ohtani's jacket

The first time I read Shooter's Legion, I just read the famous stories. This time, I read the entire thing. I was impressed by how solid the rest of the stories were. It's not that long a run, especially if you skip the final year without Swan. I've been slowly reading Kamandi. It's the same as every other Kirby series from the 70s. It starts off with a bang and quickly fizzles out. Kirby diehards can't seem to accept that fact and are always looking to blame editorial, but how many times can it happen before it's no longer a coincidence? I had the opposite reaction to Spectre. I liked the storyline that run through the first year and pretty much hated everything that followed. I don't really like Tom Mandrake's art, either.

Why do they call it a media scrum? It's a god damn press conference. A media scrum is like those scenes from television where the media swarm around a figure on the courthouse steps.

I finished Jim Shooter's run on Adventure Comics. It loses its charm when Curt Swan leaves. Win Mortimer isn't a bad artist, but I was used to the aesthetic Swan gave the book. Shooter was getting older too, and didn't have quite the same youthful enthusiasm. It's a great run, though, with some classic stories and a ton of folklore. The first appearance of Mordru is a brilliant two-parter and the peak of the run to me. I understand that Shooter continued to write some backup Legion stories in Action Comics, but I can't imagine that they're much better than the final Win Mortimer stint.

This was okay. It was a cross between a brawl and a workrate sprint, neither of which are my favorite style of Homicide match, but both guys bled hard way and worked hard.

Kawada gets attacked by Mike Awesome (I think) right before the bell. What the fuck is that shit? Just when Japan was getting good. Did they think Ohtani needed some kind of leg up? That's kind of insulting. Why'd you book him in the final if you thought he didn't stand a chance against Kawada? This is an appealing matchup on paper since it features two of the most expressive wrestlers of the 90s, but it ends up being unimaginative and uninspiring. And a lousy Triple Crown match. Despite a bum wheel (when doesn't Kawada have a bum wheel?), Kawada steamrolls Ohtani and makes him look like a bitch. Ohtani does some goofy selling toward the end where he pops up and gets tangled in the ropes. That was cute in '96. And to think this was supposed to be Kawada vs. Hashimoto. This wasn't very good even through the lens of 2003 Toshiaki Kawada. I'm pretty sure Kawada vs. Kojima would have been better than this.

Hey look, Homicide wrestled Terry Funk in 2003! And it wasn't a tribute show, either, but a legitimate effing match. Funk totally outclassed Homicide here. I love Homicide, but he followed Funk around like a puppy dog in this match. I'm sure it's tough to go up against a legend like Funk, but Homicide treated him with kiddy gloves. The match was fun because nobody told Terry that there was no need to fight tooth and nail and bleed a gusher, but it ended with a ten minute angle setting up the 6th Anniversary Show that was apparently Funk and Sabu vs. Homicide and Mafia/Dan Maff.

So, Nicho no-shows this show and the commissioner decides to strip La Familia of the trio titles and hand them to the Infernales. The Infernales don't want to be awarded the trio titles that way and they're officially held up. The giant bear in the tecnicos' section isn't sure what to make of it all. Halloween and Damian call out Violencia. He comes to ringside but bails on the Familia. Then El Terrible takes his place. I'm sure it all makes sense in Spanish, or maybe not. The end result is a decent piece of business with Averno and Mephisto finally looking useful as Satanico's partners. Halloween and Damian continued to work for CMLL after this, so it wasn't exactly a kick in the pants on the way out, but the matchmaker was clearly done with this feud. Not sure what the scoop was with Nicho, but it was an odd month of CMLL wrestling.

I don't have much time for Ohtani as a heavyweight, but Kojima has been one of my favorites in 2003. Ohtani was an absolute genius as a junior heavyweight. I could write a tome about his junior heavyweight work. I've never really put much thought into why his heavyweight work disappoints. I suspect it's because he was never really The Man in the junior ranks. His juniors schtick was predicated on being the unlucky loser. It's hard to see where you go from there. Here, he was in two minds about whether to be the asshole heel invader or the plucky underdog. Kojima seemed unsure of his role too. Was he meant to be the gatekeeper to the Triple Crown title shot? The first stage boss? A contender as well? The finishing stretch was decent, but Japanese finishing stretches are almost always decent. I was looking for a reason to care and couldn't really find one. It wasn't a bad match. Just like of average. I actually kind of wish Kojima had gone over, but I guess inter-promotional crap was still the rage.

Liverpool fans also sing a version of it.

Just to make matters more confusing, Nicho decides to show up for this show. Halloween, during his Road Dogg style introduction of La Familia de Tijuana, introduces Nicho as Psicosis. I have no idea how far off script any of this is, but there's no denying that the Familia are much better with Nicho involved. This was easily the best of the matches so far simply because LFdT worked as more of a unit, and the Infernales were able to stage an inspired comeback. Halloween and Damian are very good as the pieces surrounding Nicho, and Halloween does an excellent job as the emotional leader of the Familia, but the trio works much better with Nicho as the No.1 guy. Whatever heat Nicho had with CMLL wasn't enough to stop the production people from replaying his spectacular dives. Towards the end, this looked like it might be the long-awaited coming out party for Averno, but the Familia used a kendo stick to rob him of the victory. The commissioner wasn't happy, however, and ruled the match a no contest. The titles were held up, and we're headed for another rematch that Nicho will no show.

