TheBean

Hi folks! Wanted to share a quickie review of ZERO-ONE from 2002. I think most folks might know the Spanky vs Low Ki match but, there's some other stuff worth your time. The main event especially might be appealing. It brings a '89 FMW, '92 NJ Karate vs Pro Wrestling vibe that I know I dig. Let's go! Fugo Fugo Yumeji & Kuroge Wagyuta vs. Kamikaze & Yoshihito Sasaki - Good match! This surprised me. Nice, hard hitting action. Nice way to kick things off! Hirotaka Yokoi vs. Kintaro Kanemura - MMA type vs hard-core hero...this is an excellent styles clash. This was a blast...Kanemura leads Yokoi through a fun under 10 minute match with hard-core elements, big spots and couple nifty holds. I only know of Yokoi from Fire Pro Returns so it was neat to finally see an actual match of his Naohiro Hoshikawa, Tetsuhiro Kuroda & Wataru Sakata vs. Dick Togo, Ikuto Hidaka & Kohei Sato - Really good stuff with all of this talent. Hoshikawa was the standout for his team and Dick, Hidaka & a young Sato delivered as well. I didn't dig the finish as it came out of nowhere but there's plenty to like beforehand so it's not ruined in the slightest. Leonardo Spanky vs. Low Ki - This felt too choreographed and purposefully epic, at times. Other times it felt right. The last minute was done just right..So all said, this was a very good match. It's a lot of fun with the surprises and variations on moves you thought you knew. The familiarity is present and if you're into the early 2000's indie scene or founding fathers of ROH etc., this is one to watch. Masato Tanaka & Shinjiro Otani vs. Kazuhiko Ogasawara & Shinya Hashimoto - This was early 90's NJ with Ogasawara being a Karate black belt teaming with Hash vs Emblem. And I loved it! It had that odd flow with the Karate guy going 70% strength and blasting Otani and Tanaka with punches and kicks (and occasionally missing). Hashimoto would direct Ogasawara what to do next both as leader/vet but also to keep the match interesting. Hash would get beat up early on (going after his knee) which unfortunately was pointless and my only big complaint. Eventually he would just unleash upon his opponents. All that said, Otani and Tanaka did not go soft on either of their opponents. This was very much a WAR match in a Zero-One ring. Four guys just beating each other up. Highly recommended! ----- Zero-One along with BJW are two promotions that I have dabbled with here & there (see the Puro + More blog) but I really need to focus more on these. I am going to be looking into even more in the future. My internet only projects keep getting bigger while my stack of DVDs doesn't shrink. That said, my DVD projects get slowly taken over by internet based videos that are meant to augment originally. At the end, they become 75% internet and my DVDs augment that! I've got to be more discerning! Anyhow, more wrestling tomorrow! Thanks for reading!

Hey folks! due to some technical issues with the site, I lost access to my G. Badger account. So I'll be using this new account to continue my blog & post here on PWO. Just wanted to let you know! The Further Adventures of Puro + More... is a continuation of my Puro + More blog than I've been doing since 2018. Fortunately, my wife had made a profile on here a few years back while I was getting her into different types of wrestling & she was kind enough to loan me her profile. Let's be honest, I don't think she used it! But it definitely came in handy when the machine gods of the PWO site decided to hobble my access after changing some settings. Anyhow, this is a good time to talk about what's coming up next. It's been awhile since we looked at Japanese wrestling. I'll be posting some stuff from Zero One, New Japan and UWFi & Rings. These are meant to be a part of larger projects but I want to get something up for you guys. Think of them as teasers for projects down the road. I'll use this reintroduction to pontificate, if you don't mind. First, I'd like to reiterate my perspective on pro wrestling. It is fun. It is a diversion. So when I watch wrestling, I'm in it to have a good time. That said, I'm along for the ride. I'm interested in the story the booker and wrestlers are trying to tell me. I want to feel the ups and downs. So when I write my reviews, I'm trying to convey that emotion to the reader. I want you to get pumped to watch a match. If I'm lukewarm or cold, I want you to know why. I'm just one voice and my taste might be different than yours. This is why I try to reference other matches or wrestlers. I want you to be able to compare & contrast with your own opinions. Additionally if you have a preference for or against a certain wrestler, style or promotion, I try to add a remark in my reviews. You might see things like, "Great TNA tag match," "Classic FMW main event," or "If you're a fan of Jun Akiyama or Stan Hansen then see this match." I'm not just being colorful. I want to give you a little bit more information. There's so much wrestling available with the internet that I don't want you to blow time on something you're not going to enjoy. I don't do star ratings very often anymore. I think after Meltzer got goofy with those, they've fallen out of usage by many people. Still they are helpful especially if you trust the reviewers. I stopped doing them awhile back because I get too caught up in trying to quantify. If wrestling is a fun diversion then I don't want to quantify it numerically. Numbers are too exact even if using whole numbers. I mean that every match is different so if I give Kurt Angle vs Samoa Joe 5 stars and I give Ric Flair vs Ricky Steamboat 5 stars then they must be equal (5=5). But they aren't actually equal in all or even many ways. So I think by saying both are All Time Classic matches, I can indicate the highest level of quality, my highest level enjoyment without making a direct equivalence. So you may say, "That's good and well Badger but couldn't you just assign a number to each of your ratings? So All Time Classic is a 5, Classic is a 4, Very Good a 3 etc. And then you would be quantifying. Aren't you just trying to trick yourself?" And I would then say, "You go to hell!" ? Seriously, you can do that number jazz if you want. I'm a qualitative data person when it comes to this stuff. I'm in it to get you amped to watch wrestling not to work on spreadsheets. I want to get people excited to watch different stuff. That's what a lot of the early projects here on PWO did for me. It got me out of my bubble and tried new things. OK, I got that out. Let's do a wrestling art show ? Haven't done one for awhile. Just for fun. Misawa vs Takayama --- The Sheik in FMW --- Black Moth Super Rainbow Mr. Wrestling II --- Thanks for reading folks! Thanks for sticking around! Be back soon with some wrestling!

Hey folks! due to some technical issues with the site, I lost access to my G. Badger account. So I'll be using this new account to continue my blog & post here on PWO. I will get the "new" blog setup shortly. Just wanted to let you know! So it's the same Badger just with a new handle & pic ? thanks!