Finally, Night 1 of the G1 Climax 29 has ARRIVED.
And Night 2 is took place a week later.
This is because for the first time ever, the first day of New Japan’s G1 Climax round-robin tournament took place in AMERICA.
Dallas, Texas, to be exact. Which seemed to be a moderately successful show, at least as far as making NJPW look like a big colorful awesome deal of a company, complete with 4,000-something people that were very excited to be at a wrestling show. There was a lot of chatter about the empty seats at American Airlines Center (you know, where the DALLAS MAVERICKS play) being so prominent on-screen, as if folks hadn’t watched wildly profitable professional wrestling shows from Dallas before with empty seats all over the place. The fuck out of here. It’s the EXPERIENCE.
For some background, dorky young me nearly two decades ago (wow) was a pretty consistent watcher of most Japanese wrestling companies. And every summer, the G1 Climax came into our hearts and minds as New Japan headed into an interesting post-Three Musketeers era that included the rise of Yuji Nagata, styles that ranged from Osamu Nishimura’s old school catch-as-catch-can wrestling to a dozen schlubby MMA fighters coming in and doing a bunch of front facelocks, and eventually, somehow, the emergence of Hiroshi Tanahashi as The Ace. Plus I think there was a Giant Silva vs. Great Khali match in there somewhere. Weird times.
My following of puroresu and the G1 faded out around 2006, as high school graduation and the WWE emerged as a more simpler thing to continue on following, long before I ever saw the Super J Cup and went, “OH MY GOD WHAT.”
And now, two decades later, the emergence of Kazuchika Okada and Tomohiro Ishii, the desire to check in with old favorites, and more accessibility to the product than ever, I find myself thinking about actually legitimately watching every G1 match this year.
We’ll see if I can keep up. If not, Captain Lou’s Review has you covered.
I dug all the tournament history and wrestler intros and place-setting by Kevin Kelly and Rocky Romero at the start, just a good rundown for what is an intimidating tournament.
1. Roppongi 3K vs. Tama Tonga & Tanga Loa
Six minutes is exactly how long every Guerillas of Destiny match should be. Actually five is probably the sweet spot. This was a fun sprint of a wrestling match with SHO and YOH shining as they usually do. Their fire-up moment after the hot tag was some Rock & Roll Express shit, even if it lead to a Stun Gun out of nowhere that ended it. Besides that EVIl/SANADA vs. Okada/Goto from last year might’ve the best IWGP Tag Team Titles I’ve seen in years. It was a novel concept but what’s the point of the IWGP Jr Tag Titles anymore? ***
2. Tomohiro Ishii & Shota Umino vs. Jeff Cobb & Ren Narita
Loved the big pop for Ishii, this is a made man in the United States of America. This was all about Ishii vs. Cobb which resulted in Jeff Cobb actually looking like a guy with killer instinct for once. I’d love to see THIS guy in the G1, and hope it wasn’t just The Ishii Effect. Narita able to get a suplex on Ishii was a fun moment, and the finish was action packed with dudes and attitudes all over the place. ***1/4
3. Hirooki Goto & YOSHI-HASHI vs. Jay White & Chase Owens
Hirooki Goto is slimmed down and READY for the G1 Climax. I enjoyed him scaring away Switchblade from breaking a half crab, and I guess I liked that little rope snap deal Chase Owens did to setup YOSHI-HASHI taking heat. Otherwise, eh. Might vote Chase Owens getting the better of Goto in a wrestling exchange for Most Disgusting Promotional Tactic, even if it was a pretty good wrestling exchange. **1/4
4. Toru Yano, Juice Robinson & Jushin Thunder Liger vs. Tetsuya Naito, Shingo Takagi & BUSHI
This match, if anything, puts on full display what an odd duck of a group Block B is. Liger got me in the feels, Shingo vs Juice was hot, and the star that is Naito in America is always fun to see. **
5. G1 Climax – Block A: Will Ospreay vs. Lance Archer
Best Archer match ever, because between Will’s bumps and selling and THE HAIRCUT, he FINALLY got to come off as the actual monster of a wrestling man he appears to be. The Sasuke Special to a chokeslam through a table was incredible and set the tone – this is gonna be a ride. And it was! I just liked so much about this, it had a high-end underdog vs. big guy dynamic to it and so many great near falls and moments that the 20 minutes it went flew by. Ospreay’s “oh wow he kicked out of my move” reactions still get me moody, but his collapse into the corner off of Archer’s elbows and his selling of Archer’s Undertaker rope walk as if he wasn’t a fuckin’ idiot were both very impressive.
The countout tease after the ramp brawling, which included Archer shoving him away at like 18 and rolling in and Ospreay recovering with a springboard dropkick back inside followed by an Shooting Star Press made for an early great near fall. The OsCutter tease then OsCutter delivery made for another one. The couple Storm Breaker attempts by Will looked so ridiculous with Archer’s huge legs, but when he actually did lift him for it I freaked out. I dug THE CLAW being applied early, then coming back to finally bite Will later. In a match of spots, Archer’s step-up knee strike in the corner might’ve been my favorite too. Archer waiting around like a dummy for a few Will spots early and the Code Red on the floor were off moments in an otherwise on-point matches. And let’s give it up for that Guy In The Front Row in the NJPW T-Shirt wildly gesturing for every near fall. THAT was the real MVP. ****1/4
6. G1 Climax – Block A: EVIL vs. Bad Luck Fale
Question: What methods do LIJ use to pack their gear?
