Tarzan Goto Documentation #16

 Tarzan Goto vs Atsushi Onita, FMW 1/6/1993 - EPIC

BattlARTS level violence contained in a barbedwire ring, with both guys taking dangerous spills into the wire and getting sliced repeatedly. Right at the go they are mauling each other with shoot headbutts. Onita stops Goto with a punch to the face and goes for a sleeper, but gets pushed back into the wire. One lariat later and Onitas arms are cut. That about sums this match up, just two guys wreaking destruction on each other almost without pause. There is some filler figure 4 work which is a minor point deduction, but other than that this is just gritty insanity. Goto is a force of nature here pounding Onita to a bloody pulp, and also not afraid to fly into the wire, and Onitas aura is so insane that he can make almost any kind of beatdown work, let alone the kinda beatdown that Goto puts on him here. The barbedwire actually feels dangerous and people react with horro at the spills which is another plus of these early deathmatches. Another thing is that it’s 93 so they were excuting moves like a bulldog or DDT with maximum snap. Gotos facebuster moves also looked like an execution. At one point Goto goes for a German Suplex and I’m not sure I’ve seen him hit a german suplex in another match but holy fuck his German Suplex was beautiful here. Lots of epic exchanges here and the finish feels about as big as it gets without relying on some ridiculously big bump or anything, just visceral carnage done in a skillful way. You don’t quite get spectacles like this anymore.

Tarzan Goto & Mr. Pogo & Yuta Nakata vs Kintaro Kanemura & Masayoshi Motegi & Yusaku Obata, Super FMW 7/30/2010 - FUN

Raw injection of pro wrestling at it’s seediest. This is in Shin Kiba, it looks like there’s about 30 people intendance. They still go all out, but the emptiness of the building and the lack of crowd enthusiasm adds to the ghoulish atmosphere. We get Goto punching Kanemura in the face and them both hitting each other with shoot headbutts, some brawling that actually feels spirited. Mr. Pogo, around 37 years into his career and 10 years from having a broken neck feels like an ancient ghoul in this match. Oddly enough he takes more offense than I’ve often seen him take, eating one of Motegis nasty shotais. Motegi takes his boot off to beat on Motegi, but ends up still taking a sickle to the face. Nothing like Pogo taking the sickle to hapless fools in a dark nearly empty building. Nakata is a complete sleazeball and I like how Motegi completely no-sold his dive. Obata, being chiseled and young, looks like the one guy here who has a future still, and so Goto carves him up with a broken beer bottle and does some gritty Abby/Sheikh vs Funk Bros arm stabbing. A weird thing happens where it seems Goto and Pogo are gonna fight but they make up and do a double team move that involves Pogo doing a drop down which feels like some wild athleticism from him. Eventually it devolves to Goto vs Obata with Goto making Obata earn some offense. Obata hitting a basic suplex is made to feel like a big deal and he has a cool sliding leg lariat, though he ends up running into Gotos face and getting mauled by more punches and headbutts to the face. Everybody was working oddly hard here, but what you will mainly remember is the creepy vibe.

Tarzan Goto vs Shoji Nakamaki, IWA Japan 8/9/1995 - GREAT

Insane level of aura here. Normally these IWA Japan main event brawls have 6 or so guys in them. Here it’s just the two of them, but boy do they make up for it with action. Right at the go they are at each other with Nakamaki landing some hatefilled chairshots to Goto and Goto kicking him right back in the face. Nakamaki takes an insane bump where he falls through the barbedwire ropes to the floor and the crowd is just melting down at this. Goto proceeds to kick Nakamakis bleeding ass all over the place. You know Goto is great at dishing out punishment, and taking punishment is the one thing Nakamaki is famous for, so you can imagine the kind of asskicking that goes down. Nakamaki is quite great just firing up, hitting a headbutt, and then getting baredwire shoved in his face. Nakamakis only chance here is that the referee, Gypsy Joe is on his side. It doesn’t make a huge difference but it’s fun because clearly Nakamaki needs to hit Goto with just 1 good move and Joe will count the 3. Gotos response to this problem is to just kill Nakamaki dead. The finish in this is just absolutely heinous. It doesn’t even feel like a deathmatch freakshow exhibition spot it’s just a killing. After the match Goto beats the shit out of Joe too, knocking him over with a lariat (can you imagine how hard you have to hit Gypsy Joe that he will actually sell for you?). Joe eats some chair shots and gets shoved into the wire. A big GOTO chant breaks out and he just looks like the coldest dude on earth. This won’t win any workrate awards but it’s just an awesome heat filled spectacle in it’s glorious blood drenched and barbed wire wrapped way.

