Nobukazu Hirai vs. Yamato
Yamato is Tachihikari doing a face painted gimmick. Man, Hirai looks good here. Just rushing Tachihikari with big forearms and dropkicks, and even clocking him in the back of the head hard. Tachi fires back with sumo rushes and potatoeing Hirai and all is right in the world. Hirai does this cool thing where he powers out of a powerbomb attempt and weakens his own back. Later he hits a missile dropkick and can't get up because his back is messed up. And Tachihikari is kind of more effective as a goofy facepainted guy putting Iron Claws on people than as himself. I need more of this Hirai.
Koki Kitahara & Takashi Ishikawa & Ultimo Dragon & Masanobu
Kurisu vs. Jado & Gedo & Ricky Fuji & Super Strong Machine
(Elimination Match) - GREAT
Fun match that suffered a bit from one team being severely overpowered.
There was just nobody to stand up to the violent asskicking that the
Kitahara/Ishikawa/Kurisu trio can unleash. Strong Machine tried, hitting
some stiff lariats and potatoes, and it was decent enough. Jado/Gedo
were kinda clunky at first, but eventually settled into their rhythm
when they started cutting off the ring and hitting double teams. Still,
their stomp-punches don't quite do it for me in a WAR environment. Ricky
Fuji was also clunky, but at least they eliminated him quickly. Ultimo
Dragon was there to get his shit in. The finish was really cool with
Kitahara standing up to a 3 vs. 1 match up and a hot finish between him
and Machine.
Ashura Hara vs. Hiromichi Fuyuki
This was slow, but I still thought it bordered on nomination worthy. Two
thick guys beating on eachother with lots of character selling from
Hara. Fuyuki certainly was really good in 1994.
Mil Mascaras & Dos Caras vs. Chris Jericho & Ishinriki
Lucha guys did their thing here. Dos Caras looks very good, he really should've worked a WCW PPV or something. You can imagine how much offense Mascaras gave to his opponents. I could imagine better uses for Ishinriki, but Jericho looks where he belongs getting stretched by Dos Caras. Short and pretty much a complete showcase for the luchadores.
Arashi vs. Genichiro Tenryu (Rounds)
This Arashi is Daikokubo Benkei under a mask. He was part of a stable of
sumo wrestlers and squashing his way through WAR for a bit in 1994,
which somehow earns him a match against Tenryu. This was two angry
ex-sumos mauling each other, which is why you watch WAR handhelds.
Arashi was willing to take punishment here and Tenruy was just tearing
into his blubber. Arashi wailing away with his sumo palm strikes at
Tenryu in the corner was great. His basic throws also looked good thanks
to Arashi being a massive fat guy. The crowd actually buys Arashi as a
threat, which helps a lot. Tenryu sold those beatings in a big way, and
he comes back in a big way himself cracking Arashi hard in the back of
the head and then just destroying him. That stretch submission was a
nasty nasty move to put on such a fat guy. Nice reminder how great
Tenryu was that he could get a match this fun out of a guy like Benkei,
who basically had no good matches ever after this.
Compelling matchup, when you consider that Kitao might blow a tantrum and Meng might rip his eye out. This was short. Both guys hitting the mat was fun, and then they move on to maul each other, so it was great. Kitao was squashing everybody in seconds, so the crowd went wild for Meng making him his bitch. Highlights include an awesome corner dropkick, and big piledriver and suplex on the big gi wearing slug. Wish Meng had went down with a little more fight but at least the finish looked nasty.
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