wrestling / Video Reviews
Furious Flashbacks: New Japan Destruction in Kobe
Loading...NJPW Destruction in Kobe
21st September 2014.
Following on from the red hot G1 Climax, perhaps the greatest wrestling tournament the world has ever seen, we’re back with more of the same from New Japan. One of the major pieces of G1 business was a violent and exciting bout between Hiroshi Tanahashi and Katsuyori Shibata. With Shibata having emerged victorious, the hate remained. So they’ll be going at it tonight to see who’s ‘the man’. Also Shinsuke Nakamura tries to win his IC title back from Bad Luck Fale and Ryusuke Taguchi challenges KUSHIDA for the junior title.
We’re in Kobe (hence the title) at Kobe World Hall. Attendance is around 8,000. Make no mistake about it, this isn’t just a Backlash to G1’s Wrestlemania status. It’s a major event. When they’re running down the card the fans actually pop the announcement of Shibata vs. Tanahashi and they pop it hard. Good news for the crowd noise tonight!
Bullet Club (Matt Jackson, Nick Jackson & Yujiro Takahashi) vs. Tomohiro Ishii & Forever Hooligans (Alex Koslov & Rocky Romero)
No big singles match for Yujiro is a bonus. No big singles match for Ishii is a smidge disappointing but after his Herculean efforts during G1 he’s probably due a rest. They’re building toward a rematch for the NEVER Openweight belt that’s currently around Yujiro’s waist. Or it would be if he could figure out how to wear a belt. The Young Bucks bring their usual game with overly flippy yet innovative offence. It’s fun to watch but it makes no sense. Yujiro is a bit of a buzzkill by comparison but then Ishii tags in and murders him, and the Bucks, to meaty pops. Tomohiro Ishii does not wrestle to polite silence and occasional applause. He doesn’t quite hit the murderous highs of G1 and the heavily taped shoulder suggests he’s not quite recovered from his G1 endeavours. Bucks & Hooligans stuff is starting to get a wee bit predictable as they’ve worked each other so many times already this year. It’s still exciting and well-planned but my personal preference is for Time Splitters (and reDRagon now they work in NJPW too). An issue with the high impact spots they work into this match is the finish is just another one of those spots, a Hooligans double team (Contract Killer), which doesn’t seem all that devastating. This was fine as a hot opener. I hope Ishii is able to get himself fit and back into the big matches. He’s been one of the best wrestlers of 2014.
Final Rating: **3/4
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Alex Shelley, BUSHI & Maximo vs. Suzuki-gun (Taichi, TAKA Michinoku & El Desperado)
Taichi rejoined New Japan on the Road to Destruction tour after three months off. He’d been reprimanded for extra-marital activities. I’d not missed him. El Desperado’s heel turn allows him to partner Taichi as some sort of rock band (he’s a guitarist, Taichi the lead singer). TAKA is the roadie? Maximo works for CMLL and keeps popping up on NJPW tours. I’m not overly keen on them following the hot opener with another spot-heavy match but these 6 guys hardly have any time so they might as well use it for their own amusement. They do a load of dives until El Desperado goes nuts with a chair and that’s a DQ after about 3 minutes. Nice to see Taichi is still a total waste of space.
Final Rating: ¼*
TenKoji, Jushin Liger & Tomoaki Honma vs. Yuji Nagata, Manabu Nakanishi, Captain New Japan & Tiger Mask
Holy hell, New Japan has a big roster. Can you imagine any other company throwing Nagata and the red hot Honma into a throwaway 8-man tag? Well, maybe the WWE. Nagata and Kojima refuse to let this opportunity pass them by through and use it as a reminder to the higher card guys that they’re still here and WAIL on each other. Next it’s Liger & TM to turn back the clock by rocking counters at speed. Another mini-contest is Honma vs. CNJ to see who’s the most loveable loser. The whole thing is beautifully constructed with the fans getting popped at every turn with each spot being more entertaining than the preceding one until Honma finishes Captain New Japan off with Kokeshi and despite it only being Captain New Japan it gets a massive pop. This may have been a total throwaway match but everyone wore their work boots and it was tonnes of fun. If only all throwaway midcard bouts had this kind of energy about them.
