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Jetlag

DVDVR 80s Project
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  1. Jetlag
    Jesus CHRIST! The next match that really grows in my estimation through the power of context. So we saw Yoshida destroy all comers. Futagami has no chance, right? Unlike Yagi or Bennett Futagami really doesn't have any overwelming advantage. But Futagami is like this mad wrestling improvisation artist. Crafty and unpredictable! And she ends up giving Yoshida a run for her money. There was not a ton of matwork (who would want to go to the mat with Yoshida at this point), but every single exchange here felt unique and special. Yoshida just goes to kill Mikiko the whole time and Mikiko keeps making up exit doors from nothing like she is a cartoon mouse being chased by at cartoon lawn mower. Not only was the wrestling great, but the timing and selling was brilliantly tricked out. I mean, that is not an easy thing to do when you have these lengthy submission attempts, and the teases and nearfalls were among the best I've ever seen, including one of the hardest struggles for a rope break ever caught on film. They also told the story through their facial expressions, perhaps moreso than in any other match before. By the end Futagami looks mentally scarred, she has made up all this shit and nothing is working, while Yoshida just has a pissed off look on her face and goes for the Air Raid Crash in frustration. It even makes me want to forgive some of the no selling. Brilliant, swanky, unique match. ARSION is on fire.
  2. Jetlag
    Hikari Fukuoka/Mikiko Futagami vs. Aja Kong/Candy Okutsu (3/16) We get to see Fukuoka praying before the match while dressed like a cowboy. Uhm... wasn't Fukuoka a former JWP champ at this point? I guess she got to showcase her spots a bit in this match, but other than that didn't seem much special. She bit Candy in the foot at one point. This was a weird match, it wasn't boring or terrible or anything, but there was not much engrossing about the action. There were also a few blown spots. There was some hard hitting early on, and the sections with Aja and Futagami were solid, but, uh... it started to feel like a move exhibition at some point. It was slow, and there were transitions so not a hyperactive type move exhibit. Aja for some reason did a lot of stooging and gets played like a fool a bunch of times... yeah that was interesting. Futagami does a cool tilt a whirl gutbuster thing... hey Cesaro should steal that. And she ended the match with a nice backfist/shotai combo. Candy and Fukuoka each did about 40 top rope moves. Yeah. Candy Okutsu/Ai Fujita vs. Ayako Hamada/Mika Akino (4/14) The first appearance of the HamAKINO pair. Also the first appearance of the impossibly perky Ai Fujita, another name that has fallen into obscurity. Candy is quickly starting to annoy me with her tendency to do every top rope move 3 times in a row. When this wasn't Candy hitting her 38th moonsault, it was quite good. The other 3 work this kind of quasi lucharesu style, and they kept it nice and interesting. All the flying, fancy submissions and rollups looked polished and served a purpose. Candy thankfully didn't do much making this match feel like a showcase for the 3 promising workers illustrating how far they've come. The finish further underlines this. Mariko Yoshida vs. Mikiko Futagami (4/14) Jesus CHRIST! The next match that really grows in my estimation through the power of context. So we saw Yoshida destroy all comers. Futagami has no chance, right? Unlike Yagi or Bennett Futagami really doesn't have any overwelming advantage. But Futagami is like this mad wrestling improvisation artist. Crafty and unpredictable! And she ends up giving Yoshida a run for her money. There was not a ton of matwork (who would want to go to the mat with Yoshida at this point), but every single exchange here felt unique and special. Yoshida just goes to kill Mikiko the whole time and Mikiko keeps making up exit doors from nothing like she is a cartoon mouse being chased by at cartoon lawn mower. Not only was the wrestling great, but the timing and selling was brilliantly tricked out. I mean, that is not an easy thing to do when you have these lengthy submission attempts, and the teases and nearfalls were among the best I've ever seen, including one of the hardest struggles for a rope break ever caught on film. They also told the story through their facial expressions, perhaps moreso than in any other match before. By the end Futagami looks mentally scarred, she has made up all this shit and nothing is working, while Yoshida just has a pissed off look on her face and goes for the Air Raid Crash in frustration. It even makes me want to forgive some of the no selling. Brilliant, swanky, unique match. ARSION is on fire.
