Found Footage Friday: TOGO~! SNOW MAN~! CENTURION NEGRO~! MONJE NEGRO JR~! MEIKO~! AMANO~!

Snow Man (Chad Collyer)/Fujin vs. Dick Togo/Hideki Nishida 6/4/01

MD: This was from a lucha themed show at Korakuen Hall called Lucha Aid, which may be something people know about (there was a music video for it back in 2011 that's long been scrubbed from the internet), but it doesn't seem to be on cagematch and the only thing I can find online is from the April 30 2001 Wrestling Globe newsletter. Long story short on this one, Togo spends most of the match on the apron and you spend most of the match wishing he was in the ring. When he is in there, he matches up well with Collyer, and in a brawling bit on the floor has amazing punches and takes an insane bump into a bunch of empty chairs. Collyer is actually a lot of fun as Snow Man, constantly saying his name and posing and playing a strongman gimmick. A good chunk of the match is Fujin vs Nishida though and while nothing is outright offensive except for Fujin's elbow smashes, it's not exactly super compelling either. Still, even a little Togo goes a hell of a long way.

Centurion Negro vs. Monje Negro Jr. 9/17/06

This is hair vs mask and we get the last two falls of it. Centurion Negro won the first which we don't have. This starts out with him in control but Monje Negro quickly takes over and just batters him around the arena, a lot of shots into chairs and the like with Centurion bleeding and Monje Negro going after the wound a bit. Centurion gets a good comeback moment but chooses to go after the ref instead which allows for a cheap roll up. Cheap is the term for Monje Negro actually. He took a lot of stylistically interesting shortcuts, including catching the ref's arm instead of kicking out or dropping to his knees to hit a back body drop instead of bending over. He also through a really great foul as Centurion was about to put him in an abdominal stretch type move. As the tercera went on, he bleed too and ultimately got his comeuppance after a ref bump. If you like guys slamming each other into chairs and walls as they go around an arena (and who wouldn't) this one had a lot to offer.

Meiko Satomura vs. Carlos Amano GAEA 1/17/99

MD: This had existed heavily clipped previously but this seems to be the first full look at it. Aggressive, heated, chippy. They really go at it, full of animosity. Satomura came in with a taped up arm and has to wrestle defensively to start. Amano is able to chip away at her because of it and eventually starts to work on the arm. The arm, however, is primarily a gateway to other offense and especially to other offensiveness as she's there to bully and humiliate Satomura with the help of her cronies. That causes Satomura to lose her cool and grab a chair outside, which at first backfires on her, but as she's able to absorb both offense and humiliation and as Amano goes to the clothesline well one too many times, she's able to duck a shot on the outside and fire back after Amano guts herself on the rail. It's a match full of cool exchanges, spots, and moments, but my favorite is probably when both of them are tied up in the corner, each having hold of a leg, wrenching a joint high over the ropes simultaneously, mutually assured devastation. A close second would be some No Future style flicking kicks out of nowhere that looked amazing. There's a decent amount of interference here, but the match is so engrossing that it doesn't make you mad at the layout but instead that Meiko isn't getting her revenge or triumph, which takes some effort considering how jaded we all are in 2022. The finishing stretch had Satomura take one or two potentially baffling turns, maybe sacrificing her own assured win because she really, really wanted to hit the death valley bomb but overall this was a lovely, furiously fought gift for the GAEA channel to give us.

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Fujiwara Family: BattlArts Yuki Ishikawa 15th Anniversary Show 7/21/07

This show is available, along with a ton of late 00s BattlArts on IWTV

Katsumi Usuda vs. Keita Yano

PAS: Looking back on my early 2010's reviews Tom and I hated Yano as he just got completely up his own ass and started trying to jack ROH moves from tapes. I have heard from people I semi-trust that recent Yano is weird and cool, in 2007 he was hueing more closely to the style and he was a fine basic opponent for Usuda. I liked Yano starting the match with a sneak high kick to try to catch the veteran sleeping. Usuda is never not worth watching, and he throws some big hard kicks like he want to do. I also liked him adjusting his kneebar to really torque the leg for the finish. Replacement level Usuda match, but that is a nice level. 

Toshie Uematsu vs. Carlos Amano

PAS: This was solid joshi wrestling with a bunch of nifty mat counters. I especially loved Uematsu putting Amano in a kneebar, catching Amano's leg when she tried to kick out of it and putting in a figure four. Amano also had some nifty work both in the guard and trying to clear Uematsu's guard. I wish the strikes landed with some more thump, weakness there kept this from being a real standout, but it was worth watching nonetheless. 

Kyosuke Sasaki vs. Yuta Yoshikawa

PAS: This didn't do much for me. It was pretty much all striking, and Sasaki landed a great solebutt to the stomach, punt to the face combo, but outside of that there was nothing memorable. Lots of strike, make a face, other guy throws a strike exchanges, and the final KO needed to be a lot more brutal on a show with Ikeda in the main event. 

