New Japan Pro Wrestling on AXS TV 6/26/15 Review

1. Tomoaki Honma vs. Hiroshi Tanahashi (7/21/14)

The emergence of Tomoaki Honma "The Perpetual Underdog" is one of the better stories of the last decade of pro wrestling. It's neat to see a former death match guy actually work his way into a respected role in the largest company. I mean, it only took 15 years so maybe we just have a case of survivor bias here, but whatever the reason I'm happy for the guy. Match itself was a fun Smackdown match, with a finish that was never really in doubt nor even teased. Honma looked really great and I loved him taking it to Tanahashi before inevitably failing. The underdog character in wrestling is so good when done well, a guy who is good but just plain not as good as the top guys, and needs every single thing to go right in matches to pull out a win. I really like Honma's offense and energy, like how he makes Tanahashi actually duck on a lariat, blocking Tanahashi's strikes with his forearms, love his sad face as he realizes he's about to take a Dragon Suplex, like his fighting spirit without any sort of actual gameplan. Honma never really had a chance, but the match was fun an competitive. Though it is a little weird how Honma came off like a bigger star than Tanahashi here.

2. AJ Styles vs. Kazuchika Okada (7/21/14)

This was clipped to ribbons but what they showed was mostly good, outside of the poorly set up Bullet Club interference you knew was going to happen. Yujiro looked fine on the run-in, they're always just set up in the lamest ways. Either Red Shoes has to just ignore that it's happening and kinda hold his arms out going "Guuuuuuuys, cahmahhnnnnn", or we get the lame set-up here: Styles gets knocked into Red Shoes, Red Shoes proceeds to be knocked out or holding his stomach for the next 3 minutes. I get why nobody would want a horrible David Manning invincible referee, but goddamn do all referees have to be gentle little Faberge eggs? Red Shoes gets bumped into, does a backward roll, and is just OUT. It's human nature to roll through something and get back up, fine or not. I've tripped and fallen while running a few times, always immediately instinctively sprang right back to my feet before my brain could even process what had just happened. But all referees are required to have fragile little bird bones so doing a reverse somersault is tantamount to crashing your bicycle into a brick wall. It's just so lazy, and so damn bad. Which is a shame, as the work between Styles and Okada was very good. Styles always makes Okada's offense look better than it is, really throwing himself into Germans, splatting off the apron from Okada's top rope dropkick and getting obliterated by the Rainmaker. Okada looked better here than in most matches I've seen, his offense was clean and in some cases spectacular. His wild running crossbody into the crowd was unexpected and killer, and he at least cut low on missed Rainmakers and got really great bridges on his suplexes. So other than the lazily set-up and boring middle portion that happens in all Bullet Club matches, this was actually really good. Shame, that.

3. Katsuyori Shibata vs. Shinsuke Nakamura (7/21/14)

Shibata is a little dry, and we had a goofy ass dated headdrop exchange in the middle, but overall this was fine. I liked the sit down interview with Shibata as he explained how he hadn't fought Nakamura in 10 years, and how different each of them were then and now. That does make it kind of weird that NJ would waste a match-up like that on a G1 tourney match, but it did make the match feel like a bigger deal. Nakamura was great during this, flying face first into Shibata's kicks, posting himself nicely, getting dumped by suplexes and setting up all of his runs nicely. Shibata always feels like a guy I want to like but always leaves me somewhat cold. I also cannot fathom how Nakamura hasn't become some sort of internet crossover gif meme at this point. How have I not been bombarded by gifs of Nakamura doing his Mick Jagger Start Me Up moves with "Haters Gonna Hate" stamped across it in large white letters. Feels like a gif that would be posted by tons of people who had no idea there was even pro wrestling in Japan. His fucking finger guns and hip shakes before hitting a series of knees have me in stitches. Nakamura always has this drunken master aura to him, this weird slithery controlled sloppiness that is wholly unique. Which was in stark contrast to Shibata's grown up young boy dropkicks and half crab style. The dopey no sold headdrop exchange was clumsily out of place, and it's a shame as Shibata's spill looked brutal, but then he just popped up and a disgusted, eyerolling "yuck" involuntarily dropped out of my mouth. I did love the battle over Nak's Bom-Ba Ye's and Shibata's Penalty Kick. Nak's BBY off the middle rope looked good, and the finish PK the Nak took flush looked brutal. The execution for everything was really great, and while the order that things weren't put together wasn't all my cup of tea, this was still plenty good.

Nothing blowaway great this week, but one of the overall better episodes as the ring work was all really good, just didn't always have great match structure to go along with it. But an hour of good ringwork is still plenty entertaining even if it doesn't result in any classics.