New Japan Rumble
My most anticipated match of the year: the NEW JAPAN RUMBLE! Every leftover midcard wrestler from the main roster going at it, surprise appearances and M. Night Shyamalan-level TWISTS. This is what Wrestle Kingdom is all about. Here are the objectively-great moments from this thing: Liger coming out to a monster pop and battling Suzuki-Gun, the much-awaited return of CHEESEBURGER, the Internet-breaking debut of the enigmatic sluggy goof known as Gambino, Kazuo Yamazaki taking off his jacket when hearing the UWF theme song and of course MASAHITO KAKIHARA coming in and winning the whole thing for his boy Yoshihiro Takayama. This gets all of the stars. All of them.
SHO & YOH © vs. Nick Jackson & Matt Jackson – IWGP Jr Tag-Team Title
Easily the biggest match opportunity of Roppongi 3K’s young careers, and they totally delivered the goods by working a full-on Young Bucks tag match with all of the Young Bucks tropes that YOU either love or hate. I’m not the biggest fan of the Bucks, but their wacky brand of indie wrestling was the perfect way to kick off the show. A lot of their shtick is ridiculous and contrived, but the crowd ate it up and R3K got over HUGE by hanging in there with them. Great selling of the back from YOH as the babyface in peril, uber-convincing hot tag offense from SHO and a whole bunch of fun spots from everyone involved: the rope-draped Swanton bomb that literally broke YOH in half, the double tope con hilo from Roppongi and the crazy superkick pile-up near the ending stretch. The back work even paid off as the Bucks caught YOH in the Indytaker and then tapped him via Sharpshooter. Not that excited at the prospect of another Bucks tag reign, but R3K are not the kind of team that need to be booked as invincible champs, so it should all work out okay. ***1/2
Bad Luck Fale, Tama Tonga & Tonga Loa © vs. Tomohiro Ishii, Toru Yano & Beretta vs. Togi Makabe, Juice Robinson & Ryusuke Taguchi vs. Takashi Iizuka, Zack Sabre Jr. & Taichi vs. Michael Elgin, Raymond Rowe & Hanson – NEVER Openweight 6-Man Tag-Team Title Gauntlet Match
I was dreading this match on paper but it turned out to be a lot of fun. The action really got cooking once it came down to the CHAOS/Sekigun pairing. Juice was firing on all cylinders with his punch combos, Taguchi busted out THE NAKAMURA POSE and Makabe was just ridiculously over no matter what he did. Things went up a notch after Sekigun (or Taguchi Japan?) got eliminated and Ishii/Fale took center stage for some BEEFY BRUISING that totally had the crowd going. Spot of the match came when Tama countered a Beretta Moonsault with a freaking Gun Stun out of nowhere. Amazing timing. Trent got to shine in the finishing stretch and picked up the win for Team CHAOS via Dudebuster. Nice way to reward Beretta after all the promise that he’s shown since his heavyweight graduation. ***
Kota Ibushi vs. Cody
A lot of people had their doubts about Ibushi and Cody, but from watching the lead-in tag match from December, I knew they could put something solid together, and my friends: they did. First half of the match was heavy on shtick from Cody, which isn’t too surprising as the guy has always been a barebones template of an American heel wrestler. Style points for him: the new bleached blonde hair makes him look even SMARMIER, which is no small feat. Everything kicked into shockingly high gear for the second half of this thing as Cody started working more of Ibushi’s type of match and actually kept up quite well. Ibushi brought the stiffness in the form of his wild kick combos and Cody responded in kind with a JAW-DROPPING Cross Rhodes off the apron! Absolutely frightening bump from Ibushi. Everything just clicked perfectly for the whole ending stretch as we got a bunch of nifty counters, big-time dives and near-falls until Kota finally clocked Cody with the Kamigoye and finished him off with a beautiful Phoenix splash. A match that took everyone by surprise and almost sold me on Cody as a viable full-time gaijin for NJPW. ***3/4
Lance Archer & Davey Boy Smith Jr. © vs. EVIL & SANADA – IWGP Tag-Team Title
The best KES performance I’ve seen in a very long time. I went into the match cheering for my boys EVIL an SANADA, but came out of it hugely impressed by Archer and Davey Boy. They came off as total MONSTERS: isolating the LIJ guys one by one and tearing them apart, cutting off tags, destroying the young lions at ring-side. A whole bunch of expertly-put together tag-team wrestling with KES playing their role perfectly as the unstoppable hoss bastards. The only down side of this match is that the kind of onslaught KES brought to the table required The Babyface Comeback of All Babyface Comebacks and LIJ were 75% there for it. EVIL did good, as he’s always been great at showing fire and charisma, but SANADA’s eternal stoicism does him no favors when it’s time to step up and show personality in these types of situations. Amazing dropkicks though. The crowd still gathered behind them and the Killer Bomb kickout near the end of the match got a massive reaction. SANADA got the big win with his Ode to Muto Moonsault and I am ecstatic at the prospect of new blood in New Japan’s beyond-stale tag division. ***1/2
Minoru Suzuki © vs. Hirooki Goto – Hair vs. Hair No Seconds Death Match – NEVER Openweight Title
KAZE NI HARE! Wrestling masterclass from the evil genius that is Minoru Suzuki. Minoru had a shaky 2017, often stuck in overbooked, low-stakes NEVER title matches with comically bad stipulations, but everything started picking up again when they lined up this new program with Goto. Right from the start of their feud, the whole thing has been based on pure hatred, and putre hatred is what this match was all about. A vicious battle between two guys that have nothing but disdain for each other, with A-Game Minoru Suzuki bringing the pain and noble warrior Hirooki Goto basically FIGHTING FOR HIS LIFE and coming off as a great sympathetic babyface. The turning point and clear highlight of this thing came when Suzuki caught Goto in a top-rope sleeper and seemed to legit choke the life out of him, Goto doing an amazing sell job, collapsing with his eyes glazed over and looking like the portrait of a dying man. Minoru stayed on offense for 75% of the match and it really helped turn everything into a scary uphill battle for Goto.
