AstroBoy

Holy shit this was wild. These guys were really laying into each other. The way it built to the moment with Hoshikawa finally ripping Murahama from the ropes and slowly but surely planting him with the German Suplex was pure mastery and that led directly into the amazing cross armbreaker near submission. Murahama has been vicious and cocky the entire match and it gives the moment of him almost succumbing such weight and drama. Final round sees both guys throwing the kitchen sink at each other and they really do not hold back at all. Briefly it looks like Hoshikawa will hulk up but one more toe to toe showdown leads to his knockout and I am instantly hooked to see what comes next from Murahama and his run in Osaka Pro. Really glad I took the time to check this out. ****1/4 maybe leaning up a bit. Excellent excellent match.

With the four guys here it gets tough to keep every character's motivations pure and likable. Agreed on the point that Foley vs. HHH vs. Rock created a weird dynamic that created a tough either/or type situation. The action here was fine enough and yes, the turn at the end was completely senseless. I will say I thought HHH worked very hard to get everything he could out of this match and he's doing a fine job during this run as champion. ***

I wasn't as high on this. There were a lot of moments where guys were seemingly trying to get into position for the next three-man spot. Also think that Angle still looks relatively green here. As mentioned above, the crowd did them no real favors. The booking thing is an interesting point for sure. The victimizing of Angle here worked because it helped build his character so much so I didn't mind it. It was bizarre to see Benoit celebrating with the IC belt moments after being pinned by Jericho to end the match so there's that. I really liked Jericho's crazy bump off the top into the table too. ***

These guys had such great chemistry. I know it's a stunt show and everything but it built well. The spots were truly memorable and it was a star-making performance for lots of these guys. Refreshing to see tag teams organically getting over and making names for themselves in this setting. Jeff Hardy carved out his niche, regardless or whether you like the influence or not, with these matches. They went a long way toward laying the foundation of Edge and Christian as dangerous opportunists. Hard to rate properly I guess but it's a brilliant performance in making something special. ****

Hogan hits a karate thrust to the throat at one point in this. Both guys are wildly overselling, just cartoonish selling from the opening bell. Outside the ring the Wall introduces a table. The layout of the whole Spring Break show here is a fun idea and the crowd is into it, I'll say that much. Wall recovers from some chairshots and hits the world's lightest Chokeslam on Hogan who hulks up. Now the Wall hulks up. I actually think that's a cool kind of fun moment. At least an interesting twist in this match. So now Vampiro comes in and the match ends. Okay then.

Fun to see Dean and Perry still being kind of protected at this stage. This was more of a vehicle to advance this Terri/Edge/Christian story but sure it was a good and compact match tucked in as well. Edge stayed within his limits and sold fine. Christian got to show off some nice pieces of offense. The crowd was dreadfully dead. Terri's bump was hilariously choreographed and unconvincing to top things off.

This wasn't nearly as good as the Smackdown match and felt very placeholder. HHH is focused and vicious enough but kind of uninspiring working over Rikishi. Rikishi's offense and the crowd pops lack the energy from the Smackdown match as well. Nothing of real note comes from the result but it was perfectly fine TV show match leading up to other things.

I thought Angle looked pretty lost at moments here. This was pretty clunky overall but served mostly as a vehicle to get to the Backlund appearance which was pretty awesome. Jericho's look was pretty awful here by the way. Angle's mic work was really nice before the match and you could see his potential but I didn't think the match was anything that good.

This felt like a comedy match and had a real lack of flow/consequence. The clipping makes it jarring, sure, but we seem to mostly get a few big dives followed by some back and forth in the ring to lead to the interference from the seconds. Two accidental chairshots, including one that was very clunky in setup, lead to Octagon coming out on top in a pretty lackluster and strange match.

Satanico is really beating the shit out of Tarzan Boy here. The violence in this is awesome, with unhinged brawls bookending a solid match. The pre and post match are really something else and of course help build to the Atlantis-Villano match that I cannot wait to see. It is just fantastic, gritty, realistic brawling that feels bigger than wrestling.

It was indeed hard to discern what specifically was going on but man the crowd was hot for this. Without knowing the context it FELT like a feud that had simmered and come to this point. And they definitely do deliver on big spots in the tacks with some really disgusting huge moves including a tornado DDT onto them. The crowd is rabid for this the whole time and of course they end things with a bang with the big flaming table spot. A concise and spirited brawl with some standout spots and a gruesome finish. This was good stuff.

I liked this, didn't care that it was so disjointed and awkward. I don't know if I'd say it was "good" or anything and clearly the moments where Tank was lost hurt this but it was refreshing compared to some overchoreographed and dancy type thing. It was perfectly stiff and had kind of a vibe of an off-kilter real life fight so yeah. I enjoyed this.

In my opinion, Low Ki too often just mangles his opponents, eating them up when it would make more sense for him to fight from underneath a bit more and that's how I felt after watching this match. I understand Ki is an asskicker and that's his aura, his character, but I didn't care for the way he portrayed no real weakness here. Ki lands a very gnarly Asai moonsault and then goes through a table on a huge bump. From that point things shift to Ki kind of controlling again and I felt that lingered a little too long before Mack crushes Ki with an awesomely reckless powerbomb off the top rope. Ki kicks out and Mack lands a multiple-powerbomb to Greetings from Brooklyn that Ki kicks out of as well. And then Ki just kind of blows all that off, hits his finisher and wins. So there was a lot to like here and the action was good. The dynamic just could have used a little more of Mack tossing Ki around or beating him down. ***

Jericho is so sloppy and loose matching up with Dean to start this off. Benoit is really sharp working over Jericho and taking a nice German release to help set up the hot tag to GMS. A team like Enzo and Cass should be occupying much more of a Too Cool type role in current WWE. No reason they can't be a part of fun crowd-pleasing early card matches like this more often. Another aside -- Saturn always just seemed like such a nonexistent fit in WWE. He never really clicked until the Moppy stuff which was also just very strange. Fun little TV match and Guerrero's distraction gives the Radicalz the win.

