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Japan Reviews Wrestling

Giulia in Ice Ribbon: Maya Yukihi & Asahi

Pre-WWE, new Women’s US Champion Giulia is best known for her time in World Wonder Ring Stardom.

However I was originally familiar with her primarily from her time in the promotion she was trained and debuted in, Ice Ribbon. Her two years there coincided with when I was regularly making trips to Japan and attending a lot of wrestling shows. It’s always interesting to look back on someone’s early days, and in particular I’d like to focus on two specific matches of hers with personal significance to me.

I’ll be watching these off my DVD collection, as they pre-date Ice Ribbon’s currently maintained various streaming archives. So I’ll try to do as full play-by-play as possible in lieu of being able to direct readers to any easy way to view these.

ICE Cross Infinity Championship: Maya Yukihi (c) vs Giulia – Osaka Ribbon 5/28/19

Giulia’s a year and a half into her career here, having debuted on October 29, 2017. This is a main event challenge for company’s top title.

One fall, 30 min time limit. Time limits in Ice Ribbon title matches have extra weight due to a rule in place that means there’s no champion advantage for time limit draws. If a championship match goes to the time limit, the championship is vacated.

I was at this live and it was among my top matches of that trip (all the pictures here are from my live viewing). But I haven’t watched it in years, and I’m interested to see how it holds up.

Maya is draped in belts. In addition to the ICE Cross Infinity Championship she’s defending, she was reigning Triangle Ribbon Champion, International Tag Ribbon Champion (with Risa Sera as Azure Revolution), and Oz Academy Tag Team Champion (with Saori Anou as Ozaki-gun).

They just stare down each other without leaving their corners for several seconds after the bell starts the match. Crowd’s behind both, which is expected as it’s a rising star against a well loved champ in her second title defense.

Hard lockup as they come to the center. Maya pushes Giulia back into the ropes, but gives a clean break and they circle each other back into another collar and elbow tie up. Giulia gains a little ground but then Maya powers her back into the ropes again. Giulia reverses in the ropes and teases a clean break, but repeatedly forearms the hell out of Maya instead. Maya tries to reverse Giulia into the ropes but the latter spins Maya right back into position for more forearms. Maya tries to respond in kind again but AGAIN Giulia spins right through the reversal and puts Maya into the corer for more forearms. The challenger is being super aggressive to good effect.

Giulia fires up the crowd, then whips Maya into the opposite corner and follows with a running boot. She hits the ropes to try to sustain the offense as Maya stumbles out of the corner but the champ finally strikes back and levels Giulia in the center of the ring with a high kick.

Maya pulls Giulia up several times in a row for hair mares back down, then controls for a bit with a head vice into a Camel Clutch style chin lock. Giulia reaches back with her leg to get the ropes break.

Arm ringer into a Fujiwara arm bar takes Giulia back down. The challenger rolls out but Maya keeps ahold of the arm and tries for a different submission hold. Giulia fights it off and rolls Maya back into a sunset flip style pin for 2. Maya kicks out right into a seated waist lock and grabs Giulia’s arm again. Giulia’s on her back but forces a head scissors to fight off a hammerlock attempt. They keep grappling through reversals until Maya ends up on top of a face down Giulia with Giulia’s legs tied up and Maya pulling back on her arms. Maya transitions to another chin lock from behind and Giulia bites her way out of it. Phenomenal extended stretch of mat wrestling with the challenger finally getting tired of coming up a touch short and bending the rules to escape.

Both back to their feet, but Maya catches Giulia with a kick to the stomach and puts her back down to the mat with a snap mare. Seated position is never great to be in against Maya, and sure enough she lays into Giulia’s back with a stiff kick. Giulia roars in challenge so the next one is right to her chest. Another each to her back and chest and the challenger is in rough shape. Maya paintbrushes Giulia across the face with the bottom of her boot then kicks her challenger out of the ring.

She nails Giulia in the back with a double slap as she hops down from the apron, takes a drink of water from a nearby second, then kicks Giulia across the face again. Champ’s in firm control. They trade overhand chops and are really hammering each other.

After Maya lands a series of chops they separate a bit to different corners, all still on the outside. Giulia drops to her knees to recover and gets a drink of water of her own, then spits water in Maya’s face when the champ comes back over. An enraged Maya goes for a high kick but Giulia ducks and Maya nails the ring post. She crumples to the floor in pain and Giulia is instantly all over the …other leg, stomping away, stepping on the knee, and applying a heel hook. They’re still on the floor though so she has to break to drag Maya back into the ring.

Giulia then immediately drags Maya into the corner, goes back outside herself, and wraps Maya’s leg around the ring post. She pulls and grinds it into the post a bit as the ref yells at her to get back in the ring. When she does Maya is crumpled in a pile in the corner clutching her leg. Giulia pulls her up into a handstand and slams her leg into the mat in a unique bit of viciousness. Giulia slams Maya’s leg against the mat some more then ties her legs up and pulls back on her ponytail. I don’t think that an entirely legal hold. Ref counts to 4 and Giulia breaks.

Back up and Giulia does an elevated shin breaker to Maya’s right leg (the one that originally kicked the ring post). Giulia’s just destroying both legs now so we’re all good.

She ties Maya up in the ropes and instead of pounding on the mat to fire up the crowd she slaps Maya’s back for it. That’s cold. She hits the opposite ropes and comes charging back with a big boot to the back of Maya’s head. Cover gets 2.

Maya blocks a whip out of the corner temporarily, then reverses it when Giulia powers through. But when she charges Giulia in the other corner she eats another boot. Giulia hops up to the second rope into a crossbody for 2.

STF applied but Maya rolls out quickly into one of her own. Giulia counters that with her previously established go-to of biting Maya’s arm. Maya stays on top of Giulia though and fights for a seated Fujiawara (Becky Lynch’s Dis-arm-her). Giulia keeps her arm from extending, then rolls out into a leg lace. She adds a stretch muffler on the other leg and Maya’s in trouble. But Maya is able to grab Giulia’s weakened arm and transitions out into another Fujiwara variation. They been twisting each other in knots all match.

Giulia claws and scrapes to get her leg to the ropes for the break. Maya’s unsteady on her damaged legs but tries a suplex anyway. Giulia fights off, but eats a slap to the side of the head from Maya. Then another. And another. A series of knees put Giulia down against the ropes, but Maya’s a touch slow on the run to the opposite ropes and Giulia dodges the knee strike. Giulia tries a running boot with Maya against the ropes but it’s also dodged. Maya has Giulia’s leg tied in the ropes, and nails her in the face with a kick from the apron. Back in she unties Giulia and covers for 2.

Giulia fights off another suplex attempt and catches a kick. She drops into a leg lace and applies almost a seated cloverleaf variant. Maya fights to the ropes. Giulia breaks immediately and hits the far ropes to wipe Maya out with several big boots to the head as she tries to get up. Cover gets 2.

They fight back and forth over a reverse DDT attempt by Giulia with Maya repeatedly trying to counter into an STO. Giulia prevails and the reverse DDT gets 2. However back up Maya nails the STO for 2.

Maya hits the ropes and lands a hard kick to the face, but she kicked with her damaged foot from earlier so she collapses against the ropes nursing it. She hobbles out and forearms Giulia as the later stands, only to get hit with a forearm when she tries to reverse a Giulia whip attempt. Giulia off the far ropes… into a spin kick to the mid section. Knee lift keeps her stunned, and Maya follows up with a hard big boot. The champ looms over the fallen Giulia, then knees and kicks her head repeatedly when she tries to get up.

Giulia’s out against the bottom rope, and hers the running knee Maya wanted earlier. She goes right through the ropes with it absolutely leveling Giulia (like Sareee and Mizuki do with their against the ropes dropkicks for those familiar with them). Maya tries to shake some feeling back into her leg on the apron, then climbs up top. Missile dropkick folds Giulia in half and gets 2.

Maya hits the ropes for another knee strike but Giulia follows her in for a big boot. Maya returns the favor as Giulia hits the far ropes. Maya hits the opposite ropes again but runs into a big boot in the middle of the ring off the rebound. Cover gets 2 then Giulia goes up to the top turnbuckle.

Maya catches her with a palm strike then hair mares her down. Champ up top … and Giulia catches her with a palm strike. The back and forth in this match is just fantastic. Giulia climbs up and powers the champ into an avalanche power slam for close 2.

Giulia looked for a hammerlock slam but Maya floats out into an arm drag. Another high kick knocks Giulia down but the exhausted champ also collapses. Ref starts counting them both down, but they’re up before 5.

They go into a brutal forearm exchange where they are running at each other for more impact on them. Giulia eventually lands three in a row, then boots Maya when she runs at Giulia to try to return the shots. Maya approaches again and another boot. Third time Maya brushes the foot away, runs behind Giulia to hit the ropes, then runs right into another boot anyway for 2. Giulia’s putting up a hell of a fight.

Giulia up top and a missile dropkick gets 2. Maya’s kickouts at this point are just barely a roll of the shoulder. She’s been through a war and is spent. Giulia goes for the hammerlock spin slam again and hits it for 2. She stays on top of Maya and locks in an STF.

She cranks back on the champ repeatedly as the crowd screams for Maya to claw her way to the ropes. When she gets close Giulia releases and drags her back to the center of the ring. Hammerlock slam set up again, but this time Giulia drops Maya right onto her knees. Man that looked nasty. Back into the STF and she’s cranking the hell out of it. Maya powers to the ropes, but is wiped out.

Giulia pulls her up and reaches for the hammerlock again. Maya pushes away while still holding on to Giulia and just starts kicking her repeatedly in the head. She lets go after a few and backs up for a savate kick. She winds up and nails a side kick in the head for 2. Maya lifts Giulia but the latter floats out and grabs the hammerlock slam position again. This time she drops into a shoulder breaker. I forgot how many variant moves she does from that setup. Closest 2 yet on that cover.

Maya up and swings at Giulia but gets tied up in an octopus hold. Short lived though, as Maya drops into a slam and covers for… barely 1. Shocked awe from the crowd on that quick kickout. Maya just kicks her in the face though and covers again for 2.

Maya’s Crystal of Snow (Iconoclasm, sitout power slam) connects this time and gets 2. She lifts the challenger up one last time and destroys her with a butterfly package piledriver to finally get the 3 count.

Loved this live and love it now. Giulia looked great, especially for so early in her career, and fought like mad for twenty five minutes until the champ was finally able to batter her down. This totally holds up and was a hard hitting war laden with a ton of great grappling to boot.

———-

Giulia vs Asahi – Yokohama Ribbon 9/24/18

This one’s a bit different and significant for a mix of reasons, some admittedly heavy.

Asahi was a wrestler who debuted in Ice Ribbon on August 27, 2017 at the age of 14. She worked for Ice Ribbon until early 2023, then spent the remainder of her career in Actwres girl’Z. Asahi sadly passed away in early 2024 at the age of 21.