Final Rating; **1/2
Kazushi Sakuraba & Toru Yano vs. Minoru Suzuki & Takashi Iizuka
The Suzuki-Yano feud may never end but at least they’ve transitioned the heat onto two other feuds. I’m far more interested in seeing Suzuki fight Sakuraba and they showed hints at G1 Finals that it’ll be a killer singles match. The man who submitted Ken Shamrock (twice) BEFORE he went to the WWF against the Gracie Hunter. Nobody knows shoot-style like them. Crazy old Iizuka makes his entrance from the top deck and takes a Sandman/Undertaker length of time to reach the actual ring. The crowd mark out for Suzuki too and them singing along to Kaze ni Nare is wonderful stuff. When wrestlers actually connect with a Japanese crowd the results are magical. Suzuki-Sakuraba has a thrilling vibe about it as they’re both fantastic on the mat, which handily differentiates this feud from so many other striking duel matches. Suzuki is less than impressed and SLAPS Sakuraba in the face. OOOOOOHHHHHHH!!! Yano inserts his big gurning mug into proceedings to cut that off. Hopefully they’re building to a big singles bout, hence the truncation of hostilities here. Unfortunately the Iizuka-Yano section of the match is mostly choking. It’s about what you’d expect from Iizuka. But he is nearly 50. I just wish he was booked more like Nakanishi and less like someone who’s relevant. Interesting that Iizuka gets caught using a length of cord to choke Yano but doesn’t get disqualified for that despite the chair DQ for Suzuki-gun earlier. Yano-Iizuka-Tiger Hattori rock a little beard psychology, which pops the crowd big time. This leads right into various chaotic sequences and Iizuka going after Yano with the Iron Glove, missing, getting punched in the groin and rolled up for the loss. Meanwhile Sakuraba is trying to break Suzuki’s leg on the outside with a kneebar. This started promisingly, tailed off quite badly in the middle and went nuts in the last few minutes. Sakuraba-Suzuki is a match that New Japan has sitting in their locker room just waiting to happen.
Final Rating: **
IWGP Junior Heavyweight Championship:
KUSHIDA (c) vs. Ryusuke Taguchi
Normally I’m not that keen on Taguchi as he’s a bit clunky compared to the majority of New Japan’s top tier cruisers (KUSHIDA, Shelley, Bucks, Ibushi etc) but he does have a happy tendency of showing up for big matches. KUSHI also has belt wearing difficulties but that’s merely because he has two titles so the one is strapped around his neck. KUSHIDA is exceptional on the mat. I desperately want NOAH to book him against Hajime Ohara and just let them go. He handily outwrestles Taguchi with the Funky Weapon looking a bit confused by it all. On standing switches Taguchi fairs better and plants KUSHIDA on his face before taking out the champ’s knee. Going the ‘injured body part’ route in modern wrestling isn’t the best of ideas unless the injured party is willing to do a load of selling. It’s as if the entire world took Rob Van Dam as their mentor for selling. KUSHI is doing springboards right after a Figure Four. Sure, he’s ‘injured’ on landing but is a springboard a good idea on one leg? KUSHIDA’s solution is to destroy Taguchi’s arm and go right after the kimura. This leads into the Anklelock and a SICK near falls sequence. One of the most innovative versions thereof since Malenko-Guerrero some 20 years ago. Taguchi isn’t content with that and counters a front chancery into the Three Amigos only for KUSHI to counter Martin Short into another armbar. It’s fantastic wrestling, utilising the strengths and trademarks of the respective guys but also incorporating them into the storyline they’re telling. I love how Taguchi tries like hell to block the kimura too. Hanging on to his other arm for dear life. They duel on submission finishers with Taguchi doing his best to channel Kurt Angle, relentlessly grabbing that ankle. He even adds in Dodon to weaken KUSHIDA and finishes with the Anklelock. All in one sequence. Best Taguchi match I’ve seen in yonks. Pretty much since Apollo 55 were around. I was a little taken aback when he won the title but having seen the match I can see why. Apparently some people weren’t keen on the selling here but if I marked stuff down for the selling I’d have to mark everything down because next to nobody actually sells these days. Not consistently.
