ohtani's jacket

Hopefully, Jetlag will chime in because he's been watching a lot of that stuff recently. I personally loved a lot of the OZ Academy vs. GAEA matches from '96-97 that revolved around Ozaki & girls vs. Chigusa & girls. If you're going to watch Chigusa from this period, it's probably better to start with Chigusa in tags and six-mans. Originally, a lot of these matches were clipped or JIP, but fortunately, GAEA's official YouTube channel has begun uploading full matches. It's worth noting that Chigusa's style changed again in the 90s. She became more a bruiser -- you hit me, I'll hit you, and we'll see who hits harder. This is particularly true against the younger girls where the vets are always screaming at them to hit them harder. You don't get the great babyface work of the Crush Girls era or the shoot style-influenced workrate of the late 80s. It's not for everyone, especially if you love 80s babyface Chigusa, but it represents a big chunk of her career (at least a third of it), so it's worth sampling.

At some point in the mid to late 80s, Chigusa made the conscious decision to move away from the super babyface idol role to something of a more serious pro-wrestler. It wasn't something that happened over night. She had always been a serious wrestler even at the height of the Dump feud, but there was a gradual transformation that saw her put on weight and start incorporating shoot style influences. This would eventually spawn imitators like Hotta and Yamada. The Chigusa from '88-89 was very different from the Chigusa from '84. When she made her comeback in '93, she was even heavier. She didn't really have a home at first. It doesn't seem that AJW were all that keen on using her, or that she was all that keen on working with them. I can't remember if AJW had scrapped their early retirement rule by then, but in any event the initial idea was that Chigusa would "invade" JWP, so to speak, and go through a series of wrestlers until she got to Kansai. They sold it like stages in a video game. Unfortunately, it didn't really pan out like a video game. Perhaps JWP didn't want Chigusa going over all of their talent. I believe she lost to Devil Masami before reaching Kansai, and later on challenged again and eventually lost to Kansai. As much as I love JWP, Chigusa trying to invade the promotion and go over their ace didn't have quite the same weight as if she had invaded AJW and tried to reclaim the Big Red Belt from Aja. Kansai challenging Aja as the ace of JWP worked because it was similar to Tenryu invading New Japan. It would have felt strange if Aja had tried to run roughshod over the smaller JWP. I would agree that Chigusa's 90s interpromotional work isn't the greatest, but once she settled into her own promotion, I think she had a definite aura that she carried about her. Chigusa vs. her students, and the younger generation against the older Showa workers, is one of the more interesting parts of late 90s-early 00s Joshi.

Atlantis, Black Magic & Ultimo Dragon vs. Negro Casas, Pirata Morgan & Satanico (CMLL 8/21/92) Quick trios match which serves as the lead in the Casas/Ultimo title match the following week. Casas and Ultimo have great chemistry as usual. Ultimo gets a big pin over Casas to show he has the pedigree to beat him for the title, but strangely, Casas seems more focused on seducing Black Magic over to the rudo side (a turn that ends up happening in the subsequent weeks.) Satanico and Pirata don't really do much. They pinball nicely for Atlantis, but that's a given. Pirata wears a bandana to hide his shaven head. Satanico has a fun exchange where he tries to manhandle Black Magic. Match ends abruptly. Despite all the talent, it's not the best lead in match you'll see.

If there's one thing Japanese wrestling has been missing in the 00s, aside from, I dunno, a motivated Toshiaki Kawada, a relevant Shinya Hashimoto, and a healthy Kenta Kobashi, it's been this man, Kiyoshi Tamura. This wasn't exactly a triumphant return, but it was the return of one of the best wrestlers of the 90s and another guy to add to the list of the dozen or so Japanese wrestlers worth watching from this era. I thought Tamura showed a bit of rust in this bout, and hadn't quite figured out what he wanted U-Style to be, but I was happy to see him back in a wrestling ring. I also know there's better things to come from this promotion, so I didn't hang my hat on this being special. Decent workout for Tamura.

This wasn't quite as red hot as their mano a mano the week before, but I thought the body of the match was excellent and pretty much the epitome of what a modern title match could be. It was shorter than old-school title matches. You didn't get a long primera caida with back and forth matwork, but the work was sharp, focused, and employed good psychology. These two were natural rivals and had great chemistry. Their era of CMLL didn't last that long, but it felt like the future at the time. I was in two minds about the finish here. Shocker saved face by getting the phantom 1-2-3, and Ultimo stayed strong by going over clean, but I don't think anyone was satisfied by the outcome. I think we were all looking forward to an epic tercera caida. Instead, we got a segue for Shocker to move onto his next big program against Vampiro. It ended up being a nice bookend to the mano a mano but on paper it was shaping up to be a MOTYC. Worth watching for the match up; just don't set your hopes too high.