This wasn’t anything surprising but was a fine 10 minutes of EVIL making for a strong underdog that will chairshot your ass if he has to. Big burly dudes hitting each other in a wrestling ring is something I occasionally enjoy watching. ***
7. G1 Climax – Block A: SANADA vs. Zack Sabre Jr.
Sometimes I don’t have much to say about a match I love, sometimes I have a ton to say about a match I was ultimately disappointed in. That is the tale of the next two match-ups. This one was the one I loved. The ZSJ matwork shtick is a shtick, but it’s usually fun to watch, but this felt like it went next level – these guys were doing matwork for a while based around not trying to put on holds, but apply SUBMISSIONS. I haven’t seen anything like that in New Japan and to be honest recent wrestling in a while. They did a ton of cool counters too, like SANADA straight-up CATCHING Sabre Jr. as he tried to hit a European uppercut and turning it into a deadlift backslide, and one of the better moonsaults to triangle choke hold deliveries I’ve ever seen.
Zack’s character stuff was on-point too, and damned if I don’t love me some wrestling character. The OUTRAGE at being tied up! The DICKISHNESS as he wrecked SANADA’s arm up! And I’m not sure if an actual mocking of the NJPW countout tease trope has ever been done, ever. That was something special. They did what felt like an all-time great cradle reversal finish at the end… the Japanese leg roll clutch into a Skull End into a back bridge into a back bridge blew my mind so much I’m not even sure if I’m writing it out accurately. Brilliant match, and the best part – 95% of it was SAFE. Yeah. IT WAS SAFE. NOBODY GOT HURT TRYING TO POP THE CROWD WITH SOMETHING CRAZY IN LIEU OF A MORE INTERESTING APPROACH. HELL YEAH. ****1/2
8. G1 Climax – Block A: Kota Ibushi vs. KENTA
After a depressing run of too many injuries and disappointing matches in the WWE system that at times deeply hurt my soul and at times kind of just cracked me up, Hideo Itami is dead and KENTA IS ALIVE. And as an experience, this match – long-awaited both for how much the Itami run stunk and for the quality that resulted in these two squaring off as young pups fifteen years ago in the should-be-legendary Differ Cup – was a real good one. But as a match…. it was merely “real good” – which when it’s G1 season, translates to kind of average. It’s weird. It was fun to watch KENTA at least act and be presented like KENTA again, providing an intensity that was lacking since his first two NXT V appearances. But the match was ultimately kind of disappointing, more something that’d be a hyped up 205 Live main event than a headline match from Night 1 of the G1 Climax or what those exchanges so many years ago at Differ Ariake promised.
KENTA and Ibushi slapping and kicking each other and making badass faces early was great, but KENTA has been through some STUFF. And he was pacing things like a guy who’d been through that stuff, just a hair behind what this match might’ve promised and not better for it. I couldn’t shake that it really did feel more the style KENTA has been working for the last few years than the style Ibushi has been doing for the last decade or so, which is disappointing because when Ibushi came to WWE for that weird month or two he just wrestled like Ibushi. Here, KENTA was more intense, but he was still wrestling like… Hideo Itami.
So you had traditional cut-offs, Ibushi feeding for a comeback, and getting his name chanted while in chinlocks. You had Ibushi just standing and standing there for a diving clothesline. It’s all stuff Ibushi is perfectly fine at, but not something he’s great at. KENTA meanwhile was never really good at this style in the first place. So it was a strong WWE-style match that was ultimately highlighted by a “LET’S GO RED SHOES” chant. The atmosphere carried it and they finally got things revving at the end, but it just wasn’t the KENTA vs. Ibushi match I was hoping for after KENTA did that interview here he went, “I am fucking KENTA!” ***1/2
9. G1 Climax – Block A: Kazuchika Okada vs. Hiroshi Tanahashi
I’m going to admit something here – watching it a few years removed from the online hype, I was not a huge fan of the initial Okada vs. Tanahashi matches. Once Okada settled as The Ace is when these guys’ chemistry really clicked for me, and their draw in the 2016 G1 Climax and IWGP Heavyweight Title match last year are among my favorite matches ever, just total art that stays true to what professional wrestling was in the first place.
The rest of their matches though, including another draw in last year’s G1, were low-end New Japan main events for me. They hit the notes, sure… but I wasn’t feeling those notes deep down. I imagine these are two guys who might not even say a word to each other before the match, so sometimes it all works and sometimes it’s missing something. This… it worked, but I didn’t treasure it like some of their other matches and with these two names on paper it was ultimately a little disappointing….. even if it was still a great match!
I don’t want to say it felt a little House Show Style, but it did. And that’s not even bad considering the talent involved, it’s just what it was. There was no matwork or chess-playing here, no time for some deep story, they got right to those elbows and dragon screws and sold the shit out of everything with the added aspect of this being in AMERICA. There wasn’t anything new to say here, so they relied on selling the realness of their great professional wrestling and there was a whole lot of that. It was great, but something was also missing to take it to OH MY GOD YOU GOTTA SEE THIS THEY DID IT AGAIN territory. As brought up to me by Captain Lou, what might’ve felt missing is that these two did do basically Their Match which is an amazing match but it was in front of a crowd more about THIS IS AWESOME than WE LOVE YOU TANA GO ACE GO ACE. And so something was missing even if the work was still great.
Of course, to end Their Match the two GOAT’s pulled off an incredible finish that delivered everything any ass in those Dallas seats could have ever wanted from Okada vs. Tanahashi anyways. ****1/4