  3. Jetlag
    Continuation from the previous match! Even more great stumpy legged wrestling. Hamaguchi and Inoue have some of the most beautiful armdrags I've ever seen. References the previous match in wonderful ways. Then everything goes haywire! Animosity! Blood! Everyone's throwing punches! Big drama! HUGE Spike Piledriver! Beauitful finish! Yes, Ditch says the finish is bad, but I disagree. It was perfect. This match was fast paced and just flew by. How these guys never get dropped as among the best 70s workers is beyond me. Here you had a match with beautiful wrestling, cleverness, high end offense and bumps, hatred, blood and a hot finish. This whole thing pretty much ruled. I should get all the IWE out there.
  4. Jetlag
    Long junior tag from 1979! Hard not to love a match that has these stocky juniors doing all their awesome offense. Awesome takedowns, knee drops, punches, sumo slaps and flying headbutts a plenty. Match also had a really smart layout and clever use of double teams. Starts in a rush and then turns into a long uphill battle. The 2nd fall of this match alone as better than a lot of 1 fall singles matches. I guess the match peaked early when Inoue and Hoshino get into serious fight in the middle of the match, but that was an amazing moment and the rest of the match was still impossibly cool.
  5. Jetlag
    This was a pretty good match. Worked slow, no stupid shit, and quite a bit of selling. They did a nice job building to basic spots like a shoulderblock to make you give a shit. Yoshiko was kind of working like an underdog babyface here, which is weird as she is a natural menacing badass and once assaulted a 90 pound half blind girl, but she was pretty good in it. They kept things interesting all the way through and the finish was a hit. I think people would be buzzing about this if it were on a WWE PPV or something.
  6. Jetlag
    It is the weirdest thing that in 2016, the closest thing we have to a Tenryu/Hashimoto style battle of mythical asskickers match is between two tubby japanese girls in a vanity promotion with a ridiculous name. All the people I read who watched this show hated this match. Why do they hate it so much and I like it so much? Maybe I'm just an imbecile without knowing it. I guess they expected fat, old Aja to be little more athletic and Miss "I once shattered the face of a drama actress" Yoshiko to work a good clean no frills technical wrestling match or something. Anyways, I loved big chunks of this. Loved the entire opening section with Yoshiko going right into attempting to strangle Aja and Aja just slapping the equilibrium out of her. Yoshiko kind of works like 1990 Kawada, asskicker with a few flying moves, but because she is thick her sentons etc. look great. Yoshiko understood perfectly how to sell for Aja, as she was landing lots of little shots, but whenever Aja clocked her back her eyes would gaze into space as if she had been knocked completely out of the match. I didn't even hate the slow brawling on the outside because Aja just grabbed this huge piece of metal and chucked it right at Yoshiko like we played King Kong when we were kids, and somehow the slowness fed into Yoshiko's comeback. Didn't hate the endless lariat exchange, because it was done perfectly, and I can buy these two bears getting into a slugfest much easier than when it's two skinny jokers doing it. Yoshiko has a really hurty looking, Ikeda-like slightly modified short lariat where she hits Aja in the ear and the side of the neck. They both sell it very well, and the hits get slower but still land hard, until they are doing that old school "only held up by eachother" spot which I love, and then Yoshiko lariats Aja right in the face. Loved Yoshiko lifting Aja like it was Hogan/Andre, loved Aja doing a feint and clocking Yoshiko, loved both women selling during the finishing run. I'm not going to pretend this is a flawless match or something, but still. Those flaws are forgettable. Loved the match, really.
  7. Jetlag
    ARSION with a big title match to close out the year. Candy is back as Candy and debugs another ridiculous outfit. Her necklace even seemed to be giving her trouble. I don't wanna mock any further, because for a match that has a tasseled cowgirl in it this had some super matwork. Candy can handle herself with Yoshida, but it became fast apparent that Candy would want to take this match into a standing position while Yoshida always goes back to the mat no matter what. Candy did a bunch of popping up and got all her shit in while Yoshida tried 7,000 different submissions on her until she got the right one. I mean, it was all high end, innovative work, but a little bloated and felt a little too much like a showcase for both girls rather than a title match. Props to Yoshida however as she was utterly stellar once again.