 

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Tarzan Goto Documentation #15

 Tarzan Goto & Mr Gannosuke vs Jado & Gedo, WAR 7/7/1995 - EPIC

Molten heat for this match, you think the FMW guys must have killed someone to be this hated while scumbags Jado and Gedo are treated as gods by the WAR loyalist. The match begins hot with Goto kicking ass and punching people in the face, then it settles down into a fun segment of Jado and Gedo shining with their array of double team moves and the crowd amusingly cheering every dirty move they do. Then it gets hot again, as Jado eats a nasty surprise powerbomb, which he sells as an awkward landing on his shoulder, and Goto immediately capitalizes by attacking the shoulder. Goto is pretty great destroying a guys shoulder while acting like a scumbag. Just the way he would casually crush Jado with a big splash and then mockingly bitchslap him was amazing. The last third of the match sees Jado and Gedo getting destroyed and trying to protect each other while making desperate pin attempts. Gedo getting bloodied and then looking like the life was going out of him while Goto rained punches on his head was some great simplistic brutal pro wrestling. It was clearly inspired by the famous AJPW tag from the month before but the drama worked really well and the desperation was palpable. Great match with a ton of violence heat and drama with Goto looking like an evil monster as usual and Gedo and Jado doing a great job playing the more sympathetic bastards.

Tarzan Goto & Grigory Verichev vs Sabu & Horace Boulder, FMW 5/24/1992 - GREAT

What a certified crazy match up. The match ended up being pretty damn great too, really the kind of wild chaotic spectacle you only get in the 90s. It delivers everything you want basically being an all out brawl from the get go with a breathless pace and no time. Goto was absolutely killing Sabu here, launching tables or chairs at his head, there was tons of blood, Verichev in his gi launching dudes around with huge suplexes. Horace Hogan is perfectly fine as a big sleazy dude that will flatten the smaller guys with lariats and occasionally something odd like a stiff missile dropkick. At one point the Sheik does a run in to stab Goto in the face. Goto was great as usual both taking a big beating, bleeding, kicking ass, and coming back lariating peoples heads off. Also you get Sabu and Goto throwing punches and that's really cool. Gritty finish too.

Tarzan Goto & Shinigami vs Yuiga & Drake Morimatsu, Yuiga Produce 10/30/2004 - FUN


A match that is, thankfully, centered around Yuiga vs Tarzan Goto. Yuiga is a Kurisu trainee so she is really tough, and she looks credible going all out to try and take down the big man. Goto of course delivers a hellish bloody beatdown. Shinigami doesn't drag down the match much, and Morimatsu is fine though she does little. The story of the match is Yuiga as she engages in a bloody battle with Goto. The barbedwire boards actually make this feel like a warzone rather than a standard deathmatch and Yuigas judo throws were great. Goto delivers his usual beatdown, nothing mindblowing if you have watched him a lot but it always delivers. A GREAT match from Yuigas standpoint and a FUN entry into Tarzan Gotos resume.

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Tarzan Goto Documentation #13

 

Tarzan Goto vs. Great Punk, FMW 9/23/1993 - FUN

Punk is Katsutoshi Niiyama. He rushes Goto at the start but things go awry for him quickly and Goto starts kicking him in the face and dumping tables on his head. Goto delivers a really great beatdown as he has so many different cool ways to kick the shit out of you, headbutts to the face, huge superfly splash off the top, slapping the hell out of Niiyama etc. It's weird though, if this was Tully Blanchard or whoever delivering this kind of bloody beatdown on someone it would be legendary and epic but since Goto has a great beatdown in pretty much every match he's in it feels like it's another match for him. So it depends on what Niyaama brings to the table, and Niyama doesn't bring much except some weak looking uranages and rollups. Still, a solid by the numbers match with Gotos numbers being really damn high.

Tarzan Goto vs. Masashi Aoyagi, Shin FMW 9/29/97 - EPIC

This delivers the kind of freak violence this matchup promises. Basically Goto hacks up Aoyagis face causing him to bleed like crazy almost immediately. Aoyagi in turn busts out a barbedwire kickpad and tees off on Goto, kicking him in the face and just tearing up his leg. The barbed wire kick spots hold up about as violent as anything else in deathmatch wrestling history, I'd rather take a lighttube over the head than get kicked by Aoyagi, the barbedwire just makes it way worse. I would have liked Goto to throw more punches but retaliating against the superior striker by chucking barbed wire boards at him works fine. This didn't have any kind of deep story or great transitions but the gore aswell as a pretty big finish and both guys being willing to take crazy punishment made it really engrossing.

 

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Tarzan Goto Documentation #12

 

Tarzan Goto & The Sheik vs. Tiger Jeet Singh & Tiger Ali Singh, FMW 3/29/1993 - EPIC

This was really fricking great, a raw straight injection of blood and insanity. Singhs swarm Goto right before the bell and Goto is pelted with saber shots. Luckily Sheik makes his heroic entrance as a big chant breaks out. He throws Goto a chair and it‘s go time. The fighting here was just bloody as hell and felt reckless. Singhs looked good just attacking their opponents relentlessly and the face stabbing was sick as hell. Sheik is as good as you need him to be here as a crusty old guy who draws big reactions punching and stabbing people in the face. Really loved the bit where Sheik tries bringing in a fucking beer bottle and gets clocked with the butt of a sword. Goto as good as you know him, bleeding like crazy and throwing great headbutts and lariats. Fucking crazy post match too as Sabu and Gladiator come in, Sheik turns against Goto blowing a fireball and they set the ring on fire. You have to love pro wrestling.

