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Jetlag

DVDVR 80s Project
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Everything posted by Jetlag

  1. Jetlag
    Plenty brutal match that was characterized by Hashimoto looking great and and Ogasawara having an absolute meltdown, resulting in some gritty highly uncooperative exchanges. Ogasawara seemed too concerned with protecting himself so Takaiwa at one point just starts decking him for real. To make up for the chaos surrounding the karateka, there were some damn good exchanges between Takaiwa and Hashimoto. Hashimoto looked peak level sharp, including busting out some awesome submission counters dropping his full weight on Takaiwas shoulder, and Takaiwa looked great as a gutsy underdog trying to cut through him with lariats. There were some choice Fujiwara/Hash exchanges too altough Fujiwara went to his comedy later.
  2. Jetlag
    This is one of those feel good matches you can just back and enjoy every second of it. Basically Hashimoto & Ogawa waltz in and just destroy everything in their path. STOs, nasty kicks and chops and various cool combination moves abound. Norton & Tenzan don‘t stand much of a chance but they try. You get a great little Norton performance as he sells all the nasty chops and kicks he takes to his shoulder in a big way. There is an art to selling in such a way that everyone can emphatize with you even when you‘re a giant muscled up dude like Norton and he had it down. Tenzan also doesn‘t suck!
  3. Jetlag
    I wish MUGA had been a full time promotion at this time. This was mostly on the mat, which is where everyone here looks good. This was certainly a good use of Hase whose amateur style stuff still looks very powerful. He and Nishimura with his awesome briding where the standouts here early on. Mutoh just did his usual spiel for the finish, altough Fujinami hitting a flying knee on him was really fun and Nishimuras selling made it look better than usual.
  4. Jetlag
    Murakami and his BattlARTS pal shake things up in New Japan. Tanahashi & Kenzo actually step up here, working shootstyle and look good. Tanahashi's matwork is especially way better than pretty much anything he did from 2006 onward. Kenzo throwing big crowbar suplexes is certainly way better than whatever he did later also. This was basically an Ishikawa section followed by a Murakami section with both guys bringing their signature stuff. Ishikawa doing cool matwork and Murakami punching dudes in the face. Good shit but you come out of this match wanting to see a singles match.
  5. Jetlag
    Entertaining 5 vs. 5 Elimination Match. Not Peak WAR vs. Other Promotion material, though there are some good smacks and thuds here. Problem with the match is the booking, as they get rid of the spry guys first and soon you are stuck with an old, broken down Steve Williams, Arashi and Mutoh here. Williams can still throw a nice punch and not do much else at this point. Match has it's moments especially thanks to Orihara and Tenryu, while Shinzaki was working hard to get something cool out of Williams. Overall this match is symptomatic of the depleted roster AJPW was dealing with at this stage however.
  6. Jetlag
    Welcome to Shinya Hashimoto's ZERO1, where 2 olympic medalists, a japanese megastar and a US nobody with a supersoldier gimmick get together to work Memphis meets Shootstyle with a sports entertainment twist. Ghaffari was pretty grotesque but was a really good monster/immovable object here, no lying. The fact his nasty gut squish attack lead to a credible nearfall aswell as him acting invincible like an olympic level greco roman wrestler should added a ton to the match. Hashimoto struggling to do anything and Ogawa finally taking him off his feet all felt like like big moments. Howard looked really good too at this point as he hit all his stuff perfectly, including braining Hashimoto with a world class superkick. Unfortunately the 2nd half kind of breaks down with lots of ref bullshit happening, altough there is still fun to be had with guys getting bowled around and Ghaffari almost killing Ogawa with one of the most devastating splashes ever caught on film. Should add Ogawa looked great here too heating up the fans and selling very well. Borderline listworthy, must watch if you want to check out something unique.
  7. Jetlag
    Hashimoto is the IWGP champion. Ohara is about the lowest ranked guy in Heisei Ishingun. There is some cautious grappling early on which works surprisingly well, but we all know what is in store for young Ohara... he slaps Hashimoto, and about 30 seconds later he is bleeding and getting punched in the face. It won't shock you to hear that Hashimoto was just a vicious beast here, pummeling Ohara on the ground before trying to rip his arm out, braining a bloody Ohara with massive kicks and DDTs... this kind of match is all about what the outmatched lower ranked guy brings to the table, and Ohara does fine. He is able to power out of a DDT in an impressive spot and gets some good shots in and overall is able to just not get destroyed in the span of 2 minutes so this is a little more than a mere squash. Last DDT was just disgusting.
