ohtani's jacket

Andre Bollet/Roger Delaporte vs. Mr. Montreal/Warnia de Zarzecki (aired 1/25/69) This was broadcast in colour, and man, I forgot how bright the ring is. I wonder if they used a similar canvas for all of the promotions or it it was unique to Delaporte. I'm not gonna lie and pretend I was looking forward to this, but it wasn't too bad. It was kind of like watching an Arn Anderson and Ric Flair tag match from the mid-90s while knowing what an Arn Anderson and Ric Flair tag match from the 80s looked like. Abdel Kader Bousaada vs. Jean Luc (aired 2/1/69) I'm not sure about Abdel Kader's ring name here. There was a Moroccan worker based out of France who was billed as Abdel Kader Kabache, who I'm assuming was the same person. He may or may not have been the same guy who worked as Abdul Kader Hassouini in England, who, IIRC, features later on in the footage. In any event, this was a solid undercard bout. Mostly manchettes and both guys jostling for the win. Robert Gastel/Fred Magnier vs. Don Barreto/Eddie Williams (aired 3/8/69) Fred Magnier was perfectly cast as Gastel's tag partner. They looked as though they could have been related, or at the very least, business partners outside the ring. Gastel reminded me of a French Dick Murdoch in this bout. It was standard heel schtick, but more entertaining than Duranton vs. Williams. Don Barreto was Luc Barreto, a Cuban born wrestler based out of Spain. He suffered a career-ending injury in Germany not long after this match and began a successful singing career, releasing thirty records. I actually listened to a few of them while watching the bout. Not bad. I don't know if Eddie Williams took James Brown's spot after Brown died, but it sure feels that way. Props to the French promoters for largely pushing the black wrestlers as athletes and not billing them from deepest darkest Africa or the Caribbean, like they did in the UK.

Imagine if he'd booked the Deadman.

This was a decision match for the World Super Lightweight title, a title which hadn't been used since CMLL Japan stopped promoting shows. It was reinstated to take advantage of the success of the Southern California workers' matches against Ricky Marvin, Virus and Volador Jr. CMLL ran a torneo cibernetico to determine the participants for the decision match and gave them a decent amount of time for the final. Romero wasn't a true luchador, but he was a pretty good worker and held up his end of the match. The Super Lightweight division showed a ton of promise. Generally speaking, CMLL's at its best when there's exciting shit happening up and down the card. One of the reasons why 1997 CMLL was so good was because of the minis, and going further back, there was a far greater emphasis on the different weight classes. Sadly, the So Cal guys didn't stick around for much longer and the division fell apart, but it did give us VIrus' tremendous title run a decade later, so all was not lost.

This was a sub-10 minute bout, but highly enjoyable because of the talent involved. The rudos attacked the tecnicos as they were coming to the ring. GdI did some nifty stuff on the ramp with the steel box CMLL uses for ring steps. Aguayo was a ball of energy, and Wagner and Shocker spent the entire bout brawling with each other, which was a potent reminder that the two biggest matchups in CMLL were Shocker vs. Ultimo and Shocker vs Wagner. The finish set up Aguayo & Casas vs. GdI at the Anniversary Show.

My latest obsession is watching any Toshiyo Yamada match that sounds remotely stiff. This wasn't worked under combat rules, but these were two like minded workers and brought a significant amount of striking and stiffness to their bouts. Yamada was a chameleon in that she could blend between shoot style and the AJW Joshi style, and you get a little bit of both here. This is a tournament bout that goes the distance. It's not as dramatic as Yamada vs Hasegawa, but that's to be expected. Saito's a LLPW worker, and they don't know each other as well. There's a ton of action to sink your teeth into, and the work is generally of a high standard. I was impressed by how much energy they exerted.

