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Comments that don't warrant a thread - Part 3


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I went to Kawada's ramen restaurant last week. It's located in the basement of a building in a nice middle-upper class residential neighbourhood though it is in the middle of a busy long road and not in a particularly pedestrian friendly or well located area (i.e. not close to a train station).

 

The first thing that I thought after going in was: where did this man's money go? Restaurant is small, maybe 20 to 25 people, looks old and not filthy but not all that clean either. I guess him being loyal to Motoko cost him a nice chunk of money. There's no wrestling decoration other than some Kawada dolls and t-shirts that are on sale. It looks like any other pop and mom ramen joint you can find in Tokyo.

 

Kawada was cooking and his wife brought the food. They had no more staff. Ordering is through a machine that takes your money and gives you a printed ticket. Service was OK, food came in fast but Mrs Kawada dropped some beer on one of my friends. She was very apologetic after that. She was a nice lady, though. Glasses, cups and bowls were all very clean.

 

We were five plus a small child so we decided to get three bowls of ramen to share, several starters and a lot of beer. The Dangerous K signature ramen had curry flavour and was decent, the regular ramen was very bland and the cold shrimp ramen was passable. Noodles were packaged and not fresh. Each bowl was 1000 yen (exactly 10 bucks) but you can find much better stuff for half that price. The starters were pretty average. Nothing was bad but nothing was good.

 

Kawada isn't a very personable fella. We didn't talk to him other than to greet him and say goodbye. He wasn't unfriendly or grumpy but since he wasn't interacting with anybody, and it's not like he was all that busy, we didn't want to bother him. There's a gimmick where you can buy his t-shirt for 30 bucks and take a picture with him, but we didn't do it. He doesn't look like the youngest 50 year old man in the world but he doesn't look bad. He doesn't have the wide shoulders, chest and big arms anymore though. And he's got teeth.

 

Considering that the location isn't convenient for me and that the food was so-so, I probably won't go back, but the gimmick itself is that Kawada is the one doing all the cooking, which is quite an odd sight, so the 17 or 18 bucks I paid were fine in that regard. All this being said I'm happy that the guy has moved on and that he's got something to bring money home, so I hope that he does well.

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Is there a wrestling books thread (like the one we have for shoots)? I haven't read a wrestling book in years, probably since I read the Bret Hart book 3 or 4 years ago and I'm looking to read one but not sure which ones are good. It's hard to go by Amazon reviews as even books I have hated have many five star ratings by fans that will love anything they read as long as it's wrestling related.

 

If not, what else can people here recommend? It must be available to buy on ebook format. So far only Snowden's book on shooters is on my list.

Mad Dogs, Midgets and Screw Jobs. Not formatted perfectly in that sometimes text overlaps pictures. Otherwise I found it a fantastically worthwhile read.

 

Want to note that I received an update to my Kindle edition, fixing the formatting issues. No reservations making a full recommendation now.
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I can't imagine how strange it would be to be in a restaurant with Kawada cooking up food in the back.

I forgot to mention that there's a large open window so you can't literally see him cooking unless you get close, but you can see him moving around back and forth from any table.

 

But it was a rather odd sight, indeed.

 

I also heard that Killer Khan has got a Mongolian BBQ joint in Shinjuku so we may drop by.

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After speaking to the prosecuting attorney Meltzer outlines the Zumhofe situation in long, uncomfortable detail in the latest Observer. Haven't felt as uneasy reading something in the Observer since the Benoit murder suicide. I don't think I need to recap stories of sexual abuse nor I want to. But what the attorney was most troubled by is that so many people inside the Wrestling community knew and didn't come forward to report it.

Meltzer said on his radio show that one of his editors told him to tone down the original story he had wrote for the Observer, which was bad enough to read.

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Twitter is melting in regards to the finish. I thought it was fine given the way things had been building and actually brilliant if it is the end of Chikara.

Meant to say this, but I really enjoyed your blogging of the show. I'm not a Chikara fan, but I thought you were very even handed and sensible in your comments on the matches. I only saw the main event which I actually liked more than you and I loved the finish because it seemed to be a hilarious fuck you to all the fans. I mean a complete troll and I cannot wait to see Chikara fans bend themselves backwards to promote it as a "great" finish in keeping with Chikara's traditions or some other such garbage. As a guy who has never liked Chikara I rather loved it for fucked up reasons I admit :)

 

I think it is the end of "Chikara" but not the end of a company promoted by Mike Quackenbush in this fashion.

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For those who don't know without going into titanic amounts of backstory. Chikara essentially did the ending of Sopranos.

 

Some aren't happy at all. The glass door to the venue of smashed.

 

This could be a thread worthy topic but as a dirty Euro I never really understood the American intolerance of a open ended ending. Whether it be the aforementioned Sopranos or a Their Will Be Blood.

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For those who don't know without going into titanic amounts of backstory. Chikara essentially did the ending of Sopranos.

 

Some aren't happy at all. The glass door to the venue of smashed.

 

This could be a thread worthy topic but as a dirty Euro I never really understood the American intolerance of a open ended ending. Whether it be the aforementioned Sopranos or a Their Will Be Blood.

