Dub > Sub: 1990 All Japan TV

[William Bologna]

Greg Valentine vs. Great Kabuki

They really front-loaded the TV from the Summit. Week 1 we get Jumbo, Tenryu vs. Savage, and Baba and Andre. Week 2 we get this.

Greg Valentine treats us to some stylistic dissonance. He's in his Rhythm & Blues Honky Tonk Man regalia, but he comes out to "The Look" by Roxette, which ain't exactly Carl Perkins (or even Jimmy Hart).

Dubbed commentary mentions that “He formed a team with Honky Tonkman,” like it’s a normal last name.

There's a fair amount of standing around and hitting each, but that's what these two are good at. Valentine is selling the hell out of Kabuki’s punches - we get a Flair flop and everything.

Kabuki whips Valentine into the turnbuckle. He jumps at him, but Valentine gets out of the way and Kabuki tree of woes himself. I’ve never seen that before. Shane McMahon has to rescue him, and the commentary talks about how he looks like Vince.

Valentine repeatedly does this goofy half-ass Honky Tonkman dance. “That’s a signature pose. But it’s an unpleasant pose.” Brother, ain’t that the truth.

Valentine tries for a figure four, but Kabuki rolls him up for the win.

Solid. These guys are pros.

[William Bologna]

All Japan TV April 29, 1990

This is the end of the Champion Carnival tour, and you may have noticed that it lacked a Champion Carnival. It went on hiatus through most of the 1980s, and they pick it up again next year.

Jumbo Tsuruta vs. Genichiro Tenryu (Triple Crown title match)

Tenryu’s 1990 ends as it began. Back in January, Isao Takagi waylaid him on his way to the ring; this time Stan Hansen does the same. He chokes Tenryu with his rope and then just brutalizes him with a lariat. Tenryu was still in the corner, so there’s nowhere for his head to go but straight into the turnbuckle. It had me seeing stars.

Jumbo chases off Stan with one of his belts. Hansen gets on the mic and demands the match. “I’m the number one contender!”

Jumbo goes to check on Tenryu, who’s slumped in the corner, and Tenryu slaps him! I popped for this. Jumbo is pissed!

The match is Tenryu trying to hang onto consciousness while Jumbo cuts off his comebacks. He’s so good at selling. Tsuruta knocks him silly with a high kick, and it’s just perfect.

Top rope enzuigiri and Tenryu finally gets an opening. Yokohama is chanting his name.

The flaw at this point is that they try a bunch of fancy Hart-style rollup reversal stuff, and they’re real bad at it. Tenryu ducks a Thesz press and drops Jumbo’s throat on the rope, and it’s clunky as hell. But then they start beating each other again until Tenryu goes down to two backdrops.

I loved this. It had great character work from all three guys, intensity, and historical significance.

That’s it for Tenryu, his last All Japan match for ten years. Obviously, we have hindsight and know that things worked out, but this must have seemed like a disaster at the time. So far in 1990, the TV has been built around:

1. Tenryu getting real mad at Jumbo’s flunkies.
2. Tenryu hurting his leg, losing the tag titles, and getting stomped by Stan Hansen.
3. The glittering stars of the World Wrestling Federation.

He’s been out there every week busting his ass, selling like crazy, and getting everything over. When did they know he was leaving? It seems insane to build everything around a guy on his way out. Google tells me he gave notice around the time of the Summit; that would explain it.

Super World of Sport doesn’t start running until September, and the rest of the guys stick around for a while. Honestly, a lot of those defections were addition by subtraction, but I’m going to miss Tenryu.

At least he upheld the time-honored tradition in the wrestling business by getting his ass kicked on the way out. The same cannot be said of one of the participants in our next match . . . 

[William Bologna]

Bret Hart vs. Tiger Mask

This is famous for being a retroactive dream match that let everyone down. I’m having to improvise with the TV coverage, so I’m getting the full 20 minutes.

I am again a victim of my expectations. Hansen vs. Hogan was supposed to be great, and I thought it was just OK. This is supposed to be awful, but it wasn’t.

That’s not to say it was good. Most of the stuff they did looked fine, better than fine even. Misawa launched a couple planchas, and they looked great. But it didn’t hold your focus. Highspot, arm work, highspot, headlock.

And the finish really does come out of nowhere. There were no announcements that time was running out, and they weren’t doing anything in particular when the bell rang.

I was expecting worse, but I’m not going to be telling anyone to watch it.

[William Bologna]

Jake Roberts vs. Big Bossman

I like Bossman. His punches are great, as are his big husky boy bumps. He has fun cartoon offense, like standing on Jake’s back. He had a brief AJPW run later, and if he’d stuck around I think he would have been an asset. He’s getting big heel reactions here too, just from stepping on Jack and making mean faces.

He grinds down Jake for a long time until he goes to the top rope and misses a splash. He doesn’t land great, but he rolls his big ass all the way across the ring and falls out. A for effort.

Jake fires up for a while, but then Bossman maybe reverses a running knee? I don’t know what was supposed to happen there, but it doesn’t stop Jake from getting the DDT out of nowhere and putting a snake on his opponent.

I don’t know, I loved this. Nice change of pace. They got some big reactions, too. I don’t think they were the sarcastic Ultimate Warrior cheers.

That’s it for the Pro Wrestling Summit. I didn’t watch any of the New Japan stuff, but it was a fun show. It’s kind of odd that most of it was AJPW vs. WWF, and then there were a couple entirely NJPW matches in there.

I wonder if this piqued the WWF’s interest in the market. They got in cahoots with Tenryu and SWS pretty quick after this, and they seemed pretty enthusiastic about it.

[William Bologna]

April 1990 Power Rankings

1. Tenryu completes the sweep. Four out of four. What are we going to talk about without him?
2. Macho Queen Sherri Martel
3. Macho King Randy Savage
4. Stan Hansen
5. Hell, I don't know. Let's give it to Tito Santana