That Patera/Bruno match was some old-school goodness. Not much of a Texas Death Match, though, even by WWWF standards. It's too bad they didn't play the gimmick up more.

If you wait a few months, the match will be reviewed and shared with folks on YouTube.

From what I can gather, they had another match on 9/15/89. Someone in the comments said they had four singles matches.

"Sockeye" Jack McDonald vs Dave Levin "Sockeye" Jack McDonald is definitely one of the characters of the 50s TV footage. I love how Jules Strongbow paints this picture of McDonald as a lumberjack learning to wrestle in lumber camps. It's slightly more flattering than Lou Thesz' description of him as "the barfly being pushed by the Texas office." This was a match between veterans. Most sources have Levin retiring the same year he worked this bout ('54), but there are records of him having matches later in the decade. In any event, both guys were far removed from their salad days, but they put on a neat preliminary bout with some fun leg scissors work and a strong build to the fast paced finish.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=imCcTj4jGhY

The Kandori/Devil Masami rematch has appeared on YouTube, and it is a doozy.

This ancient YouTube channel has footage of both women --- https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCQr3wPZzq6OaYPCUMIZc9jA

Well, Funaki vs. Rutten is better than anything Funaki did in a pro-wrestling ring. So, there's that.

I finished Fables today, a series I first began reading back in December. It had its ups and downs as you’d expect any series to do that lasts 150 issues, but it consistently entertained me day in, day out for a solid five months. I read that Willingham originally envisioned the series running for one issue longer than Cerebus. I don’t know if Willingham had that many stories left to tell, but now I hear that the book is returning for another 12 issue arc, so we’ll see how that goes. A lot of people comment on how the book should’ve ended after the first 75 issues, and would have been better as a standard 60-75 issue Vertigo series. I never really felt that way reading it. In fact, I didn’t find the reveal of the Adversary’s identity, or the final battle against his Empire, to be hugely momentous. I actually felt that the conclusion to a lot of the arcs were anticlimactic. It got to the point where I started wondering if it was intentional on Willingham’s part or a weakness of his as a writer. What held the book together for me was the rich cast of characters and the uniform look that Buckingham and Leialoha gave the series. Willingham was lucky to have the same artists on the book for the majority of its run. Many people had strong opinions about this series. It almost rivaled the type of feedback you see from a television show. As I read the complaints, I began to develop a type of mentality of “Ok, let’s see what the writer chooses to do with these characters” instead of worrying about what I wanted to see happen. I didn’t agree with every decision Willingham made, but I wasn’t incensed by any of them, and I remained invested in the characters. Nobody’s forced to like the direction an artist goes in, but I sometimes think we lose track of an artist’s right to take things in a new direction. That said, I’m not sure where Fables would rank in my echelon of great comic book runs. Probably in my top 25 If it had been a bit more emotionally satisfying instead of intellectually stimulating it may have ranked higher. There were a few moments that were genuinely emotional, and well built, but the highs weren’t quite as high as other runs I’m fond of. Still, a remarkable achievement for any creative team to last that long, and now they want to come back for more?

Vampiro Canadiense vs. Pirata Morgan, hair vs hair (CMLL 7/17/92 ) Man, this match is something else. The thing you need to realize, and I know it may be difficult to understand, is that Vampiro was insanely over in Arena Mexico in 1992. I don't think there was anybody else in the world who was more over than Vampiro in that building in '92. Now, if you're anything like I was when I was younger, you don't want to watch Pirata Morgan have a hair match against Vampiro. You want to see him work hair matches against Dandy and Satanico. I get that. But actually, Morgan works the same way in this match that he did against Dandy and Satanico. The difference is that this is high stakes, high drama lucha at its absolute best. It's an absolute masterpiece of a performance by Morgan. Vampiro sells well, but pretty much everything he does on offence looks bad, but it doesn't matter because the stakes are so high. Morgan works the most beautiful tercera imaginable. He has the crowd on a string. They erupt when Vampiro wins. You can see the building shake on camera. I don't know what happened when Morgan jumped to AAA, but how the fuck didn't he have another run in CMLL? I'm not sure that I've ever seen this match before. If I have, I'm pretty sure I was predisposed towards hating it because of Vampiro. It's not that I don't like big spectacle lucha. I love Rayo vs. Caras, Perro vs. Mascara Ano 2000, and other matches from this era, but for whatever reason I ignored this. Watching it now, Pirata was at the height of his powers. He's almost godly. Again, how did he fall from grace so badly? I always talk about Arena Mexico being Casas' house in '92, and Dandy, and Pierroth, but Pirata was right up there. I just didn't realize it.