The hope spots were sparce and Suzuki just kept on pummelling Goto with murderous forearms and kicks. Throughout all of their lead-in tag matches, I’ve been noting the great chemistry between these guys, and they delivered on that promise when they started trading off crazy counters in the ending stretch, Goto slowly but surely finding his footing against this monster opponent. Goto’s final burst of offense was appropriately high-impact considering the toughness of the cranky psychopath standing in his way: DEVASTATING TOP-ROPE USHIGOROSHI, super brutal-looking LIFT-UP Reverse GTR and finally the regular GTR for the 3 count.
In the most Minoru Suzuki Moment of the match, the bastard refuses to let Goto shave off his hair, sucks it up and does it himself out of pure spite. This man is a national treasure and this match kicked all kinds of ass. ****1/4
Marty Scurll © vs. Will Ospreay vs. KUSHIDA vs. Hiromu Takahashi – 4-Way Match – IWGP Jr Heavyweight Title
To be perfectly honest, my favorite thing about this match was Marty Scurll’s glorious WINGED ENTRANCE. I am not a big fan of this man’s wrestling, but he really does have an eye for esthetics and those wings were just amazing. The match itself was a colossal clusterfuck, and not the fun kind. For unexplainable reasons, the most popular and bankable wrestler in this whole match: Hiromu Takahashi, was made to look like a total jobber for the majority of the contest, basically remaining a non-factor until the ending stretch where he got a big run of offense. Everyone tried hard to string together nutty high-risk stuff, but it all turned into a soul-less spot exhibition that repeatedly lost the crowd’s interest. Ospreay took it home with the Oscutter on Scurl and I am dreading those 2018 Will Ospreay Jr title defenses. **3/4
Hiroshi Tanahashi © vs. Jay White – IWGP Intercontinental Title
So, this was a bit of a disaster. Throwing the unproven Jay White into a high-profile Tokyo Dome slot as his post-excursion return match seemed like risky booking right from the start and this match did nothing to alleviate those concerns. Just to put things into perspective, even Kazuchika Okada, who turned out to be the company’s biggest new star, started off his 2012 post-excursion career with a 5 minute midcard match against YOSHI-HASHI before getting thrown into the spotlight against Tanahashi. Even before we get to the match itself, a lot of stuff about Jay White’s new Switchblade identity seems off. He looks like a kid cosplaying as a brooding badass and all of his promos have been cringe-worthy. These are all things that can be improved throughout the year, as we’ve seen plenty of guys with goofy gimmicks get gradually better in New Japan (prime example being EVIL) , but let’s just say it contributed massively to the general awkwardness of this match. Everything about it just screamed: ‘’This is a bad idea’’.
Now, for the actual wrestling. After the empty-calorie binge that was the 4-way, I actually kind of dug the matwork oriented opening here, but the action quickly devolved into a heatless, unconvincing attempt at New Japan main event wrestling. The crowd being completely unfamiliar with White resulted in all of his big moves getting no response whatsoever. Other spots, like the ridiculously-weak looking apron Brainbuster, were just plain stupid and should be discarded from his move-set. Then there was that awkward moment on the top turnbuckle where the fans laughed him off. You could tell Tanahashi was desperately trying to get this kid over, but the crowd was just not buying into any of it. We’ll thankfully be spared the Jay White Intercontinental title reign, as Tana got the win via High Fly Flow. Broken-down Tana needs to drop the belt and take time off to heal ASAP, but Jay White should not be the guy to shelf him. Lose-lose situation here. **3/4
Kenny Omega © vs. Chris Jericho – No DQ Match – IWGP US Heavyweight Title
For the last year, Kenny Omega built himself as the face of New Japan Pro-Wrestling for western audiences. The guy made it a point to redefine the concept of ‘’making it’’ in the wrestling business by foregoing the traditional path towards the WWE and instead focusing on making NJPW a global entity through the power of awesome wrestling matches. Now, here is the ultimate irony: Omega and Jericho worked a match that would feel right at home as a WWE PPV main event, and Kenny seemed to have an absolute blast doing it.