These two go at it in a relatively pedestrian but crowd-pleasing brawl. Flair gets busted open to add a little pizzazz to the proceedings and he takes the bodyslam off the top for good measure. Jimmy Hart appears to be laying in much harder shots than either Flair or Hogan when he tees off on Flair. I am shocked when Luger comes out for interference and hits Hogan right on the top of the head with a chair. Predictably the rules become a forgotten mess and Hogan wins via a combo of pin touching one of the corners. **1/4

The ever-continuing Funk/Rhodes feud. Funk looks fine as a mean old son of a bitch here early on until Rhodes low blows him. Funk works in his teeter totter rope bump but it's not super fun to watch old Funk get wasted by this cow bell. Dustin doesn't come off too spirited here but he's throwing some nice punches in the corner before bulldogging Funk on the bell. Now some chicken bullshit I have no clue how to react to. Mark Madden is so awful here screaming about killing the chicken. And Funk also turns the table via crotch attack. Thankfully we now move on to Funk cursing repeatedly and nailing Dustin and Billy Silverman with direct cowbell shots. This would be working better if it doesn't come across as total comedy. Any semblance of sanity and match stipulation is just lost at this point in WCW, huh? You would think after such a long career that Funk would know you can't just make the rules and then win by them mid-match. Dustin wins after piledriver on the bell that at least looked nice. *3/4.

At least WCW seemed like they were trying to present Vampiro as a different kind of star. It didn't work but he WAS fresher face at the time. And I actually liked the start to this, felt like a real fight of attrition at first. Vampiro's strikes and kicks in particular were awfully tentative. I don't really buy him as some lethal kickboxer but whatever. The crowd is pretty dead for this and they start walking up the stairs as I realize this is one of *those* matches where it's just a tour around the building to get over the stipulation. So we get some lame walk and brawl moments. Seems like a good time to point out Charles Robinson acting like a doofus and not letting Finlay use a chair. "They're going outside!" screamed Shiavone and nobody cares. This was much better when it was two guys fighting with a modicum of hatred inside the ring. At least stuff looked decent. Nail in the Coffin somewhere backstage on the floor ends this just as things reach the height of tedium. This could have been much more decent but it was pretty lackluster. *1/2

Fine match with a satisfying ending instead of a classic match with a cathartic ending. I get the points from defenders and detractors of this and think it's somewhere in the middle. If I look at it as a standalone match it's a good match that hits the spot well enough. Of course it falls down against the lofty standards set by its own buildup, but hey. . . that doesn't take anything away from the ride there. The brawl between the first two falls was absolutely awesome, by the way. I was astonished no fan got seriously involved in that fracas.

I subscribed for a month to see the Mania weekend shows. It's to the point now that every time I try to even click on the "EVOLVE" section it just crashes the Roku App and sends me back to my home page. It is truly astounding how poorly run this service has been from the very beginning.

Guido is playing very angry and vulgar to the crowd throughout all this. Something that I enjoy about Guido is that I think a lot of his "moveset" looks kind of stilted and awkward but the moves themselves look devastating. The Sicilian Slice, that unprettier move that ended the match. . . kid of clunky in the wrong hands but brutal when he does them. Excellent point on him getting over constantly through not only personality but through strong work. Sort of like a Cesaro of his time in the work sense. The match was fine but Kash didn't shine much here.

An awesome piece of business this was. I was totally on board with the opening matwork, thought it looked smooth and natural. First two falls felt more like a tentative feeling out than anything with either guy catching a fall. The real hook of the match comes, though, at the end of the second fall of course. It's a believable quasi-injury angle and Atlantis stands in the ring presumably thinking he deserves the title while the other Villano protests. The build and anticipation during the countout tease was so perfect and led to the very shady Villano "return". I didn't know for sure they were going for a switch angle but that's how I read it as I watched it and it just works so well. The attack on the knee of Atlantis and quick submission to escape with the title was a perfect cap on the angle and the fans go ballistic in the post-match. Atlantis sells his anger and outrage brilliantly and makes the challenge for the mascara contra mascara and I can't wait to see this progress to that point. Really great mixture of solid work and a pitch-perfect angle.

Felt like kind of a dull match but the interactions between Satanico and Tarzan Boy of course stood out. For now I'm really enjoying Shocker's personality dripping into these matches. Another cog in ongoing feud stuff but doesn't hit the highs of some of the previous brawls.

The atmosphere here was pretty weird but man Ricky Marvin was out of his mind crazy in this hitting highspots. As a match this wasn't too much but as a showcase of moves (especially for Marvin) it was a really fun time. They threw some pretty crazy difficult spots into this and I enjoyed watching Marvin throw himself all over the place.

Regal's knee strikes didn't look so stiff here but his elbow to the bridge of the nose was awesome. Plus he did a great job putting over Fidel's weakass arm wringers. Always love Regal draping his leg over the opponent's windpipe while chatting with the referee and it went on for awhile here as Sierra basically sells that he is dead. This was uninspired but perfectly fine as baseline Regal is still worth watching.

Yeah there was some miscommunication and general ugliness here which prevented this from living up to the heights of Silver King vs. Barry Horowitz from January. Lash is just very annoying and there is something odd about the way he wrestles plus he seemed to be a step out of place at different points here. Both men sort of get their shit in during the finishing stretch with King busting out some neat top rope moves but it's Lash who wins with his incredibly weird finisher. Bring Horowitz back.