Fujita Hayato vs. Munenori Sawa

PAS: This was a way better version of the stand and trade type of match. I liked the story of Sawa having the faster hands and feet, but Hayato landing the big shots. Hayato always fit in the Fujiwara Family feds great whenever he showed up, his default is crowbar and he lands some big thumping shots. Sawa had a little more horseshit then I prefer, his Mutoh aping never looks good, and I don't know about a figure four as a finishing submission in a shoot style fight. I did like how Hayato kept slapping the shit out him to try to break the hold, by the time Hayato tapped Sawa's nose and mouth were bloody. 

Alexander Otsuka/Yuki Ishikawa vs. Daisuke Ikeda/Manabu Hara - EPIC

PAS: These fucking guys. What absolute legends. Most people celebrate big milestones like Anniversaries by inviting some friends to dinner, maybe spending a weekend in Vegas. Ishikawa spends it by inviting his buddies over to kick the ever loving shit out of each other. Hara isn't my first choice for the fourth in this tag, but he is on eleven here, from opening up the match by dropping Ishikawa with a high kick to his killer final stanza against Otsuka, career performance for him. Of course the other three are incredible too, Ikeda spends much of the match sniping, anytime Otsuka or Ishikawa puts a submission on Hara, Ikeda is coming in hot, with full force kicks to the head. Ishikawa and Ikeda also have a couple of their legendary back and forths, as nasty and grotesque and you would expect from those two. Otsuka maybe the star of the match though. He mostly faces off against Hara and eats big shots again and again trying to get close enough to unleash hell with suplexes. At one point he counters a Hara kneebar attempt by grabbing him and chucking him with a German suplex. He and Ishikawa also hit an awesome enzigiri/German combo and finishes Hara with a dragon suplex on his head. These matches are made on their final showdowns and this one had a great one.

COMPLETE AND ACCURATE DAISUKE IKEDA

FUJIWARA FAMILY

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Yoshiaki Fujiwara Cometh, and They Shall Seek Peace, And There Shall Be None

Yoshiaki Fujiwara/Kana v. Yuki Ishikawa/Carlos Amano Kana Pro 1/10/11-EPIC

A total out of nowhere awesome match. I have very little interest in current Joshi, I haven't seen Carlos Amano in years and I don't think I had ever seen Kana, but they were just killing it in this match. Their early grappling was very slick, with some really nasty ankle locks and armbar transitions. Very good stuff, as intricate and interesting as that kind of shoot mat work gets. Ishikawa and Fujiwara click together like puzzle pieces. There is a great moment where Fujiwara tags in and slaps Ishikawa in the mouth, and when Ishikawa tries to respond Fujiwara grabs his arm and wrenches in the namesake armbar. After watching and reviewing this many Fujiwara matches it is great that he still breaks out new neat shit. As good as everyone else is, this was the Ishikawa show. Every once in a while Ishikawa shows up on DVD or youtube and reminds you he is the best wrestler in the world. Starting out he is such a nasty fucker, smacking around Kana like Billy Campbell in Enough. However Kana fires back and his selling is so good that by the end we have a full on epic Ishikawa v. Ikeda finish with the role of Daisuke Ikeda played by a 97 pound girl. Kana is throwing bombs and Ishikawa is desperately fighting back. Excellent match as good as the best stuff from 2011.

Yoshiaki Fujiwara vs Yoshikazu Yokoyama Zero-One 8/27/11-FUN

Yokoyama is a young guy testing himself against the wily veteran. This a story we have seen before and Fujiwara is great at working. He does a bunch of very cool counters, including a nice use of a crucifix and an ankle pick reversal out of an armbar. He also uncorked a nasty headbutt. Yokoyama didn't show me a ton although he was a fine guy getting worker over by Fujiwara. Worth your four minutes to watch

COMPLETE AND ACCURATE YOSHIAKI FUJIWARA

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America Needs Yoshiaki Fujiwara

Yoshiaki Fujiwara v. Antonio Inoki NJ 3/16/89- FUN

This is a far cry from their wars in 1986, as this is worked more like a mid-card guy challenging Ric Flair on WCWSN. Fujiwara is playing the role of a tough guy with some tricks up his sleeve, who is out of his league. Some really nice mat wrestling to start, these are a pair of guys who can work holds, and show struggle, and I dug Fujiwara smacking Inoki in the mouth. However the finish is pretty disappointing as Fujiwara goes down pretty easily to the Octopus hold, I loved the slumping passed out selling, but I expected more of a fight.

Yoshiaki Fujiwara v. Dick Murdoch PWFG 5/23/96-EPIC

TKG: thank god they clipped and jip'd everything else because we get to see this in full. It looks like the audience has actually filled up over the course of the show. I mean it isn't fill for the main event but a whole lot more folks watching then at the start. I was expecting to enjoy this match but I wasn't expecting it to be this good. They start it off with Fujiwara as guy who backs opponent into corner and then wastes him with punches...while Murdoch is working guy with really nasty ways of taking apart opponents arm on the mat. So all the roles are switched and your waiting for them to righten themselves. They work a really great headscissor escape attempt section. Normally in these type of things a guy will do a Muga escape be put back into headscissor, do another escape get put back in, etc. What made this so neat is that it wasn't just that Fujiwara had a variety of ways to try to escape a headscissors but Murdoch had a variety of different ways to push his opponent down and keep him in the headscissors. Match had all the guys signature spots plus really neat ways both guys tried to avoid and escape their opponents signature stuff.