She was a personal favorite of mine, as I really enjoyed her style of wrestling and cheering her on. I was at her debut match against the legendary Manami Toyota and was lucky enough to have met Asahi and seen her wrestle numerous times over the years. She is missed.

Asahi was a key rival of Giulia’s in their early careers, as they had debuted just a couple months apart. They had a lot of great encounters and interactions, including during a really unique trios match they were partners in I attended in early 2019 .

So for the second match of this entry I’d like to take a look at a singles encounter between the two from September 2018.

Somehow I’ve never watched this particular match before, so in contrast to the above this’ll be a completely new experience. This is right around a year into the career of both competitors, and roughly six months before Giulia would challenge Maya for the title in the above match. This match was the “semi-final” (second to last match) of the show.

These two had crossed paths in tag matches several times prior to this, mostly as opponents but a couple times as partners. They had also faced in one prior singles contest, that went to a draw.

Hot start to this as Giulia only poses briefly during her entrance, then hurries out of the ring to run up the other path and ambush Asahi behind the curtain before the latter can even be announced or come out. She drags Asahi to the ring by her hair and the match is officially underway.

Asahi gets in Giulia’s face and screams in defiance as they enter the ring but Giulia just tosses her down, kicks her into the corner, and steps on her head. Asahi might have the tiniest bit more experience, but the smaller, younger competitor is being overwhelmed and is definitely the underdog here.

Giulia drags Asahi to the center for a snap mare, then hits the ropes and runs right through her seated opponent with a kick to the head for 2. She then throws Asahi into the corner and chokes Asahi with her foot. That turns into standing face washes with the soles of her boots.

Back to the center and a hair mare puts Asahi down again. Asahi grimaces in pain as Giulia applies a rear chinlock. In short order Giulia opts to release it so she can just mockingly slap Asahi over the head a few times. Slap to the back and a cover for 2. She’s in straight up bully mode.

Dragon sleeper applied and Asahi keeps struggling to repeatedly bridge up until she’s able to inch to the ropes for a break. Giulia drags her up by the hair again and ties her in the ropes. Another slap to the head then more embracing facewashes and slaps to the back follow.

Giulia hits the far ropes and comes running for a boot but Asahi quickly jumps out to the apron and ducks the kick. Asahi pushes Giulia’s leg away, then catches Giulia’s attempted wild punch in an armbar over the rope. After a few seconds she has to break due to the ref’s count and does so by dropping off the apron and snapping Giulia’s arm over the rope. First offense by Asahi of the match.

Asahi goes up top. Giulia catches her and throws her down, but Asahi lands in a roll and quickly gets up, turns around, and dropkicks Giulia back into the corner.

Whip attempt reversed in Giulia’s hammerlock slam position, but Asahi floats out and slaps Giulia across the face. She had that coming at this point. It’s not well received though and Giulia hit Asahi upside the head again, hairmares her down again, and steps on her head again.

Asahi’s had enough and as the ref tries to count to make Giulia get off Asahi the latter speeds up the process by biting Giulia’s leg. Well, her boot at least, but close enough. She finally gives back the abuse she’s been enduring in kind and stomps and steps on Giulia’s face a bit. Although Giulia’s a fast learner and copies Asahi’s counter technique, sinking her teeth into Asahi’s leg.

Once that’s caused some separation, she boots Asahi into the ropes. Off the far ropes and she gets the boot to the back she tried for earlier. Asahi is stretched across the bottom rope and takes more kicks to the face and choking.

Asahi catches Giulia with a faceplant though and stomps on her arm several times. Giulia tries to kick at Asahi from the mat, so Asahi drops into a cover. Giulia immediately kicks out at 1, but the motion swings her arm that Asahi had been working over straight into an armbar. Asahi transitions into a seated Fujiwara, then twists Giulia wrist to apply more pressure.

As Giulia gets closer to the ropes, Asahi suddenly changes her grip and falls backwards still holding Giulia’s arm to switch into a cross arm breaker. Giulia manages to get a foot on the ropes to escape though.

They trade several scoop slams, while slapping, kicking, and shouting at each other in defiance in between them.

After three each Giulia tries to block and counter Asahi’s fourth, but Asahi fights back out and powers through to complete the slam and covers for 2. Back up they lay into each other with forearms. Both give good shots, but the size difference means Giulia’s are more effective and knocking back Asahi more. They proceed to simultaneous forearm shots and Asahi’s eventually laid out while Giulia is affected but able to get up.

She goes over to Asahi and drags Asahi up by her hair, but Asahi drops into a surprise small package for a close 2 count. Asahi hits the ropes with a burst of energy and hits a dropkick, then jumps into a rollup for 2. Deep schoolboy rollup gets another 2.

Asahi goes up top. Giulia runs over and tries to slam her down, but Asahi climbs onto Giulia shoulder. Back towards the center she twists into kind of a crossbody from above. Cover gets 2, but Asahi keeps at repeating the cover several times without letting Giulia up for a series of successively closer 2 counts. I adore when wrestlers fight for a pin like that.

Asahi climbs to the middle turnbuckle and hits a missile dropkick, then repeats it in the opposite turnbuckle and covers for 2. The she kick and slaps at Giulia trying to pull Giulia up, but when Giulia gets to her feet she gathers herself and boots Asahi in the face.

They grab hands and keep swinging at each other with their other arms, but after several mutual blocks Giulia spins Asahi into reverse DDT position and hits a stepover drop. She ties Asahi up tight and the latter barely rolls backwards out of the pin to kickout.

She applies an STF and cranks away until Asahi’s able to drag herself to the ropes for a break. Giulia immediately goes for the hammerlock sideslam and connects, but Asahi kicks out just in time to the crowd’s delight.

Asahi knows she’s in trouble and desperately wraps her arms around the top and middle ropes, struggling to hold on as Giulia tries to pry her away with a waist lock. Some knee strikes and leveraging her bodyweight back eventually rolls Asahi way from the ropes into a facedown position in the middle of the ring. Giulia wraps her legs around the head and shoulder of her screaming, struggling opponent, then pulls back with an armbar and Asahi is forced to tap.

This was thirteen intense minutes of two rookies completely conveying that they had had quite enough of each other. They used their basics well while giving glimpses of the great potential everyone already knew they both had. A little rough around edges at times, which was not only understandable at their level but also completely appropriate for the type of raw battle they were having. There was a good deal of innovation too, and it all came together in a really compelling match. Asahi rocked as the overwhelmed underdog determined to keep clawing and scraping until the end, and after a brutal start fought back to the point of having Giulia in danger. Giulia made the perfect bully who kept at it until she got the win.

It was a treat to be reminded of how much emotion Asahi put into her matches. I’m really glad I watched this, and that’s exactly what the point of wrestling should be.

Overall these were two thoroughly captivating matches and an interesting look back into the early career of today’s Beautiful Madness.

Thanks to everyone who’s given this a read. Derailments of Thought currently updates sporadically, but more regular posts will hopefully be on the way soon.

If you enjoy the blog any support is appreciated, including shares on social media and simply continuing to read. If you happened to be inclined and able to help out monetarily please see my  Ko-fi page. Every little bit helps.

Categories
Japan Wrestling

Final Boss: Meiko Satomura’s Retirement

Recently we all said goodbye to who was in my opinion simply the best wrestler in the world.

Meiko Satomura debuted April 15, 1995, and was already a 20 year veteran when I was first fortunate enough to see her wrestle live at the end of 2015. I had of course heard of her, as she was already well on her way to being a legend, but I hadn’t seen her wrestle until then. I was in for a treat.

As it happens that show was one of the first shows I ever saw live in Japan at all, Stardom Year End Climax 2015. It was headlined by Meiko defending the Wonder of Stardom title as an outsider champion against company ace Io Shirai (now WWE’s Iyo Sky). It was a hell of an introduction to two truly incredible wrestlers.

Meiko wrestled Io 1-on-1 a total of five times (twice each before and after the above match). As luck would have I managed to attend another of their battles at Senjo’s April 2018 show. It was another excellent, engrossing encounter and it was fascinating to see how two already extremely accomplished wrestlers kept evolving in the couple years that had passed.

In retrospect it also ended up being their final singles encounter. Rather surprising given their overlap time in WWE, and the fact WWE never ran the match is insane.

Everything Meiko did in the ring had meaning, with great attention paid to the little details of her craft. So every match felt special, and battles against opponents with skill levels like Io’s were always jaw dropping.

Meiko’s intensity was always on full display. She dismantled her opponents with hard hits and unmatched mastery of wrestling fundamentals. She brought out the best in her everyone she fought and forced them to rise to her level. Japan’s “Final Boss” was the wrestler everyone wanted to test themselves against.

Some of my personal favorite matches of Meiko’s involved her facing up and coming stars. These were almost never about whether or not Meiko’s opponent could win. It was about the fight they put up.

Throughout my trips to Japan I saw a total of eight of Meiko’s matches. Her promotion, Sendai Girls (Senjo), had a schedule that didn’t always match up with when I was there. But I did see her four times in Senjo and as many in other promotions.

Five of those were singles matches, and in addition to the pair of Io matches I was lucky enough to have been at two matches of Meiko’s at TJPW (Tokyo Joshi Pro Wrestling) shows where a couple of that company’s top stars got to test their mettle against the legend.

The first was in August of 2017, against TJPW’s ace in waiting Miyu Yamashita. It was exactly the breakout performance I’d been waiting for from Miyu at that time, and it’s no surprise it came against someone the caliber of Satomura.

From my review of that show:
“Miyu wrestled like someone with something to prove from the very first second and really took it to Meiko, believably smothering the veteran at points with relentless offense, but just couldn’t put the larger, more experienced wrestler. Meiko of course is an artist in the ring and always a joy to watch.”

That same show was headlined by my two favorite TJPW roster members battling it out for the Princess of Princess Championship. A couple years later a personal dream match happened as the victor of that match, Reika Saiki, got her own one on one encounter with Meiko on TJPW’s 1/4/2019 show. As always with my highly anticipated matches of Meiko’s, it was exactly what I expected and hoped for.  

The fifth singles match of Meiko’s I saw live left to talk about was legend vs legend. On my first Senjo show she wrestled Ayako Hamada in a #1 contender ship match for the Sendai Girls World Title that was simply phenomenal. The two beat the hell out of each other and it was my top match of the entire trip.

Outside of the matches of hers I was lucky enough to see live, one particularly cool experience I had was the opportunity to attend was a Sendai Girls New Year’s Party fan event in early 2019. It was a fun chance to meet and hang out with Senjo wrestlers and other fans, and of course an honor to meet Satomura.

Meiko, DASH Chisako, and Millie McKenzie

Meiko could do it all, and never shied away from a fight. Moving on from stuff I personally saw live, I want to specifically point out her intergender matches. She waged war against a number of male opponents over the years, including wrestlers who would go on to appear for WWE or AEW and may be quite familiar to foreign fans such as Pete Dunne and Konosuke Takeshita. The entire feud she had alongside fellow Sendai Girls wrestlers Chihiro Hashimoto and DASH Chisako against DDT Pro’s faction All Out was wild and well worth seeking out.