Tarzan Goto & Flying Kid Ichihara & Mr. Gannosuke vs. Kendo Nagasaki & Giant Korean, & Kim Soppo, BJW 6/10/1995 - GREAT

This was an elimination match as a series of singles matches and really unique. Nagasaki teams with two Korean guys, early BJW was weird. We start with Gannosuke vs. Soppo which was between alright and so-so, I liked Gannosukes dropkicks and his indian deathlock, Soppo seemed like a decent wrestler but they were both clearly unfamiliar with each other so they just kept it very basic. The unique thing is Goto and Nagasaki are at ringside and tempers are already flaring, when Soppo gets thrown out and suddenly you have Goto running him across the arena into a wall while Nagasaki throws a table at Gannosuke. Gannosuke ends up going ovoer and against GIANT KOREAN next. Giant looks like he has acromegaly and he wrestles a lot like Baba, brain chops and headbutts which is what you want from a Giant Korean. Still their match up is far from good as the Giant also likes to chinlock, but Gannosuke wins pretty fast with the Gannosuke Clutch. Now is when things get interesting, because Kendo Nagasaki in and he is in Dragon Master mode, just beating the live out of Gannosuke, torturing him with painful holds, he does a Magistral that looked like it almost ripped Gannsukes shoulder. All the while Goto is at ringside and he really wants to have a go at Nagasaki, when Nagasaki throws Gannosuke outside Goto goes after him with the chairs and these moments are over 9000 in intensity level. It looks like Gannosuke is gonna get squashed but he keeps hanging on. Eventually Nagasaki throws him out again and Goto has enough clocking Nagasaki with the chair. Now Nagasaki is bleeding and it seems Gannosuke might have a real chance to win the match 3-0… but then Nagasaki just drops him with the most awful piledrivers in history. 1,2,3, Gannosuke is out. There is a brief confusion where it seems like Ichihara is next but instead Goto comes in with a fucking fire extingiuisher, he doeses the whole ring and then lariats Nagasaki in the fog until he‘s out. This is a weird match to go GREAT on because the first two portions weren‘t much, but they ended up telling a compelling story that really had me at several moments, building to that epic ending, with Goto being integral to the whole match and doing a great job.

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RIP Masashi Aoyagi

 

Masashi Aoyagi & Akitoshi Saito vs. Naomichi Marufuji & Daisuke Ikeda, NOAH 11/16/2000

Very WAR-feeling NOAH match, the kind that the company should have done more. Not many „wrestling“ sequences, just guys awkwardly kicking and punching each other, jumping on each other and refusing to get off. Marufuji looked pretty good here as he knows how to work this kind of match, instead of his junior spots he did double legs, capture suplexes and going for chairs. Aoyagi is nice here kicking ass and matching up with Ikeda. They don‘t square off as much as you‘d like because Saito is the focus, but when they do its good stuff with Ikeda using the gi against Aoyagi, hitting a hard lariat etc. Also really liked the bit where Saito challenged Ikeda to a macho exchange and Ikeda just blindsided him and went for the eyes, something that should have ended all macho exchanges right there.

Masashi Aoyagi vs. Atsushi Onita, FMW 8/28/1994

This was an exploding barbedwire, double hell landmine deathmatch. As a match it was pretty much a tribute to their matches in the 80s, except now occasionally guys would get pushed into an explosion by a kick or takedown. I give Onita a ton of credit here as he sold a ton for Aoyagi. Aoyagi just took him apart with kicks, kicking at his bandaged shoulder, Onita took most of the explosion bomps getting shoved into the mines by Aoyagis kicks. Even Mr. Pogo did a brief run-in to blow a fireball in Onitas face. It really ramped up the drama of the match and the crowd was huge into it. Aoyagi taking of his jacket for a strap drop moment only to end up getting blown up himself was one of those deathmatch moments. Ending was the standard Onita fare but it was good. It was nice for Aoyagi to have this match where he kicks the tar out of Onita on a big, exploding stage.

RIP Tarzan Goto

Tarzan Goto & Atsushi Onita vs. Genichiro Tenryu & Ashura Hara, WAR 2/3/1994 - EPIC