KENTA & Marufuji were the tag team darlings of 2003. I believe they won the WON Tag Team of the Year award for 2003. I don't have a horse in that race. If I had a time machine and a ballot, I'd probably vote for Rey Bucanero and Ultimo Guerrero, but let's see a little more of what KENTA and Marufuji could do. I grew to like 2000s Juvi during his CMLL run, and I don't know anyone who doesn't like Ricky Marvin. So, I'm keeping an open mind here. The match took a long time to settle into a groove. It wasn't bad. Stuff was just happening. It got good when they started busting out the crazy moves. I liked the Juventud vs. KENTA matchup that developed, and for a while, I was considering how much of Juvi's generational talent he wasted. I do think it's interesting that Rey Mysterio became a WWE legend while Juvi and Psicosis became their own worst enemies. The match turned into a crowd pleasing spotfest, which may not be enough for seasoned fans, but it's not like I'm setting the bar impossibly high for a KENTA and Marufuji match. It was a decent bout. Maybe not worth the lovefest at the end, but Budokan's not an easy place to work and I'm in a generous mood.

This was a great match. It was kind of a hybrid shoot style match since Hasegawa didn't have much to offer outside of her strikes and a few choke submisisons, but what she lacked in technique she made up for with gutsy intensity. Is it possible that I've been underrating Toshiyo Yamada this entire time? This is isn't the type of Joshi match that was ever on my radar because as far as I'm concerned shoot style is shoot style and Joshi is another thing entirely, and the two should only meet if it's early ARSIOn Yoshida, however this was some first class striking from Yamada. It makes you wonder how far she could have taken this style if she was allowed to do it more outside of Korakuen Hall spot shows. She was a hell of a lot better at it than Yumiko Hotta, Lioness Asuka, or Rumi Kazawa. The last third of the match was outstanding. Sakie shrugging off the knockout hits and fighting back with slaps and kicks of her own was awesome, and the heat for the submission attempts was out of this world. I actually thought this was legitimately one of the best worked time limit draws I can remember seeing as the match was still live up until the final count. So many time limit draws end with the workers dawdling about. This was still rocking right until the end. Yamada maybe should have gone over, but it's nice that they wanted to give Hasegawa some rub, and the moment where she blocks what should have been the finish was truly epic. It was long, but in a good way. Clearly if you're not enjoying it, you're going to dread the fact that there's more, but if you like the match as much as I did, it's a treat. I never really felt like the match was messy or rambling... it was just a great contest and a hell of a fight.

Well, thanks for trying.

What an awesome match. I don't think I'm ever gonna be a Honda fan... a lot of people whose opinions I value are, but I don't see it happening for me. He has the strength of an Olympian, but he doesn't move with the grace that I'd expect from a high level amateur, and though it's superficial, I hate his hair and wispy goatee. That said, he was a mother******* problem for Kobashi in this match. I loved the way this match escalated into high stakes puroresu with extremely well-executed moves and tight looking holds. I am firmly on team Kobashi. For the longest time, I was put off by this GHC run because it was NOAH and Kobashi was broken down, and it couldn't possibly be better than 90s All Japan, and 2000s puroresu sucks (all of which is true!), but Kobashi was brilliant in this run. Easily the best worker in the world. This is a Kobashi masterpiece that ranks alongside matches like the Takayama bout from 2000. Greatness.

Who's an active moderator on this site these days? I have a backlog of match reviews waiting to be approved in the database.

This was a decent match while it lasted. I was perversely fascinated by Vampiro vs Terrible just as I'm perversely fascinated by most things Vampiro does. I really enjoyed Atlantis' performance in this match. You can't really point to anything special Atlantis did in 2003, but he was excellent in every match I saw him in, and as ever, he was the glue in each and every trios match. They teased us with some Atlantis vs. Wagner, but this wasn't a match where any of the individual pairings erupted. In fact, it finished with Wagner shoving El Terrible after the bell, and Wagner and Shocker squaring off to the delight of the crowd. Then the GdI jumped Shocker and held him in a Christ pose as Tarzan Boy cut a promo on him. I dunno how good the promo was, but the angle was flat. I dunno why they never do an angle where the rudo cuts off a few locks of the tecnico's hair before the apuesta match. That would make such a cool visual.

This was a short trios match that was mostly based around Pierroth and Violencia, who had just signed the contract for their hair vs. mask match at the Anniversary Show. The other workers didn't really do much, aside from clearing the ring for the grandstand finish between Pierroth and Violencia. I wanted to like the Pierroth/Violencia exchanges more than I did, but they barely touched one another.