Speaking of WWE, as I alluded to above Meiko regularly appeared for WWE for a while later in her career. She appeared in the Mae Young Classic 2018, making it to the semi finals with victories over Killer Kelly, Mercedes Martinez, and Lacey Lane before being eliminated by Toni Storm.

She returned in 2021 and made most of her appearances as part of the roster on NXT UK, and was NXT UK Women’s champion from 6/2021 to 9/2022.

She made a few NXT appearances early 2023 after NXT UK was wound down, and last appeared for WWE during their Japan tour in July 2024. While I lamented that WWE never ran an Iyo vs Meiko singles, they did cross paths in a WWE ring during this tour.

Meiko teamed with Bayley, Bianca Belair, and Jade Cargill to face Damage Control (Iyo, Asuka, Kairi Sane, and Dakota Kai) on two shows. On the final show of the tour Meiko challenged her previous teammate Bayley for the WWE’s Women’s Title.

Her April 2025 retirement had been announced right before that title match. Going into 2025 I wondered if one final appearance might happen at the Royal Rumble or possibly during Wrestlemania weekend (which was shortly before her final show). There were also rumors of her being in attendance of NXT Roadblock in NYC. But as it turns out the match against Bayley was her final WWE appearance in retrospect, and a championship match isn’t a bad bookend for her time there.

Meiko’s retirement tour was a gauntlet of tough opponents and challenging contests as she bid farewell to the ring. She faced DASH, Chihiro, Saori Anou, Minoru Suzuki, Yuki Arai, Nanae Takahashi, Takumi Iroha, Sareee, and a great number of other significant opponents in emotional matches. Sadly a challenge from Emi Sakura never materialized into a match, but otherwise it was a series of great farewell matches featuring near everyone fans could have hoped to see challenge the Final Boss one last time.

Meiko’s final show was on April 29, 2025 at Korakuen Hall. In the main event she teamed with Manami against Senjo ace Chihiro and another legend, Aja Kong.

Manami’s inclusion in this match was special and significant. Trained by Meiko and having debuted at the age of 13, she’s now 20 and a 7 year veteran charismatic rising star in Senjo. I saw her wrestle live early on in her career and her potential was immediately obvious.

I’d also seen her and Meiko team opposite Kong once before. On Senjo’s 1/6/2019 show The Senjo roster team of Meiko, Manami, Mika Iwata, & Cassandra Miyagi face Aja, Hiroyo Matsumoto, Alex Lee, & Mikoto Shindo. Manami was fed to the wolves, with Meiko at one point refusing a tag and demanding the relative rookie get back to the center of the ring and put up more of a fight against the monstrous Kong. She was pushed to her limits, rose to the occasion, and the audience went nuts when she eventually secured the victory for her team.

Meiko & Manami would prove successful one last time, winning Meiko’s retirement match when Meiko pinned Kong with Scorpion Rising.

But that wasn’t quite the end. Post match Aja wanted to fight alongside Meiko one last time and throws out a challenge. Five wrestlers argued about who was going to accept but the vets don’t care about the handicap. So Meiko Satomura’s true final match ended up being a five minute time limit draw in which she and Kong fended off Chihiro, Iwata, Iroha, YUNA & Senka Akatsuki (and Sakura Hirota doing Sakura Hirota things). All told Meiko’s final show was a fitting an appropriate goodbye.

Farewell Final Boss. Thanks for an incredible 30 years and best wishes in whatever comes after wrestling.

Thanks to everyone who’s given this a read. Derailments of Thought currently updates sporadically, but more regular posts should be on the way soon.

If you enjoy the blog any support is appreciated, including shares on social media and simply continuing to read. If you happened to be inclined and able to help out monetarily please see my  Ko-fi page. Every little bit helps.

Categories
Japan Reviews Video Games Wrestling

ChocoPro Happy Festival Video Game Review

ChocoPro, formerly Gatoh Move, is a Japanese pro-wrestling company based in Ichigaya Japan. Founded by near 30 year wrestling veteran Emi Sakura, ChocoPro embraces and embodies Sakura’s core belief that wrestling should be fun for both the audience and the wrestlers.

For the last couple of years a ChocoPro themed mobile game has been in development, and today the anticipation came to an end with its release.

Having evolved from a joshi (women’s) wrestling company ChocoPro’s core roster is primarily women, but they are a fully intergender company featuring a number of both men and women wrestlers on every show. As such the ChocoPro wrestlers in this game include both women and men.

ChocoPro Happy Festival is a collection of 9 mini-games each featuring one of ChocoPro’s wrestlers. Wrestlers featured include reigning Super Asia Champion Mei Suruga, Sayaka, Chie Koishikawa, Tokiko Kirihara (Otoki), Sayaka Obihiro (Obi), Emi Sakura, Miya Yotsuba, Baliyan Akki, and DDT Pro’s Masahiro Takahashi (Masa)*. There might also be a special guest appearance lurking about.

Adorable chibi versions of the wrestlers are used on the games. The visuals are gorgeous. The chibis capture the essence of the wrestlers, the backgrounds and details are great, and everything is colorful and vibrant.

The games are straight forward, as expected and appropriate for mini-games, but still amusing and addictive. There’s a nice variety of game types included. Three are side scrollers, two are stop the gauge games, one’s a matching game, two are reaction games, and the last a speed puzzle.

Thematically they’re fantastic. From Mei running along jumping around collecting apples to Sayaka elbowing dummies out of the ring for distance to feeding Her Highness cake and so on each game was clearly carefully designed with great knowledge and respect for the subjects.

Instrumental versions of familiar songs from Gatoh Move and ChocoPro through the years have been adapted to be used for the various menu screens, and each wrestler’s stage features their entrance music. Music is so closely intertwined with a wrestler/promotion’s presentation that it’s inclusion in something like this feels necessary, and was done excellently.

There’s effort and care visible in every aspect of the game. Wonderful little details, like glasses piling up around Masa as you serve him more and more beer during his game or the various levels of happiness or disappointment the wrestler has after the game depending on how you did are great touches. The loading screens during installation are cool profiles of the included wrestlers (which I wish there was a way to view on demand – there’s thankfully no loading screens needed during play after the game’s installed).

Speaking of Masa’s game, it’s likely the reason for the 17+ years old rating this has in the Apple App Store. There’s really nothing else in here beside the alcohol inclusion that would push this above an all ages rating.

The other half of the package here is the rewards system. Choco Points earned in the mini-games can be redeemed for icons and photo tickets. Photo tickets will randomly unlock one of 300 photos. Unlocked photos can be viewed in the photo album, as well as chosen to be featured on home screen. Photos include action and posed shots of ChocoPro wrestlers.

To be honest I’m mostly a console gamer and don’t play/buy mobile games often. So I don’t have much frame of reference on the $12 price point for a mini-game collection of this type. I will say that this is well made and is a wonderful pickup for fans of the company, and for me was definitely worth getting.

It’s really cool to see this game go from concept to fully released, and it turned out great. ChocoPro Happy Festival is a love letter to the company, and an easy recommendation.

——-

*It would feel like an omission to talk about Masa in this post without mentioning that he is currently out with a major neck injury. He recently was released from ICU and is starting rehabilitation. Wishing him a speedy and complete recovery.

Thanks to everyone who’s given this a read. 2024 was a sporadic return for this blog and I hope to sustain more regular updates going forward in 2025. Derailments of Thought currently updates once to twice a week.

If you enjoy the blog any support is appreciated, including shares on social media and simply continuing to read. If you happened to be inclined and able to help out monetarily please see my  Ko-fi page. Every little bit helps.

Categories
Japan Wrestling

Gatoh Move Match Review: Mei Suruga vs Yoshiko

Gatoh Move: The Last Heisei Shin-Kiba Gatoh
March 22, 2019

An interesting match recently popped up in my YouTube recommendations that I forgot existed and was somehow completely unaware it was ever aired.

In 2019, current reigning Super Asia Champion Mei Suruga was a rookie with under a year in wrestling. She was a prodigy who only trained a few months before debuting in Gatoh Move (now ChocoPro), and was already showing skills far beyond her limited experience.

Fair or not, Yoshiko will always be best known for the incident with Act Yasukawa. But a lot has changed in a decade. Act has publicly forgiven Yoshiko and has amazingly returned to wrestling related activities. By 2019 Yoshiko was fully back in wrestling and had been working with a number of companies who all trusted her enough to often be wrestling their rookies and up and coming stars. See this post from a couple years back for a look at my personal thoughts on the more recent state of things and how my opinion on Yoshiko changed over time.

I’d seen excellent matches of hers in the couple years before this match against the likes of Mio Momono and the dearly missed Asahi. She was the perfect imposing monster to test one’s mettle against. Yoshiko is currently on hiatus and hasn’t wrestled in a couple years, but to my knowledge still intends to return someday.

So with the stage set for Gatoh’s super rookie against SEAdLINNNG’s gatekeeper, away we go.

Mei Suruga vs Yoshiko

First (and thus far only) singles contest between these two.

This is early in Gatoh Move’s YouTube offerings, featuring commentary by Pumi Boonytud.

Mei was trained by Emi Sakura and a protege of Aoi Kizuki. Mei’s 20 here but as usual looks younger.

Yoshiko is one of the pillars of SEAdLINNNG, and was in-between tag title reigns and a year and change away from her Beyond the Sea championship reign.

Single camera angle for this video, as it’s all hard cam footage.

Yoshiko doesn’t come out of the corner for Mei’s handshake offer. Mei responds by getting the fans to cheer for Yoshiko. The stoic one is unamused.

Lockup to start. Yoshiko easily overpowers Mei into the ropes, but the Apple Girl switches positions and lays in forearms. Yoshiko ends that in short order by grabbing Mei’s hair and pulling her out to the center of the ring.

The pace quickens as Mei ducks a lariat but then has her dropkick dodged. Mei locks hands with Yoshiko and goes for her rope jump assisted arm drag, but Yoshiko’s too solid and doesn’t budge. She pulls Mei up and just tosses her away.

A Mei Irish whip attempt does nothing, and is reversed. Mei tries a running crossbody off the ropes, but is caught and dropped into a hard back breaker.

With Mei face down near the ropes, Yoshiko simply stands on her. Yoshiko’s considerable size advantage is making quite a difference so far. Jumping double knees to Mei’s back. More standing on Mei then another knee drop leads to a 2 count.

Mei’s unceremoniously thrown into the corner, then hair tossed out. Prone in the opposite corner she’s on the receiving end of numerous face wash kicks. Yoshiko sprints to the opposite ropes and hits a hard running version.

Yoshiko hairmares Mei into the center, then lands a huge kick to Mei’s back followed by one to front for a 2 count. I winced at these.