This is the match that stole the #1 spot from the 6/3/ Misawa/Kawada match in the 1994 Japan Match of the Year awards. That should give you an idea of what kind of epic scope we are looking at for a match here. Of course, it‘s FMW vs. WAR and two of the biggest stars in all of Japan, Onita and Tenryu are involved, so you are going to have absolutely molten heat and crazy reactions for everything compared to the somewhat sterile formality of a Misawa/Kawada match, but this match is way more than just star power. It‘s a remarkably intricate match, really, and there‘s a sneaky Goto performance here as he plays second fiddle to Onita but largely carries his team. They work the early exchanges with insanely high stakes and drop of a hat momentum shifts, guys get thrown outside just to get back in immediately to not risk a brawl outside, later Tenryu immediately tags out after eating an armbreaker from Goto to avoid possible armwork etc. Goto works the early exchanges teasing Onita coming in to square off with Tenryu. When Onita finally tags in the place comes unglued, but he soon gets busted open and kicked to a bloody pulp by Tenryu and Hara. WAR guys kicking a bleeding guy in the face is tried and true greatness, and when someone as charismatic of a bleeding babyface as Onita is on the receiving end it‘s really upper echelon stuff. I really liked how Onitas hot tag seemed to come as a fluke as he just ducked a move, but Goto just immediately tags him in again as if to give the fans some more star action but Onita gets his ass kicked even more. At that point it‘s like Onita is the broken down megastar and Goto starts thinking on how to salvage his team. Tenryu gets a bit too angry at Goto breaking up a pin, rushing him which in turn leads to Goto clocking Tenryu with a chair and bloodying him. At that point the match just becomes this huge Tarzan Goto rally where he just keeps taking people out. He busts out his huge superfly splash to Hara which leads to Hara having to get taped up, later he hits his huge facebuster to Tenryu onto a table which is a fucking nasty move to take on those hard ass Japanese tables. Hara getting taped up after the splash is honestly such a neat detail, how many tag matches do you recall where a guy has to get taped up after eating a finisher to continue the match? It‘s rare but it totally makes sense and it should happen more often, and it made the second superfly splash to Tenryu so much more brutal. When Hara later grabs Gotos leg to prevent him from making another safe it‘s really this crucial moment and maybe most heated moment in the whole match, as Goto has safed Onitas ass for half the match. It‘s really an amazing match full of impeccable timing and psychology, I have to say Onitas basic DDT to Tenruy reentering the ring may have been one of the greatest transitions ever, and Tenryu was world class as usual going from megastar who‘s pained to deal with these garbage wrestling scumbags to being furious and beating the shit out of people to punch drunkenly trying to lariat and abiesigiri his way out of a really tense situation. I also really like Hara just for his crazy facial expressions and selling, he looks mad tough shrugging of Gotos headbutts and strikes initially so when Goto lariats him really hard and his eyes roll back it looks just killer. Really everyone here was great and it‘s no surprise this ended up being the #1 match of the year, heated to the max with a beautiful story where they did a great job going from Onita bleeding and getting beaten to Onita and Tenryu taking guys out and swarming Tenryu, ending with an all-timer of a finish. I mean people can complain about sloppiness or whatever, but for me it doesn‘t get much more real than Tenryu trying to duck an enzuigiri only for Onita to catch him and drop him on his head because Onita is that beaten up and broken. This may not just be the greatest tag of 1994, but the greatest tag match of all time.

Tarzan Goto vs. Cactus Jack IWA 10/5/1995 - EPIC

These two are among the most „crazy brawler“ looking guys in history, and they do a bunch of crazy brawling in this, but there‘s also a surprising amount of wrestling! Jack controls early with a fucking Fujiwara armbar of all things and then works a bunch of sleeper holds. Technical babyface is a bit strange for Mick Foley to work, but they do a pretty fun job at it! Of course, 1995 Mick Foley is also an absolute bump freak and down to trade punches with Goto, and Goto is a great bruiser squashing him with nasty lariats and facebusters. Both guys end up bleeding big and Goto does his classic bloodletting, cracking Foley with a beer bottle and stabbing him in the face. Goto getting heel reactions from his home crowd says alot about what an effective heel he is, and Jack bleeds and sells like crazy. What makes the match is the amount of energy both guys put in, usually in these kind of matches guys will stroll around or lay on the mat while the other guy sets things up, here both guys are constantly reaching for weapons, when Goto goes outside Jack follows him and connects with a nasty hip attack, later Jack catches Goto in a backslide during a lazy moment for a tremendous hope spot. Tremendous Foley performance and Goto is a fantastic antagonist while also putting Foley over huge, and this match was a great example of both guys having the nuts and bolts of wrestling down along with the crazy bumps and blood.

Tarzan Goto vs. Atsushi Onita, FMW 8/4/1990 - GREAT

This was the first ever exploding barbedwire match and also a match that stole the match of the year awards, proving Goto had some serious workrate cred in Japan in the 90s. Unlike later explosion matches where they would milk and tease the falls into the wire to the max this match is chaotic like a warzone as the explosions go of left and right sometimes triggered by guys just stepping too hastily next to the wire. Onita unwittingly triggers two explosions early on and he gets up bleeding from his arm and a nasty cut in his back. Goto is right on him dropping him with fat powermoves and bloodying his face with nasty headbutts and fists. They make up for the shoddy explosions by headbutting each other to a bloody pulp and it's quite gritty. Goto works on Onitas bad leg a bit with some figure 4s that Onita punches and headbutts his way out of and they continue fighting. Goto is bombing Onita and he looks done but Onita is able to ram him into the wire and Goto takes the biggest bump of the match as he gets entangled in barbedwire and explosions. Then Onita keeps dropping him with like a dozen powerbombs and DDTs until Goto stays down. Could've done with another big Goto rally having a go Onitas bad leg like they teased but it was a wild, cool, experimental fight that probably sent the fans imagination running wild in 1990.

Tarzan Goto vs. Toshiaki Kawada, AJPW 11/28/1984 - FUN

What an insane upload. Mostly a fun technical match, with Goto doing the same cool hold for hold work while mixing in cool headbutts he would do later as a veteran. Kawada is a black trunks rookie and pretty athletic, he busts out a few very clean flips and even leaps to the top rope to hit a huge crossbody. Goto takes it in a style with the big Superfly Splash.