  8. Jetlag
    Aja Kong: abuses children and gets paid for it. This goes pretty much like you expect it to go. Aja slaps Ayako around a bunch and steps on her bad arm while looking unimpressed by Ayako's feeble offensive attempts. Hamada uses her agility to survive and it builds to Ayako landing increasingly bigger spots on Aja. It develops into a quite good match, even if a little by the numbers and you've seen it a thousand times from Aja before. The thing that sets it apart is that Ayako hits some spots vastly beyond the ability of most wrestler. Ayako didn't have the sharp offense she would develop later to combat a monster like Aja, making the match feel even more one sided. She gave a spirited selling performance, that's for sure. By the end she looked as if pushed beyond her tolerance point but just wouldn't quit.
  9. Jetlag
    Uhm... I'm starting to think my brain isn't big enough to process this kind of match. I didn't like the offensive choices in the beginning of the match (X-Factors and Flying Clotheslines and so on). Then the match just kind of went into a spiral. Lots of unpredictable twists and turns, partner interferences and all that. There was one nifty Yagi/Fukawa exchange that I could sink my teeth into, and Ohmukai countered Tamada's Rolling Elbow by punching her in the face at one point. They play off the previous Tag Final match, and I liked some of the stuff near the end. The dead crowd didn't help either. I'll leave it to the joshi experts to judge this match.
  10. Jetlag
    I've seen this match before and felt it was great. But watching all this stuff now has changed my whole outlook on this bout. Proof that sometimes context is everything. We've seen Mariko demolish everybody else on the mat, and everyone tries to beat her standing. But here's Yagi. Hiromi Yagi, in this match, feels like the lost great female worker. Like we all fantasybook Tamon Honda to go to BattlARTS or Carl Greco in U-Style, here is Yagi, an unusual worker in her home promotion, going into an environment that fits her perfectly, and blooming. Nobody was able to do shit to Yoshida on the mat, until Hiromi Yagi came to town. Even the opening move makes sense now: Yoshida catches Yagi and drops her, and this match is business as usual right? Well not tonight, because Yagi goes back in and proceeds to put the fear of god into Yoshida. Yoshida would show weakness and Yagi would throw herself at her, Yoshida would try a move and Yagi would get her into trouble like no one before. Not only can Yagi hang on the mat, she can win. Suddenly all of Yoshida's sweeps and grounding aren't working. Yoshida would go to the mat, and suddenly she would be the one in trouble. The bandaged arm didn't even seem that important now. In a way, knowing that made the lulls/slow parts better as the bout had a type of tension building that I don't recall seeing in many other matches. Now I understand the crowd reaction when Yoshida escapes that armbar but doesn't engage further. For the first time, Yoshida doesn't want to be on the mat anymore. They do a tremendous job teasing the big throws, and Yagi ends up meeting her tragedy. No wonder she didn't want to shake hands after the match. Unbelievable, mindblowing, truely great contest. I've loved it before but now it's in my canon of untouchable superclassics. The swank moves, slick matwork were present as before, but the story that the match told has now been elevated in my mind. Hiromi Yagi, what an astounding young lady.
  11. Jetlag
    And here is AKINO in her first appearance on the set. Feels a little weird to watch this tiny young girl pop up in a title match less than a year after her debut, , but I ain't complaining! Pretty boss match for what it is. You can totally see the pet project thing with Akino. She wasn't a mat genius or anything, but she gets to survive Yoshida for a while and gets to impress with all these swank. Yoshida pretty much takes her apart twisting from one outlandish submission into another, while Akino goes for rope climbing spots and dives that a rookie really shouldn't be doing. A little robotic from Akino at times she couldn't hit everything cleanly, but her selling was solid enough and Yoshida is stellar just doing all this nifty stuff for 15 minutes. Y'know, I think if there's one thing missing from current junior weight wrestling it's this kind of SWANK. Yes yes I know they do all kinds of crazy spots and dives and 2.99999999999 counts and whatnot, but I can't name a single wrestler active in 2017 as swanky as Yoshida. Maybe Virus or Solar or some other luchador, but nobody elsewhere. I mean look at all these preposterous, twisty leg hooking holds! That fucking wristclutch throw she did just out of nowhere! People talk about DG being spectacular, but fuck that. A basic sweep from Yoshida is spectacular.
