SEGUNDA CAIDA DECLARES WAR!!! 3/3/93

Ultimo Dragon/Nobukazu Hirai v. El Samurai/Rio Lord of the Jungle

TKG: This was joined in progress but still felt longer than it needed to be. I can't decide wether the length allowed for a lot of cool moments in amongst the mess or the if the length caused a lot of the mess. This has a bunch of blown stuff and never really comes together.The El Samurai/Rio team is an amusing team. Rio shockingly doesn't blow up in a match where guys are moving at a fast pace. He does an ok job eating Dragon's stuff, throws more suplexes than you'd expect him too, does a really awful Fuller leg lock and manages to not blow up. Samurai looks pretty great until he falls out of the ring running the ropes.

PAS: Ultimo hits an awesome tope, but otherwise has some moments of awkwardness. Hirai looked pretty bad in parts too. Someone could make the argument that Renegade was the second best guy in this match. I am not going to make that argument, but someone could.

Koki Kitahara/Masao Orihara v. Shiro Koshinaka/Kuniyaki Kobayashi

TKG: When Shiro Koshinaka wants to beat the shit out of someone he will do it. Every punch he throws looks like he's trying to break his opponent's nose or cheek bone. After watching Hirai do a lousy job at this type of larger WAR tag partner in peril, it's really awesome to watch Kitahara sell as stronger partner taking a beating. The point where the smaller Orihara has seen too much and puts his all into throwing strikes at Koshinaka (while Koshinaka is holding Kitahara in a crab) is bad ass.

PAS: I love Koshinika potatoing people, there were multiple moments where I though he smashed the bridge of Kitihara's nose. Which is pretty much WAR in a nutshell, lots of guys potatoing each other. It is worked exactly the way you expect a Tenryu fed to be worked. There was a really cool camera angle for Orihara's Orihara as he just flies out of the corner of your eye.

Ashura Hara/Earthquake v. The Great Kabuki/Haku

TKG: Yeah this is four guys hitting each other as hard as they can, all trying to stay standing. The last match had a section where guys took it to the floor for a streetfight. Here that would have just seen excessive. What could they possibly do on the floor that would look more violent than what they did in the ring? Hara just eats an absolute beating and well he dishes one too. I haven't watched the Texas set yet, or seen the early stuff that people are watching on the All Japan set, so kind of still think of Kabuki as a guy with a great superkick and a bunch of nerve holds. But fuck, Kabuki is way more awesome then I could have imagined. Tenta is great at coming in and looking tough and also doing a slow topple and well Haku will throw a superkick that will make you cringe.

PAS: With the WAR Kabuki, All Japan Kabuki and Texas Kabuki I think that soon it will be time to ask if Kabuki is actually a better wrestler then Muta. I loved Hara in this, his headbutts are super nasty, he always aims for the soft part of his opponents head. This is really the perfect match for Haku, as it a match with tough bad ass guys throwing stuff as hard as they can and limited selling. It is basically Haku teaming with Meng to work King Tonga and his partner Uilii Fifita.

Hiromichi Fuyuki v. Shinya Hashimoto

TKG: They do a big pull apart at the start of this and I was totally expecting a real Choshu style heavyweight sprint. Instead they do a neat slow building match. Starting with some leg work which they sell nicely. You forget once they start laying in the bombs, but the crowd stays heated throughout the mat work as they get excited for the build.. For interpromotional match this had a ton of selling which both of these guys do really well. At one point Fuyuki drops Hashimoto with a nasty DDT and you get giddy with excitement. No one does a nastier DDT than Hashimoto, and Fuyuki has laid down a challenge.

PAS: Yeah this has a lot slower build then most of your WAR matches, the structure of the show is very similar to the April show I already reviewed with a nasty stiff tag, slower paced singles match and crazy hot main event inter-promotional tag. It is a really great way to pace a show, and this was even better then Fujinami v. Kabuki. The pull apart built me up (much like the Kabuki mist in the other singles) and then they did a really nice job slowing it down, only to build it back up to a great finish. Awesome selling by Fuyuki at the end as I really bought that Hashimoto knocked him cold (unless he actually did knock him out, then it wasn't selling)

Genichiro Tenryu/Takashi Ishikawa v. Riki Choshu/Osamu Kido

TK: HOLY SHIT!!! WRESTLING AND ROMANCE!!! WE ARE REVOLUTION! I love big match Kido and this was big match Kido. I don't have any memory of Ishikawa but he and Kido are essentially working guys on same level ( beneath Choshu/Tenryu) but are able to step it up to face the higher ranked guys. Choshu and Tenryu are as amazing as you expect them to be against each other and the sections with the B guys against the A guys on the opposite team rule really hard as well. They do a long finish run with Kido just looking awesome and getting stomped on every time he almost gets a fall. Post match pull apart is also really great with Tenryu running over and kicking Choshu in the eye multiple times with the toe of his boot.

PAS: Yeah this was amazing. Tenryu and Ishikawa are both so great as cheap shotting dicks too, no one stomps a guy from behind as nastily as Ishikawa, and Tenryu short punts are as violent as anything in wrestling history. Choshu is Choshu and I loved all the different ways Choshu set up his lariat, my favorite is when he shifted direction and just blasted Tenryu on the apron. This was really Kido's career performance he is so spectacular in the end run of this match throwing out counter arm bar after counter arm bar, you get the sense that he wants the win more then he ever wanted anything. Another match which really compares to anything being done in your more acclaimed puro promotions.