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Tarzan Goto Documentation #11

 Tarzan Goto vs. Mr. Gannosuke, FMW 6/28/1994 - EPIC

When Gannosuke trained in the FMW dojo under Goto, he was pegged as the #1 student over Hayabusa. This kinda match gives you an idea of what position that put Gannosuke in as he takes a murderous assbeating from Goto. Starts fun enough with Goto doing some chain wrestling which is always fun. You can kind of tell a faint influence of Baba in Gotos style of grappling as positioning and setting up bigger moves are important when he‘s rolling and out of armlocks, and he is really good at sneaking in headbutts and punches between the holds that hit hard. Naturally the match soon turns into a gruesome beatdown with Goto bloodying Gannosuke, hitting him in the face with the wooden hammer and just generally dropping him with nastier and nastier moves. It was the kind of beatdown that felt like it lasted around 10 minutes, it starts pretty violent and then it just keeps escalating until it looks like Goto is dragging a corpse around the ring. Gannosuke got the soul beaten out of him but it was kind of awesome how fired up the crowd got when he showed he still had a little life in him as Goto tried slapping his limp body back to consciousness. And the Gannosuke Clutch is always an awesome nearfall especially in 1994.

Tarzan Goto vs. Buh Buh Ray Dudley, IWA Japan 8/8/1996 - FUN

Two tubby guys wailing on each other in front of a surprisingly hot crowd. This was one of Bubuhs few Japan experiences and he was there to bring it. He hits some impressive splashes, big suicide dive and plants himself through a chair while acting like a simpleton. And Goto is not afraid to beat on a fool with headbutts to the face and some jaw cracking lariats. The brainbuster to big Buh Buh was sickening, totally spicked him. Really fun under 5 minute match.

Tarzan Goto vs. Perry Saturn & John Kronus, IWA Japan 8/10/1996 - FUN

Eliminators have a rep for their work not aging well, but they do a fun job swarming Goto here and not letting up. Yes, there were some crappy punches, but I really liked how the just started throwing chairs at Goto at one point. Pretty unusual Goto performance as he was mostly eating offense and taking big bumps, but he looks great doing that stuff. And the few comebacks he has are great and feel like a barfight as he just starts wailing on people with headbutts and chairs, exactly what you would do if you were outnumbered in a fight. Eliminators are a workrate team but they knew how to work with some necessary edge (e.g. hitting a mean doomsday device where Goto was brained hard with a chair). I kind of expected Goto to just start destroying them so the finish surprised me a bit but it was logical.

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Tarzan Goto Documentation #10

Tarzan Goto vs. Katsuji Ueda, FMW 8/25/1990 - GREAT

I always wanted a Katsuji Ueda showcase match, and here he is against Goto!! I don‘t know much about Ueda, but he is someone I buy as being tough just by looking at him. Mustache, boxing gloves, taped ankles for some reason. And Goto doesn‘t care about any of that – as he opens by moving in and trying to headbutt Ueda into oblivion right at the go. Ueda throws punches and kicks and this is really like a martial artist vs. Bar fighter match. Goto moves close enough to Ueda where in a normal sport the referee would break it up – but this is FMW, so Ueda eats headbutts to the face. Goto also has some pretty fast ankle picks for a fat guy. Ueda soon puts a pretty big beating on Goto, knees to the face, elbows to the back of the head. It‘s rough and grizzly and Goto is soon bleeding like crazy and getting knocked out over again. Pretty great transition from Goto bullying this guy around Goto putting over how dangerous his strikes are. It looks like Goto is done but he is able to catch a kick, pop Ueda with another headbutt and sink in a Figure 4 of all things. Some really great falling headbutts to Uedas leg later and he‘s out. I would‘ve liked a bigger 3rd stanza with Goto throwing Ueda around some more, but it made sense since Goto looked on the brink of defeat. Great match, anyways.

 

Tarzan Goto vs. Masaru Toi, FMW 2/19/1994 - GREAT

Curious match up because it‘s Toi working a main event singles (unless there was a match after this that the camera guy missed). The match was almost a total squash too, albeit a memorable one simply due to the sheer violent asskicking Goto unleashed. Toi paid his dues working in Calgary so he was never really on young boy duty and instead the guy delivering punishment when it comes to his matches in W*ING, PWC etc., so Goto kicking him all over the place here felt different. Goto was like a more violent Regal early on, cutting off Toi in different ways with knees to the face, punches, headbutts to the side of his head etc. Soon Goto was chucking tables at Tois head and bloodying him. Toi made the most of his brief offensive runs catching Goto with some kicks to the chin. Goto mostly catches them and continues the beatdown so when Toi finallly slowed him down with his gnarly solebutt to the face it felt rewarding. Of course Goto soon just dropped him with a Hashimoto level brainbuster and pinned him. For how one sided the match was, it was pretty great.

Tarzan Goto vs. Viking Taniguchi, Onita Pro 9/23/2001 - FUN

Merciless, Necro-level one sided beating by Goto to Taniguchi. Taniguchi isn‘t very good and his one comeback is pretty lackluster so it was probably for the better he barely got any offense. Goto did it all here, chucking chairs, tables at him, beer bottle, violent lariats and punches. He also beats on referees and ring announcers after the match, I‘m not sure of the monster Tarzan Goto run ever happened in Onita Pro but it looked promising here.