  12. Jetlag
    Mariko Yoshida vs. Mika Akino (1/17) And here is AKINO in her first appearance on the set. Feels a little weird to watch this tiny young girl pop up in a title match less than a year after her debut, , but I ain't complaining! Pretty boss match for what it is. You can totally see the pet project thing with Akino. She wasn't a mat genius or anything, but she gets to survive Yoshida for a while and gets to impress with all these swank. Yoshida pretty much takes her apart twisting from one outlandish submission into another, while Akino goes for rope climbing spots and dives that a rookie really shouldn't be doing. A little robotic from Akino at times she couldn't hit everything cleanly, but her selling was solid enough and Yoshida is stellar just doing all this nifty stuff for 15 minutes. Y'know, I think if there's one thing missing from current junior weight wrestling it's this kind of SWANK. Yes yes I know they do all kinds of crazy spots and dives and 2.99999999999 counts and whatnot, but I can't name a single wrestler active in 2017 as swanky as Yoshida. Maybe Virus or Solar or some other luchador, but nobody elsewhere. I mean look at all these preposterous, twisty leg hooking holds! That fucking wristclutch throw she did just out of nowhere! People talk about DG being spectacular, but fuck that. A basic sweep from Yoshida is spectacular. Mariko Yoshida vs. Hiromi Yagi (2/18) I've seen this match before and felt it was great. But watching all this stuff now has changed my whole outlook on this bout. Proof that sometimes context is everything. We've seen Mariko demolish everybody else on the mat, and everyone tries to beat her standing. But here's Yagi. Hiromi Yagi, in this match, feels like the lost great female worker. Like we all fantasybook Tamon Honda to go to BattlARTS or Carl Greco in U-Style, here is Yagi, an unusual worker in her home promotion, going into an environment that fits her perfectly, and blooming. Nobody was able to do shit to Yoshida on the mat, until Hiromi Yagi came to town. Even the opening move makes sense now: Yoshida catches Yagi and drops her, and this match is business as usual right? Well not tonight, because Yagi goes back in and proceeds to put the fear of god into Yoshida. Yoshida would show weakness and Yagi would throw herself at her, Yoshida would try a move and Yagi would get her into trouble like no one before. Not only can Yagi hang on the mat, she can win. Suddenly all of Yoshida's sweeps and grounding aren't working. Yoshida would go to the mat, and suddenly she would be the one in trouble. The bandaged arm didn't even seem that important now. In a way, knowing that made the lulls/slow parts better as the bout had a type of tension building that I don't recall seeing in many other matches. Now I understand the crowd reaction when Yoshida escapes that armbar but doesn't engage further. For the first time, Yoshida doesn't want to be on the mat anymore. They do a tremendous job teasing the big throws, and Yagi ends up meeting her tragedy. No wonder she didn't want to shake hands after the match. Unbelievable, mindblowing, truely great contest. I've loved it before but now it's in my canon of untouchable superclassics. The swank moves, slick matwork were present as before, but the story that the match told has now been elevated in my mind. Hiromi Yagi, what an astounding young lady.
  13. Jetlag
    Hashimoto vs. Naoya Ogawa, 10/11/99 Either that or something else with Hash.
  14. Jetlag
    I thought we had some joshi superfans on this board, how the hell does this not have a thread? This was another fantastic contest in the series of Meiko vs. Game Opponents. Chihiro Hashimoto is this brawny amateur wrestler and works like Rick Steiner. They start of with great mat wrestling and Meiko does some awesome wristlock work, before the inevitable kicks in. I've said it before, but Meiko really has the sharpest offense in the world. She just kicked the snot out of Chihiro. Clearly Chihiro is her pet project, and while the young girl has some iffy moments, all her throws ruled and her german suplex was deadly. I also really liked how she rolled to the apron to evade her opponent. Because it's a Satomura match, everything was timed and built perfectly and felt like a fight. Really great match despite a few soft transitions, that the finish more than makes up for anyways.