Boy did it take some digging to find this match. So many mislabeled matches. One of their matches was uploaded three times with three different dates. Anyway, it turns out that people had their 5/30 and 6/6 matches confused. I can see why people would get confused since their matches are so generic. It's not that they aren't trying hard. It's similar to the Smackdown workers, who are trying hard to have good matches each week and good pay-per-view matches, but also deliver a generic product. A lot of the match is action for action's sake. I would rather see an electric exchange between Halloween and Averno, or Satanico and Damian, than crisp action. The Famila are handicapped by whatever problems Nicho was having with CMLL, and Halloween is trying his damnedest to hold everything together, but the feud either needed to be Averno's coming out party as the lead guy or a Satanic special. Unfortunately, it's neither.

Many of the international stars were legit. Some were gimmicks. A lot of the African and West Indian gimmicks were bullshit, as were the Russian gimmicks or anyone from the Communist Bloc. Some of the talent were naturalized British citizens. Others were born in the UK but billed from overseas. The Wrestling Heritage A-Z website is the best resource for finding out more information about the workers. Wrestling was a product for the working class, and the UK working class included a melting pot of immigrants from Europe and the Commonwealth. In the 60s and early 70s, it was common to see European workers on TV. That tapers off as the European wrestling scene dries up. There wasn't a ton of money to be made in Britain, which is why you rarely see American or Japanese stars, and why a lot of the British workers are often away working the European tournaments or touring other countries. IIRC, wrestling was initially shown at 4pm in the standalone spot, but gradually they started programming it earlier in the day. Eventually, it was on at lunchtime, which killed it off completely. I'm not entirely sure about why Big Daddy used "We Shall Not be Moved" other than the obvious imagery that Daddy was tough to move. The Seekers were hugely popular in the UK in the mid-60s, and it was their version that they originally used until Daddy recorded his own version. I guess the song was popular with the grannies.

This was a decent match that was part of the build for their mask match. It ends up being screwy because it's a Tijuana match, and that's what happens in Tijuana matches, but my immediate impression was a distinct reminder of what a great brawler Santo is, especially for a tecnico. He's one tecnico who doesn't mind getting his hands dirty, or bloodied, as the case may be. Super Parka isn't super, but we know this. It's still interesting seeing what Santo can do with him, and frankly this is an era of wrestling that could do with a little Santo on television. If they'd cut the shenanigans and had a more epic finish, this probably would have been a hidden gem. Instead, it's a footnote, but a footnote worth watching if you're skimming 2003.

This planted the seeds for their famous trilogy of matches by showing that Punk could be competitive with Joe. I don't have a lot of time for Punk's straight edge gimmick, and I see him as a loose and scrappy worker, but he has good ring sense. He's a much better matchup with Joe than you'd expect. That's largely because of how inventive he is. I haven't really enjoyed Joe steamrolling over folks even if they try to make the matches seem competitive, and I'm looking forward to seeing someone step up as the Sting to his Vader. I'm not sure what state Joe was in physically, but I kind of feel like an epic world title fight is something from ROH at this point in time. I haven't followed the promotion all that closely, but the general impression I get is one of second year growing pains. US wrestling in general seems to be down from 2002 while Japanese wrestling is up.

This match almost has me believing the hype surrounding Akiyama. I like Tenzan more in theory than reality. There's definitely a place for bruisers in wrestling, and Japan produces its fair share of meatheads. He's just not a very interesting meathead. Still, every dog has its day, and the G-1 Climax was Tenzan's time to shine. Akiyama was excellent in his role as the outsider, and Tenzan was convincing enough as a worker grappling with his destiny and the ultimate prize of being a G-1 winner. I absolutely love the reaction of Tenzan's father, who stands there almost in disbelief, with his hands in his pockets, as the crowd goes apeshit for his boy.

Probably because of the ban on women's wrestling. She did appear on WoS as a manger in a Big Daddy match. Other than that, I think the only footage of her is from Reslo and that French Catch Eurosport show. You're not missing much.

The honorable mentions section is random. I haven't updated this in a decade and would probably change some of the rankings if I did it again -- It doesn't feature any French workers since we barely had any footage at the time.

This is such a beautiful match. I was 100% with Nishimura all the way. With matches like this, Taue vs. Nagata and Hashimoto vs. Kojima, Japanese men's wrestling is on the rise in 2003. Definitely the best year for Japanese men's wrestling since the turn of the decade.