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Tarzan Goto Documentation #9

 

Grigory Verichev & Koba Krutanize v Atsushi Onita & Tarzan Goto, FMW 12/9/1991 - GREAT

Classic early 90s soviet shooter spectacle. Krutanize and Verichev are two huge soviet judokas and they are there to toss Onita and Goto around the ring like potatoe sacks. Crazy uranages and suplexes ensue. Onita and Goto fire back in spirit and it‘s all crazy heated and good fun. Our man Goto is a tank in this punching and lariating the judo guys, even hits a big Superfly Splash in a huge moment. Very unpolished and rough looking but all around great pro wrestling.

Tarzan Goto & Mr. Pogo vs. Atsushi Onita & Sambo Asako, FMW 7/25/1990 - FUN

Classic early 90s brawl where they fight all over the place and chuck chairs at each other. Goto and Onita looked great just tearing into each other. It‘s a grainy handheld, with a pro shot this might look like that Dragon Master brawl. Mr. Pogo was slimmer here than later. Asako basically just took a beating. The finish was great as Onita hits a nasty powerbomb to Goto and looks like he has won it, but moments later ate a piledriver to the floor. The post match brawl with Goto and Onita continueing to brawl in uncooperative fashion, slapping each other and bleeding was almost better than the actual match, though.

Tarzan Goto & Atsushi Onita vs. Jerry Flynn & Mitsuhiro Matsunaga, FMW 12/10/1989 - EPIC

Insane fucking match, 2 karatekas, 2 crazy unhinged wrestlers locked in a ring surrounded by barbedwire trying to beat each other to death. The opening 2 or 3 minutes have to be up there with the best match openings in history anywhere. Goto pops Matsunaga with a big damn headbutt only to get jumped with a kick assault. Goto tries to suplex his way out ouf the 2 on 1 situation only to get blindsided with a kick to the face. Onita jumps into the fray, and we get to see him pulling Flynns hair, twisting, and punching him in the face. The whole match was worked like that, violent, crazy exchanges punctuated with guys jumping on each other and getting blindsided by kicks. I liked how the barbed wire caused guys standing on the apron waiting to take in to get into dangerous situations, this was before they had done barbedwire to death and they sold it as super dangerous, so the crowd freaked out whenever someone was lightly leaning into it with his arm. Onita takes a nasty thumble through the barbedwire and he comes back with a shredded arm and the rest of the match he tries to punch people out with that shredded arm. Matsunaga is as good here as you need your untrained karateka to be, he throws some crazy kicks including axe kicking Onita in the face and a wild jumping abisegiri. Flynn is the same but a bit bigger and more lumbering. Goto is a fucking monster in the second half of this, bleeding from his eye, headbutting people in the face, trying to stomp Matsunagas head in, hitting a big leaping elbow to Flynns face. Then he‘s getting killed by crazy striking combos. You think he‘s not gonna make it, but then he does and in comes Onita to make himself a legend. It was like a gory surreal western crossed with BattlARTS. 

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Assorted Early FMW

Atsushi Onita & Lee Gak Soo vs. Mitsuteru Tokuda & Sambo Asako, FMW 6/2/1990

Early FMW was a pretty interesting promotion, like a seedier, more garbage brawling heavy BattlARTS. Here Onita tags with a crazy Korean Taekwondo(?) guy against two gi clad grapplers. Lee Gak Soo honestly looked amazing in this, his kicks were super violent and he was hitting so many pretty variations, landing his soles right in peoples faces. It felt like a fight to the death whenever he was in the ring. My boy Sambo Asako is a damn champion here once again taking violent assbeatings from Gak Soo and nasty headbutts from Onita, bleeding and getting fired up. Tokuda is a bit non descript but he does some solid throws and grappling and at one point busts out a god damn Cattle Mutilation. This thing was pretty one sided with Gak Soo and Onita mostly kicking the snot out of their opponents, so it felt like a big moment when Asako was able to hit a basic suplex. Also, the heat was off the charts. Really violent, crazy spectacle feeling, no down time, pretty much exactly what you want.

 

Atusshi Onita vs. Lee Gak Soo, FMW 5/19/1990

Not quite as violent as the above tag, but still Gak Soo axe kicks Onita in the face a bunch. Onita hits some violent throws in retaliation including a backedrop that spiked Gak Soo. All time brutal finish where Onita drops Gak Soo with an insane thunder fire bomb but the bell saves Gak Soo so Onita drops him with another in the next round.

Lee Gak Soo vs. Yukihide Ueno, FMW 5/12/1990

I expected this to be a complete squash, but Ueno (who is the future Battle Ranger) smacks Gak Soo at the bell and then downs him with some big kicks! Gak Soo comes back with a rage though and beats the tar out of Ueno with crazy punches and kicks, while doing his amusing high pitched yelling. Ueno becomes more cautious and does more grappling, including hitting some really nice throws before Soo takes off his jacket and finishes him off. Fun stuff, and impressive for even a rookie like Ueno at the time to be so proficient.

