MJH

Whilst I agree with the majority that it was a great a match, I also have to agree with ShinyLittleBoots that the second fall was majorly problematic for me. I should preface this with two points: one minor, one major. The minor one is I'm writing this 5 days since I watched the match (it's been a long time since I actually logged in, I'd forgotten my password, and if not for the system overhaul today I would'n't've been about to retrieve it); the second is, as with most of the long-term posters of this board, I grew up, as it were, watching the All Japan guys, how they put their big matches together, and that has obviously influenced how I watch/understand/etc big matches ever since. Anyway. I went into the match knowing the result. I know many people try and avoid doing so, but I've never been one for #spoileralert, quality is quality and anything worth watching is worth rewatching. I also knew how the falls went (i.e. the first to Okada, the final two to Kenny) but not the actual finishing spots themselves. So, the first fall. I liked this a lot. I thought they did a tremendous job of working an interesting 30/+ minutes without bringing out any of their big offensive guns, nor even any major spots. What was clear to me, how I read it, was Omega had the momentum. Of course Okada got his licks in and the current NJ group as a rule work more back and forth than the old All Japan guys, but nevertheless, I picked up on "it's Omega's night" very quickly, and nothing they did broke me out of that. As a result, I saw the "fluke" pin coming, but thought it tremendously well done and the perfect way to wrap up the first fall. But, like I said, the problems for me started in the second fall. So, we're now in a situation where Omega has dominated, but Okada "stole" a pin. It seemed patently obvious to me how the second fall would go: Omega gets desperate, starts to take chances, one backfires, he's beat on for a long time, makes a comeback (if ever there was a time for a modern guy to steal Misawa's comeback it's in that situation there) and pulls it out, leading us into the showdown finale (which is, in the end, what we actually got in the third fall). Obviously, that's not what we got. Sure, Omega wiped out early, Okada was far more relaxed and was strutting around with everything under control, but that segment didn't last for a long time at all, Omega gets back into it after having his back worked over, etc, without any great struggle, and the second fall continued in much the same way as the first had ended, with Omega "having the better night" as it were, only this time he avoids the flash pin and takes it home. Herein lies my problem. Dramatically, the momentum is all with Omega. He dominated the first fall, slipped on a banana, lost his head for a moment at the start of the second but swiftly gained control back, kept his cool, and evened things up. And this is where knowing the result did create an issue: the booking calls for Omega to comeback from having the odds stacked against him, right? At no point was that the case. Sure, he lost the first fall and was beaten on for a bit at the start of the second, but Okada wasn't going for the kill by any means; Omega has evened this up without taking much damage, AND, of course, Okada's just spent the interval on his back putting over the One Winged Angel. At this point, they've lost me. What are they going for dramatically? Now, they had the table in place, and I thought, OK: so they double-barrel the comeback, using the table spot for the Kobashi transition, Omega does his long comeback and gets the job done. But, no. He eats an early rainmaker, puts it over huge, and the third fall is the epic, next-move-wins showdown with everything at stake. They do a much stronger job of long-term selling than has become the norm, and the third fall in many ways was great, but I'd been so taken out of it by the second fall and the absence of a prolonged period of peril for Omega that for all the great work, I wasn't drawn into it. * I'll hold my hands up: I realise these guys are not Misawa, Kawada or Kobashi, and I don't expect them to work matches in the same way at all. It's not a problem for me that they took a different route to what I was expecting: I have no problem with them breaking the law of Chekhov's gun, and whilst there are some spots that I didn't like (the tombstone on the apron and the straddling DDT on the floor could have been significant transitions and I felt both were completely wasted), there were significantly more positives about the match than negatives. But the negative is a big one: I didn't get the structure. Or rather, I did (or thought I did) for the first and third fall, but with what happened in the second, the third should have gone differently. From a dramatic perspective, I felt at no point was Omega in real jeopardy of losing except at the end when it was even-stephens (the false finish on the flash pin in the second fall was a great spot, but that's not what I mean). It all goes back to what I've thought/written previously about Okada's matches with Tanahashi: for all the great work going on, I'm not in tune with whatever their thought process is and I find it hard to join the dots. I'm happy to be corrected by people who watch more of these guys than I do, who're inevitably more attuned to their work (I've seen all their previous matches except the 60:00; some of the major G1 matches and Okada's defences), perhaps with less of an All Japan hangover, for lack of a better word. Hopefully I've laid out in sufficient detail where my problem lies here, and I don't want to sound like I'm down on the match, or these guys, I think they're great, I really do, in so many ways, but it's so fundamental for me as a viewer to understand what's going on in terms of structure, story, etc, and in a very literal sense, they're incomprehensible to me.