Yoshiko controls with a hold pulling back on Mei’s arms with her feet planted in Mei’s back. She shifts into body scissors, which gives Mei an opening to do an awesome counter roll backward over Yoshiko into her own body scissors.

Mei tries her signature rolling pinning combination, but Yoshiko spreads her legs to remain stable. So the clever Apple starts a Yoshiko chant again and forces Yoshiko to move her arms in time with the audience chanting her name. The distraction causes just enough of a lapse on Yoshiko’s part for Mei to get her roll for 2. But Mei pays for it when Yoshiko lands an Earthquake splash to Mei’s back. A brief Camel Clutch is abandoned after Yoshiko pulls on Mei’s face, then Yoshiko adds some dismissive kicks for insult to injury.

With both back up Mei tries to start a strike exchange but Yoshiko counters with an overwhelming flurry instead and sweeps Mei back down. Mei gets her arms up to block a running kick but Yoshiko just kicks right through the block. This is a masterful matchup of technique and speed against size and raw power.

Mei dodges the senton, then hits a flurry of five dropkicks. She grabs Yoshiko’s head and calls for her Totsugeki (battering ram), but is shrugged off and sent towards the corner. Undeterred Mei kicks off the middle turnbuckle for momentum into a dropkick.

With Yoshiko down Mei turns her over and goes for a bow and arrow. It doesn’t work too well on her larger opponent so she switches sides. Still no go. Mei stomps on Yoshiko’s back, then hits ropes and rolls… into her “cute on purpose” taunt right in front of Yoshiko’s face. That’s a bold move.

Yoshiko is predictably annoyed, and takes a shot at Mei but the latter is too quick and avoids the wild swing. Both up to their feet and Mei baits her into a charge then ducks into a drop toehold. With Yoshiko down and stunned Mei is now able to complete the bow and arrow.

Mei releases after a few seconds though, shaking her legs out from the strain on her knees from supporting a much larger opponent. Totsugeki to the turnbuckle connects this time.

Perhaps a tad too confident after some sustained offense Mei attempts to slam Yoshiko. Yeah not so much. Yoshiko counters into a slam attempt of her own, but Mei pushes off while in the air and lands on feet. Mei hits the ropes but runs right into a beautiful tilt a whirl backbreaker by Yoshiko.

Boston crab by Yoshiko is quickly transitioned into a deep half crab. Yoshiko holds on to it for a while as Mei tries to fight to the ropes. When she gets close Yoshiko tries to stop her by twisting Mei around and grabbing her arm, but Mei makes it with other arm. Mei fought for every inch there.

Yoshiko hits a hard lariat against the ropes on Mei, followed by a senton for 2.

Apparent choke bomb is countered into a slick forward cradle for 2. Scissor rollup gets another 2. Mei’s hanging in there and forcing some close kickouts.

Off the ropes Mei gets caught in samoan drop position, but fights down to try a schoolboy. Yoshiko tries to counter with another Earthquake splash, but Mei scurries out of the way. A dropkick leads to the propellor clutch for 2.

Mei hits ropes, and ducks a lariat, but is DESTROYED by a second attempt coming back the other way. And just like that it’s over. Yoshiko pins Mei for the victory.

Excellent match that was more competitive than I might have expected if I wasn’t previously familiar with both super rookie Mei and how good Yoshiko is in this role against smaller underdogs. This match was exactly what I expected, and I mean that as a huge compliment.

Watching older Mei matches is a reminder of how quickly and intuitively she got pro-wrestling. She looked fantastic here for under a year experience. Yoshiko makes great imposing opponent and their competitive chemistry was unreal. Great stuff.

This match is available to watch for free on ChocoPro’s YouTube Channel.

Thanks to everyone who’s given this a read. 2024 was a sporadic return for this blog and I hope to have more regular updates going forward in 2025. Derailments of Thought currently updates on Wednesday and Saturday.

If you enjoy the blog any support is appreciated, including shares on social media and simply continuing to read. If you happened to be inclined and able to help out monetarily please see my  Ko-fi page. Every little bit helps.

Categories
Japan Reviews Wrestling

Tokyo Game Show AEW Matches 9/17/22

September 17, 2022 in Tokyo, Japan

Back in 2022 Tokyo Game Show, an annual video game trade fair, featured several AEW sponsored wrestling matches to promote the release of AEW Fight Forever. I previously took a look at day one, and now it’s on to day two.

Konosuke Takeshita vs Chris Brookes

Cool matchup of two of DDT’s cornerstones. Brookes had numerous title reigns at this point but hadn’t ever won the big KO-D Openweight Championship yet. Takeshita had held it a number of times, and had just recently lost it a month prior.

Both these wrestlers faced Christopher Daniels (in separate singles matches) on day one.

The match starts with extended technical grappling including a cool counter where Takeshita powers Chris up while in an armlock to counter, but the latter releases his legs and stands up to prevent any sort of slam. They trade holds until Chris lands a chop and challenges Takeshita to respond in kind. A hard elbow levels Chris and that might not have been the wisest challenge to make.

An awesome moment sees Chris tease an inside out suplex from the apron, then hit a flying cutter into the ring after Takeshita fights out.

Chris works a deathlock for a bit while in control. Takeshita fights to the ropes for a break.

Later with Takeshita back on offense highlights include a wicked slingshot plancha, and a Blue Thunder Powerbomb for 2.

Takeshita goes up top. He’s intercepted by Chris but counters the latter’s superplex attempt and pushes Chris down. Chris pops right back up and hits a butterfly superplex.

Chris’ Praying Mantis Bomb (sitout butterfly piledriver) is escaped with a crazy counter seeing Ueno land on his feet when Chris sits out. A knee strike wipes Chris out.

They link left hands and forearm the hell out of each other with their rights. Takeshita eventually ducks one of Chris’ strikes and grabs a waist lock for a German suplex attempt. Chris counters into a rolling cradle but Takeshita rolls through it for 2.

A fast paced exchange of strikes ends with a big lariat by Takeshita, but the pin is countered into a tight crucifix by Chris for 2.

They go back and forth some more then Chris ducks another lariat, but after rebounding off the ropes he’s nailed with Takeshita’s kneestrike. The 3 is academic.

Handshake afterwards, then Takeshita gives the quick winner promo that’s been standard throughout the weekend.

Chris lost both his matches but looked great and Takeshita felt like a monster beating him clean here. Takeshita will wrestle again in the last match of the day.

A hard fought, exciting match. Again the presentation, participants, and matches have been spot on all around for an event like this.

Riho vs Hikari Noa

My most anticipated match of the whole weekend. Riho was AEW’s first ever Women’s Champion, and was a 16 year vet at age of 25 when this trade fair happened. This was her only match of the event.

Hikari is the only wrestler that had matches on all three days. As I said regarding day one seeing these previously unreleased matches of hers is a treat for me as I’m a huge fan and she has since left wrestling.

On a random note the smoke on the entrances is heavy today, completely blocking the side cam view of some of the wrestlers. It’s just a couple seconds of footage so no big deal, but it’s still a bit weird to see them walk through such a dense cloud.

Squaring up right away, they fight over wrist lock then go right into the standard quick paced counter exchange. Longtime wrestling fans know this when they see it, with rope running, leg sweeps, quick rolling out of covers, and so on. Always a good way to show athleticism though and a crowd pleaser. Can’t think of a better time to use it either, as there’s likely to be a bunch of first time watchers in the audience.

Hikari tries to get an edge of her much more experienced opponent with a number of hair tosses, but Riho counters the third with a cartwheel. A subsequent Riho crossbody is countered at one into a pin, which Riho quickly bridges out of.

Riho ties Hikari in the ropes, then climbs them herself and poses and waves to the audience with her foot in Hikari’s face. She breaks at 3. Riho then settles in for a bit with a deep single leg crab. Hikari struggles hard to claw her way to the ropes for a break.

Creating a bit of space, Hikari deploys her dropkick barrage. For those who haven’t seen this: she throws a number of dropkicks (or super kicks) in as quick succession as possible, sacrificing power for speed. They’re less impactful than carefully measured ones and are sometimes glancing blows, but the point is to overwhelm and wear down her opponent a bit.

Now in control, Hikari goes into her seated rolling cradle for 2.

Hikari rushes a downed Riho in the ropes, and hits a knee to the back. She does it again and gets legswept into Tiger Feint Kick (619) position. The knee was a touch awkward. Looked like Hikari expected Riho to be closer to the ropes (or maybe expected the sweep on the first run). But she adjusted well and it was a really minor thing.

Commentary went with the 619 name, so I guess I’m switching over. Riho nails it, then goes up top. Crossbody gets 2. Riho calls for the end, and her Northern Lights Suplex gets another close 2.

She goes up to the top turnbuckle again, but Hikari dodges the diving double stomp. Hikari’s charge is countered with a schoolboy rollup, and a resulting series of counter rollups for 2 ends with deep cover rollup by Hikari for an even closer 2. Great sequence.

Riho follows Hikari into ropes for a clothesline. Hikari returns the favor with hard dropkick, then follows up with a diving lariat for 2

Hikari’s Blizzard Suplex is fought out of, but she lands super kicks to Riho’s knee then head to keep control. Hikari goes up, but is slow due to exhaustion/damage. Riho meets her on the turnbuckles and after a forearm exchange superplexes Hikari back into the ring.

Riho’s diving double stomp from the top … gets 2.999999. Great shocked face from Riho at her opponent’s resilience. It’s Hikari’s last act of defiance though. Riho nails the Somato (running double kneestrike) and Hikari’s done.

Face paced and fun. In concept this was extremely similar to Hikari’s day one match against Mizunami. She was outmatched and fighting with all she had until she couldn’t anymore. But Riho’s a very different type of skilled vet than the physically imposing powerhouse Mizunami, so it was a quite different encounter.

This was essentially a dream match for me and I’m thrilled that it happened and that I could finally watch it. Shame it was one of the shortest matches of the weekend (I would’ve loved another 5 minutes), but 8 minutes is still solid and what we got was great.

Yuki Ueno vs Michael Nakazawa

Ueno was DDT’s Universal Champion at the time and came out with the belt. Outside of this, his only appearance for AEW was 7 months later on Dark.

Haven’t seen much of him, but he’s one of DDT’s top stars and was a great choice to have make an appearance.

After Ueno’s entrance different music hits, and at the announce table Nakazawa acts surprised. Didn’t catch the banter as I don’t speak much Japanese, but after a bit the crowd encourages him to get in to face Ueno.

He has the ref check him while still holding the mic and chatting. Bell rings with him still commentating as he circles Ueno. He calls for a lockup. Ueno forces him to the ropes and gives a mostly clean break. Nakazawa reverses the second lockup in the ropes and tries a cheap shot, but begs off when it doesn’t work.

Nakazawa calls for a handshake then tries a cheap shot with the mic while calling Ueno a baka (fool), but it’s blocked and he’s wiped out.