  15. Jetlag
    The Saints vs. The Royals. A technical sprint! Compare this to the tags from japan or the US from the 70s and it'll look like it's from another planet. They go all out with the tricked out technical stuff. There wasn't much usual tag psychology, but they worked a highly competitive match. Walton kept bringing up the size difference, giving the bout a nice feel of an uphill battle with the Royals having to be as slick as possible. They work their butts off taking all these awesome bumps and sprinting across the ring lightning fast. Some of the best criss cross running spots I've ever seen, and it felt bordering on dangerous especially Faulkner who seemed always close to causing a crash with how reckless he was. My favourite guy in the match may have been Bert as he did all these crazy lucha-ish submissions. They do a bunch of really great nearfalls - british wrestling isn't nearfall heavy, but having watched a bunch of it I knew a fall could end with any move, and they do so many teases that had me and the crowd by the balls the whole time. Because getting a pinfall in WoS is treated as catching and containing the other guy rather than knocking him silly and then lying on top of him for the 3 count, the match never felt excessive. Great, intricate bout that flew by.
  16. Jetlag
    Rie Tamada/Hiromi Yagi vs. Michiko Ohmukai/Yumi Fukawa (ARSION Tag Titles 12/18) Uhm... I'm starting to think my brain isn't big enough to process this kind of match. I didn't like the offensive choices in the beginning of the match (X-Factors and Flying Clotheslines and so on). Then the match just kind of went into a spiral. Lots of unpredictable twists and turns, partner interferences and all that. There was one nifty Yagi/Fukawa exchange that I could sink my teeth into, and Ohmukai countered Tamada's Rolling Elbow by punching her in the face at one point. They play off the previous Tag Final match, and I liked some of the stuff near the end. The dead crowd didn't help either. I'll leave it to the joshi experts to judge this match. Aja Kong vs. Ayako Hamada (12/18) Aja Kong: abuses children and gets paid for it. This goes pretty much like you expect it to go. Aja slaps Ayako around a bunch and steps on her bad arm while looking unimpressed by Ayako's feeble offensive attempts. Hamada uses her agility to survive and it builds to Ayako landing increasingly bigger spots on Aja. It develops into a quite good match, even if a little by the numbers and you've seen it a thousand times from Aja before. The thing that sets it apart is that Ayako hits some spots vastly beyond the ability of most wrestler. Ayako didn't have the sharp offense she would develop later to combat a monster like Aja, making the match feel even more one sided. She gave a spirited selling performance, that's for sure. By the end she looked as if pushed beyond her tolerance point but just wouldn't quit. Mariko Yoshida vs. Candy Okutsu (Queen of ARSION Title, 12/18) ARSION with a big title match to close out the year. Candy is back as Candy and debugs another ridiculous outfit. Her necklace even seemed to be giving her trouble. I don't wanna mock any further, because for a match that has a tasseled cowgirl in it this had some super matwork. Candy can handle herself with Yoshida, but it became fast apparent that Candy would want to take this match into a standing position while Yoshida always goes back to the mat no matter what. Candy did a bunch of popping up and got all her shit in while Yoshida tried 7,000 different submissions on her until she got the right one. I mean, it was all high end, innovative work, but a little bloated and felt a little too much like a showcase for both girls rather than a title match. Props to Yoshida however as she was utterly stellar once again. So that's it for 1998! To say ARSION has achieved a lot would be an understatement. They introduced all these wrestlers in their new characters, established it's own style (including educating the audience on submissions), made