Black Menso-re & Kotaro Suzuki vs. Rising HAYATO & Oji Shiiba
Greetings to all fellow consumers of All Japan TV. We are inside an obscure venue known as ‘’Korakuen Hall’’ and crowd cheering has finally been sanctioned by the Japanese Ministry of Wrestling. High on renewed crowd support, these four gentlemen had an efficient opening match with inspiring lucha armdrags and dropkicks. HAYATO was a good foil for Kotaro – the veteran Gundam enthusiast already on the junior title warpath. **3/4
Naruki Doi & Hokuto Omori vs. Yuma Anzai & Ryo Inoue
Everything about this professional wrestling match was so deeply enjoyable. The crowd cheering activation has revealed the true popularity level of the AJPW roster and let me tell you – Anzai and Inoue are over as fuck. Naturally, Doi bounced off their immense babyface energy by heeling it up like SEASONED SLIMEBALL. While Hokuto/Anzai worked some foream magic together, the Dragon Gate OG led Inoue through a rollup-heavy ending stretch and life was truly good. ***1/4
Toshizo © vs. Minoru Tanaka – GAORA TV Title
Once fellow BattlArtists and Voodoo Murderers – now opponents!? Minoru and Toshizo have journeyed through space/time and today battled it out for the top prize in the industry: the GAORA TV championship. They parred it down to the bare essentials and had a no non-sense match that appealed to mankind’s basic desires (Loving Minoru Tanaka). Minoru put together a compelling babyface performance – selling big and gradually sprinkling in esthetically-pleasing comebacks. ***1/4
Shotaro Ashino, Ryuki Honda & Masao Hanabatake vs. Yuji Nagata, Hikaru Sato & Dan Tamura
Lead Gungnir of Anarchist Shotaro Ashino has returned from injury and is ready to gutwrench suplex some fools. They leaned into Reality-Based Subplots, what with Team Blue Lives Matter lasering in on the bad shoulder. The Korakuen support for Ashino and the rest of GOA was heartwarming and provided an appropriate background for all of this solid wrasslin’. **3/4
Shuji Ishikawa, Takao Omori, Yoshitatsu & Ren Ayabe vs. Suwama, KONO, Jun Saito & Rei Saito
The murdering must continue. This was the message of this controversial art piece and subsequent TARU motivational speech. Big Wama and the Saitos have had their differences, but it seems they’ll now put their issues aside to keep tormenting AJPW Twitter. RAW is forever ZEN NIHON. **
Atsuki Aoyagi © vs. Kaz Hayashi – AJPW Jr. Heavyweight Title
This wasn’t without issues, but the core story worked in furthering the Junior Ace Establishment of young Atsuki Aoyagi. Old man Hayashi brought the veteran presence and layout oversight, forcing Atsuki to fight through the ancient technique commonly known as Working The Neck. Aoyagi continues to excel at delivering exciting offense, even if he can’t quite convey any sense of struggle.
It’s the double-edged sword of all the Atsuki vs. Veteran matches – the structure makes perfect sense but Atsuki isn’t great at making you think he’s in actual trouble. While there were a few execution hiccups near the end, the extremely-forgiving Korakuen crowd made them easy to ignore. Bring on the Kotaro match. ***1/2
Kento Miyahara & Takuya Nomura © vs. Yuma Aoyagi & Naoya Nomura – AJPW Tag Team Titles
Japanese wrasslin’s been buzzing for the past few days. The imminent Muto retirement, Kongo vs. Nooj series and Kaito Kiyomiya freakin’ SHOOTING on Kazuchika Okada all brought back a fun sense of interpromotional wonder to the scene. Not to be left out, All Japan attempted to grab some of the spotlight in their own way and put together this pure spreadsheet destroyer of a wrestling match.
Backed by the loudest AJPW crowd in literally four years, Miyaken To Takuya and the recently-resurrected Nomuyagi had the best World Tag match since the height of the Violence Giants mega reign. The pace did not let up for one second – 22 minutes of frenetic, bullshit-free, in-your-face pro-wrestling.
Every pairing offered high-end nerd fulfillment, but the two most notable were Takuya/Naoya and Kento/Yuma. The Battle of the Nomuras lived up to the hype and delivered gritty, face-smashing excitement. Two experts at throwing curveball cut-offs in the middle of full-force ass-whipping sessions. I’m still thinking about that Takuya lariat.
With their Triple Crown match coming up, the Kento/Yuma exchanges carried even more drama than usual. They remixed the greatest bits of their recent title bouts into an absolute nail-biter of an ending stretch – Miyahara forcing his eternal frenemy to dig deep into his Probable Future Ace potential.
Add to this a bulletproof layout with meaningful tide-changers and blockbuster double-teams (STRONG BJ STACKED GERMAN~!) and you end up with the very definition of a tag banger. The kind of match that grabs the viewer and screams ‘’PLEASE PAY ATTENTION TO ALL JAPAN’’.
In the immortal words of the Triple Crown champ: Zen Nihon Pro-Wres Saiko. ****1/2
