El-P

He pimped dwarfs ?

Did Liger just had two MOTYC in the same week ? I can see how someone would think Kanemoto took too much at the beginning, but really, Kanemoto beating the shit out of Liger made sense and built to the counter of all counters. Really, that missed/not missed moonsault welcomed by the mother of all shoteis is one of the best sequence I've ever seen for a comeback. And it turned into a bombfest like no other. Kanemoto was much higher on the totem pole than Ohtani and it showed, and at the end (and what ending !!) it's really that one match that made Liger finally look like the junior God that he was before. Awesome work by Liger and Kanemoto was quite the dick here too, with terrific timing and execution as always. Greaaaaaat.

Odd how nobody mentions Ohtani blowing off Liger's legwork during the first part, Sasuke would have got hell for this. Apart from that, this was fantastic. Liger clearly had toned down the flying by that point and is still great. He's all about the shotei. Ohtani had matured somewhat, he wasn't your crazy young lion he used to be and was still one of the best wrestler in the world. Fantastic match that built and built until Liger gets a bit too arrogant, lets Ohtani sleep in a comeback before the final shotei barrage and the final pin which looked terrific. MOTYC and certainly one of the best junior match of the decade.

Golden Liger is the best. The creepy mask during the intro was pretty great too. But Ultimo coming out with 8 models, each carrying a different belt was just, well, the ultimate entrance. Really good match which suffered from a lack of heat. Liger was still coming back from a brain surgery, so cut him some slack as far as maybe not being as crisp as he could have. Not as good as the JCup match in 95 but some nice call backs to the J*Crown quick match with Liger himself trying La Majistral to win at one point. Junior match at the Dome show never translate the best anyway, this is underrated (well, maybe not in the Observer, not sure I'd have gone ****).

Well, seems like it's already beginning. There's nothing more than a director name and people are already hating on it, ah ah. Well, I for one am quite curious about it.

Hollywood is gonna make a movie about Chris Benoit ? Holy shit, and people "in da business" didn't like The Wrestler... This is gonna be fascinating on so many levels.

Like it's been said : the WW3 match without the matwork to ground Mysterio building to the spots. But hey, what they do is so good that it's still a very good match. One big difference, Ultimo does the Majistral pin attempt early on as it's really over in Japan. Yep, Rey was kinda formulaic against the same opponents while touring, as showed by his matches with Dragon or Psychosis. But hey, so was Ric Flair, and Rey was so much in advance in term of prime flying offense that he didn't need more while working in front of new audiences.

Good matwork to open the proceedings. Hell, they do refer to Sasuke cracking his skulls (which kinda shows in his work too) with a brutal brainbuster, followed by a not less brutal DDT. So, psychology, people ! Sasuke doing the insane kick from the top rope to the outside in his condition was all kind of Sasukesque. not going into the epic it could have been without the injury, but all things considered, this was really really good. That finish too. Gotta love when something looks like the finish, should be the finish, and ends up being the finish.

Not exhibitionist in the least. Fuck, this can seem that way because two generations of shitty indy workers tried to replicate what these two were doing, without the great execution and agressiveness. But these two were having the ultimate lucharesu bomb throwing match, with Asai moonsault payback spot from the student to the mentor. And of course, Sasuke KILLS HIMSELF FOR OUR PLEASURE !!!! Well, that was the felling of some back then. And of course, they have to go home, and it's a classic-that-would very good match in the end. The J*Crown was such a great concept. That it made its way into WCW was even better.

Ohtani, ladies and gentleman. What a worker he was back hen. The slighest of his body movement expressed something. And the execution. Well, it's not like Dragon was much behind, as he was also a great masked wrestler, in that he conveyed so much emotion and intent with the mask. Amazing pinning attempt early on. Which never looked like two guys doing some cool flippy stuff, but guys trying to fucking win a pro-wrestling match. And yeah, this is the kind of awesome match which should remind everyone that yes, execution does matter. Ohtani is just on another planet and Dragon has never looked much better than this. MOTYC. A classic junior match that holds up even better today after years of awful X-div shit and self-conscious epics.