Cheri Bibi vs. Gilbert Cesca (aired 9/2/66) One of the questions that has bugged me the most about this Catch footage has been, "What type of worker was Gilbert Cesca?" Was he a super worker who looked good against anyone? Was he a foil for better workers? Or a guy who looked good against the right opponent? I don't think I'm any closer to answering the question, but I'm pretty sure I liked this a lot more now than I did when it first dropped. Back then I was like a junkie looking for my next hit of pure Catch. This was a brawler vs. stylist match, and far removed from the pure Catch of Catanzaro vs. Cesca, but as we've learned, matches like this were fairly common in French Catch and well received by the audience. This started with some fun cat and mouse stuff before Bibi took over and began taking Cesca apart. Cesca launched into a babyface rage, and the match ended with them brawling outside the ring with the cops and a spectator getting involved, a real flashback to late 50s Catch. Bibi looked a lot better than usual. I'm not sure if it was because he was trying harder or Cesca sold well. Probably six of one, half a dozen of the other. I've always said that so long as Bibi is moving forward and attacking his opponent, he's watchable. I thought he did a good job of varying the point of attack here and delivering different types of body blows. He even threw in some kicks. Cesca was playing the plucky underdog archetype, so we didn't get the full repertoire from him, but he deserves points for making this entertaining. It wasn't as exciting as Bibi vs. Jacky Corn, but it was definitely one of Bibi's best. And to be honest, probably one of the better matches from '66.

I'm struggling to recall what we have on tape, but I definitely think the McHoy match is the best carry job I've seen from him. Not that McHoy was bad, it's just that it was a big Royal Albert Show and McHoy was a last minute replacement for Rocco's billed opponent, Kung Fu. IIRC, they'd actually built that match up on television as well. McHoy was such a weird replacement for Kung Fu, but Rocco makes it work. I feel like the Pete Roberts bout was a lot slower as well. I can't remember if there any any other catchweight bouts where Rocco worked a slower pace. My favorite period is his late 70s explosion when he first takes off as a heel. I remember enjoying the matches against Bert Royal. Some of that might be original broadcast stuff, though, and not the Wrestling Channel footage. I think Lister uploaded all that stuff, though.

Florida TV Title Match: Mr. Saito (c) vs. Barry Windham (Title Change!) (July 26th, 1980) -- a skinny Barry Windham takes on Saito at a house show. Mostly clips of Barry being valiant and scoring the upset win. Decent footage. Mike Graham vs. Hiro Matsuda (August 11th, 1981) (Championship Wrestling From Florida) (CWF) -- I really like Hiro Matsuda. If you think about the first two decades of Japanese professional wrestlers, he has to be in the top 10. This is basically clips of Graham trying to deal with Matsuda's superior wrestling ability and it's impressive the way that the crowd are behind Graham even though it's more of a wrestling contest than a brawl. Graham sure grows on you if you watch enough of this stuff. Very good footage. Ric Flair vs. Mr. Wrestling #2 (December 8th, 1981) (Championship Wrestling From Florida) -- If I'm going to watch any Flair at this point, it's probably gonna be young Flair. And the thing I'd be looking for most is new opponents. Mr. Wrestling II fits the bill. Wish we'd seen a bit more than the finish. OK footage. Mike Graham vs. Tully Blanchard (1981) (Championship Wrestling From Florida) -- this was supposed to be Dory Funk Jr vs. Mike Graham, but Tully slapped Graham in the face and a match broke out between the two. Tully wasn't anywhere near as good a TV worker as he'd become later on, but it was still an excellent studio bout. I actually didn't know that Tully cut his teeth in Florida. Solie did a tremendous job of putting the whole thing over, and even Dory served as a pretty decent heel. Very good footage. Dory Funk Jr. vs. Steve Keirn (Funk Goes Berserk!) (1981) (Championship Wrestling From Florida) -- really good TV match with a killer angle afterward. If you think Dory Funk couldn't to this pro-wrestling stuff, you need to watch this. Really good footage.

