SEGUNDA CAIDA DECLARES WAR!! NJPW 3/23/93

PAS: Here is so more of the New Japan section of the all time great WAR v. NJ feud.

Shinya Hashimoto v. Kodo Fuyuki

PAS: Not a lot happens in this match, but these are two guys who are such masters at working a crowd, and who deliver such violence when they land, that I don't need a ton of things to happen. Fuyuki is such a hateable prick, he just has this look on his face that you desperately want to wipe off. They start out rolling around a bit and go into the ropes, Fuyuki takes his sweet time unraveling his legs and Hashimoto responds by straight kicking him in the chest, and it is on. Fuyuki gets some big shots of his own including bloodying Hash's nose, but it mostly Fuyuki absorbing a righteous ass kicking, including a bunch of those classic Hashimoto wheel kicks which sound like a firefighter breaking down a steel door with a sledgehammer. Finish has Hash dump Fuyuki on his head a bunch of times, pin him, then go to DDT him again. This starts a WAR v. NJ brawl which Hash just sits back and watches like a king on his throne. Such a great piece of wrestling theatre.

ER: Man, the looks these two men give each other throughout this fight are more terrifying than most things I've seen. Two giant, rigid, angry dudes both representing a side they believe in is a scary thing, and here it's exactly what you want to watch. Nobody has been able to replace the Hash shaped hole in my heart, and watching him is still an exercise in watching perfect wrestling. Fuyuki is meaty and surly and goads Hash by almost taking things not seriously. Both men have almost have an air about them, with neither wanting to show what this match means to them, but you can see how much it matters as things ramp up and lead to the inevitable postmatch windbreaker suit squall. I dug the mat stuff with Hash crucifying an arm while looking for an opening, going for a crossface, twisting a leg, any sort of advantage. The whole time Fuyuki is acting like he couldn't be bothered and Hash is the first to flinch and react, and from there we get the fight, with both man battering the other in the face (and Hash getting a bloody nose), both doing cool spinkick variations (loved Fuyuki's standing spinkick, like a Booker T kick that actually lands on the chin) and of course you already knew the gorgeous Hash kicks. Crowd gets in a lather when Hash punts Fuyuki in the chin and stomps his throat and it's only a matter of time before Hash plants him with a couple of DDTs for the end. After is perfect as Hash aims to hit another and then the windbreakers charge in, Hash standing in the center of the madness, purposely getting his hand raised while standing over Fuyuki.

Genichiro Tenryu/Takashi Ishikawa v. Tatsumi Fujinami/Riki Choshu

PAS: Sort of a RAW sprint which builds up to the bigger PPV tag matches in this feud, but a hell of sprint. Big moment for my main man Takashi Ishikawa, as he is the face in peril fighting against the pair of NJ legends, and then gets some huge moments including pinning Fujinami after a decapitating lariat, it takes balls to throw out a lariat that nasty with Choshu opposite you, but he made it work. Tenryu was more of a bit player in this, but he was pretty great, cutting off Fujinami's tope with a huge jumping kick to the face, getting in Choshu's grill, and doing some of his patented kick you in your eye submission and pin breaks. Finish of the match was pretty electric, it almost felt the end of a WWE Shield six man, with big move after big move and great saves. Heck of way to spend 13 minutes

ER: Heck yeah it was a great way to spend 13 minutes. This match might be the most I've ever enjoyed Fujinami. That is not an insult to Fujinami. Obviously he's been a part of some classic matches, but he's always felt like a guy that other people love more than I do. Here he's this emotional aggressive ballsy asskicker. His clubbing forearms stand out as especially brutal in a match filled with guys who always hit hard. The way he flies after Tenryu was nasty and Tenryu has some incredible facials, like a guy who was not at all expecting to get steamrolled. I loved Tenryu finally getting the upper hand and immediately going for those cocky Tenryu condescending toe kicks to the face, and Fujinami catches one and whips him into a nasty dragon screw. Chosyu/Tenryu is one of the greatest all time match-ups and here they just man into each other. Tenryu's chops look like the most violent possible thing and Chosyu somehow barely flinches as he takes them to the throat. Chosyu does the all time greatest Scorpion Deathlock here on Tenryu as he somehow makes it look like a violent, quickly applied shoot submission; something I didn't ever think possible with that sub. The staredown as Chosyu is fighting Tenryu to put it on, Ishikawa leaning into the ropes waiting to break it up, and Fujinami climbing the top rope waiting to stop Ishikawa is pro fucking wrestling. All four men look great and all the builds to saves and false finishes is awesome. Phil mentions Tenryu's enziguiri to cut off a Fujinami tope and damn if it isn't just flawless. Nobody sees it coming (least of all Fujinami) and it's just a perfect out of nowhere cut off spot. At one point towards the end of the match Tenryu and Chosyu lock up in a corner while Fujinami locks a dragon sleeper on Ishikawa, and  you instantly think you know the finish....except you don't. Awesome match.