  8. Jetlag
    Brutally stiff fight that blows away pretty much all current (2019) pro wrestling. The opening segment alone where they unload in the corner was just disgusting. The submissions here won't make you forget U-Style, but they did everything with a certain intensity, and you'll be too busy wincing at these two lunatics trying to hit eachother as hard as humanly possible to notice. They did a good job telling the story of the match, which was that Hoshikawa was slowly falling apart as he kept getting destroyed by his super vicious, more precise opponent. I liked how both guys used limb selling to put over the punishment, it makes sense that wyou would pick up injuries after getting kicked a dozen times, even without your opponent specifically targetting a bodypart. Sakata was just a bastard here, Hoshikawa is someone you buy as being really tough, but anytime Hoshikawa started to build momentum Sakata would punch him in the liver or knee him in the face. All the big strikes, including Hoshikawas massive enzuigiris were really well timed. I'm not gonna pretend the match was flawless or some kind of classic as Hoshikawa does a pretty lame no sell and at times the match is just going a long but for this kind of brutal fight it was fairly great. It starts out pretty nasty and you wonder how can they keep this going and have some kind of arc building up, but they pull it off and the last strike that left the loser drooling blood from his mouth really feels like an exclamation point.
  9. Jetlag
    Really really stiff match. This was a small show, but they were certainly loosening eachothers teeth here with brutal knees and elbows. Ran Yu-Yu was hitting some especially stiff enzuigiris, that is normally not a move that will be done in a stiff manner, but she was punting Genki like a football with them. Outside of the stiffness this match didn't do a ton for me as it had poor structure. Also, like their 2000 match, they both went back to offense whenever they pleased. Ran Yu-Yu is a classy wrestler with a cool moveset, aside from the gross elbows and knees I really liked her leg trips. Genki, I dunno. Her power offense doesn't even look that impressive. I'd say this should go in your „watch“-pile as it may do more for others than it did for me (like the 2000 match) and any Ran Yu-Yu singles is worth watching, nitpicking be damned.
  10. Jetlag
    This was a „bigger“ match than Amano/Yoneyama, meaning that it had more nearfalls and bigger moves, but it wasn't as smart. Also, Haruyama looked nowhere close to as good as Yoneyama did at this stage. Bolshoi largely just went to her spots. Spots where good, but the stuff around was largely just happening and didn't draw me in. The one cool moment of the match was Haruyama countering a Fujiwara armbar into a rolling cradle. I am a sucker for Bolshois submissions so the finishing run was somewhat worthwhile... still, a Bolshoi singles match could be so much more.
  11. Jetlag
    Boy, I am glad Amano was given something to do in 2002 JWP, because her working these small show matches is way better to me than GAEA. Here she does a bonafide job working as veteran against pre-curls Kaori Yoneyama. Pretty interesting as it is a good Amano match without flash submissions. They work the mat to begin, and Yoneyama would only be able to hang by using biting etc. to set up her holds. Yoneyama is a perfectly good spunky young wrestler here, with the big dropkicks and the occasional cool lucha move. Amano added some nice veteran touches: blocking Yoneyamas strikes, acting savvy to Yoneyamas flying offense, using an opening to lock in a shoulder separating submission hold etc. Even the comedy spot they did added to the match. Really well executed little match.
  12. Jetlag
    Round Girl is doing a gimmick where she uses her crotch, cleavage and butt the same way Danshoku Dino uses his junk, inbetween posing raunchily. There you go, I just made this match must watch for all you internet wrestling perverts out there. Aside from all the raunchiness this was actually a decent Monterrey/lucharesu style encounter. I have no idea what Sarubobo Mask is supposed to be (google tells me a sarubobo is some kind of monkey baby puppet... no idea why all the high pitched yelling then and where all the other mannerisms of the wrestler are supposed to come from) but I liked the rope hanging headscissor etc. aswell as Round Girls modified indian deathlock.
  13. Jetlag
    Sayama and his fat man flips are great, no questions about it. Solar is really fired up and carried this, even though there wasn't as much matwork here as there needed to be. This would've been really good if Diablo & Azteca weren't so mediocre. Seriously these two have been working their own vanity promotion for years and can't have an exciting exchange to save their lives.
  14. Jetlag
    Fun indy opening match. Soldier with his trainwreck style has endeared himself to me through his 90s work. He was less trainwrecky here but he was still doing stuff a little uncooperatively, a little rough around the edges, which makes him more interesting than your typical polished guy running through his stuff. For example, check out the way he reversed a resthold into a nasty stretch. Taira looked decent and the match had some submissions and reversals slicker than your average junior indy match. Full japan indy point
  15. Jetlag
    Well, there was a 4 way match between Black Terry, Dr. Cerebro and Gringos Locos VIP back in 2010 that was really good. It was basically worked like a 2 vs. 2 match, but I guess it still counts as a lucha multiman cage. And there was that DVDVR list barbedwire cagematch from Tijuana around 2000, never seen it though.
  16. Jetlag
    It's a slow paced AJPW undercard match with a lot of matwork. Pretty cool eh? Sano is a guy you don't know what to expect from here as he is in between UWFi, KINGDOM, BattlARTS and Michinoku Pro, but he rocks the shootstyle here. Some really cool matwork involving him and Smith which had that clash of styles feel. Smith isn't a guy who does a ton for me but to his credit he sold the fuck out of Sanos kicks and knees and looked like he was struggling with all his might here. Really good moment when Sano was destroying Smith in the corner with kicks and Smith goes for a front headlock only to be taken down easily. Tornado is Richard Slinger in a goofy mask and he looked good here grappling and throwing kicks, did not look so good trying to take a huracanrana. Fuchi is obviously still very good at this point but doesn't go full bore aside from a cool pin.