Shocker vs. Tarzan Boy, 8/22/03, is an excellent mano a mano bout. Looking forward to the hair match. Just to see if I'm crazy, I checked the DVDVR 500 from this era and they had Shocker as the #2 lucha worker behind Rey Bucanero, which I can't quibble with as Rey was an excellent worker.

Say what you will about post-90s lucha -- and trust me, I said plenty about it back in the day -- this was one competitive as mano a mano bout. It was worked with the intensity of a title match or an apuesta bout, and was as good as any TV match from any other company in 2003 as far as two alphas having a singles match. Tarzan Boy has come such a long way since 2000. His improvement has been dramatic. I've never watched this much week-to-week lucha over such a long period, and while we're always moaning about the lack of continuity in lucha booking, watching workers improve is definitely one of the perks. Shocker's comeback here was boss, and he continues to lord it over Arena Mexico. Good times with an apuesta challenge at the end.

1994/11/25 - Fit Finlay vs Tony St. Clair (Cage Match) (CWA) This was more like a fence around the ring than a cage, but it was actually one of the better Finlay vs. St. Clair brawls. They got to move about around a bit more instead of being restricted by a chain and it was more interesting to watch from the perspective of a German fan in the crowd. 1994/12/07 - Fit Finlay vs Tony St. Clair (Chain Match) (CWA) This was a second chain match during the same Bremen season. It's a shame the chain matches from this era aren't more violent. It's such a promising sounding gimmick on paper then it ends up being fairly tame.

Pierre Bernaert vs. Mr. Montreal (aired 9/7/68) Last few minutes. I've never been that partial to Mr. Montreal and we've seen better from Bernaert. Robert Duranton vs. Eddie Williams (aired 9/7/68) Slow moving. If you like wrestling shtick then the stuff with Duranton's valet is okay, but the match itself is deathly dull. I wonder if Duranton picked that valet shit up working in the States. Pierre Bernaert/Gilbert Le Magouroux vs. Armand Zarpa/Henri Le Mao (aired 11/23/68) Lovely bit of Catch. Henri Le Mao is one of the best guys in the entire archive. He worked this match like a British babyface, constantly outdueling his opponent with flashy counters, but he wasn't obnoxious about it. And the heels weren't allowed to get their licks in. They worked extremely well together with Le Magouroux looking better than in his tag matches with Catanzaro. L‘Ange Blanc vs. Scarface Le Balafre (aired 12/7/68) This was so boring. I don't know how Matt always finds something nice to say about each match. Such a nice guy. Scarface used his strength and clubbing blows to wear L'Ange Blanc down. Blanc was a decent Lawler style babyface, but aside from being historically interesting, he does very little for me as a performer. The match would have been much better if it had been a sprint. The post-match was wild and more entertaining than the match. I don't know when the trend began, but I'm seeing a pattern where every now and again you get a decent tag match between the lighter weight guys, but they're peppered between boring heavyweight matches. I can only imagine what awesome lightweight and stylist matches were on the undercards of these shows but never made it on TV. Ah well, beggars and choosers, and all that.

Here's a Christmas present for yours truly... Jan (Lord James) Blears & Frank (Gorilla) Marconi vs Sandor Kovacs & Harry Finkelstein 3/20/47 This is the earliest Blears we have on tape. Given he's one of my favorites from this era, I was excited to see this. The commentary is corny, but there's some pretty decent action. Mostly brawling with some nice forearm smashes. Blears' big move is the front dropkick, which he does repeatedly throughout the film reel. It's amusing seeing him as a game youngster without the aristocrat gimmick. Fun present. Thanks, Santa Claus.

This was the first minis match I've seen in an age. It was nothing special by minis standards, but I was still pleased to see them do their thing. Octagoncito hit a sweet tope.

This was really good. I've never had a strong opinion on Super Parka one way or the other, but he was fantastic here, stalking Park in the early going and beating on him relentlessly. The match was clipped, which hurt the ebb and flow a bit, but you got the general idea of Super Parka's dominance and Park's failed comeback in the primera caida. Parka was great at jawing with the fans, which helped punctuate the action. Park eventually made a comeback, and there was some great back and forth action once he'd leveled the scores. The match had a pretty high ceiling at that point, and I thought it might end up being one of the better lucha matches of the year, but then they burst my bubble a bit by having a bunch of bullshit go down with the refs and Park's second showing up all of a sudden in the tercera caida. It was all very WWE, and completely unnecessary, but it didn't ruin the match completely. It was still a kickass performance from Super Parka and a better match than I expected on paper. So cheers to that.