Final Rating: ****
Bullet Club (AJ Styles & Tama Tonga) vs. Kota Ibushi & Tetsuya Naito
This is Ibushi’s 3rd New Japan match back after the concussion he got losing the Junior title to KUSHIDA. That particular piece of business cost him his spot in the G1. Meanwhile AJ and Naito were both superb during G1. Also, Tama Tonga is here. Hi, Tama! Still thinking about challenging Tanahashi mate? Let me know how that goes. AJ starts out by elbowing duelling with Ibushi, just to mess with him and make him think he’s not that tough but Ibushi clocks Styles big time. Kota has been ready to mix it up with the heavyweights for some time and he tends to prove it every time he works a main event guy. Not that any of these guys are particularly big. I’m taller than all of them. The Ibushi-Styles stuff is top action and it leaves me wanting a singles match. Ibushi’s selling is a little suspect but a) that’s always been the case and b) see comments on selling in last match. Tama doesn’t seem too out of place here and contributes bits and pieces that are up to speed. Obviously the others have better offence and thrill the crowd but he looks like he belongs. I would comment on how good AJ-Naito is but AJ-anyone seems to be great at the moment. He’s certainly proved himself to be one of the shrewdest signings in New Japan history. TNA must feel like absolute mugs for letting him go. Ibushi is anxious to prove NJPW missed him during G1, although that tournament was all kinds of awesome, and he clocks Tama with a lariat so hard it knocks half his facepaint off. As soon as Ibushi has Tama isolated he picks him off with the Phoenix Splash. This was a disposable midcard match that won’t stick in the memory but it was a lot of fun to watch. New Japan has a loaded roster at the moment and can afford to put AJ, Ibushi and Naito in a midcard tag. This was all about Ibushi. He’s definitely back.
Final Rating: ***1/2
IWGP Tag Team Championship:
Bullet Club (Karl Anderson & Doc Gallows) (c) vs. CHAOS (Kazuchika Okada & YOSHI-HASHI)
Machine Gun & Doc have held those belts since the Dome show making them the longest reigning champions in the company by some distance. Anderson makes me chuckle by doing his machine gun entrance taunt right into Okada’s face. Luckily Okada is wearing invisible bulletproof makeup. Okada dominates the match by himself and if this was a handicap match you could see the belts changing hands. Incidentally the last time YOSHI-HASHI won a singles match was November 2012 and that was against K-Dojo’s Sekine. There’s just nobody lower on the card than him who he can beat. The fans get into him as the plucky underdog but all he seems to do is absorb heat. Then it’s the hot tag to Okada.
RAINMAKER POSE!
Anderson actually breaks the pose up with an attempted Gun Stun, which is shrugged off, all while the camera remains wide. Then YOSHI-HASHI is tagged back in and destroyed again. It’s formula to a tee. The crowd heat is off the charts for it although I suspect this is a combination of Okada being the G1 winner and top tier star and YOSHI-HASHI’s potential for upsetting people. Okada routinely saves YOSHI-HASHI from certain defeat and as soon has he’s occupied elsewhere YOSHI-HASHI finds himself overpowered. Still a random lariat on Gallows gets a huge pop. New Japan has this weird habit of getting over all the lowest rung guys in the company because they don’t win! Honma, YOSHI-HASHI and Captain New Japan are all over huge. Yujiro runs in to stop YOSHI-HASHI getting the upset win and the Magic Killer finishes. Surprisingly it’s only the 6th successful title defence over the last 8 months for the champs.