  17. Jetlag
    One of the less technical T2P matches, but there are still a handful of holds shown here that you won't see anywhere else. This was actually made fun by both guys having a ship on their shoulder and punting eachother hard between all the moves. Owashi is all sorts of fun her like a mini Taue with nifty power offense. I prefer this type of short match with a couple big moves over a drawn out 25 minute epic.
  18. Jetlag
    The constant clipping was really annoying, but you still get a pretty fun match here. Essentially Milano absolutely dominates Saito with his whacky holds and Saito has to find ways to fight back. Saito was a little on the bland side here, altough he sold fine and had a nice german suplex, while Milano looked like a star. Especially liked his big abisegiri right before finishing off his opponent which was a very japanese touch as opposed to the more hybrid style that T2P was using.
  19. Jetlag
    Whacky Dragon System name changes tricked me into writing another review for this, for posterity: Much of T2P was basically thrown together ideas for cool moves and sequences. That was felt strongly here, altough the match had a solid structure. You get the initial matwork sections, then a stretch of Yasshi and Yossino working heelishly and hitting a variety of double team moves before a hot ending run. Pretty simple formula but it works fine. My favourite section here was probably the Yossino/Mori hold exchanges which felt like the lucharesu equivalent of two fired up U-Style guys going at it on the mat. Really slick and fast movements. Double teams were cool and the finishing run had some cool, some slightly wonky stuff. It didn't help that this had a whole 7 minutes clipped from it. Still, a nice showing, and probably the most inspied brother YASSHI performance ever.
  20. Jetlag
    Jaguar had a match in Wrestle-1 earlier this year where she hit some sharp looking spin kicks. She's been working consistently the last couple years, but hasn't made tape much for such a legendary wrestler.
  21. Jetlag
    Pudgy mulleted japanese guys beat the fuck out of eachother for your entertainment. Tatsuo Nakano is just the master of this kind of brutal under 10 minutes brawl, and Kitahara is Kitahara. Starts out with a pretty intense scramble to the outside. Nakano of course gets a bloody nose, hard to see where, so he gets up and fucking breaks Kitaharas nose with a knee of his own. I was surprised he may have out-stiffed Kitahara in this one. Kitahara does throw one absolutely disgusting leg kick though which Nakano sold accordingly great. Short and intense but you already knew that.
  22. Jetlag
    Yamazaki at this point was honestly a kind of dull worker. That does not matter though because Tatsuo Nakano is here to kick his ass. Anytime Nakano gets close he is battering Yamazaki with headbutts. At some point during the early grappling Nakano gets a bloody nose and then blows the blood from his nose during a leglock. Yamazaki DOES kick Nakano like a dog at one point but largely looks overwhelmed. Nakano even slaps him like a bitch after hitting a suplex. Nakano nearfalls were awesome and the crowd went nuts for him, easy Yamazaki finish not so much.
  23. Jetlag
    This was fine. I'm not a huge fan of shootstyle matches with a ton of leglocks, altough Fujiwara is one of the few wrestlers who can make it somewhat interesting. He basically outclassed Yamazaki here with amazing fast submissions and counters left and right. When Yamazaki finally starts to unwind it's somewhat pedestrian as he's reluctantly beating on Fujiwara with elbows and knees in the ropes. Though I did love the little kick he belted Fujiwara with when he went down, a nice touch of taking out built up frustration. Fujiwara blasts him with those awesome body shots though a seemingly punch drunk Yamazaki hits a lucky suplex and quickly puts the old man away for great reaction. Parts of this were great but the overall structure and Yamazaki being Yamazaki didn't draw me in as much as it possibly could've had.
  24. Jetlag
    Big megastar vs. Pudgy short jobber. Nakano doesn't care though and uses Maeda as his punching bag with awesome kicks, punches and headbutts. The first minute or so is slow but this quickly picks up with brawling. Maeda looked pretty badass putting the little fucker away too.
  25. Jetlag
    This is one of my favourite UWF matchups. Even young Minoru Suzuki is best as a dickhead beating someone down, and Nakano is just a pitbull. And they maul eachother something fierce here. There is some intense grappling, with veteran Nakano mostly dominating early through sheer tenacity. Suzuki would hit a big fireman carry only for Nakano to keep controlling him. There is an awesome leglock battle leading to a really intense nearfall for a single leg crab. After he had bruised Suzukis face with kicks on the ground, Nakano would wrench his face further with a nasty facelock. Obviously the highlight here are Suzukis out of the this world brutal stomps and kneedrops. The shootstyle Gotch Piledriver was just amazing aswell as Nakano wasn't willing to take that at all and lowered his weight only for Suzuki to pick him up. Loved Suzuki getting fired up to a huge crowd pop after the low blow. Finish is something very rare for shootstyle but executed about as believably as you can. Just really intense brutal wrestling, great moment after great moment that the crowd loved.
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