This was a pleasant surprise. I thought it would be e a bunch of silly buggers between Parka and Park, but the first fall had a bunch of traditional matwork and rope exchanges, including one awesome exchange between Safari and Panther, where Safari got the better of Panther and Panther took it out on the ring apron. Even when they switched gears to the brawling part of the match, there were some really cool exchanges between Parka and Park, and some inventive use of the plastic white chairs at ringside. They kept the bullshit to a minimum, and, believe it not, sold me on the Parka vs. Park match the following week.

I was a bit disappointed with Dan Clowe's Lloyd Llewellyn series, though suitably impressed that he went from that series to the mind-bending brilliance of Like a Velvet Glove Cast in Iron and the rest of Eightball. Even more disappointing was Six from Sirius, which I'd have to classify as a dud. It's one of those sci-fi comics where the author tries to explain everything through expository dialogue instead of captions, which made it confusing and difficult to follow. There also wasn't a ton of story to fill a four issue limited series. Gulacy's art felt a bit static to me and didn't have the level of composition I've come to expect from him. I'd be interested in hearing from a fan of this series.

I didn't like this quite as much as @Jetlagbut it was a kickass BattlARTS style AJW match. It was fought under "Kakugi rules," though they were pretty liberal with it since the only shoot style moves Hasegawa knew were a few kicks and the basic submissions that all All Japan trainees are taught. The main draw here was Hotta vs. Kong, but the heart of the match was Hotta and Yamada since they were the shooters. If you like the famous Hotta vs. Kong match from '94 then this is another chance to see Aja smack Hotta in the face with shoteis. Hotta bled hardway from the mouth in a continuation of the violence from their singles match. It was a typical AJW match in terms of roles -- Aja was the alpha, Hasegawa was the weak link, and so on. Yamada wast the most impressive worker of the bunch. She reminds me a lot of Kazuo Yamazaki in the sense that she doesn't have the charisma or personality of her piers, but her technique is exemplary. The finish could have been better. They teased Hotta going down for the 10 count, but instead Aja finished her off with a uraken and a sleeper, but Aja either needed to drag Hotta to the center of the ring, or the ref needed to wait a few more beats before calling for the bell, because the crowd didn't really get it and neither did the commentator. If I'm being cynical, Akira Hokuto on commentary telegraphed the promo she cut at the end, which made this feel like fodder for the dome show, but there was some decent faux shooting along the way.

Gotham Central = great series. Greg Rucka and Ed Brubaker reimagine the Gotham Central Police Department as The Wire, or more accurately, Homicide: Life on the Streets. Spectacular ending too. Best Bat-book I've read in a long time.

Let's see if Kawada and Hashimoto can conjure up some magic to end the year. Hashimoto has really short hair. I'm not sure why you'd do that. It's like Samson cutting his hair. The Hashimoto vs. Kawada exchanges are pretty good. They would have been better during the mid-90s in a bigger setting, but for the most part they remind me of Hashimoto vs. Tenryu, and on the whole, Kawada vs Hashimoto is a match up you want to see from 2003 wrestling. I'll tell you this though: I'd much rather take Wataru Sakata to a fight than Kendo Kashin. Sakata and Kashin try to add something to the match with their exchanges, but it's a losing battle. Kawada vs Sakata was cool. They could have done something with that. The match is middling-to-good, then Ogawa shows up in a gi and luchador mask, beats some folks up and posts a sticker on the ring post, and you're instantly reminded that 2003 wrestling sucks compared to the past. Another go watch PRIDE instead bout.

I reached the end of the line for Ms. Tree, IMO one of the best characters of the 1980s and one of the best female characters in the history of comics. I'll admit that I preferred the stories where she fought the Muerta family more than the stories taken from the lastest issue of Newsweek magazine, but it was a tremendous run right up until the end. I'm feeling a bit wistful wondering what happened to the characters in their lives after the final special.