The problem with Shawn's early heel work isn't the structure, but he was really fucking boring in control, especially in '92-'93; that he was such a great bumper, and so the shine/comeback was always fun, only highlighted how comparatively-dull the middle section was. That said, there's some really nice work if you know where to look (the SF handheld with Jannetty from Nov/Dec '92 comes to mind), but I don't think he was able to find a balance as a heel until '97. That said, yes, he's on my list.

Also, I agree with JS that a lot of these things are more tasteless than what I'd consider "scummy", and the problem, as thebrainfollower mentioned re: Trish/payback, isn't necessarily the subject matter itself (we can all name great TV shows, films, etc. which deal - graphically - with contentious subject matter) but rather how it was handled. There's nothing innately wrong with doing an angle based around, say, racism, but you have to treat it as an adult, which wrestling often seems incapable of doing.

Bit of a Devil's Advocate but... at the end of the day, Fritz was exploiting the deaths of his own sons, not someone else's.

I won't be able to sit down and watch the match for a few days, maybe not until this weekend, but I've always remembered the first 6/7 minutes going thus: Kawada/Kobashi start, Misawa tags in, Kawada wants no part of him, and when Kobashi comes back in Kawada/Taue work over him (Kobashi); Kawada spends as much time taunting Misawa, building to the switch-high kick off the apron they re-used at the start of 6/95, which Misawa sells on the floor for a minute before storming back in to kick his ass. Perhaps 'chicken-shit' gives too strong an impression of begging off, Flair on his knees saying "nooooooooooo!", but the whole opening segment is based on the same principle of avoidance-gloating-comeuppance. The greater point - Kawada is distinctly, clearly the heel - remains.

Dot-to-dot wrestling.

Were I to make one, she'd rank pretty high on my "hurt by lack of quality opponents" list. Some styles are more conducive than others to carrying limited opponents; Yoshida's wasn't one of them.

I'm not altogether sure she did that; it's been a good few years since I watched it, but my recollection of it is that the '89 Yamada match is a lesser-experienced dry-run of their later matches, and in most matches she, like just about everyone else, was working fast, throwing out move after move, etc... she clearly made an effort to develop her move-set in '92 or thereabouts, but I can't recall any big rejuvenation.

Toyota didn't "forge her own style"; she took the house style and played it faster and louder than everyone else.

My problem with Nishimura is half of his signature spots were counters. It's not as bad as, for example, Doug Williams showing up in NOAH and Masao Inoue is suddenly using British holds so Doug can do his counter spots, but it's nevertheless high on my list of bugbears. As far as tribute acts go however - and it's worth noting that he got there earlier than most and had the 'protege' endorsement too - I enjoy him more than most. There's a Dory-in-the-1975-World-Open feel to his tournament work; you'd know that even with the Nakanishis and Yoshies of the world he was gonna hold their hand to a solid, fine-but-forgettable match, and I can't remember many disasters or disappointments.

"Evil" in the loose, simple sense of "they're the bad guys" rather than "EVIL". They're bad guys, who do bad things, which pay-off, and they win (by bending rather than breaking the rules).

Kawada even does the full chickenshit routine at the start of the 5/94 tag. He's 100% bona fide heel. However, that doesn't mean he can't be sympathetic, or rather that you're prohibited from viewing his chase from his POV. 12/6/96 is evil triumphing over good, they take advantage of every opportunity to cheat, there's not one time Kawada gets under the kosh that Taue isn't running straight in there to regain the advantage for them... they couldn't be heel anymore clearly, but, Kawada's also human, an underdog, and got a big win.

Whilst I can understand John's point about "no reason not to take it home at 57:00", I think the only real mark against the 1/95 60:00 is that their Carnival draw was so similar to essentially be a truncated, streamlined version and ultimately better for it.

She's a ludicrous nomination but... I think there's an interesting question in: should she (or someone else) elevate women's wrestling in the WWE to a point where they're on equal footing with the men and can main event major PPVs including WrestleMania, how much does that elevate her amongst/against a comparatively talented but ultimately historically-meaningless woman from Japan or whatever (think a Suzuka Minami type)?

Whilst I agree with the gist of JvK's comments about there's no point debating Dylan with someone in the "he can't sing" camp, there's a big difference between that and not debating Clash 6 vs. 6/3/94 unless both agree they're 'undisputedly *****'; nobody is saying the former sucked, and I'm certain if we tallied up every poster on this board's star-rating for Clash 6 there'd be none lower than **** which means we can all agree it's 'great'. At the same time, I think it's pretty much unquestionable that the AJ guys were working a significantly more evolved style, laying their big matches out ahead of time, and they were as structurally-tight as they were offensively-advanced (or certainly the usual suspects were). Flair/Steamboat is scarcely more involved than face/heel. One can watch 6/3/94 as a straight forward face/heel "hero overcomes the odds" match but, and whilst it's much more commonly described from Kawada's POV it basically is, that's being somewhat simplistic. Ultimately the debate on the two matches would come down to the value we individually place on that "complexity".