Masanobu Kurisu vs. Shooter #2 (FMW 3/10/90)

 Kurisu beats the life out of this poor sap. Shooter won't go down without a fight and gets in a nice stiff lariat and a big suplex, but Kurisu just brutalizes him. Nasty stomps galore. Kurisu nearly sprained the Shooters ankle with a nasty toe hold. Kurisu was an asskicking machine in 1990 and it was awesome.

FMW 1/10/1996

Ricky Fuji vs. Hayato Nanjyo

Two juniors you don‘t see work a lot. They did a RVD/Jerry Lynn like routine of dodging spin kicks and going for ground moves early on. Then they settle into slow, pointless, time killing matwork routine before they whip out their cool highspots. Nanjyos asia moonsault was pretty beautiful and Fuji spiked him hard with Tiger Driver style moves. Crowd popped huge in the last couple minutes. Both guys also had good fashion sense, Fuji rocking some tasteful tights with tassles and his glorious dyed mane and Nanjo a cheap but charming looking silver costume with a red scarv belt.

Bad Nurse Nakamura vs. Yuki Nabeno

A surprisingly heated little match. Nabeno laid a ton of spice into her moves, dropkicking Nakamura in the face. Bad Nurse looked like quite the badass tearing up Nabenos bandaged shoulder and then finishing her with a nasty STF.

Daisuke Ikeda vs. Hisakatsu Oya

This was a truely mouth-watering match up. Ikeda vs. Ishikawa is one of the greatest matchups of all time, and Oya is the sleazy Fake Ishikawa. And they duke it out in a BattlARTS-before-BattlARTS style match here! Mostly gritty matwork in between Ikeda kicking the dogshit out of Oya. Oya took some manly ass kicks and then dropped Ikeda on his head with those big backdrop suplexes of his. 11 minutes of exactly what you want it to be.

Megumi Kudo vs. Chigusa Nagayo

Bomb-dropping sprint with some smartness displayed. I loved how they would put over the sleeper. Kudo was a bit sloppy here and there so I give Nagayo credit. She handled herself like a badass and put Kudos submissions over really strong, in between destroying her with kicks and throws. When she fought out of a sleeper, then collapsed, barely hit a counter move and tried to shake of the cobwebs it was like something that should be hammered into every aspiring wrestlers head on how to sell chokeholds. After a match a pull apart happens between all the girls in FMW and GAEA tracksuits and Nagayo bleeds and jumps on Miwa Sato like she is going to kill her because that‘s what Chiggy does.

Aja Kong vs. Combat Toyoda

Another sick ass match up on this card, what was Arai on when he put all this awesome shit together? These two could have an intricate epic match, but fuck that this is FMW, they chuck tables at each others heads and bleed. Opening brawling with Toyoda smashing things over Ajas head and then suicide diving right into an Aja trashcan shot was just great. Both women bleed, and then we get them both exchanging stiff blows and crushing each other with suplexes. I‘d say the lariat trading here was better than usual in Japanese matches because these two are supposed to be crazy monsters so you buy it more. Excellent build to the finish. This hit all the spots.

 

Hayabusa & Koji Nakagawa & Masato Tanaka vs. BADBOY Hido & Mitsuhiro Matsunaga & Kintaro Kanemura 

This had barbedwire ropes, spider nets and they brought in a ladder among other things. It was like a pretty typical multiman match involving all those things. At first guys try not to get thrown into the barbed wire, then they do get thrown into it, some highspots and a heel control segments happen before the bomb throwing finish. The brawling here wasn't super exciting although technically there was a cool matchup in Hayabusa/Matsunaga. The highspots were pretty good with some big dives over the barbedwire and a splash off the ladder to the outside. Bomb throwing was also gnarly but didn't go long. Overall this was a solid entry to the genre.

The Library

Tarzan Goto Documentation Project #7

 

Tarzan Goto vs. Leon Spinks, FMW 3/25/1992 - EPIC

Awesome, awesome Goto performance getting a great spectacle out of the in a pro wrestling context very limited ex boxing champ Leon Spinks. First round is just Goto as an offense juggernaut, he opens by flattening Spinks with a punch to the face and then just moves in for the cool, constantly pressuring, landing headbutts to the eye, fast takedowns including an awesome plausible drop toe hold. He even hits a great dropkick and enzuigiri all while the crowd is having a meltdown for Goto. I also really dug Gotos and stance and head movement. Second round Goto continues to pressure until Spinks finally catches him with a punch. Spinks wasn‘t exactly hitting hard but him punching a grounded Goto in the face looked gritty. Goto, of course, bleeds and from then on it‘s all drama with Goto eating punches and near Kos and trying to survive. After the match Onita immediately jumps Spinks and we get a big pull apart (with Mike Awesome and Dr. Luther amongst others seconding Spinks). This was kind of a Goto as Onitas right hand man goes down to put over how dangerous Spinks is match to pave way for the bigger Spinks/Onita showdown but on it‘s own it was pretty damn great.