How great a babyface Sasuke was is way overlooked at this point. He sells those Sammy submissions (when he's in) like crazy. Yes, he did blow off the legwork a bit too fast, but damn Sammy was brutal with him, including with some of the comeback spots. This is not merely good, this is excellent, with the idea that Sammy really is gonna upset Sasuke (who's the bigger star of course by now). The more I watch these junior matches today, the more I see the differences with all the indieriffic matches, as there was a clear sense of struggle back then, with intent on hurting and winning as opposed to do "cool shit". Sure, Sasuke was also about "cool shit, but he was way more than just this. Very good/excellent match.

Exactly. So does the intros. They can add to the enjoyement. But let's not be kidding, the match is the match. A great post-match avec a craooy match doesn't make the match better. It certainly can make a segment enjoyable, in which case the match itself simply doesn't matter much. And yes, finish matters. Like the very last scene/shot of a movie before the credits hit.

A Block B Block ****+ as they say Elgin vs. Naito Quite excellent SANADA vs. Tanahashi Nakajima vs. Shibata Okada vs. Marufuji SANADA vs. Okada Tenzan vs. Marufuji Damn fine Tenzan vs. Ishii Nagata vs. Naito Fale vs. Goto Shibata vs. Honma Ishii vs. Goto YOSHI-HASHI vs. Honma Fale vs. Marufuji Omega vs. Yano Goto vs. Okada YOSHI-HASHI vs. Nagata EVIL vs. Nakajima Good it is indeed Omega vs. YOSHI-HASHI Elgin vs. EVIL Honma vs. Omega Shibata vs. Elgin Unoffensive Makabe vs. Tanahashi Yano vs. Nakajima Ishii vs. Fale EVIL vs. Nagata SANADA vs. Makabe Naito vs. Yano Tonga vs. Tanahashi Not good Makabe vs. Tonga Tenzan vs Tonga

YOSHI-HASHI vs. Nagata Everything YOSHI-HASHI does seems so random to me. Nagata can still have a good match with anyone with enough ability, so there you go. EVIL vs. Nakajima Best EVIL match by far. Nakajima has a Naoki Sano quality to him, he looks stoic and polite, then at some point kicks you really hard and shows unexpected intensity. Maybe kicked out of too much stuff, but this was really good. Naito vs. Yano So, no one wants to explain me Yano ? *sigh* This was bullshit but too short to amount to anything. Funny enough though. Honma vs. Omega Omega is trying way too hard. This didn't click with me. Probably burned out a bit already. They overdid the epicness at the end. Too much no-selling of big stuff like double nelson suplex. Good match but… Omega is really odd. Just settle down A BIT. Shibata vs. Elgin Stiff as fuck, as we used to say. So, the whole "please, hit me hard" is a new trope that is fun for awhile but can get silly quickly. Lots of cool strenght and kicking stuff. Some really ridiculous selling too. Good. expected better. Yeeeeeah, I'm getting burned out and tired of some stuff that are cool when fresh but tiresome when not fresh anymore. A bunch of good matches but nothing going to the next level. maybe that was the issue for this show. The G1 Climax is officially WAY too long.

This was funny as shit, especially since he was delivering it in a totally straight way.

That's why the first months of the nWo angle was the apex of US pro-wrestling TV.

Raven vs Abyss vs Monty Brown (Monster's Ball) Monty cut all those cool promos that made him look like a star. He had the cool finisher but wasn't much of a worker apart from this. Not Goldy-like. Abyss had the Foley fetish. Raven was insane and fat. And was a babyface, or a heel. Not sure. Not terrible, they kept it fast and non-offensive. Until came the finish, with Abyss finally getting a "Foley !" chant when he got the tacks on the mat. I think that gave him a hard-on. So we get Raven powerbombing Abyss on the tacks, making it a first obvious fail. Tacks 1 - Abyss 0. Then soon enough, a "holy shit" chant emerge followed by a "This is awesome !" chants when Raven puts a table in the ring, near the tacks. To whomever said this very first chant during this match was ironic, it's clearly not, the crowd was hot after the tacks bump. ANd did they get more, with Raven bumping AByss through a table at ringside, immediately followed by a pounce through a table, with, back to back, did look quite impressive, brutal and cool, despite the meh match until that point. So, theer we have the second "This is awesome !" chants on a TNA broadcast, the first appearing during an AJ Styles vs Alex Shelley match two months earlier. This one was much stronger though. Nice to spot Dixie in the crowd too, totally not believing what was happening in her ring. That was both neat, cute, and... kinda stupid when you think about it. But mostly neat. Monty Brown surely had the charisma to become a star. The in-ring skills, not so much, but he wasn't worse than… well, he wasn't worse than a lot of people pushed at the top at one point or another, and still pretty green.

