AstroBoy

My God this was insane. As far as deathmatch wrestling goes I am surely drawn to the spectacle element. I appreciate and think that there can be *good* deathmatches with strong psychology and a strong story. But I am watching this match -- and all wrestling to some extent -- to see the bizarre. To see the larger than life, to see the car crash, to see the morbid and the fascinating. This was all of that, and in the case of the car, some of it literally. Some of the falls here are absolutely horrific especially Kasai diving right into the barbed wire on accident and Zandig getting dropped in the worst fucking powerbomb ever off the hood of a car onto a table where he just lands on his face in the concrete. The slam off the truck to the tables that just spread apart on impact was also brutal. As something that you can't look away from this was unbelievable. ***1/2

Love these junior/heavy matchups and Takaiwa has a soft spot in my heart. Maybe a tad bit overkill with Takaiwa utilizing the top rope death valley driver and then getting an even hotter nearfall off the death valley driver to lariat combo. And this was an awesome lariat. Chono takes it and you can see him just absorb the impact in his upper body and crumple to the mat. Great stuff. Takaiwa admirably fights off Chono but gets shut down and sent away by the STF.

This was a really awesome few minutes with a great closing stretch and Liger really asserting himself, almost bossing Fujinami around with palm strikes and getting a great nearfall off a brainbuster. Fujinami uses some savvy to wear down Liger and eventually trap him in the figure four in a nice finish where both guys look really strong coming out of it. Definitely would like to see this whole thing.

This looked pretty fun from what made it. I like Nakanishi a lot here and the crowd responds to him big time. He comes across like a big deal and Tenzan, by contrast, looks pretty sloppy and secondary in this. There are some brute spots between the two but Nakanishi just shined brighter than Tenzan here. Hot crowd, though, plus a fun slugfest.

I was pretty high on this. It puts a premium on matwork, focused targeting on offense, and not much in the way of maximalism. On top of that it gets over Akiyama even more as a cutthroat guy climbing to the top by any means necessary. When he targets the knee of Kobashi it's great. When he thinks he has Kobashi beat with the exploders and reacts to Kobashi kicking out his expression is great. And so he just kills Kobashi and chokes him out for a fantastic finish. Kobashi kind of blew off the leg as a thing but he was good here too. Both guys incorporated the neckwork on Akiyama really well. And Kobashi brought a fun bully kind of attitude coming out to knock Akiyama down a peg. Build up to a bigger match or not, I really enjoyed this alot. ****1/4

I liked this structurally as a way of caging Murahama's energy into something a little more quick and heated. In some of his performances I've really liked him but been a bit wary of a tendency to maybe come back too fast and too hard from punishment and blow off selling a little too much. This fixed that because it's a straight up fight and Togo changes the landscape by putting him through a table and using chairs. It's more sensible pacing as they fight back and forth and Murahama comes across much more fired up but outgunned in the end as Togo proves too much on this night. Definitely a good stumbling block along Murahama's path and a good Togo performance. ***1/4

I started coming to the board in earnest as the GWE project was starting. I decided to take a shot and participate and I have visited here pretty much every day since. It has really helped me expand my love of wrestling and helped turn fun childhood memories into a fun outlet and hobby today. I've had the pleasure of meeting a few of the people involved with the board and I've loved diving into the 80's sets, the PWO2K project, and many other things along the way. Hope everyone enjoys the holidays.

This was pretty enjoyable. Misawa played his role perfectly, bothered just enough to respond with some viciousness, while Ogawa did most of the leg work in a satisfactory manner. Ikeda felt mostly "there" but the subplot of Shiga trying to man up to Misawa helped this along a good deal. Side note from an otherwise fine underdog effort from Shiga -- he threw some of the absolutely most laughably light dropkicks and strikes in this. Aside from that lightness it was fun to see him take cheapshots at the boss and ultimately get smacked down. Great simple finish too. ***

Just having things actually ready to go when they launch and knowing their technical and platform capabilities/problems would be a huge step.

Yeah I just looked at the pricing structure for ClubWWN and it's pretty stupid. Gabe is arguing with people on Twitter about how they want to give the most options to fans while also saying he didn't realize a ROKU app wasn't actually ready to go yet. Fantastic start.

Morishima was a beast here and I really loved his clashes with Rikio. The rest of it I could pretty much live without and this was pretty bloated without much interesting to sustain it but they all get a chance to air their stuff out a little bit and grow into bigger roles this way. I don't find Inoue as go-away as some I guess. He is serviceable. But this was all about Morishima and to a lesser extent, Rikio. **

This was pretty middling though I was surprised to see Izumida go over Omori so strongly. Fun to see Taue vs. Takayama interactions and Takayama stood out for the second straight night for sure. Other than that, this wasn't lighting my world on fire. **1/2

I think I get where Dylan is coming from and he has a point but I'm not sure I have a great answer or solution. I know that for myself, it's been somewhat easy to get involved on the board a little more through match discussion and projects that usher that kind of involvement. Sort of like it might be easier to cover a live event for a newspaper instead of unleashing an editorial. . . sometimes it might be a little daunting to approach some huge narrative discussion until you feel more comfortable on this board. That said, I don't know an obvious solution. My instinct tells me maybe there should be some way to combine or merge the microscope stuff with the MDA stuff. Maybe keep the match discussion threads and subforums and add on another section that could cover microscope projects, comparisons, philosophical discussions of style, time, region, etc. Basically any longer form projects that could spawn from match discussion. And the two could feed into one another. Just a loosely formed idea.