Rovert feel free to start a thread specific to this show, Chikara "end," et. It probably merits it even if it goes nowhere

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Thanks for the kind words Dylan. The show in ring wise was honestly better than I thought because some of the matches featured body work that played into the finish and the tag title match built to the climax instead of your typical American Wolves affair where they have 5-10 minutes of "feeling out" and then collectively say fuck it. I wont to watch the spotfest match again but I thought I was removed from the point in my fandom where that kind of match would excite me, but damned if all them guys flying around helter skelter didn't get me pumped up watching at home. I do think the match was senseless but grounded in gaining the victory which is all I ask of that type of match.

 

JDW: The show ended without a conclusion to the main event. Security guards who have a connection with Chikara rushed the ring and escorted all competitors out and then destroyed the set. Chikarason on commentary then announced that he saw Archibald Peck (really no quick way to describe why besides it being convoluted) and then the feed immediately cut to black.

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I'm not really a Chikara guy, but I watched tonight's show, since the build seemed, if nothing else, interesting. I say I'm not a Chikara guy based on having only seen one recent show, which was part of the WrestleCon show that my friends and I left early because we just weren't into it. I respect that the rest of the crowd was into it, and that Quack does a good job promoting to his base, but the overall jokey/ironic vibe didn't work for me. So I'll preface my comments with that.

 

That said, I thought the show was generally good. The in-ring was decent or better for most of the night, save the Sarcophagus Match, which went on for WAY too long and for a feud-ending grudge match, really lacked fire from either guy. Everything else was good. I mostly enjoyed the Colony six man tag, although I also felt like they overdid that match in a lot of spots, and the tag title change was pretty good too. The Tim Donst/Gavin Loudspeaker match was a highlight for me, because that match was worked almost exactly as it should have been (granted, I think the match was helped by Loudspeaker legit being scared out of his mind in there) with a satisfying finish for most fans (me, I wanted Loudspeaker to get his head shaved, partly because his name is Gavin Loudspeaker, and partly because of his insistence at WrestleCon at referring to intermission as "intermish").

 

As for the main event, I have to admit, I'm just not sure where this is going. They seem to be putting a lot of heat on this Wink Vavasseur guy, which is all well and good, but he's not a wrestler, and he's not even managing wrestlers. It's another evil commissioner/evil owner storyline, which is beyond played out in 2013. Maybe that's the idea in "wink-wink, nudge nudge" hipster-ass Chikara, so maybe it's just another instance of Chikara not being for me, or maybe this is going in an even weirder direction. Who knows.

 

Anyway, no regrets on getting the iPPV. I was home, I had nothing else to do, and the wrestling was generally good. That said, I'm still not much more certain I'm a Chikara guy now than I was two months ago. Maybe I'll follow things online just to see where things go, but I don't necessarily see me shelling out for another iPPV or going to another Chikara live event anytime soon.

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After decomposing and lisening/reading to the Chikara coverage, I am miffed at what people expected.

 

Short of Quack coming out at the end and having a casket with a chikara flag over it, this was a pretty definitive way to end the show and at the very least say that big shit has changed.

 

I also cant fathom reading some of the Observer feedback threads and seeing Loudspeaker/Donst as the worst match of the night while giving some praise to the overbloated nonsense that was Amasis vs. Ohphidian.

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After decomposing and lisening/reading to the Chikara coverage, I am miffed at what people expected.

 

I also cant fathom reading some of the Observer feedback threads and seeing Loudspeaker/Donst as the worst match of the night while giving some praise to the overbloated nonsense that was Amasis vs. Ohphidian.

That's crazy; Loudspeaker/Donst was really well worked and as someone that hasn't seen any Chikara for 3/4 years, I felt immediately caught up with the angle and Donst's entourage. The Sarcophagus match was a meandering, boring mess.

 

I read your review (good stuff btw!) but disagree about Hatfield on commentary. For some reason, him speaking through the mask and wondering if Jigsaw was really Dynamite Kid cracked me up and I thought he really added to the tag.

 

As for the ending, man, I love when pro wrestling gets into crazy high-concept shit like this. Like the time Regal was Raw GM and he cut the broadcast off in the middle of Cena/HHH. Just awesome stuff that gets people talking and inappropriately riled up and the fallout is always great.

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Did it seem like to you Stiva, that Dasher and LFC were not on the same page in the main event. I don't know if that was by design, but I sort of doubt it. Dasher kept pushing that Kingston was not getting much of a reaction and LFC was stating that it was more 50/50.

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Looks of people woke up to the events page looking like this. Some pissed off as they booked Summer Holidays around seeing them. Some even are saying they bought plane tickets:

 

"All You See is Mine"

Saturday, July 20th

Easton, PA

CANCELED

 

"Cause Each Other Pain"

Sunday, July 21st

Manhattan, NY

CANCELED

 

"Who Am I Without You?"

Friday, August 23rd

Minot, ND

CANCELED

 

"Wide Awake"

Saturday, August 24th

Sioux Falls, SD

CANCELED

 

"The Things That You Saw"

Sunday, August 25th

Minneapolis, MN

CANCELED

 

"The Answer's At The End"

Saturday, September 14th

Easton, PA

CANCELED

 

"Weeping Atlas Cedars"

Saturday, November 9th

Reseda, CA

CANCELED

 

"All Things Must Pass"

Sunday, November 10th

San Diego, CA

CANCELED

 

National Pro Wrestling Day

Saturday, February 1st, 2014

View Festival Information

http://www.chikarapro.com/jul-20-2013.php

 

All event titles were from George Harrison songs from All Things Must Pass.

 

Mike Johnson says some roster members were pulled aside and were told to sign Non Disclosure Agreements.

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