My reasoning behind St. Final was that Aja/Kudo did well on the Yearbook as I recall, better than its initial rep next to Hokuto/Kandori 2 and the 3WA Tag (without it having been ignored as such by any means), and I think in part due to its difference. I agree that one needs a basic knowledge of the backstory for Hokuto/Kandori (or will benefit from having it), but something like the Dream Rush tag...? That's as self explanatory as wrestling gets, isn't it? Granted, there's no limb work, and the work is fast and furious, but, at the end of the day, Zenjo's style was a sprint one and if it's an Andersons tag you're after... you wouldn't hand out a Rings DVD at a Dragon Gate show and say "this'll be right up your street".

Whilst I get the point people are making about Toyota, I don't see how the Aja Big Egg match, for example, would make anything but a strong impression. It's short, a big show, strong heat, strong spots, very simple and recognisable structure... my 12 y/o nephew was curious about it, I stuck that on, and he dug the hell out of it. As a stand-alone match I think Dan's call for the DS1 tag is a good shout and that's a match I've often heard as being people's favourite on the show the first time they watch it. Hokuto/Kyoko from Dream Rush falls into the same category. As far as full shows go, it has to be Dream Slam. Maybe Dream Rush, maybe even St. Final. (I'd recommend starting with the 92-94 boom simply because we have the whole run available chronologically, including the girls' evolution from late '90/91 and the aftermath to 97. The '80s is harder to navigate as an overall product.)

When they're drinking it's a different story. I'm talking about their iPod, what they listen to in the car, at home, and maybe their ringtone (about 2/3rds of which are either You'll Never Walk Alone or Z-Cars, of course). [Those'd be the theme songs for the two football/soccer clubs for those less versed].

Then I guess it depends on area (and age too). The area I grew up in in Liverpool, a lad whose hair was anything but short-back-and-sides or a skinhead (over the age of say 21) is asking for trouble, ditto anything other than rap or rock audible through your headphones; but the last time I was there the teenage lads were far more metrosexual and would openly listen to, say, Rihanna, although not without drawing comment. Conversely, the city centre (only 2 miles away) is hipster central and I'd seldom walk more than thirty feet without seeing a top-knot and patchy beard or hearing dub step or (insert random genre I have no idea about) and nobody gives a shit.

I've no idea as to the whys... Plant and Page were as androgynous as you were likely to get away with at that time and Zeppelin's music isn't seen as effeminate. I might be wrong on the techno thing, it's not something I've ever taken the slightest interest in, but my perception has always been that it's not the kind of music most devoutly-masculine fellas would have blasting out of their cars...

I know a few guys who like it, but, yeah, my perception has always been that it has an effeminate image. I can't speak for that authoritatively, though, not having any interest in it.

It's all about the image too, of course: techno music is hardly the most masculine first impression. Similarly, I mostly listen to classical music, but I know that if a guy comes out to some, generally speaking, the audience are far more likely to take him/her as a snob (see HHH) than anything else. Maybe that was the thinking behind giving Bryan a rockier version of Ride of the Valkyries rather than a full orchestral version?

(Your average 70 year old probably knows Kanye West's music better than I do...) Maybe, as much as anything, it's down to having a certain idea of what wrestling entrance music sounds like. Sure, you can deviate with certain gimmicks (and the late 80s had a far more diverse collection of characters, too, of course), but I can't imagine Randy Orton coming out to dub-step without finding it ridiculous.

Listening to Sasha's theme is near-torturous for me, but it works for her character, absolutely. The problem is, how many (modern) pop, r&b, etc. songs are there that would work as an entrance theme for a 6'3" jacked-up tough guy (theoretically)? Rock music is loud, "tough", and dumb; it just fits. Sure, a rapper character can have some rap music, but we've been over the racial stereotyping plenty of times. There's somewhat more variety in the UFC, but the ones that I can actually remember (Ronda, Bisping, Brock) are 35, 20 and 25 years old respectively. I guess you could give Seamus an old Irish folk song like Conor has but he's never been nearly as demographic-targeted.

Actually I'm in the same boat (or near enough) to Jingus on goofy bullshit, and I think he laid out a perfectly valid reasoning as to why. I've both been on, and seen, far too many shows where there was a massive overreliance on cheap comedy. I'm fine with the odd spot, and if you're creative with it then great, but a) few guys are original with it, and it's worse for someone like me because I'm likely to know where they've lifted it from, b ) it gets old very fast, and c) at the end of the day, I'm an adult.