PeteF3
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Everything posted by PeteF3
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The final destruction of Brutus Beefcake as a relevant player in wrestling, and a glorious destruction it is. I love the Horsemen laying stomps down on Beefcake in the background of Arn cutting his awesome promo. A full-blown war between the Horsemen and NWO is on, and it sounds like the most awesome thing ever even if it doesn't really turn out that way.
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Same promo as WCWSN, with an awkward edit over Hogan talking about "in one week." How could anyone have considered Shawn Michaels to be remotely cool as compared to this? Neat twist as Sting and Luger hijack the production and order the tape to be stopped. Sting interrogates Craig Leathers about why it was played to begin with.
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Shawn Michaels is going to do what's best for Shawn Michaels, even though Shawn Michaels is not invincible. Shawn Michaels.
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This was whatever, an indie-riffic jaunt between two guys who need somebody with a stronger command of the basics to be led to a classic match, with every spot being something I could call before it happened, and with a badly booked and badly executed finish. I don't hate Sasuke as much as Zenjo because unlike Tiger Mask, his spots generally actually hit, but I sure am souring on him in a big way. Edit: Didn't realize this was the broken-skull match. I'll go lighter on them, then, though I still didn't think the pre-injury work was anything special even if was strong athletically.
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Not a great match but this is as shocking of a result as I've seen on these Yearbooks--up there with Liger pinning Chono and some of Honaga's wins. I've complained about NJPW being *too* upset-heavy in contrast to All-Japan but matches like this show that Choshu still has the magic. This isn't really even meant to be great--it's just Tenzan zeroing in on a wounded body part and having it pay off. But it felt realistic, thanks to the different layout (no big comeback for Hash) and Hash's selling.
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Pretty meh. There is some good stuff in the opening matwork, like Samurai grinding his knuckle into Sasuke's eye to escape a hold, but there isn't much to this. There was a fairly sizable anti-Sasuke backlash during the '06 Smarkschoice poll and I don't recall him placing well, and with this Yearbook I'm finally starting to see why.
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We should be fair and point out that we had a Hispanic man dominating the IC title scene in the years prior to this. (Yes, that was sarcasm.) Cornette was constantly wanting to put Tammy with black guys in SMW. When she debuted and was going around looking for proteges, that was supposed to lead to the introduction of Tony Atlas. Then later he wanted to put her with the Gangstas, which she (sensibly) refused to do. I can't say that I'm grossly offended by this booking move even if I probably should be--the far worse Flair/JYD stuff is right there, after all--but it does feel about 20 years out of date as a heat tactic in 1996.
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I don't know if this is the better match than the Samurai bout, but this might be the greatest performance of Otani's life, and one of the better ones I've ever seen, period. Dragon has morphed into at least an inoffensive worker, but this was still a match almost completely made by Shinjiro. From his early la majistral escapes, to the timing of his kickout when Dragon actually gets him in the move, to his offense, to his awesome selling and frustration every time Dragon makes an escape. Otani is pretty easily the #1 worker in the world at this point, and he puts on a second MOTYC in what's one of the most impressive and highest-end carry-jobs in history. I don't want to sell Ultimo too short, as he hits all of his spots and I don't think a match this good can be entirely the work of one guy, but he couldn't help but be overshadowed.
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I actually liked this match the best of the three. No 2.9 wrestling and the "near falls" they did do were actually well-executed. Sabu is full train wreck worker by this point, but I do admire how he always sets up the table between the apron and guardrail, then makes you wait and wait and wait for one of a various number of payoffs. He *did* put some thought into some aspects of his matches, at least. This has a lot of cringeworthy spots and some inventive ones, too--the payoff in this case was RVD countering a springboard into a fisherman buster through the table.
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Much better than the Sabu match, as the matwork is more dynamic and better-executed. There's still moments of meandering from both and sloppiness mostly from Jericho, but Scorpio holds this together. I actually would have preferred more of the mat stuff to the high spots as they were busting out some wacky lucha-esque submissions for a little bit.
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E-C-W! E-C-W! Gilbert's "number 11" punch on Rich is awesome and Rich is still a great heel seller. Eventually Jarrett manages to handcuff Christopher to the ropes and that leads to a long beatdown on Gilbert courtesy of Double J, Rich, Frank Morrell, and Tony Falk. Falk is about as low-rent, dumpy, and trashy-looking of a wrestler as you can get, particularly by 1996.
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"For some reason"...heh. Fun angle that, as usual, has me wondering what people walking or driving down the street have to think--or if it's just second nature at this point. "Oh, the WMC action spilled out in the parking lot again."
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Other than the good work on the hand, Koshinaka was pretty useless here. I'm fine with him leaving the hand-work in the holster until he was in big trouble and needed to do it, but it was his only good contribution to the match. He's still a shitty seller and everything else here--and this was a perfectly decent match--was due to Yamazaki.
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Too long and meandering to really be good. I actually kind of appreciated the low-key opening stuff, but it takes too long for them to get going and the build is off. Sabu isn't exactly Mr. Smooth but Jericho is even looser and sloppier here, a criticism that would stick with him his entire career. The closing stretch is good and fast-paced and there were things to like in-between, but this needed to be tightened up.
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The previous bout was all about little things--now we have two of the best "big moment" workers in the history of wrestling. The previous matches in this series tended to be about the young dog Hashimoto trying to take down Choshu--he was but the learner, now he's the master and Choshu is older, slower, less in shape, and in general just barely hanging on. The match is compelling on its surface from that point and the selling of both guys adds to it. There's not much to this other than kicks and lariats, but few people in wrestling have ever gotten more out of less. Dramatic match with another surprise finish.
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Great match all about the little things--Yamazaki being a superior mat worker full of deadly submissions, and Muto resorting to stomping on his hand to gain advantages. Yamazaki withstanding the dragon screw->moonsault->figure four combo was a shocker, as that really seemed to be the finish. Then once again he pulls a submission out of his ass for an upset victory. Muto walking out was a little weird but his actual selling while in the cross armbreaker was gold.
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I didn't notice the breathing at all, and this thread actually had me seeking it out. God, that sounds weird. Anyway, this was a little bit emptier than the FMW match but was still fun, with some cool back-and-forth exchanges and a spunky little performance from the overmatched Kojima. Finish is logical and realistic but it sort of peters out.
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Tanaka isn't THAT good, but damned if he wouldn't look out of place in an AJPW setting the way he works here. This was really fundamentally sound on top of the big bombs, which surprises me even if I'm not sure that it should--if that makes sense. There's some good big vs. little psychology, some heel work by Kanemura, and good underdog selling by Tanaka, who keeps W*ING off guard with some cool roll-ups and reversals, not to mention the big rolling elbows. Really fun match, probably the best I've seen out of Kanemura. Let the record show, years later, that Michinoku's opponent was Hayato Nanjo.
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136 minutes may well be right. 1 is not a long show at all.