He tosses Ueno the mic and hits a super kick with the distraction. He’s now in full heel mode and the mic stuff is done. He works over Ueno in the corner for a bit.

Nakazawa pulls off his polo to reveal a Michael Nakazawa tank top.Then takes off his pants to reveal his trunks. If only he had stopped there. He whips then chokes Ueno with his pants. Once that’s done he elevates Ueno to crotch him on the ropes then slides him along them.

Nakazawa runs to ropes, but holds on to them to foil a Ueno dropkick counter. Eats the next dropkick though. Ueno repeatedly wipes him out with running forearms, then goes on an extended offensive flurry including a flying seated splash in corner, a beautiful overhead German, a plancha to the outside, and a DDT on the announce table.

Back inside, Nakazawa gets his knees up to counter Ueno’s top rope frog splash.

During a forearm exchange Nakazawa takes off his tank top to fire himself up. He eats another shot, lowers his kneepad, eats another shot, then lowers his trucks (he’s wearing another, slimmer pair underneath). The ref stops him from disrobing halfway, leading to another another shot from Ueno and Nakazawa’s now wrestling with his original trucks around his knees. I can’t believe I’m recapping this.

A teardrop suplex puts Ueno down and Nakazawa pulls his trunks up. He then takes off the underneath pair (a leg at a time) and puts them on his hands, then they struggle over whose face what’s essentially worn underwear is going to be shoved into. Of course it’s the ref that takes it as a collateral shot. This is now everything I hate about lowbrow humor in wrestling.

Nakazawa gets a rollup but there’s no ref as he’s still suffering from the underwear to the face. Suplex by Ueno, but he springboards into the trunks to the face. Cover with the trunks still over his face gets 2.

Nakazawa puts the deadly trunks on his knee, but whatever he had planned is countered with a dropkick. Half nelson suplex gets 3 for Ueno.

Objectively the crowd was into this and showing a different style of wrestling was smart. And DDT is known for its mix of comedy and action. Personally though I thought this was a waste of Ueno, showed only a fraction of what he’s capable of, and at 10+ minutes it was a lot of wasted time that could have been given to other matches. Fine for what it was, but what it was is so not for me.

Christopher Daniels & Ryo Mizunami vs Yuka Sakazaki & Konosuke Takeshita

Man if we could get AEW to regularly book Yuka and get over their aversion to intergender matches this dream team could be tearing things up every week. While Yuka was in TJPW at this time and a part time AEW guest, she’s now living in the US and a full time member of the AEW roster.

The wrestling experience in this match is insane. The least experienced participant is Yuka, who was a nine year veteran at the time. The rest range from 10 to 30 years in the business. Four masters of the craft.

The men start. Some fun counter wrestling early, leading to a Daniels cheap shot for a momentary advantage. But when things settle Takeshita hits a backdrop then a leg lariat to take over. Daniels bails to the corner to be comforted by Ryo. Tag to the women.

A counter wrestling exchange is dominated by the powerhouse, with some particularly vicious use of a headlock, but Yuka’s deceptively powerful and it won’t last long until she gives it back.

Fun sequence follows of Mizunami shrugging off Yuka’s shoulder blocks, then wiping out the smaller competitor with her own. Yuka sends Mizunami to her corner though and tags Takeshita. And thank goodness while they’re calling this a “mixed tag” we have proper intergender rules and not the silly meaning mixed tag has in the states (where tagging your partner forces a switch on the other side so men only face men and women only face women).

Takeshita elbows Mizunami in the corner. Yuka comes in for a double suplex, but she’s so much shorter than Takeshita she isn’t really needed and nonchalantly walks out while Takeshita has Ryo up. Then Yuka lands an enzugiri on Mizunami’s head as Takeshita brings her down. Great, creative double team.

Daniels comes in to get plastered with a double rolling elbow. Yuka goes out but gets tagged right back in. Looks like they’ll be minimizing the sections of men versus women, but at least it’s not being overly artificially done. Double axhandle from the top to Miznumai’s arm as Takeshita holds it.

Yuka’s trademark forward snapmare roll into a kick sets up the sliding lariat for 2. She goes up top, but from the apron Daniels grabs her leg to delay and Mizanumi slams her off the top. Mizunami works Yuka over with stomps and strikes. A chin lock into the Camel Clutch keeps Yuka grounded. Great heelish touch as Daniels tries to push the bottom rope out of Yuka’s reach as she goes for a rope break, but she eventually makes it anyway.

Yuka floats out of a bodyslam attempt, but Daniels trips her as she hits the ropes then gets into it with the announcers. Nakazawa on commentary makes a horribly sexist comment of “what’d you do man? I mean she’s just a girl man,” to Daniels. She is, in fact, a multi-time singles and tag champion who has competed numerous times against men during her career and was an equal competitor in this contest (and was 30 years old at the time). The heel move was the illegal person tripping her and had nothing to do with Daniels being a man and Yuka being a woman. Clearly trying to get more heat on Daniels, but that infantilizing bullshit is counter productive.

Mizunami lays in machine gun chops in the corner, but the showy one to end the series is ducked. Yuka fights back but is rocked by more strikes. Mizunami hits ropes and runs into TEA TIME (scoop suplex). Yuka’s crazy strong and that was so smooth despite the size difference.

Both down. Mizunami manages the tag to Daniels before Yuka can get to her own corner. He cuts her off and sends her to a neutral corner. Stopping to taunt Takeshita, he runs into Yuka’s boot when he resumes his charge. Yuka takes him down with a hurricanrana, then ducks a clothesline and rolls into the tag to bring in Takeshita.

Takeshita runs over Daniels numerous times, then nails the Blue Thunder Powerbomb. It gets 2 as Mizunami saves. Daniels uses her as a distraction for a cheap shot on Takeshita, but Yuka comes in with a missile dropkick on Daniels.

Hard Yuka elbows rock Mizunami, but a lariat turns the tide and then Mizunami levels her with a spear. Mizunami goes up top but Yuka meets her there with forearm shots. Superplex attempt is thwarted by Daniels pulling Yuka down. She fights off him off though and stuns him with an enzugiri, then Takeshita launches Miznuami off the turnbuckles at Daniels for an unwilling crossbody.

With Mizunami out on the mat, Yuka goes up for the Magical Magical Girl Splash (that’s not a typo, the double “Magical” indicates this is the version where she does a spinning splash (Twisted Bliss) from the middle of the top rope). Takeshita hits the running knee strike to Daniels a second later and a double pin gets the win (Takeshita and Daniels were still legal so that was theoretically the pin that mattered, but the ref counted both).

Fantastic match. Best of the weekend against solid competition.

Takeshita thanks his opponents for the match and the four shake hands.

Another strong batch of promotional matches, with everything not involving Nakazawa being great. And admittedly even the match I couldn’t stand served a purpose.

This event and other shows from numerous promotions including TJPW, DDT, Sendai Girls, Marigold, and so on can be viewed with a Wrestle Universe subscription.

Thanks to everyone who’s given this a read. 2024 was a sporadic return for this blog and I hope to have more regular updates going forward in 2025. Derailments of Thought currently updates on Wednesday and Saturday.

If you enjoy the blog any support is appreciated, including shares on social media and simply continuing to read. If you happened to be inclined and able to help out monetarily please see my  Ko-fi page. Every little bit helps.

Categories
Japan Reviews Video Games Wrestling

Tokyo Game Show AEW Matches 9/16/22

September 16, 2022 in Tokyo, Japan

Back in 2022 Tokyo Game Show, an annual video game trade fair, featured several AEW sponsored wrestling matches to promote the release of AEW Fight Forever. The eventual game itself was less than warmly received, but the unique matches had quite a bit of buzz around them from those lucky enough to catch them.

The lineup contained a mix of a few select AEW roster, some Japanese wrestlers who had appeared for AEW, a couple of DDT’s stars and one of TJPW’s top rising stars (at the time). Most of them worked two or more matches through the weekend. There were a total of 9 matches over the three days involving 10 different wrestlers.

These matches were recently put up for streaming on the Wrestle Universe platform (subscription required). They involved a lot of my favorites wrestlers of all time on both the women and men’s sides so I’m thrilled to see them finally shared.

Christopher Daniels vs Chris Brookes

Winner faces Takeshita later in the last match of the day. First of many dream matches in this lineup for me. Been watching Daniels wrestle for well over a decade starting back in ROH, and I’m extremely familiar with Chris via ChocoPro.

Daniels has worked Japan a lot in the past and is part of AEW talent relations, so was a natural choice to be involved in this. Brookes has been DDT roster for years, making this an interesting matchup of two foreigners well established in Japan. All of the other competitors in these matches are Japanese.

Daniels was getting close to 30 years in at the time of these matches. He retired from in-ring competition earlier this year.

On a completely random note, Chris has incredibly awesome entrance music.

Brookes’ size advantage vs Daniels’ experience edge anchored this match. It was all about Daniels picking Chris apart and Chris fighting back with holds and high impact strikes and moves. Solid, straightforward stuff that was exactly what it needed to be as the initial offering to a potentially largely unfamiliar audience.

Ending saw Daniels hide behind the ref when Chris up top and kick ropes to cause an unfortunate landing for Brookes. With Chris crumpled on the mat the Best Moonsault Ever (BME, a triple jump up the corner turnbuckles into a moonsault) was academic for the for win.

By the numbers finish in the best way possible that gave Chris an out and let Daniels proceed to Takeshita.

Daniels teased heel tendencies during the match and went full bore during the post match interview by attacking his translator (Michael Nakazawa) to send a message to Takeshita. Takeshita came out and Daniels bailed, saying they’ll face when he says so. Super efficient way to set up a story for their impending match.

Ryo Mizunami vs Hikari Noa

Such a treat to see these lost Hikari matches. She was a personal favorite who left wrestling last year. The three women’s singles matches across this event are basically her running a gauntlet of several of my other favorites. A rising star in TJPW at the time, these were her first and only AEW affiliated matches. The other women participants had all appeared for AEW before. She starts with the charismatic powerhouse Mizunami.

Mizunami easily overpowered Hikari in the opening lockup, absorbed Hikari’s dropkicks like they were nothing, and wiped her out with several shoulder tackles.

It was made crystal clear that Hikari was fighting an uphill battle here, and her tenaciousness was the story. She fought tooth and nail to even get a hair toss, which took several attempts and stomps to Ryo’s feet to be able to move the much larger competitor.

Mizunami easily reversed a scoop slam, and later when Hikari floated out of another slam attempt by Mizunami the latter simply leveled Hikari with a chop. A Camel Clutch tortured Hikari until she could make the ropes, she took machine gun chops in corner, and so on. At one point was nailed with and STO and Mizunami’s big leg drop for a super close 2.

