moments as well. I don't know if you're
I'm going to be looking at the AJPW Classics for 1984. I want to make an effort to put a sizable dent into my DVD collection this year. I was pulled a little off track with the JWP and Muto AJPW last month. And I am planning on going back to Muto's All Japan perhaps in May. Anyhow we're looking at 1984 AJPW right now. It's interesting to me as it features quite a few Americans that weren't necessarily AJPW regulars. A big part of that is the inclusion of AWA talent since this is when Jumbo was
Back with more of Muto era AJPW! This time I'm going over 2005-2010. Well I'm actually going to sneak in a '03 & a '04 match that I found as well. This post I thought I'd change it up a bit and focus more on the Junior Heavyweight side of things.. or at least matches that included them. AJPW was never really known for their Junior division so I thought I'd check that out since there was a concerted effort by many companies to feature these guys in the 21st century. Just a guess but NOAH see