Bill Cody vs. Honest John Cretoria This was a nice, simple wrestling match. Cody was billed as a newcomer to the professional ranks and used a lot of amateur style "leg dives." Cretoria, on the other hand, used a lot of inside moves. Cody proved he could handle himself in the ring, and in the end he proved too skillful. Cretoria had a great moustache and beard. He looked like he could've been a fun worker, especially if he had a bit more time.

Lizmark, Love Machine & Vampiro Canadiense vs. MS-1, Satanico & Pirata Morgan (CMLL 7/10/92) This was better than you'd think. The Infernales were such good brawlers that they could make just about any scenario entertaining. They were particularly good at opening falls, which can oftentimes feel perfunctory in lucha. Here, they actually went against expectations and had the tecnicos pinch the opening fall. I like that booking as it breaks up the predictable formula of a lucha trios match and makes it seem like anything can happen in a match. Vampiro bled a shit ton here, including all over the ref's white shirt, and spent most of the bout getting the shit kicked out of him by Pirata. While that was happening, Lizmark and Satanico had a number of fiery exchanges. This was one of Lizmark's best performances of the year, and it actually left me thinking an apuesta match between the two would have been a better option than a title match since Lizmark came across as far more interesting in a brawling scenario. He also had a huge rip in his mask that gave us a pretty decent gawk at what he looked like. I've been raving about Vampiro vs. Bucanero, and I couldn't help but wonder if Rey had seen Pirata/Vampiro because the blueprint for getting the most out of Vampiro was definitely on show. I'm curious about their singles match now, which, of course, was the purpose of this match. Gotta love solid CMLL booking when you get it.

I finished a few things, which is pretty good going considering how many new books I've started. I really enjoyed Camelot 3000. Ordinarily, I would hate this sort of premise -- King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table are resurrected and fight space aliens in the future -- but Bolland's art was brilliant. I understand there were all sorts of delays with the book because of how slowly he worked, but it left me wishing that he'd done more interior work during his career. Probably more of a triumph in collected form than it was off the shelves. Nonetheless, DC's 80s experiments were a fertile time in mainstream American comics. Stan Sakai's run at Mirage was nowhere near as good as his stuff at Fantagraphics. I prefer Usagi in black and white much like I prefer samurai films in black and white to color. The stories didn't seem to resonate as much, either. They were easy reads, but didn't have the same energy. I believe things pick up again with his Dark Horse work. The Aardvark-Vanaheim/Renegade Press Flaming Carrot Comics were a lot of fun. I really enjoy Bob Burden's sense of humour. His ideas didn't always stick, but he was the master of absurd situations and quirky one-liners. I'm interested to see how well Flaming Carrot transitions into the 90s.

I would be extremely surprised if a person living in a major city traveled to the rural areas to catch shows. Considering All Japan ran shows in all of the major cities, I can't envision why anyone would travel to see a house show. It's possible that folks traveled from out of town to see some of the bigger cards in another city, especially folks coming to Tokyo, but I'd wager that most fans only attended shows in their area.

Are there any Hellboy fans here? I re-read the original mini-series, and the DHP serial that followed. I don't want to judge it too harshly since Byrne scripted the first series, and the serial was Mignola's first crack at doing the writing, but is there a point where Hellboy comes into its own?

A better worker than he's given credit for. Good enough to be accepted as a main eventer, and going through the early 00s footage, his absence was sorely felt when he blew his quad, to the same extent as Kobashi and Benoit. Hell of a career all things considered.

MS-1 vs. El Faraon, hair vs. hair (CMLL 7/3/92) This was really good. I feel like we overlooked these smaller scale apuesta matches in our pursuit of 4 star lucha libre. Case in point, this is the main event of the show with the Casas vs. Dandy match. MS-1 was in his element here. He takes a backseat at times to his Infernales partners who are super workers and have huge personalities (egos?), but he was a great worker in his own right. I love his methodical style. He's almost like a heavyweight Satanico in that respect. Faraon was pretty much a relic in terms of what was popular in lucha libre at this point, but he comes to fight. I love how his big comeback is punching the guy harder than the guy punched him. The third fall is great. Both guys bleed like stuck pigs, and put each other in increasingly elaborate submission and pinning combinations. There's some tremendous visuals with the blood and the wrestlers screaming that they won't submit. The tape glitches before the finish, which is a bummer but also a reminder of how lucky we are that somebody taped this stuff off TV back in the day. This is like a 3 to 3.5 star match, but not because it's lacking something that would have made it a 4 star match. They earn those stars. It's a glass half full 3 star match. Folks should watch it and remember the great MS-1.