Puroresu Show Reviews

A bit overdue getting to watching the rest of this, so here's part 3, and expect part 4 soon.

Blizzard Miyuki debut: Blizzard Miyuki VS Mariko Yoshida
This was really poor for a debut. Aside from the nice dramatic intro she had, Blizzard just did NOTHING of importance. She sorta reminds me of Heat from NJPW, but this was way before that so I’m guessing this might be where they stole the costume idea from.
Anyways, most of the match was Blizzard using submission holds to tie Yoshida down and I found the whole match to be dull and anti-climatic. And now that I think about it, over a decade later, Yoshida is still active in the business, whereas Miyuki isn’t even around anymore unless she’s working under her real name.
Match Rating: *

V*TOP Tournament – Round 1: Yumiko Hotta VS Combat Toyota
After watching this I can understand the ego trip Hotta is on in AtoZ now booking herself as an unstoppable monster even worse than Triple H. It looked like she really didn’t want to put Toyota over as she sold horribly and even blew a few spots and timing.
Toyota was the exact opposite, selling well for Hotta’s strikes as well as actually showing fatigue as the match went on whereas Hotta just didn’t seem to feel any long term damage from all the powerbombs and such Toyota was delivering. Heck, even the ending of the match had to make it look like Toyota got lucky as she was exhausted and Hotta was on her feet throwing a tantrum at the referee.
Match Rating: **

V*TOP Tournament – Round 1: Eagle Sawai VS Akira Hokuto
Now this was a great match! Sawai is 260lbs, but she moves real quick for a big woman! She dominated early on with her size and power putting up a real uphill battle for Hokuto, who re-aggravated her knee injury during the match but still forged on and actually managed to get Sawai’s huge frame up for one of the sickest looking Northern Lights Bombs EVER! A great match from front to back!
Match Rating: ****

V*TOP Tournament – Round 1: Manami Toyota VS Aja Kong
THIS is what I’m talking about! Non stop action from the opening bell and I was rather shocked at the amount of work they got in when the ring announcer announced they had just reached the five minute mark of the match! Toyota played the underdog to Aja’s power game, but unlike Yumiko Hotta earlier, Aja knew how to sell her opponent’s offense well and make the match believable. I was stuck on the edge of my seat watching this waiting to see what they would pull out next cause there were a TON of near falls and sick bumps taken from both girls in this one. Heck, Toyota even went hardcore and splashed Aja through a table! A true classic and the best match of all the matches I’ve seen on the show so far!
And damn, in addition to being really “flexible”, Toyota sure has a set of lungs on her as she screamed at the top of her voice throughout the match whether on defense or offense!
Match Rating: *****!!!

V*TOP Tournament – Round 1: Dynamite Kansai VS Kyoko Inoue
I thought this was boring and disappointing mostly due to Inoue doing rest holds. Thankfully Kansai brought the stiffnest to the match as well some power as she actually managed to get Inoue up in the splash mountain bomb! Just OK for me.
Match Rating: **

Megumi Kudo & Hikari Fukuoka VS Takako Inoue & Cuty Suzuki
Interesting back and forth tag match with a lot of great tag action. I’m not sure how popular Inoue and Suzuki were at the time, but it was good that they put over Kudo as the senior of the match even though she was representing a little indy fed called FMW. Kudo took the brunt of the punishment for her team, but gave as much as she got showing how good she is in the ring. She really did retire too early in her career.
Match Rating: ***

Overall: A slow start, but once the V*TOP Tournament got underway, there was a lot of goodness on this edition of the show! Two MUST SEE matches, and it can only get better as I go into the final volume of the show which I hope to watch tomorrow and get the review up as soon as I can.

Labels: Joshi