good use of tournaments and upset wins and delivered a whole bunch of good matches. Earth to indy wrestling promoters: this is how you establish your new company. Best ARSION Matches of 1998 Yumi Fukawa vs. Michiko Ohmukai (4/11) Mikiko Futagami vs. Rie Tamada (8/31) Mariko Yoshida vs. Rie Tamada (4/17) Rie Tamada/Hiromi Yagi vs. Tiger Dream/Ayako Hamada (Twinstar Tag Final, 12/7) Reggie Bennett vs. Mariko Yoshida (8/31) Mariko Yoshida vs. Ayako Hamada (8/31) Aja Kong vs. Mariko Yoshida (6/21) Aja Kong vs. Michiko Ohmukai (2/18) Mariko Yoshida vs. Candy Okutsu (Queen of ARSION Title, 12/18) Yumi Fukawa vs. Candy Okutsu (2/18) Reggie Bennett vs. Mariko Yoshida (5/5) Mariko Yoshida vs. Mikiko Futagami (5/5) Candy Okutsu vs. Mikiko Futagami (4/17) Michiko Ohmukai vs. Rie Tamada (8/9) Mariko Yoshida vs. Michiko Ohmukai (8/31) Mikiko Futagami vs. Michiko Ohmukai (7/21) Aja Kong vs. Ayako Hamada (12/18) Rie Tamada vs. Candy Okutsu (5/5) Yumi Fukawa vs. Rie Tamada (7/21)
  17. Jetlag
    Threw up this list from my notepad file. Didn't do anything from before 1970 because there's so many matches there where there's no date. Just doesn't feel fair. Also kinda feel like the Top 10-30 area of some members list would be much more interesting than the #1. With so many years there are so many great matches that picking 1 feels like an injustice.
  18. Jetlag
    Yes I know. This goes 45 minutes and we all can't stand that! But bear with me. I love me a good 7 minute Velocity match, but I also love me a 45 minute title match, when it's good, and this is good. I know we live in a fast paced age and people can't sit down and concentrate on a piece of entertainment for 40 minutes anymore. But for me, it's basically like watching an epic movie that's about two men fighting to death. That is the strange fascination of wrestling, forever and always. With the way this is filmed and the slightly weird sound mix, it kind of feels like a movie too. They are wrestling in this bright ring surrounded by folks in colorful 70s clothes, and above them is only darkness. The action in this bout was kept extremely simple, and in a way the audience may have been the third worker in this match carrying the action, as the arena was just trembling with excitement to see Jumbo claim the title. I am not the biggest fan of either guy, and in terms of brilliant moves there wasn't much to see, as they kept the bout nice and simple, but the selling was spot on, and they painted the time in such a way that the match just flew by. Call me oldfashioned, but no amount of neck breaking suplex moves or daring stunts is as endearing to me as seeing a wrestling match that has two guys working a dozen variations on the most basic of holds. Then you watch as the match turns into this intricate struggle, with Bock making a one armed comeback by kicking the dogshit out of Jumbo's kidney as the audience gets nervous, and then Jumbo stepping forward and FEELING IT and just chopping away at Bock, and this match turns into this really intricate struggle. They were selling the moves in such a way that I felt any well placed blow at the right time could turn the tide, and Jumbo here puts on maybe his greatest performance that I've ever seen as he does this brilliant one legged comeback and then some of the best leg selling ever caught on film that you selling nazis really really got to see. Then there's of course the "travelling champ makes the local yokel look like he could take the title" trope but this wasn't that, this was Jumbo the hopeful japanese superathlete making minced meat of Bock while all the folks in the audience no matter their background will him on. Then add in a bunch of great 70s spots, awesome Cobra Twist, teasing of the Butterfly Suplex, Bock making use of the ring, epic blood, Jumbo having all these great rushes where it looks like he is kicking Bock into a smear, and outrageous finish that decides the match by a whisker, and you have yourself a classic. Beautiful beautiful bout.