Kenta really did hold his own here. Comparatively, I thought he was much more interesting and watchable than Marufuji the night before. Both the crispness of his offense and his ability to make Asako's offense look good. The match is decent enough with the slam outside changing the complexion and Kenta getting a nice reaction for a run of dropkicks and some fun underdog offense. A camel clutch finishes it but the future is bright for Kenta in NOAH. **1/4

A fun collection of guys but a tad underwhelming as an actual match. Shocker always seems to carry stretches of these matches with his charisma and fun bumping and I really appreciate him in this setting. Casas in particular had some fun interactions with him. Outside of that and a few moments between Aguayo and Pierroth this didn't feel very standout. **1/2

This certainly had a very exhibition feel to it and allowed a nice platform for Virus to show some flashy mat skills. The rolling surfboard was great and he led Marvin nicely here on the mat. Outside of a few moments, this wasn't the flashiest of Marvin but he still delivered a decent performance trying to fight off this guy grounding him the entire match. They finish with a nicely executed La Majistral to wrap up a nice little match. **3/4

I thought this was great. Right off the bat Kobashi drills Misawa and Jun slaps on the guillotine which gets sold like death. It's quite a statement to go with a fall that quickly and definitively and it just feels like a shock to the system in the best way. As for the rest of the match, it's cautiously paced and we get some routine work by all involved with enough small escalations built in. The nodowa on the ramp for example is enough to keep this from dipping into a one-note feeling. And the restraint here helps alot. There are some bombs thrown down the stretch but they come in a frenzied flurry and don't go overboard. Also helping is yet another definitive finish that leaves no doubt about where Akiyama stands in NOAH. Post-match is just a bonus. This was great. ****

This just felt like it took an eternity. And it's correct that they did not have much to fill that time with. This was a reallllly tedious and mundane heat segment on Marufuji, though I liked the backdrop he took early on getting insane height. Both guys work over Fuji with bodyslams and not much else until Kanemaru's dropkick drills him in the face. I certainly could have done with a few more hope spots or some semblance of a struggle or will to fight back from Marufuji who mostly just takes a bland beating with a mixture of competence and disinterest. Inoue was kind of fun in this and he and Kanemaru's double team communication was a good moment and Kanemaru showed more charisma than anyone with his low blow on Shiga. But this was mostly forgettable. **

This was solid if a little bland to me. Like, the word was fine and deliberate but very little stood out. Everyone looked solid and I liked Takayama a lot here. His slugfest with Kakihara was a great exchange. Ogawa is always a useful glue guy in these kinds of matches. Kakihara is positioned strongly getting the submission win here. **3/4

Smothers goes out of his way to make this offense entertaining and really milks his surprise win. Vis looked fine and it was a fun dynamic between the two but as a match it didn't get a chance to go much further than a fun little diversion.

A tight match with enough of a little story to come off really well. Dragon is really sharp here and busts out a spinning fisherman suplex along with some cool armdrags. He got great lift on his elbow drop from the top and the thing is he's credible as a quicker guy as well as a technician so he has a lot to draw from in working a comeback. I also liked his little teases of a comeback. Shooter looked capable and threw some nice suplexes before using his full nelson camel clutch finisher. *3/4

Cabana continues to look like the more obvious prospect of the two though Punk may have the edge in engaging the crowd. Even with his sloppiness and awkward moments he has that foundation at this point and constantly gets the crowd involved, playing a real good babyface to Cabana's heel. And Punk does have his moments here where he kind of flubs a leapfrog and stumbles at a few points but his timing is good and he makes the most of his comeback spots. Cabana is solid if a bit vanilla and clearly a more natural athlete and these two have an obvious natural chemistry. Good little match with a screwy finish as Cabana steals the win here. **1/2

The brawling here is fundamentally fine and Bull Pain threatening fans is a lot of fun but this was quite a slog to get through. It's not bad and it does build as it goes along but it doesn't do so in super entertaining fashion and these guys just kind of plod around until it all starts to run together a bit. The finish is a little silly but that's fine. The match was just a little too long and a little too rigid to leave a great impression. **1/4

This is apparently the main event of this show. There are some tentative moments in here but Reyes looks pretty good taking Sun Warrior's stuff. Sun Warrior is kind of gangly and not very graceful flying around so it's nice that Reyes keeps this pretty coherent. Reyes doesn't really show a ton and doesn't have a very compelling offensive arsenal here but this was okay. **

B-Boy is so skinny here and Romero looks really young. Reyes is with him here at ringside and does a fine job as a second, eventually running in to cause a DQ. B-Boy had a nice presence here and laid it in pretty well but kind of took a while to set up a clunky spinning reverse suplex. Romero has never been my guy but he looked pretty solid here and seemed to direct the match pretty well. Nothing special but an interesting glimpse at these two. **