Chain Match: Finlay vs. Schuhmann (CWA WIEN'97) I felt like watching some Finlay after listening to Regal's podcast. This was from right near the end of Finlay's time in the CWA. He had shaved off his moustache and was letting his grey hair show. He lost some of his aura when he shaved the mo. He looked like such an asshole with that stache. Schuhmann looks unrecognizable without his mullet. The match is okay. They couldn't go the whole hog with the chain presumably because of the cameras.

Fancy entrance for the champs. They're decked out in full Aztec warrior headdresses. Vampiro and Lizmark make a regular entrance. The Mega Powers combine! There was a time when you wouldn't have been able to pay me to watch this match; now, I'm eagerly anticipating it. The first fall is rubbish. The second fall is a quick equalizer. The third fall is where the action is. They do a good job of making this seem like an important title fight. For all its flaws, the modern lucha style is still good at delivering a dramatic third fall. The match swings back and forth, and there are some exciting nearfalls. Arena Mexico is rocking as it usually does for Vampiro fights. There's a guy in a huge bear costume. It's amazing how Lizmark can disappear in a match. It happens all the time in trios matches. There will be these long stretches during a trios match where he's off camera. It's almost like he's hiding from the camera. It's not that he doesn't do anything. He hits some big moves. He just has the magnetism and charisma of a replacement level player. The match comes down to Vampiro vs. Ultimo, which is fitting, and the matchup everyone wants to see. Vampiro is sucking in the big ones, and I don't think it's because he's a great seller. I was unashamedly into this. I thought for all money that Ultimo was gonna cheat, but the bugger went over clean. Vampiro did a nice job of selling it afterward. The match ended up being pretty good. On paper, it looked like it needed to be an all-time great carry job to be anything special, but Rey and Ultimo didn't need to go the extra distance. It all kind of fell into place with the booking, and the fans were happy to get the Ultimo vs. Vampiro showdown. Good stuff.

I was surprised when Last couldn't recall any history between Yokozuna and the Hart Foundation.

Bert Royal has passed away. https://slamwrestling.net/index.php/2022/08/20/british-star-bert-royal-dies/

Quiet Japanese crowds are real. Rowdy Japanese crowds are real too.

I'm not sure if the crowds were different for tapings vs house shows. I imagine the tapings must have drawn people who didn't routinely go to the house shows, but I can't say for sure. At its peak, Joint Promotions ran around 40 shows per week. I'm not sure how the TV was scheduled. It's never been clear to me whether it was scheduled from ITV's end or from Joint Promotion's end. They filmed matches from around the country. Mostly, they were Dale Martin shows, but occasionally, they'd show matches from the other promoters as well. There's almost no continuity to the television. You occasionally see a rematch from a few weeks before, and every now and again there's a match that's announced in advance, but it's nothing like American wrestling television. The halls were a bit different. They'd set up return matches for the following week much like the US territories did, and would add stips to matches. From memory, the wrestlers received their schedules from the Joint offices, which included TV dates. I'm not sure how the wrestlers got booked on TV. I'm not sure if you made TV because the taping date matched your travel itinerary, or because you were popular and in demand. Basically, the cards would have around 6 matches and they'd tape the entire show and split it into two broadcasts. They didn't show every match (and the matches were generally clipped), but the full shows exist in the ITV archives. There is some debate about how much footage survives, as some people claim some of the footage was destroyed in some sort of accident. I know for a fact that late 60s footage survives. There's also more 70s and 80s footage in the archives that wasn't shown on The Wrestling Channel. The hope is that someday the footage becomes cheaper and more accessible.

There were rules about what they were allowed to show on TV. In the halls, they often had blood and gimmick matches, but they weren't allowed to show these things on ITV. This type of wrestling had been prevalent before they introduced the Mountevans Rules in the late 40s/early 50s. They call it the "all in" style. Rival promoters Paul Lincoln and Brian Dixon often booked "all in" matches, billing it as the wrestling you couldn't see on television. The US worker Chris Colt had a match with Mick McMichael that they wouldn't air on ITV because it was deemed too violent, and once Dixon got his hands on Colt, he began promoting him as the man they wouldn't let you see on TV. What we consider classic WoS from the 70s was actually a down period for British wrestling. It had a brief shot in the arm from Daddy's popularity, but the early 70s stuff is a down period. The crowds vary from region to region, but they were always more interested in seeing the entertainers than the pure grapplers. Walton often puts over the grappling matches as matches for the purists, but if you listen carefully to Walton you can tell when he's frustrated by a wrestler's performance or a bad match. He had a subtle way of burying wrestlers when he wasn't impressed. The crowds are generally loud for the Big Daddy stuff, and for the loud mouth American heels like John Quinn. What's interesting about 1960s wrestling is that the crowd wear formal evening clothes. You get the impression that wrestling was so big in the 60s that it was like going to an evening show. The 70s crowds are much more casual. The uncut ITV vault footage often starts rolling the cameras pre-match and you get banter from Walton where he discusses the evening's crowd. There's one match where he talks shit about some eccentric woman who has brought some homemade gift she made for Wayne Bridges.