But Hikari was the best kind of persistent underdog and fought back whenever she got an opening. At one point she countered a corner rush with a dropkick, ducked a Mizunami lariat then hit a flying clothesline, then threw her dropkick barrage at the powerhouse. Later a great rolling cradle got 2. Other close calls for Mizunami came from a sliding rollup with a bridge and a superkick barrage.

Late match Mizunami took a superkick but then fought off a Blizzard Suplex setup and nailed Hikari with a lariat followed by a spear. Hot Limit (Cradle Shock variant) ended it.

Energetic encounter with the outmatched Hikari throwing all she could at Mizunami until she had nothing left. Perfect match for the participants. Fun stuff.

Christopher Daniels vs Konosuke Takeshita

Daniels slaps away handshake offer to remind everyone he went full heel earlier in the day. This is about 6 months before Takeshita’s big heel turn in AEW, and he was 100% pure babyface in this time period. Takeshita started in DDT but now primarily wrestles in AEW, being official roster for both companies (and recently NJPW as well).

Daniels pulled Takeshita’s hair then gloated about taking him down. In turn Takeshita LEVELED Daniels with a slap. Ten seconds in and the battle lines are drawn, the characters clear, and the crowd engaged.

Takeshita got a huge reaction for landing some big shots on Daniels early. He teased an inside out suplex from the apron, but Daniels went to the eyes and proceeded to control for a while. Highlights included a sweet Saito suplex, and mounted punches to *back* of Takeshita’s head in the corner in an unusual and brutal looking spot.

Later a back elbow and a lariat gave Takeshita some daylight, and the pace picked up. Takeshita hit a gorgeous plancha then back in a Blue Thunder Powerbomb got 2.

Daniels dodged Takeshita’s jumping and hit Angel’s Wings… FOR ONE?! Great use of the quick kickout there.

Takeshita fought back with a rolling elbow, but his charge in the corner eats boot. BME gets 2. Having Takehista tough things out and survive the move that put Brookes away earlier is particularly nice layered storytelling for anyone who attended both matches.

A palm strike with Takeshita up top set up a FrankenSteiner attempt by Daniels. But he was pushed off and ate canvas. A jumping knee from the turnbuckles followed, then Takeshita hit another for good measure to get 3.

Formulas are formulas for a reason. Great little feel good, well worked face over heel match. Hottest match of the day.

All three of these matches were a blast and exactly what they should have been for the event. Really impressed with how it was all handled and presented, and at a solid 9-10 minutes of action apiece these were a great way to promote the game and potentially introduce new fans to AEW and wrestling in general. Looking forward to watching the rest.

Thanks to everyone who’s given this a read. 2024 was a sporadic return for this blog and I hope to have more regular updates going forward in 2025. Derailments of Thought currently updates on Wednesday and Saturday.

If you enjoy the blog any support is appreciated, including shares on social media and simply continuing to read. If you happened to be inclined and able to help out monetarily please see my  Ko-fi page. Every little bit helps.

Categories
Reviews Wrestling

NXT Roadblock 3/11/25 Live Thoughts

March 11, 2025 in New York, NY

Was lucky enough to be in attendance for a stacked NXT show at the smaller Theater venue within iconic Madison Square Garden.

Due to health constraints/limiting factors towards travel and live events this was my first live wrestling show of any kind in a couple years. Was thrilled to attend and looking forward to seeing Ethan Page and the women’s double title match in particular.

This was a fast paced, breezy watch and I’m going strictly off memory so this’ll be more impressions than any kind of full recap.

1) TNA Tag Team Championship: Matt & Jeff Hardy (c) vs Nathan Fraizer and Faxiom 

As always the NYC crowd was over the moon for the Hardy’s, making this a super hot opener. They seem to be in good form, and played the hits while Fraxiom supplied their usual high octane offense. Straight forward, crowd pleasing tag team wrestling.

Which titles were on the line made this a forgone conclusion, but that didn’t detract from the fun.

2) Roxanne Perez vs Jordynne Grace 

Standard “put over the next big NXT star on your way out to the main roster” encounter. Roxanne showed great ability to work a body part dissection match, going after Grace’s leg incessantly. Grace sold it well, with it affecting her offense at key moments. Always nice to see psychology done properly. Grace eventually overcame, making this a well done, textbook heel vs face story.

3) NXT Championship: Oba Femi (c) vs Moose

Moose is TNA’s reigning X-Division Champion, so this is the second NXT champ vs TNA champ contest of the night.

Never been much of a fan of Moose to be honest, but he seemed motivated here and played his role well enough. Oba looked like a monster putting him down. This was two big men throwing bombs and showing wild strength, which is exactly what everyone wanted from it. Could have been a touch shorter, but that’s mild criticism at best.

4) NYC Street Fight: Je’Von Evans vs Ethan Page   

Page had been a favorite of mine since his Evolve days and was super excited to see him live again.

He’s been tormenting Je’Von for months, ever since he turned from heel to even bigger evil douchebag heel at Je’Von’s expense when Je’Von tried to reach out to a despondent Page and paid for his empathy with a broken jaw.

Had everything the crowd wanted from a street fight, including a couple of big table spots. In a nice callback Ethan got a close two off countering a Je’Von backspring with a hard punch to the injured jaw, which won Page their last encounter.

Ending was suitably insane, as Je’Von hit a cutter on Page with the latter’s head wedged in a chair. This was all about Je’Von getting revenge on the asshole who’s hurt him and beat him at every turn until now, and it hit all the right notes.

5) NXT Women’s Championship/Women’s North American Championship Double Title Match: Giulia (c) vs Stephanie Vaquer (c NA)

Lots of rumors about the possibility of injury or others reasons for this happening so soon. Vaquer just won the NA title last month, and with Wrestlemania weekend and NXT’s big Stand and Deliver show coming up many expected this match to happen then.

To be clear, this was not a unification match. Both were on the line and the winner would hold both titles, but they are still separate titles.

Huge fan of Vaquer, and this was my first time seeing her live.

Last time I saw Giulia wrestle live was a couple lifetimes ago when she was still in Ice Ribbon, so it was downright surreal getting to see her wrestle in MSG.

I’ve heard complaints about the length and pacing from TV viewers, but live this came off great. Yeah it might’ve gotten more time if there wasn’t a hard out on the broadcast, and it was technically the shortest match of the night by a few seconds (I looked that up post show, wouldn’t have guessed it otherwise), but live it was an engaging sprint between two wrestlers just straight up trying to put the other down. If Giulia’s banged up as rumored she still worked a great match here.

I was half expecting Meiko Satomura to come out to challenge the new champ for Stand and Deliver (Meiko was rumored to be in attendance and she has a conspicuous gap in her announced retirement schedule WrestleMania weekend), but it didn’t happen. Show closed with and extended confetti celebration for the new double champ.

Amusing subtle moment happened when the ref clearly had to give Vaquer a heads up to turn around and do some of her celebrating for the crowd. The way the venue is set up when she was celebrating towards the hard cams her back was to 90% of the audience.

Prior to the show I was afraid this card was too packed for two hours and something would get short changed, but instead it was a really well crafted show with everything between 11 and 15 minutes and nothing really feeling too short or too long. Sure the main could have been longer and Giulia and Vaquer certainly have an epic in them, but the sprint we got played well live and was great in its own right. Just a fantastic show to have had the privilege to see live all around.

Thanks to everyone who’s given this a read. 2024 was a sporadic return for this blog and I hope to have more regular updates going forward in 2025. Derailments of Thought currently updates on Wednesday and Saturday.

If you enjoy the blog any support is appreciated, including shares on social media and simply continuing to read. If you happened to be inclined and able to help out monetarily please see my  Ko-fi page. Every little bit helps.

Categories
Wrestling

AEW Match Review: Yuka Sakazaki vs Mercedes Moné

AEW Dynamite January 29, 2025

Yuka Sakazaki is a longtime favorite wrestler of mine, and since her departure from TJPW in December of 2023 to move to the US and be a full time member of the AEW roster I’ve been waiting for her to be spotlighted properly.

She was out with injury for a while in the middle of 2024, but came back last Fall in a short feud with AEW Women’s Champion Mariah May. Her absence on AEW programming since is odd as it’s not due to lack of availability, but regardless it’s nice to see her back and in a high profile match that might allow her to really remind the AEW audience what she’s capable of.

Mercedes Moné is of course the former Sasha Banks and has had a strangle hold on the TBS Championship since winning it last May.

Super excited for this matchup and glad it’s getting the main event slot it deserves. Going to try a live reaction, so away we go…

TBS Title Match: Mercedes Moné (c) vs Yuka Sakazaki

No one going into this has any illusions that Yuka can win here (although I think she should – a surprise shakeup on that level could create a lot of interest). So it’ll be interesting to see if they can get the audience into things enough to bite on near falls. They’re both certainly capable of it if this gets proper time.

Not looking good for that off the bat though as AEW plays a seemingly endless stream of recaps and promos before finally starting the main event at 10 minutes to the hour. Then they recap Yuka’s contendership match victory over her entrance, really diminishing her status as a challenger.

Counter wrestling to start, which is completely talked over by commentary to hype a Death Rider match on Collision.

Mercedes does her CEO dance taunt after a shoulder tackle, so Yuka returns the favor on both counts. Her mimicking the dance was amusing got a nice pop.

Announcers convey a 20 min time limit and say they’ll stay with it past the show end time if need be.

Yuka does a truncated rolling cradle for two after just a couple spins. Mercedes seemed a little off and didn’t roll with it quite right.

Mercedes NAILED Yuka with a Meteora on the floor after moving out of the way of an intended Yuka dive. Nice sequence showing the champ’s intelligence, but they really should have Yuka hit her big dive at some point.

We go to a commercial break 4 minutes in, that lasts as long as the match had been so far. Lousy way to let the main event build.

After a solid strike exchange Yuka counters a powerbomb into a hurricanrana.

A Meteora in the corner is dodged, and just as they’re starting to heat up momentum stalls as it takes Yuka two tries to do her springboard. Looks like the ropes might have been looser than she expected. Mercedes sold being dazed well and Yuka recovered quickly and hit a nice springboard on try two.

Yuka nails a brainbuster and her sliding elbow for 2.

The announcers try to sell possible ring rust for Mercedes as she “doesn’t have ring reps in” since she hasn’t wrestled since January 5th, but Yuka only had one match in that same timeframe so it doesn’t really track.

Moné hits the Three Amigos for 2. Then generates big time boos for walking back and forth across on Yuka. Yuka catches her on the turnbuckles with elbow strikes when she goes up though and hits a superplex for 2.

Magical Merry Go Round countered into a Moneymaker attempt, which is countered and Yuka level Moné with a kick. Magical Merry Go Round gets 2.

Mercedes comes right back with a backstabber into the Statement Maker, but Yuka survives by countering into a rollup for 2.

Big rolling elbow from Yuka dazes the champ. Shortly afterwards she catches Mercedes in the full body rollup that beat Deonna in the 4-way. Mercedes escapes at 2.