PAS: It seems pretty trite in a Dick Murdoch review to talk about how great his punches are, but goddamn are Dick Murdoch's punches great. Short jabs, big rights, beautiful uppercuts, just mixed it up and they all were gorgeous. Of course Fujiwara has some of the best punches in wrestling history too, and they had lots of really great exchanges, with Fujiwara being sneaker and not wanting to box heads up with Murdoch. Speaking of turning tables, Murdoch is actually the first guy to try a Fujiwara ambar, which Fujiwara counters by making a pyramid with his head and legs to relieve pressure, then spinning out to counter. Murdoch then counters Fujiwara's armbar attempt by twisting at the knee. It was an awesome bit of mat wrestling by both guys, and just a small piece of awesome in this awesome sandwich of a match.

Yoshiaki Fujiwara/Mariko Yoshida v. Yuki Ishikawa/Carlos Amano Chigusa Pro 3/25/05-GREAT
This is a mixed tag from a Chigusa promotions show of all weird mixed tags. For some reason they were using a gigantic ring, I mean a ring that looked 30x30. I would have liked to see spots where the younger Ishikawa used the giant ring to tire the older Fujiwara, but I shouldn't Coey a match. Fujiwara and his trainee Ishikawa start out, and run through some beautiful shootstyle stuff. Great matwork, and super nasty punches and headbutts. Ishikawa has one of the best punches in wrestling, and he drills Fujiwara here. Fujiwara of course smacks him with Kikuchi level headbutts. One of the craziest things about current Fujiwara is that he has really retained all of his quickness. He is 57 years old, but every once in a while he will break out a counter which is blindingly fast. The first move of the match is Ishikawa going for a shoot and Fujiwara countering into a Fujiwara armbar with Dragons Gate speed.

Fujiwara also has some really fun mixed tag spots. Amano comes in and tries to outstrike him and he no-sells except a shot to the balls. Then she comes in later to headbutt him, he laughs at her grabs her like he is going to headbutt her, but instead gives her a big kiss Dusty Rhodes style.

Ishikawa however is the king in this. He comes off as such a scumbag rapist. He lifts Marika for a bodyslam, and just holds her there with his hand on her special parts and a smirk on his face. There is also a section where Ishikawa and Yoshida do some awesome fast matwork which ends with Ishikawa in an STF and he leans down to lick her ear. You really get the sense this how every Joshi fan with a Yoshida avatar would wrestle her if given the chance.

Finish is great as Amano goes all Take Back the Night on Ishikawa and all three of them beat on him. Yoshida then locks in a triangle choke and Yuki just gets this beatific smile on his face as he is face first to her flower. He even waves off the save from Amano.

Totally fun match, which makes me badly want to see an Ishikwa v. Fujiwara singles match, and for GAEA to restart with Ishikawa as your lead heel.

The Complete and Accurate List of All of the Yoshiaki Fujiwara

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FUJIWARA OF THE DAY #2

Yoshiaki Fujiwara/Mariko Yoshida v. Yuki Ishikawa/Carlos Amano 3/25/05

This is a mixed tag from a Chigusa promotions show of all weird mixed tags. For some reason they were using a gigantic ring, I mean a ring that looked 30x30. I would have liked to see spots where the younger Ishikawa used the giant ring to tire the older Fujiwara, but I shouldn't Coey a match. Fujiwara and his trainee Ishikawa start out, and run through some beautiful shootstyle stuff. Great matwork, and super nasty punches and headbutts. Ishikawa has one of the best punches in wrestling, and he drills Fujiwara here. Fujiwara of course smacks him with Kikuchi level headbutts. One of the craziest things about current Fujiwara is that he has really retained all of his quickness. He is 57 years old, but every once in a while he will break out a counter which is blindingly fast. The first move of the match is Ishikawa going for a shoot and Fujiwara countering into a Fujiwara armbar with Dragons Gate speed.

Fujiwara also has some really fun mixed tag spots. Amano comes in and tries to outstrike him and he no-sells except a shot to the balls. Then she comes in later to headbutt him, he laughs at her grabs her like he is going to headbutt her, but instead gives her a big kiss Dusty Rhodes style.

Ishikawa however is the king in this. He comes off as such a scumbag rapist. He lifts Marika for a bodyslam, and just holds her there with his hand on her special parts and a smirk on his face. There is also a section where Ishikawa and Yoshida do some awesome fast matwork which ends with Ishikawa in an STF and he leans down to lick her ear. You really get the sense this how every Joshi fan with a Yoshida avatar would wrestle her if given the chance.

Finish is great as Amano goes all Take Back the Night on Ishikawa and all three of them beat on him. Yoshida then locks in a triangle choke and Yuki just gets this beatific smile on his face as he is face first to her flower. He even waves off the save from Amano.

Totally fun match, which makes me badly want to see an Ishikwa v. Fujiwara singles match, and for GAEA to restart with Ishikawa as your lead heel.

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