Final Rating: **3/4
Hirooki Goto vs. Togi Makabe
This is a revenge match as Goto injured Makabe’s jaw in a tag match back in May and on Day 1 of the G1 Goto did it again, thus ruining Makabe’s G1 before it even started. Goto’s response was along the lines of: I broke my jaw in G1 last year and I didn’t bitch about it. This will end in violence. It begins with heavy lumber from both guys, neither wanting to back down. Eat my elbow! Eat MY elbow! No, eat MY ELBOW! I don’t want to eat your elbow, it tastes foul, eat MY ELBOW, BITCH! Goto is a weird guy because he always measures up to main eventers but you can’t see him beating any of them. He’s a JTTS, almost. Makabe plays his role here as an underdog, due to his jaw problems, which balances the two out. Togi might be a former IWGP champion but he’s also injured. Goto might have a chance at winning a big match. It’d be the first one this year. Togi’s comeback is a touch casual considering how angry he’s supposed to be. One of Togi’s main character issues stems from his normal everyday persona being a pissed off brawler. Where do you go up from there? Goto handily targets the jaw with virtually every move, intent on punishing Togi for stepping up to him. They don’t spare the horses and work hard, bashing each other in the face as often as possible. In terms of workrate it’s fine, I just struggle to find either one of them that interesting, unless they’ve got someone to play off. Togi does hit a superb strike when he does the Polish Hammer to Goto’s face. There’s a slight vibe that Togi is looking to break Goto’s face as revenge. This is especially evident during the King Kong Kneedrop where he blatantly lands his knee across Goto’s jawline. Neither man will be chewing solid food tonight but Togi will be enjoying a pint with the winner’s share of the purse. Meltzer loved this and went ****1/4. I think that’s a tad excessive as they didn’t get all that creative and just wailed on each other. I’ve seen enough fantastic Tomohiro Ishii matches this year to know this wasn’t as good as those bouts.
Final Rating: ***3/4
Hiroshi Tanahashi vs. Katsuyori Shibata
What a sensational rivalry these guys have. In interviews both have made derisory comments about each others style. In Japan that’s the equivalent of ragging on someone’s Mom. This culminated in a G1 Climax bout, which Shibata won. This is the re-match and the hatred levels are off the charts. Considering Tanahashi is the hand-slapping, air-guitar playing top babyface and Shibata is an asshole this is sure to divide the crowd. The manly men will be rooting for Shibata. The girls and kids for Tanahashi. This is reflected in their entrances where Shibata is all business and Tana slaps hands on his way out here. This isn’t just a wrestling match, it’s a clash of ideologies.
Tanahashi’s early intent is to prove he can counter and outwrestle Shibata, which runs headlong into Shibata’s intent of schooling Tana in the art of wrestling. Tanahashi then adds in a slap and the elbowing begins in earnest. This is Tanahashi trying to prove he can go toe to toe and Shibata is out to just end Tana and prove his strongstyle is superior. He almost catches Tana with the PK and Tanahashi has to show he’s faster and capable of avoiding these big kicks. From there it’s into trading in the corner and Shibata’s elbows get increasingly stiff. They end up elbowing the shit out of each other on the floor, which is almost a count out but then they roll back inside and CARRY ON! There’s a difference between the repetitive elbowing here and in the last match. While the last match made logical sense, with the jaw injuries, here it’s all about pounding your opponent into submission. Beating your beliefs into his face. The anger is palpable. The one small criticism is that Tana shouldn’t allow himself to be drawn into trading with Shibata and should try and outsmart him instead but that’s not the traditional Japanese way. He’s being noble and meeting elbows with elbows because he’s a role model. If he took shortcuts what kind of example would he be setting? But he can’t win that way, no matter how hard he tries because Shibata is prepared to take that shortcut. Like when he ducks out of the way of a Stinger Splash and starts lacing in vicious elbows in the corner. He doesn’t give a fuck about Tanahashi’s wellbeing or the nobility of his cause. He just wants to win. Tanahashi ends up standing there taking abuse for a lot of the match before he eventually hits a dragon screw. Now the crowd are prepared to accept that because of the abuse he’s suffered. It may be a switch to a more defensive move but there’s now cause for it.
