70s Joshi on Wednesday: Tomi! Martin!

54. 1979.09.21 - 01 Judy Martin vs. Tomi Aoyama

K: I didn’t think much of this one. There was a lot of interference from the Americans patrolling the ringside area; my main thought about it was how much it seemed to disrupt the flow of the match and every time Tomi got back in the ring it felt like a reset. I’m not sure what the difference is because Black Pair of course do interference in their matches but it usually works a lot better than this, like it’s just part of the greater package whereas here it’s more of an irritating intrusion.

When Judy and Tomi are just in the ring the work is fine but nothing really of interest. Judy dominates the vast majority of the match, which I don’t think is ideal, and Tomi just gets one big comeback with her top rope boomerang and a giant swing into the big splash and that’s the end of that.

*1/4

MD: Judy Martin is a favorite and it was great to see her here so maybe I’m biased towards this one. She’s sort of the best possible manifestation of Moolah-ism, that style known for hair throws and clubbering and slams, just an excellent base to give structure and form to all the fireworks around her. I was wondering how fully formed she’d be here (maye three years in they said, and age 20), but nope. She drives Tomi right into the corner with nasty shots to start. This is Judy Martin, fully formed already basically.

This was the first match of the long awaited Japan vs US series and it functioned almost like a lumberjack match with both teams on the outside. Martin would control and toss Tomi to the floor where she’d get beaten on for a bit before her team broke things up and she fought her way back in. Just solid, well-formed stuff overall. Great finishing bit where she Tomi hit her comebacker body press off the ropes (very nice camera angle on it) but just for a 1. It served as the last transition though as she mowed through Martin and flung her about in a fantastic screaming giant swing for the win.