Rina Ishii & Maiko Matsumoto vs. Chihiro Nakano & Makie Numao
Only in GAEA will you see a bunch of rookies having an opening match this long and complex. This went about 17 minutes and they never slowed down, never let things get repetitive, and worked in a bunch of ridiculously fun transitions while displaying good sense of timing. Nakano and Numao continue to work very well as a team of kickpadded asskickers, and Ishii and Matsumoto look very good too. I love how something like Matsumotos Atomic Drop is still a hot nearfall. The match didn’t have much story, but I could see a lot of people watching this and be blown away. To say the raw talent GAEA had was amazing would be an understatement.
Hiromi Kato vs. Bomber Hikari
Fun debut match for Hiromi Kato, who would retire just the next year. She showed plenty of fire and caught Hikari in a damn argentine backbreaker of all things. Hikari didn’t do anything out of the ordinary but she was hitting her bodychecks and leg drops with extra oomph, and shut down Kato as needed.
Chigusa Nagayo & Meiko Satomura & Sonoko Kato vs. Mayumi Ozaki & Sugar Sato & Chikayo Nagashima
This was pretty great. Nagayo and Ozaki held the match together and added the character moments, while the young girls were all fired up and fighting like mad. All the Nagayo/Ozaki exchanges felt akin to the Tenryu/Hashimoto interactions in a WAR/NJ tag. Plenty of violence with all the girls throwing huge kicks and stomps. They lost focus a bit in the second half, as they did some stuff like bringing in a bunch of tables, plus Ozaki kicked out of virtually everything that was thrown at here. Still, it was a pretty loaded match. Satomura almost pinning Ozaki worked and kept the fans on the edge of their seats. The finish was a bit unusual as there were a ton of big bombs thrown and then one wrestler succumbs to a basic submission, but I guess that was the GAEA philosophy.
Sakura Hirota vs. Devil Masami
Pretty insane squash. Basically Hirota can’t do anything to harm Devil, but she tries her hardest, and Devil just nukes her. One of the powerbombs seems to KO Hirota and Nagayo comes in, slaps Hirota, drags her up and throws her at Devil again only for her to immediately hit another nasty bomb. Harrowing shit.
Akira Hokuto & Toshie Uematsu vs. KAORU & Kyoko Ichiki
This was fantastic and instantly became one of my favourite joshi matches of the year. Lots of cool uncooperative exchanges throughout, and the match told a good story. You had Hokuto being two classes above both opponents (and making that very clear), Uematsu refusing to back down and wrestling a class above hers, and Kaoru and Ichiki trying everything to gain the advantage and topple their opponents. There were some basic spots such as biting, stomping eye rake or hair pulling toss which felt really violent here. There was also plenty of awesome receipt spots, especially whenever Hokuto felt disrespected, she would step up and show who's boss usually by booting someone in the face. There was also plenty of head droppin death moves and crushing diving attacks. Despite that the match didn't feel like overkill and ended at just the perfect spot. Little weak transitions here maybe, but yeah all things considered I enjoyed the hell out of this.
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