  19. Jetlag
    We move straight to the finals. And also the first appearance of Hiromi Yagi! Apparently in ARSION she was mostly used in tags in 1998, which is a bit of shame because she was pure gold here. She was a feisty harpy cladded in leopard fur and did all these brilliant swank moves, including a chickenwing style suplex and chokehold that really need to be stolen. Watching this match, I was wondering if Arsion with it's reintroduction of lucha into the joshi style was merely a return to those early 80s Jaguar Yokota tags which are heavy on lucha. Because they do all this flying around and ranas and you have Hamada doing headbutts like her Papa, and between that they go into all these brilliant mat scrambles and takedowns and it's just a rush to watch. Of course being it's ARSION the swank lucha rollups lead into shootstyle submissions and legbars and what not. For all you psychology nerds Tamada and Yagi do some fierce isolation work on the plucky babyfaces here, leading to a series of dizzying double teams that actually lead to the finish. Didn't really matter to me because the wrestling on display here was fantastic, breath taking, inspiring, what have you. The first great ARSION tag I've watched so far.
  20. Jetlag
    Finally Yoshida gets a break from having to wrestle big, heavy opponents. This was worked the same as Fukawa/Ohmukai but better because Yoshida always adds a certain uncooperativeness and all these awesome takedowns and mat transitions to a match. Ohmukai wants to play reckless kicker and Yoshida just mangles her legs on the mat. One of the things I like aboutYoshida is that she always maneuvers around and changes positions so her opponent can't get the ropes. Other wrestler will just sit there and let the guy crawl to safety, not so easy with Yoshida. Not that Ohmukai sold any of that, but man I don't even care. Match was short, to the point, and Yoshida looked like a beast.
  21. Jetlag
    Pretty much a move exhibition where they cram as much as possible into a sub 5 minute match. There were a few swank moves and counters and the execution was good, so, this gets the Full Worldwide Point. Mikiko kind of works like a WCW PowerPlant guy in this meaning she busts out all kind of cool random stuff while Ayako sticks to her game lucha offense.
  22. Jetlag
    Reggie took the spider woman out of the last tournament; can she do it again? I love this matchup. They work this like the previous match and do callbacks and all that and start out with a bunch of matwork and it's all stupidly great. Reggie may have been better on the mat here than before as she did these great spots where she just collapses Mariko with her power and weight and it's brilliant. Mariko sells big time for Reggie and snaps her submissions on like a snare. I mean the first 5 minutes of this match would've done Negro Navarro proud. Reggie really lays in the chops and Mariko does her damndest to avoid the power moves. It all leads to an utterly brilliant finish. Fantastic stuff and it's so cool to see Bennett as a gaijin monster that doesn't suck on the mat.
  23. Jetlag
    This was kind of like an abridged version of their 4/11 match but not as good. They start out all scrappy and slapping eachother at the bell, and then it was Ohmukai's kicks and suplexes vs. Fukawa's submissions. Fukawa had a few neat counters and worked over Ohmukai's arm, which is a good idea when you look at Ohmukai's super thin matchstick like arms. I cringe when I see a wrestler with arms that skinny, male or female. It wasn't anything transcendent like previous matches and I felt Ohmukai was physically awkward at times. Also, the match was short and I felt like they were getting all their shit in. The crowd was also fairly dead too.
  24. Jetlag
    Oh Mikiko Futagami, where you have been all my life? This was tremendous. Two workers who are always doing something nifty having a gritty match. Tamada worked over Futagami's leg for most of the bout, and Futagami came right back at her with all these neat/violent comebacks. Some of you selling purists might object to Futagami's selling here, but I thought it was just right. She was initially overwhelmed and would collapse after landing a single comeback move, then slowly work out the kinks, always hobble around and slapping at it as if to get it back working 100 %, and the leg seemed to come back and haunt her at the most uncomfortable times. Did I mention Futagami has this really great palm strike and nifty armbars and reckless desperation kicks and whatnot? Really dug how Tamada seemed to have Futagami's number throughout the match but went desperate near the end when Futagami kept catching her bad arm. Another damn good match where Tamada targets a limb, another damn good match where GAMI is GAMI.
  25. Jetlag
    Mari Apache: Genius Luchadola. This was pretty much a lucharesu exhibition with some big nearfalls. Not a lot of selling and a bunch of pop-up transitions. I liked this as Mari is chunky so her graceful flying around is really cool to watch and I prefer swank armdrags over dragon suplexes. Plus Ayako continues to look incredible in her second match ever. Full worldwide point.
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