Mercedes gets tied up in the ropes and Yuka nails a SPIDER GERMAN to make the crowd start to come alive. Magical Girl Splash eats the knees however and the champ gets 2.

Powerbomb followed by the Money Maker retains for Moné.

Ends at 7 minutes past the hour (as per me watching on Max). Six minutes post commercials for about a 14 minute match total with 10 shown.

Solid if unremarkable match overall. Wasn’t bad and I was getting quite into it by the end, but it wasn’t what it could have and should have been. The highlights were fun and I always enjoy watching Yuka wrestle but it didn’t all quite feel properly connected. I’m harping on the time but a few more minutes to let things breath and allow for proper transitions between big moves would have made a huge difference. It ended up as glimmers of a great 20-25 minute outing shoved into 10 minutes of air time.

This was Yuka’s challenge to Mariah all over again where AEW didn’t do much to really get the crowd buying Yuka could win. And again a heel beat her squeaky clean. That said getting the main event spot at all does mean something. She did get a good reaction to her signature stuff too, so hopefully she earned a few more fans. I also hope AEW won’t forget she’s on the roster for four months again. Fingers crossed.

Thanks to everyone who’s given this a read. 2024 was a sporadic return for this blog and I hope to have more regular updates going forward in 2025.

If you enjoy the blog any support is appreciated, including shares on social media and simply continuing to read. If you happened to be inclined and able to help out monetarily please see my  Ko-fi page. Every little bit helps.

Categories
Japan Wrestling

Ice Ribbon Ribbonmania 2024

Show aired live December 31, 2024.

Ribbonmania is Ice Ribbon’s big annual year end show, which I’ve been watching since I became a fan of the company in 2015 and have attended several times in the past (pre-pandemic when I could travel).

It’s been ages since I got to sit down and watch much wrestling and longer since I’ve written up thoughts on a show, so I’ve really been looking forward to this one. A lot of the wrestlers here are either new to me or I’ve only seen them a couple times.

In the wake of management changes this is the final show for a good portion of the roster before they move on to other things. I’ll be mentioning some specifics throughout the review (and will recap the remaining roster at the end).

Two roster members who are staying are not on this show: Ice Ribbon ace Tsukasa Fujimoto is on maternity leave, and Infinite Potential Girl Kaho Matsushita is out due to injury.

With all that said, away we go.

1) Kirari Wakana vs. Miria Koga 

Miria, a rookie from SEAdLINNNG, has wrestled in Ice a few times but this is my first seeing her. She faced Kirari singles and tag action previously, with both matches ending in draws.

Kirari debuted last July (with an unusual debut win). I’ve seen a bit of her here and there, and she’s come across as a charismatic rookie with sound basics and excellent potential. She reminds me a bit of Asahi in both look and energy (which is of course bittersweet considering Asahi’s untimely passing in early 2024).

Kirari was sporting awesome new gear here.

This was pretty polished for a match between two wrestlers with under a year and a half combined experience. They made the most of what they were capable of and had several tense exchanges. Determination was absolutely dripping from both and the tangible feel that winning the match is important to them came across well. Was engrossed in this one for the duration.

To my delight Kirari won by rolling Koga up super tight following an extended series of attempts and reversals. Overall Ice Ribbon’s newest roster member showed the heart of a lion.

Great way to open the show. Kudos to both rookies. I’m becoming a huge fan of Kirari, and I also hope Koga keeps coming back.

2) Grizzly Fujitaki, Nanae Furukawa & Mayuka Koike vs. Mifu Ashida, Yuu Hanaya & Yuuki Minami 

The wrestlers in this match were the six participants of the Challenger: Ring of Hope series that made it through and ended up debuting as professional wrestlers. They all debuted on August 26, 2023 at Ice In Wonderland 2023.

Minami left Ice Ribbon to go to Marigold in early 2024 and was making a special appearance. This was the final Ice Ribbon roster appearance for the other five. Koike and Hanaya are retiring. Mifu, Grizzly & Nanae seem to plan on continuing elsewhere, with their destinations unknown at the time of the show. (Mifu has since announced she will be joining TJPW and debuted on their big annual January 4th show.)

It was nice to see Minami appear for this match, giving us one last trios contest with all of them involved. She’s had a complete look overhaul in her new company. This is the first time she’s wrestled here since leaving, and the first appearance of anyone from Marigold in Ice Ribbon.

Mifu is a former International Ribbon Tag Team Champion (with partner Kyuuri) and as such the most accomplished of the six thus far.

Nanae and the returning Minami got in slap fight right away with everything devolving into a brawl, nicely setting the tone of all six having something to prove.

After the hot start there was a little bit of a styles clash / roughness in this at times. Minami seemed to have a little readjusting to do after being retrained in a different company’s style, and they are all still relatively early in their careers. That said they all fought hard and made things work. Minami busted out an awesome, vicious looking arm trap guillotine choke at one point.

Grizzly vs Mifu was the backbone of the match and the two have good chemistry. Highlights included Mifu’s Cutie Special on Grizzly and Grizzly later absolutely wiping Mifu out with a short arm clothesline.

The match came to a surprising end as Nanae tied Mifu in absolute knots and got the submission win. As I mentioned Mifu’s the only former champ of the group and I wouldn’t have bet on her taking the loss.

Hanaya never tagged in, but was involved in multi person team moments, breaking up pinfalls, etc (including a wild spill to the outside when she took a shot on Grizzly from the apron and went flying from the recoil). Both she and the other retiree Koike only ever wrestled sporadically, with under ten matches each for their careers. It was nice to see them involved one last time and get a nice sendoff with the rest of their compatriots.

The match was somewhat rough around the edges at times but I’m really just mentioning it because I noticed it. Nothing detracted much from this fun outing with a lot of energy and some really awesome moments. Overall it clicked was a really good farewell for the Challengers in Ice Ribbon.

They all took a bow together afterwards. Wishing them the best in whatever’s next for each of them.

3) Kyuuri & Yuna Manase vs. Arisa Shinose & Kaori Yoneyama vs. Bad Butts (Yappy & Ancham)

Arisa will be going to Asuka Pro-Wrestling, but seems likely to continue appearing as a guest in Ice Ribbon.Yappy and reigning Triangle Ribbon Champion Kyuuri are staying.Yoneyama, Manase, and Ancham are guest participants.

Bad Butts coming out to Sir Mix A Lot had me dying of laughter. So great.

They brawled all over the place to start, highlighted by Yappy threatening people with the ever present Bad Butts warning sign, and things never really settled down from there. Having a proper, unapologetic, “we’re villains and proud of it” heel team is a nice addition to Ice Ribbon. Good contrast too as Kyuuri leans heel at times as Triangle Champ in more of an impish, faux innocent way. It all adds an extra dimension to things and additional depth to matches like these.

The other teams eventually had enough of Bad Butts and taped them to a ring post outside, neutralizing them for the rest of the match. Things got crazy at the end as Kyuuri accidentally took out her own partner with her attempted shortcuts, and Yoneyama intentionally rammed Kyuuri into Arisa to set up Yoneyama getting the win.

I expected a Bad Butts win, but Yoneyama pinning Kyuuri and the winning partners arguing over who gets to challenge her for her singles belt makes sense too

Not much to say here, but I mean that extremely positively. This was just straightforward chaotic fun.

The live feed became unwatchable due to buffering here and I stopped watching live. Until this point it had frozen about once a match and refreshing quickly corrected things. Ice Ribbon PPVs are usual stable on this platform, so no idea what was going on. Watched the rest from here later on replay.

4) Mio Shirai & Saran vs. Ibuki Hoshi & Unagi Sayakaa 

The semi-retired Mio Shirai and perpetual thorn in her side Unagi Sayaka have been feuding on and off for a bit. Unagi’s a freelance guest, Ibuki is staying with Ice Ribbon, and Mio and Saran are making their final appearance (future plans for both unknown). Extremely curious about where Saran ends up, as she’s really finding her style and has a huge upside for whatever company she works with.

This was the planned last show of a temporary return from maternity leave for Ibuki (although she’s now decided to wrestle for a bit more before returning to hiatus).

As usual for anything involving Unagi and Mio this was extremely antics heavy. Add in the mischievous Saran and hard hitting Ibuki to anchor things and this was exactly what it needed to be. Light and entertaining match with good pacing, amusing undertones, and wild action when they got down to it. Presented at the perfect place in the card to boot.

Saran fought tooth and nail, nearly stole the match a couple times, and kicked out of a lot of close calls. But Ibuki finally put her away with a great crucifix bomb.

Saran was visibly emotional after the match. Looking forward to cheering for her wherever she goes. Really glad Ibuki got to come back a little earlier than expected to be able to wrestle here.

5) Totoro Satsuki & Tsukina Umino vs. Yumiko Hotta & Miku Kanae 

Ice Ribbon vs T-Hearts tag match. Both members of the Ice team are staying on the roster (although Umino was unfortunately injured days later with a broken collarbone and will be out for a while).

Umino debuted in April 2021 as Shizuku Tsukata in Wave, went on hiatus around the end of that year, then redebuted as Umino in Ice Ribbon in December 2022. She’s grown a lot in the last couple years and is really finding her style and persona.

Totoro was sporting her annual year end rainbow braid extensions, which always look awesome.

Never saw Miku wrestle before. She’s really good and I hope to see her more in the future.

This was on formula in best way possible for a match with larger power based veterans teaming with outmatched but resilient less experienced partners. Umino and Miku both showed great fire, both against each other and when they were fighting uphill battles against the vets.

When Totoro and Hotta were in against each other the dynamic completely changed and it became the less experienced Totoro trying to prove something against Hotta in a good old fashion power fight. At one point Totoro hit an unbelievable Finlay Roll on Hotta.

Down the stretch this was all about Umino throwing everything she had at the imposing Hotta until she just couldn’t fight anymore. Hotta finished her with a palm strike after Totoro accidentally wiped her out with a clothesline.

I really dug this. Probably my favorite match on the card up to this point, and it’s all been extremely good.

6) Manami Katsu vs. YuuRI 

Manami Katsu returned to wrestling to join Ice Ribbon a few months ago after a three year hiatus. She’s a 13 year veteran formerly of JWP/Pure-J. I never watched a ton of Pure-J but have been to a few shows and had seen her wrestle there. This is my first real look at her in Ice.

YuuRI is a regular guest wrestler from GanPro, and a former ICE Cross Infinity Champion.

Manami went straight at YuuRI from the jump and this was pretty much 12 minutes of them throwing bombs (and occasionally trying to squeeze the life out of each other) and suffering the effects. It fit well into increasing match intensity throughout the show, which of course is exactly what should happen.

Late match YuuRI survived a tombstone driver, but Manami finally kept her down with a gorgeous straightjacket German suplex for a big win. Respect shown with a big hug between the two afterward.

A hard hitting affair that made Manami look tough as hell to have defeated YuuRI. Completely different than anything else on the card, and all the better for it.