The great part about Shibata getting his leg taken out is when he subsequently connects with a punt to Tanahashi’s chest his leg gives out. There’s now weakness where there was none. Mainly because of Tanahashi having to change his tactics to avoid defeat. So while Tana is winning, Shibata made him be evil to get there. This mirrors what WWE were trying to do with Cena earlier in the year (yanno, with the Lantern guy. Captain Beardface or something?*) It’s less pronounced here, especially as Tanahashi’s very next move is the Sling Blade. Ultimately that leg gives Tana an opening and he does hook a Texas Cloverleaf. After that it’s back to the elbows and Tana drops Shibata with an unexpected left hand slap. The idea being that Tanahashi is done trying to be Shibata’s equal and instead he’s showing Katsuyori the value of variety. So Shibata, subtle as a brick, BACKFISTS HIM IN THE FACE. When he follows with the GTS he gets caught in another dragon screw, which shows how great Tana is at counter wrestling. Tanahashi then lifts the big corner dropkick, just to mess with Shibata’s head, and hits High Fly Flow. Another High Fly Flow and it’s over. Tanahashi gets his win back and confirms his position as the companies top dog. This was Shibata trying to knock him off his perch. Tanahashi isn’t ready to step aside. Not yet. Brutal match with some of the most competitive striking since…well, damn, G1. Post match Shibata offers a handshake and thanks Tanahashi for the state of New Japan Pro Wrestling nowadays, which has been built on the back of his efforts for the past decade. He’s mad that he lost but the resentment isn’t there. They’re not friends but they’re not enemies anymore. Tanahashi positively glows in the victory. He’s proved he belongs at the very peak of the wrestling world. Critics be damned, he’s still The Man.
Final Rating: ****3/4
*Bray Wyatt. Had a mental slip there.
Tangent: The infamous ***** rating is so hard to give out. I loved this match and the angle behind it and everything they did out there…but was it *****? I honestly enjoyed the Ibushi-Ishii match from earlier in the year more. I was quite surprised to learn that Meltzer dished out ***** for this. He has a habit of sitting on the fence and going ****3/4 when he’s not quite sure. Any way you slice it a match where I’m debating whether it’s ****3/4 or ***** means it’s a fucking great match and you should watch it.
IWGP Intercontinental Championship:
Bad Luck Fale (c) vs. Shinsuke Nakamura
This is one of those title switches they did so Bullet Club would have all the belts (bar the junior titles). Along with Yujiro winning the NEVER belt, it didn’t quite sit right with me. Fale isn’t a main event guy. He’s ok at what he does and his finisher is carelessly badass but he doesn’t have enough in the locker to be a star. Nakamura has made him look very good three times already this year and only once by bleeding half his head’s blood all over the place way back at the New Japan Cup. Even worse than smashing his face open, Fale had the temerity to take Nakamura’s title. He didn’t take that shit from Tanahashi and he’s not going to take it from the Underboss. Nakamura brings energy and lots of taunting to this contest while Fale’s response is pounding away and chinlocks. It’s not his best outing in the series. Nakamura tries to make amends with random knees and strangeness and it’s very hard to dislike any of his matches, because he’s in them, but this one isn’t Shinsuke at his best. Fale’s main weapon is the Bad Luck Fall and they tease it here but wisely don’t throw it out there as a false finish. Without it, Fale would just be a big ponderous dude. Nakamura has a good time taking Fale down and generally making him his bitch on the mat. It’s far more pronounced here than during previous encounters, perhaps suggesting they’ve taken this feud as far as they can and want to admit Fale isn’t on Nakamura’s level. Nakamura even gets in a few power moves, which reflects the same sort of vibe. Also another elbow duel where Nakamura handily goes 50-50 with his larger opponent. Jig is up! Nakamura takes a sloppy Grenade as we head down the stretch. It shows how hard Nakamura had been working to keep this together and how tired he was because of that. I do like Fale’s attempts to shake off the Boma Ye, staggering around the ring with his thumb raised as if contemplating a Grenade but unable to get his bearings. Nakamura catches him with two Boma Yeeeeee’s for the win. Fale’s run had been a short-lived failure but Nakamura busted a gut again to make him look credible here. Fale has learned a thing or two and he’s starting to get watchable as a worker. He’s just not a main event guy.
Final Rating: ***1/4
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