The original Workrate Guilt. Well, they did get showed up by IWA Japan that night too, so, it's understandable.

It was promoted by one of the magazines I believe. For ever there was only a (crappy) handheld, so watching conditions aren't very good. It was infamous for the Women & AJ showing up everybody (well, except the MPro guys), including a pretty lame NJ main event in their own building, and an awful FMW match. With a legit TV broadcast, it probably would have become legendary. Well, it kinda is, but overlooked still.

you can stop banging this drum now dude. we get it. Don't bother. This is a gimmick for him at this point. He's just trolling in a very uncreative way. Funniest part is that I've been using the term "indieriffic" as a super negative for years and really haven't pimped japanese stuff for ever it seems (apart from the occasionnal stuff for the GWE). So yeah, it's just a gimmick. Either that or he's just a bit…. well it's a gimmick probably. Please find all these times I've used "indieriffic as a super negative" because I'm not sure I've ever used the term at all and probably not more than once if I have. *I* have been using indieriffic as super negative. You don't even read correctly. Seriously, give it a rest. Just ignore me. It's not like I really care about anything you say anyway. (the irony is that we actually agree on some of the stuff we both say about WWE, as I didn't care one bit for the Cena vs Owens stuff after the first match and though Cena vs Styles was godawful for pretty much the reasons you mention)

you can stop banging this drum now dude. we get it. Don't bother. This is a gimmick for him at this point. He's just trolling in a very uncreative way. Funniest part is that I've been using the term "indieriffic" as a super negative for years and really haven't pimped japanese stuff for ever it seems (apart from the occasionnal stuff for the GWE). So yeah, it's just a gimmick. Either that or he's just a bit…. well it's a gimmick probably.

Glad someone finally points an element that has been ridiculously overlooked when you hear that John Cena is a great worker. In today's environment, I dare say that the Warrior working modern WWE main events carefully plained out by agents would be considered a great worker too. Hell, he had one great match against Randy Savage, and we know how that one worked out. The modern WWE style is the most manufactured and self-conscious style of all time. And in essence, the "fakest" of all time, simply because it says the least about the workers involved.

He's gone. Hopefully he goes back to LU, but he wasn't happy the last time and there's no way he gets the same sweet deal now. From his Youshoot (where he played family man and shit, which is kinda funny now), he seems to have a real inflated sense of his value and talent.

Roman Reigns has it, Randy Orton has it, Eddie had it. Well, like the immortal Faith no More used to ask : what is it ? Let's be real. People who had *it* were Hogan, Austin, Dusty, Inoki, Choshu, Flair, Rock, Baba, Misawa, Takada, Onita, Cena. We're not talking about the same thing, obviously, because Orton never meant shit despite being pushed forever (yeah, he gets crowd reaction, so you'd hope after more than 10 years of being pushed on top, that's the HHH school of being a "star", but so did Sid), Batista became a legit star the day he appeared on the Galaxy movie (which was quite the good surprise too), and Reigns has been rejected by the crowds because of being shoved down their throat. Maybe he should mary Stephy. (one can argue than Bryan had *it* too BTW, but the constant depush and health issues prevented him from reaching his star potential. CM Punk probably had *it* too, but then again, not the favourite son, so...)

A *big* part ? Seriously ? The Demos had that fucking SM leather outfit, makeup and a great music theme and were killing people. They didn't need Fuji at all. Who did Fuji managed at that time who got over like the Demos ? The Powers of Pain (just joking) ?