My Thoughts on 8/30/951

[Guest RickyChosyu]

Finally got around to seeing All Japan Women's WWWA Championship Night, and I thought I'd post my thoughts on the key matches that I've heard so much about:

 

The Hokuto/Shimoda match was a very fun student/teach bout, with both women's attitudes on display. Shimoda played the defiant young punk trying to break into her own against her mentor, and Hokuto played the vicious, arrogant veteran returning to teach her old protige a lesson. Both women sold very well, as usual, though Hokuto spent more time dishing out punishment. She was able to make Shimoda seem like a threat to her but stayed in charge and provided some good "don't get cute with me, kid" moments that made me chuckle. I won't spoil them or some of the other little things Hokuto does to drive the point home, but it's all very effective, straight-forword stuff that makes this enjoyable. I'd be willing to go as high as ***1/2 for this.

 

The Kong/Kansai WWWA Singles title match was very good, but a bit underwelming. I really enjoyed their 11/20/94 match, and this one had a lot of the same qualities, but a few problems kept it from living up to my expectations. First off, there were some goofy moments, such as a part where they began head-butting each other for a while. I can see how they wanted to have the two monsters square off, but seemed pretty hooky when they could have just stuck to their normal strikes which had, you know, won them matches in the past.

 

Another problem was some of the matwork, which gave off an NJ Juniors vibe of being there just to kill time, mainly because it wasn't all that logical. Kansai went after Aja's leg and back using various holds (Scorpian Deathlock, STF, Cammel Clutch, ect.) but it seemed strange when the biggest threat to her was Aja's Uraken, which she executes with her arm. Yes, breaking down Aja does make sense and you could argue that Dynamite was working the back to set up her finisher, but the way she reacted to the Uraken later showed that she realized that it was dangerous and that she needed disable it. She eventually went after the Uraken arm and hurt it rather easilly, but it made me wonder why she didn't just do that to begin with.

 

The other problem was the finish, which came off as flat. This was partly because they didn't go the obvious route of Kansai winning with the Splash Mountain and partly because Kansai just couldn't get Aja up for a regular Black Tiger bomb, something she was able to do in their 12/94 match, despite having already wrestled that night. She had to use the turnbuckles to assist her in the this match, and even then it didn't look like she got her all the way up before dropping her. Also, in their previous meeting, Aja kicked out of a BT bomb but narrowly escaped Splash Mountain and went on to win, which gave the impresion that in order to beat Aja, Kansai just had to find a way to unleash her most powerfull attack. Here, they tease the Splash Mountain again, but fail to deliver it, ending the match with Kansai hiting multiple BT bombs to win, which was made worse by her inability to lift Aja all the way up for the move.

 

That said, I still enjoyed this. They did some great throw backs to BEU, with both women anticipating each other's counters to their countes and so forth. They also teased spots within the match, and then played back to them later, such as Aja's back drop. Once Kansai went after Aja's right arm, and injurred it, to protect against the Uraken, Aja put it over nicely and generally did a great job selling for Kansai's offense. Just like their previous encounter, the standing ten count was used to build great drama and it was great to see two of the biggest women bumping, selling, and putting each other over so effectively. This had a very epic feel thanks to both women using (almost) everything in their aresenals to win, and both women showing the smarts that few other "monsters" have, along with the brute strength, size, and athletisism that made them the top dogs in their respective promotions. Just based on my gut feeling, I would say this is ****1/4ish.

 

I may post my thoughts on the 2/3 falls Toyota/Hasegawa vs. Double Inoues later, once I get around to watching it. I'm interested in what many of you have to say about these matches since it's entirely likely that you picked up on some little things that I missed and whatnot. So feel free to give me your thoughts.