7) International Tag Ribbon Title Match: Hamuko Hoshi & Makoto (c) vs. Yuko Sakurai & Sumika Yanagawa 

This is Hamuko & Makoto’s third reign with the tag titles, and both have also held them with other partners as well. Hamuko had an additional six reigns with other partners and Makoto had an additional two.

Sumika is a former International Ribbon tag champ with Misa Kagura, who we’ll see in the main event. She is also the reigning Queen of JTO champion.

Yuko just recently won her first championship and is half of theWave Tag Team Champions with Yuki Miyazaki. Thrilled for her as Yuko’s a wonderful, sometimes underrated wrestler who’s easy to cheer for.

Makoto is a freelance regular guest (who originally started her 18 year career in Ice Ribbon). Hamuko is staying on the Ice Ribbon roster. Yuko is from COLORS and Sumika from JTO.

The challengers jumped the champs in lieu of handshakes for another appropriate quick start.

Hamuko was in wrecking ball mode, which is when she’s at her most awesome. Makoto has become a fun bully type vet primarily focused on trying to kick her opponents face off.

Sumika’s developed into a great submission wrestler and busted out some wild holds here. Yuko applied one of the most vicious looking dragon sleepers I’ve seen as well. Yuko gave as good as she got throughout. She hit a beautiful bridging suplex and a nice sitout facebuster for close near falls late match.

The champs’ hard hitting double teams ended up being the difference maker. They eventually retained with Makoto nailing a firman’s carry Michinoku driver on Yuko followed by a big top rope splash from Hamuko for the pin.

Yuko & Sumika are a good team and fought with ferocity that had the crowd pumped. This was all about the champs weathering the storm from a team giving them more fight than they might have expected. Excellent semi-main.

The champs strapped each others’ belts on afterwards. It’s a little touch that shows their pride in retaining them and support as a team.

I adored Yuko & Sumika together and definitely need to revisit numerous matches of theirs as a team I’ve missed. Would love to see them have a reign with these titles someday.

8) ICE Cross Infinity Title Match: Yuki Mashiro (c) vs. Misa Kagura 

Reigning champion Mashiro is participating as a freelancer (as of the end of October), and her challenger Kagura is from JTO.

Mashiro has had an incredible transformation over her career, and every stage has been something special. From the rookie who howled in pain when she chopped opponents, to the lovably goofy Gacha King, to the technical wizard who captured Ice Ribbon’s top prize she’s always been one to watch. Mashiro retired from wrestling in 2022 after a year and a half, but came out of retirement in early 2024.

I’ve always been a huge fan of Mashiro and was thrilled to see her return, and am equally thrilled she’s been continuing to appear in Ice Ribbon freelance. She’s also starting appearing in other companies such as Marigold.

Misa has been in tournaments for this title in the past, but this is her first time directly challenging for it. I haven’t seen her much, but remember her being solid from what I have seen of her. She’s one of those people with an infectious smile, and she came out with it beaming for this title match.

They went AT each other right away with a wild forearm exchange. All the matches have started hot without anything feeling repetitive, and the show has been an engaging breeze to stay invested in as a result.

A hilarious moment early on saw Mashiro try to double eye poke Misa, But the latter caught her arm and countered by stuffing Mashiro’s fingers back into her own mouth.

I hadn’t consciously noticed until a really cool shot in this match of Mashiro choking out Misa in the corner, but the camera work had some particularly good work all show. The mentioned low camera angle from the corner was great. They did occasionally cut to/away from it too quickly in succession making it overly noticeable and a bit distracting, but overall it was well done.

The challenger excelled when using her power and slight size advantage for devastating tackles and grinding away at the champ with leveraged submission holds. A brutal sitout spine buster delivered to Mashiro at one point looked absolutely devastating.

In contrast the champ used her explosiveness to create openings, and relied heavily on being tenacious and smart counter wrestling.

Either outcome felt possible, which I appreciate greatly in a main event. In the end Mashiro hit her cross legged suplex with a bridge to retain.

Happy Mashiro will apparently be sticking around.

Hell of a match that had a little bit of everything: heavy strike exchanges, submissions, power wrestling, brawling outside, and so on. Fantastic way to cap off the show.

Katsu came out post match and there’s Mashiro’s next challenger. That’ll work. Intense exchange and they have to be pulled apart. Match set for January 13th.

I see the post show crowd handshakes are back. Mixed feelings watching that from afar as someone dealing with chronic illnesses in a post-pandemic world. But it was always a fun thing and a cool way to show appreciation, and its absence was felt for the years they couldn’t do it.

Overall

This show was everything I like about Ice Ribbon and pro-wrestling in general. Well balanced and paced with a variety of styles done right and the lighter stuff in the undercard giving way to fraught battles for championships to end the show out. Everyone’s commitment and effort was plain to see, and this was an extremely enjoyable watch all around.

As promised here’s a list of the remaining ten woman post Ribbonmania Ice Ribbon roster: Tsukka, Hamuko and Ibuki Hoshi, Manami Katsu, Kyuuri, Totoro, Yappy, Tsukina Umino, Kaho Matsushita, and Kirari Wakana.

Looking forward to seeing what lies ahead.

Thanks to everyone who’s given this a read. 2024 was a sporadic return for this blog and I hope to have more regular updates going forward in 2025.

If you enjoy the blog any support is appreciated, including shares on social media and simply continuing to read. If you happened to be inclined and able to help out monetarily please see my  Ko-fi page.

Categories
Art Cards Comics Japan Wrestling

Imagined Reality: The Art of Veronica O’Connell

Psylocke sketch card by Veronica O’Connell

I’ve had a surprisingly difficult time finding the proper words to open this look at the work of a truly special artist. There’s something indescribable that jumps out of Veronica O’Connell’s art and demands attention. So I decided to let the stunning depiction of Psylocke above make the first impression.

Ghost Spider, Spider-Woman, & Silk AP by Veronica O’Connell

I honestly don’t recall when I first saw Veronica’s work, but I do remember being blown away with her versions of Marvel characters and immediately putting her art on my collection list.

There is an incredible balance of realism and the fantastic in her illustrations. Her takes on comic characters simultaneously look like they could step right off into the real world while still feeling appropriately larger than life.

The qualities that initially caught my eye are on full display in the above gorgeous Spider-Women triptych, which is mind boggling. All the art I’ll be showing in this blog is directly drawn on blank trading cards. So each of the three characters shown above (Spider-Gwen, Spider-Woman, and Silk) is drawn on a third of a 3.5″ x 2.5″ work area. The detail and impact she’s able to achieve under such conditions is phenomenal.

There is so much style infused into Veronica’s work. Her use of color and lighting is exquisite and a big part of what makes her art so eye catching. It also underlies her emphasis of mood and atmosphere, making the same subjects feel different in different pieces depending on what she’s chosen to convey while retaining their core essence.

I have multiple cards by her of some of my favorite comic heroines, including Psylocke, Emma Frost, and Spider-Gwen, and the contrast between equally captivating depictions of the same character is fascinating to see.

Spider-Gwen PSC by Veronica O’Connell

My discovery of Veronica’s art through her Marvel work eventually led to the great opportunity to get some Personal Sketch Cards (PSCs) done as part of another key subset of my card collection.

I have followed and enjoyed Japanese women’s professional wrestling (joshi wrestling) for over a decade and collect related art in a number of forms. Veronica is the third artist to create PSCs for this collection, along with Juri H. Chinchilla and  Miki Okazaki

Kairi Sane PSC by Veronica O’Connell

Veronica’s renditions of the wrestlers she’s drawn for me are absolutely stunning. She achieves an amazing level of detail, capturing the subtleties of her subjects expressions and doing an exceptional job representing their intricate wrestling gear.

Perhaps most impressive is her ability to create such incredible likenesses on such small workspaces. From a distance these precise works could be mistaken for photographs, while up close the aspects that make the depictions hyper realistic elevate them even further.

Over time I’ve gotten 24 wrestling PSCs from Veronica, featuring a total of 30 wrestlers. Only 8 of those wrestlers had been drawn for me before on PSCs by other artists, meaning 22 of the wrestlers she drew for me were first time subjects for my sketch card collection.

All of the repeats were drawn in different gear and/or with different partners than the other cards I have, and it was a treat to get Veronica’s take on recurring collection subjects like WWE’s Asuka, AEW’s Riho and Hikaru Shida, and Sendai Girl’s DASH Chisako. Likewise awesome was adding in wrestlers I’d been meaning to have drawn like Asuka’s tag partner Kairi Sane and Stardom’s Starlight Kid.

Juria Nagano PSC by Veronica O’Connell

The vast majority of the wrestlers I had drawn for the first time were a large number of roster members and regular guests from two of my favorite promotions.

From Tokyo Joshi Pro Wrestling (TJPW), Veronica did wonderful cards of now former roster members Juria Nagano and Sakisama (with Mei Saint-Michel), tag teams Miyu Yamashita & Maki Itoh (121000000) and Himawari & Wakana Uehara, long time roster members Mizuki and Yuki Kamifuku (Kamiyu), and the Up Up Girls Hikari Noa, Miu Watanabe, Raku, & Shino Suzuki.

Veronica’s encapsulation of that Up Up Girls lineup is a particularly nice memento for me given the recent departure of my favorite member, Hikari Noa, from both TJPW and the Up Up Girls.

The other big focus among the joshi wrestling cards Veronica’s done for me is a company called Ice Ribbon. One of my most watched promotions, it was a privilege to get Veronica to do related cards for me.

The core IR lineup I got includes brief former roster member Amu Yumesaki, and current roster members featuring second generation wrestler Ibuki Hoshi and impressive newer wrestlers like Tsukina Umino, Mifu Ashida, and Kaho Matsushita.

I was also happy to add former IR regular guests Ram Kaicho (from Triple Six), Saori Anou (now of Stardom), and Tae Honma & Maika Ozaki (SPiCEAP, both freelance), and reigning ICE Cross Infinity Champion YuuRI (from GanPro) to the collection.

As with the comic art, Veronica’s vivd colors, stunning lighting and shading, and delicate touches make all of her wrestler illustrations simply gorgeous. I could not be happier with how they all turned out.

Joshi PSC displays. Art by Veronica O’Connell, Juri Chinchilla, and Miki Okazaki.

I’m extremely thankful to Veronica for all the fantastic art she’s created for me. I hope to continue collecting more in the future.

Asahi PSC by Veronica O’Connell

To wrap up I’d like to talk about a particularly special card Veronica’s done for me, although there is unfortunately tragic news attached to it. Early this year Actwres girl’Z reported a 21 year old member of their roster named Asahi had unexpectedly passed away. Asahi started her career in Ice Ribbon and was a personal favorite of mine. Nicknamed the Sunrise of Hope, she was always a joy to watch and is greatly missed. Veronica’s remembrance piece of Asahi is absolutely breathtaking and a cherished keepsake.

Rest in Peace Asahi.