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MLJ: Guerreros del Infierno A-12: Rey Bucanero & Ultimo Guerrero (c) vs El Hijo Del Santo & Negro Casas [CMLL Tag]

2001-11-02 @ Arena Mexico
Rey Bucanero & Ultimo Guerrero (c) vs El Hijo Del Santo & Negro Casas [CMLL Tag]

I'm back to more familiar territory with GdI here. Thankfully, the next two matches on the disc are the title changes, so I have a pretty good sense of when they happened. I'm probably going to have to double back for a couple of Trios matches (including a title one) when I get back to things though. I've decided that I really need to hit something current before moving forward, so I'm going to take a week or two to look at Titan vs Barbaro Cavernario, with everything post-Busca last year. Negro Casas deep cuts will have to wait.

There are a couple of things that really stand out with this match. The first is that these four wrestlers really know each other well by now. Obviously the partners do, and work well together, but the pairings do as well. They've been around with things over the last year and that lets them weave a different level of complexity into their spots, especially the key ones that lead to transitions or finishes.

Case in point is the end of the primera. I didn't love the primera, by the way. It was fine, servicable, and Rey and UG had progressed to the point where they could keep up and where they could provide a sense of struggle. What they couldn't do, however, was bring anything above and beyond. They were at the point where Casas and Santo weren't going to move them around, but weren't really at the point where they could do masterful stuff. I'm not sure they ever got there either. My favorite Rey Bucanero stuff is when he's a dickish rudo and my favorite UG stuff has him blustering and powering through. Certainly the title matches between the two years later were lackluster.

Anyway, what I DID like was the finish of the fall. They ran through the pairings and Casas made a final comeback on UG and it looked like the tecnicos were going to take it. You can just get the feeling sometimes when you've seen enough wrestling. WWE is particularly bad about this. I imagine most people watching with any regularity can tell you what'll happen in most matches as its happening. Often that's a bad thing but a lot of the times it's because it's what should be happening within the genre. There's one "right" narrative and it's the path of least resistance. That's where this was heading. Casas was going to come back, hit La Casita, and the tecnicos were going to take the first fall. Instead, he got pushed off once, hit a clothesline, went for another low dropkick, and La Casita again. UG deadlifted him up into a powerbomb, though, and Santo, going for a camel clutch on Rey, got shoved off and locked into one of his own to give the rudos the first fall. Little twists on the norm make the world go round.

The segunda was what it was, a little bit of a beatdown, and then a pretty massive comeback. The comeback was good enough that I really wish there was more beatdown. It's possible something was cut but if so I didn't see it. GdI are best at beating guys down and doing their tricked out double teams. What separates this match from being pretty great and extremely great was the fact that they didn't have a couple more minutes to raise the tension before the tecnicos came back. I'm used to that with modern title matches, but usually, they're not set up for as much heat as this one was. Anyway, after a couple of minutes of them beating on Santo, Casas charges back in, they clear the ring, and then hit a couple of big dives. In a touching moment, after Santo took out both Rey and Casas (who was holding Rey), he helps his partner up and they both roll back in to win the fall, definitively, by countout.

Tercera was really good. Of course it was really good. What else would you expect here? There are a ton of great moments and near-falls, starting almost from the get go with Santo's Cavernaria on UG, through a few more dives, some really strong power offense by Ug, and a ton of partner saves. That's what made this work for me. Everything is sold since 90% of the kick outs come from partner saves. It felt somewhere in the middle of a finishing stretch between those big AJPW tags and the last year or so of Usos matches in the WWE, just with more focus and more heat.

The finish was great too, with UG pulled out of the ring at a key moment to let Santo hit his dive-through-the-ropes senton on Rey, taking him out of the match. One well-earned Casita later and the titles went to the tecnicos. Rey, especially was awesome at selling the loss as heartbreaking. Post match, they go so far as to shake each other's hands, and I'm a little surprised that no one threw money in. This was good, really good, with a hugely exciting tercera, but I thought the primera was lackluster due to what GdI could bring to the mat, and the segunda was way too short. If they just built up the heat a little more this could have been blow-away great.

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