Jericho has been working this whole angle as a monster heel and his performance defied expectations, both in terms of world-class heeling and actual workrate. The match had all sorts of crazy moments that we’ll get to later, but the main thing that made it work for me and kept it from being a full-on trainwreck, is that these two guys wrestled like they fucking HATED EACH OTHER. Jericho exploited this amazingly, acting like a complete dick to Kenny, the fans, Red Shoes and his freaking SON (SHOTA UMINO), whom he put in the Walls of Jericho! (Hands down my favorite spot of this match)
Huge props to Kenny who played a great babyface to counter Jericho’s out-of-this-world dick heel act and totally killed himself for the cause: massive blade-job, insane bumps, big-time selling. The list of great moments is never-ending, but here’s a few: the AMAZINGLY-TIMED springboard dropkick from Jericho, Kenny’s announcer table death bump and the One-Winged Angel rope break. Just a crazy display of wild blockbuster wrestling with all of the nutty WWE tropes, namely tables, chairs and blood. I did feel like the match went on for maybe 5 minutes too long and that the No DQ rules were completely inconsistent, but otherwise this was a boatload of FUN. ****
Kazuchika Okada © vs. Tetsuya Naito – IWGP Heavyweight Title
I’ve been thinking about Okada’s goofy-ass new pants for the past two days, trying to find some semblance of logic to Wrestle Kingdom’s biggest fashion faux pas. And then it just hit me. We are witnessing Kazuchika Okada’s FINAL FORM as God-level IWGP Heavyweight champion. This is the Dragon Ball Z moment where Frieza reveals his deadliest form to be the least physically threatening one. Disco Mariachi Pants Okada is the FINAL BOSS of New Japan Pro-wrestling. The evidence is all over the place, from Okada’s 2017 promos to the BEYOND-EPIC pre-match video package that presents Okada as this ominous force of nature that cannot be overcome by mere mortals.
This marks a stark contrast between the presentation of Okada and Tanahashi as New Japan’s aces. Okada has grown into this unkillable super-wrestler that can withstand any challenger, while Tananashi was very much New Japan’s savior, a being of pure light that single-handledly dragged a drowning company back to the surface. For the longest time, I was convinced Naito would be the man to topple New Japan’s final boss and end his record breaking title reign. He actually still might be, but it just wasn’t meant for Wrestle Kingdom. And as heartbreaking as Naito’s defeat was, I’m partially okay with it because we got this fantastic match out of it.
Few guys in the wrestling universe have the chemistry that Okada and Naito have together and here they got display all of it on the biggest stage possible. People tend to forget that Okada was initially trained by Ultimo Dragon before coming to the New Japan dojo, but matches like this are a good reminder that Okada’s a master at working whirlwind-paced Toryumon-like matches mixed with high-emotion New Japan drama. And Naito’s the perfect dance partner for such a thing.
I liked pretty much everything about this match. The slower opening with Naito establishing his Tranquilo shtick, the subsequent neck-work and Naito’s hurty neckbreaker variations, Okada’s use of the cobra clutch to wear down Naito, that spot where Okada ran around the whole ring just to boot Naito in the face. More importantly, this match felt IMPORTANT and had the kind of surreal big Japanese wrestling match atmosphere that reminded me of a 90’s All Japan epic. Both Okada and Naito came off as fully-realized characters doing battle at crucial point of their story arcs. The last 15 minutes of the match are some of the most state-of-the-art wrestling you’ll find anywhere. I thought both guys struck the perfect balance between finisher escalation and the selling that should come with such a thing. Even if they had to use multiple versions of each, the Rainmaker and Destino came off as BIG DEALS. I mean, Naito was dead on his feet after a single Rainmaker.
The spot where Okada could no longer throw proper forearms and resulted in Naito spitting on him and then slapping the shit out of him was TREMENDOUS. I could just go on and on about this match, but I feel like I’ve covered most of the important aspects of it via DBZ, Toryumon and 90’s All Japan. A dazzling spectacle of high-end NJPW wrestling between two superstars at the top of their game. ****3/4
Outside of the Jay White debacle and the disappointing 4-way match, Wrestle Kingdom more than lived up to the hype this year. A main event for the ages showcasing the company’s two top wrestlers, Jericho and Kenny killing each other in a super fun WWE trainwreck match, an epic showdown between Suzuki and Goto, and finally a rock-solid undercard that completely took me my surprise. This is the perfect jumping on point if you’re looking to get into New Japan. The new season starts now. WATCH THIS!
