Yoshitatsu vs. Ryuki Honda – Ryuki Honda Trial Series
A good old TRIAL SERIES has been long overdue in my life. I still have fond memories of a pissed off Jun Akiyama beating the shit out of KENTA all over Korakuen Hall as part of his trial series in ’04. This obviously wasn’t on that level, but WORLD FAMOUS Yoshitatsu going straight into young boy killer mode was a lot more compelling than anything he’s done in the past months. Honda had to work for every ounce of offense so all of his comebacks felt properly earned. Logical, no non-sense opening match wrasslin’. **1/2
Yuma Aoyagi, Atsuki Aoyagi & Rising HAYATO vs. Takao Omori, Black Menso-re & Francesco Akira
My biggest takeaway from this is that we need a singles match between Atsuki and Akira ASAP. These kids have absorbed all of the Ospreay and Rey Fenix GIFs but are distilling them through their strict All Japan training and it’s feeling pretty special. The whole match built up on their crazy opening and remained super fun all the way to the flash pin false finishes between Yuma and Menso-re. PS – TAJIRI teaching HAYATO his shitty WWE-style punches is a bigger sin than any booking decision he might’ve made so far. ***
Izanagi vs. Dan Tamura
Dan really went FULL YELLOW on that bleach job. Kinda makes him look more evil – I dig it. As for the match, it was a bit weird. Big Dan asserted himself early on so sneaky Izanagi had to take out his leg to even the playing field. Makes sense to me, but they spent so much time fucking around with the contrived Dan Lock that I ended up losing interest. Daniel, please drop this bad submission and focus on the Powerbombs and lariats. **
Jake Lee, Koji Iwamoto & TAJIRI vs. Shotaro Ashino, Kuma Arashi & Hokuto Omori
Couple of fun story points here. There seems to be some dissention brewing at the heart of Enfants Terribles, with Ashino showing irritation for Hokuto’s bullshit and Kuma taking the kid’s side. Also, please inject a Jake/Ashino singles match straight into my veins because their chemistry is out of this world. Most of the match highlights came from these two actually: the Gentleman Warrior Jake Lee looking Ace-like knee’ing the crap out of people and Ashino laying waste to the opposition with his big suplexes. Solid stuff. **3/4
Kento Miyahara vs. Abdullah Kobayashi
Good lord, why was this even booked? Not a good look for anyone involved. Kento trying to force his shtick through a minefield of ref bumps and foreign object spots was not exactly pleasant. This whole feud with Fat Muscles just seems like a colossal waste of time. With the tag belts finally off Violence Giants, you’d think the powers that be would want to throw the new champs into exciting programs right off the bat. Why this? I get that the Big Japan guys have that tag league win over Nextream, but I’m sure the AJPW faithful would have no issue forgetting about the whole thing. *
Suwama & Hikaru Sato vs. Kohei Sato & Shuji Ishikawa
This was a bit dry for a Triple Crown preview tag but the finish did a spectacular job in getting Kohei over as a threat. Hellacious forearm to knock out the champ and then the big Piledriver to obliterate Hikaru. Yeah, this dude is dangerous. Most of what came before was structured around Hikaru as babyface in peril. It was allright! Evolution’s junior enforcer took a real shit kicking at the hands of the Towers and his eventual comeback and flurry of offense on Kohei was pretty satisfying. Big Wama didn’t do a whole lot with his challenger, but I’ll assume they’re saving all of their best shit for the actual match. ***
