Posted November 4, 200816 yr comment_5435546 DVD 20 10/20/86: Matches also on Classics 249 Antonio Inoki & George Takano vs. Super Mario Man & The Barbarian - Mostly interesting because Fujiwara came in to save Inoki from a beatdown at the end. Kengo Kimura & Shiro Koshinaka vs. Nobuhiko Takada & Osamu Kido - This had plenty of good wrestling in it but never really built into a standout match. Tatsumi Fujinami vs. Keiji Mutoh - Fujinami treated Mutoh with more respect this time. Mutoh spent the early portion of the match showing he could hang with Fujinami on the mat. They did one nifty sequence in which Mutoh missed the moonsault but landed on his feet and quickly scrambled back to the top to nail Fujinami with a crossbody. Ultimately, Mutoh tried another moonsault, but Fujinami got his knees up and small packaged Mutoh for the win. This match-up isn't clicking for me. Not sure why because the wrestling is ostensibly good for the most part. I guess I dislike the fact that Fujinami ceded so much offense to Mutoh when he was supposed to be the veteran gatekeeper. And there was an intensity missing. Why didn't Mutoh seem more fired up to prove himself against such a big star? They're good matches but not ones I'd think to recommend to anyone. 10/27/86: Keiji Muto vs. The Jackal - Nothing noteworthy here. Tatsumi Fujinami vs. The Barbarian - Barbarian tried to introduce a chair to the action, but Fujinami took it from him and brained him with it. I was surprised how easily Fujinami took the win. I guess they were done trying to build Barbarian as a monster. Antonio Inoki & Yoshiaki Fujiwara vs. Steve Williams & Bad News Allen - Interesting dynamic here as Fujiwara seemed disinterested in helping Inoki during an outside beatdown in which Williams and Bad News busted him open on the post. He seemed all fired up, however, when he finally tagged in. They did lots of comedy spots based on the hardness of his noggin. In my favorite, Williams rammed Fujiwara's head into Allen's lifted knee, and Bad News screamed in pain. Nice play on a common double-team spot. Anyway, Inoki and Fujiwara ended up working together fairly smoothly. Unfortunately, they cut up the ending between the close of the show and the credits, so it's hard to rate. My sense is that it was an interesting match in setting up the Fujiwara/Inoki partnership for the tag league but not a nomination on its own terms.