Tarzan Goto & Sambo Asako vs. Masanobu Kurisu & The Shooter #1, FMW 5/14/1990 - EPIC

Classic unexpectedly violent indy sleaze fest, really the best kind of match to discover when going through a bunch of random handhelds. This was really all about Kurisu and Goto trying to outdo each other by putting an even more sickening beating on the other guys partner, with both guys doing comically little to protect their own partner. Goto starts the fun by immediately opening with a headbutt to Shooters eye, then later we get Kurisu putting his trademark sickening beatdown on Asako. At one point both guys run in to the ring to stomp on the other guys partners head, later they do the same with chairs while eyeing each other. The brief Kurisu/Goto interactions are great (and probably braincell killing, these guys were maniacs with the headbutts), but the rest holds up too. Sambo Asako is a fat kid who can take some insane punishment and has fun sambo submissions and throws, and Shooter is a sleazeball shooter who doesn‘t seem to be able to control his kicks much so when he goes for a kick combo it seems more reckless. Once again Goto‘s offense was insane, he busted out an awesome German suplex, Capture suplex and even a gnarly super kick when interacting with Shooter, inbetween trying to kill guys with brutal headbutts and occasionally trying to shatter Shooters ear with a slap. Would‘ve pushed into MOTYC territory for me if there had been another Kurisu/Goto standoff down the stretch.

Tarzan Goto & Ricky Fuji vs. Atsushi Onita & Mr. Gannosuke, FMW 11/4/1991 - GREAT

Classic Goto tag where he puts a graphic beatdown on a clear underdog. In this case that is young boy Mr. Gannosuke. Even though this was presumably a houseshow, Goto beat the shit out of the kid, full on stiff lariats and chair edges to the face, and Gannosuke bled a good deal. I enjoyed Ricky Fuji here too, as he hit some nice worked punches and elbow drops to the cut. Onitas hot tags are of course super over, and I really liked the ending run with Gannosuke getting to shine a bit with some basic dropkicks and suplexes. Facebuster finish looked brutal as hell, too.

TARZAN GOTO DOCUMENTATION

Assorted Japanese Indy Wrestling

 Mitsuhiro Matsunaga vs. Koichiro Kimura, W*ING 10/26/1991

What a scuzzy dream match. I had no idea this ever happened let alone that it was taped, and now a quality handheld randomly shows up on YouTube! Wrestling can be good sometimes. Matsunaga is blond already but still very much a karateka. This was before he suffered a leg injury so he was much more mobile than later and still capable of throwing crazy kick combos. And Kimura is just a monster with the submissions. A lot of pro wrestlers are taught to not follow up quickly, let the audience register that a guy was slammed before they put on a submission, Kimura ain't like that, he will throw right into the submission in a split second. This was basically just a gritty as hell striker vs. grappler match up. Matsunaga was demolishing Kimura with his kicks and Kimura was landing crazy throws and submissions. Everything was a bit more violent and aggressive than in your standard shootstyle match, these guys would bitchslap each other, there's some nasty headstomping, at one point Kimura refuses to break clean and eye rakes Matsunaga which Matsunaga really sells like a shoot eye rake. There's this intense moment where Kimura goes to par terre while Matsunaga takes off his belt. You sense some serious violence is about to go down. The finish wasn't quite as epic as I wanted, but they made it look hard fought. I'm a huge fan of both these guys, and this overdelivered on my expectations.

Gekko vs. Gosaku Goshogawara, FMW 12/21/1995

Gekko is Masao Orihara wearing this insanely creepy outfit. Gosaku is some FMW trainee and Orihara just completely Kurisus him here. Gosaku has a bandage and Orihara kicks him full force in the face. Soon Gosaku is bleeding and eating brutal clotheslines and stomps from Orihara. Orihara takes the pin in 3 minutes. Brutal and abject.

RIP Hideki Hosaka

 

Hideki Hosaka vs. Hisakatsu Oya, FMW 6/19/1998

Pretty much the scuzziest MUGA match you‘ve ever seen. Hosaka used to be an SAW guy and Koichiro Kimuras sidekick, even had a match in RINGs, but it seems too many multiman garbage brawls have made him lose his submission skills. Basic grappling, but very entertaining due to the struggle and both guys having good instincts. Oya using his spindly form to grab armbars etc. ruled. Hosakas leglocks were simple, but good due to Oya selling desperation. We get a cool finishing run with Hosaka powering out of the Octopus Hold and whipping out cool Frankensteiners, and Oya dropping him hard with those backdrop suplexes as Oya does.

Hideki Hosaka vs. Great Wojo, W*ING 8/7/1991

Hosaka in one of his earliest appearances faces the Great Wojo, a guy with a rich background in olympic wrestling. Wojo pretty much dominates here and looked like a maestro when it comes to amateur matwork. That is, you have to be kind of an amateur matwork geek to appreciate the intricancies of what Wojo was doing, but he was good. And he dropped Hosaka with some big damn suplexes. Hosaka doesn‘t in anything except one desperate kick flurry. A valuable learning experience, I guess, but the Great Wojo was worth seeing.

Hideki Hosaka vs. Masato Tanaka, FMW 10/19/1997

This is foor Tanakas heavyweight title so… the biggest match of Hosakas career? It‘s still co-main event to an Onita tag, but what have you. Really good little match. Tanaka can have a good match against a blind man, but Hosaka adds a lot to the match. Fun AJPW – like opening standing exchange with Tanaka slapping Hosaka hard out of nowhere. Then a cool transition occurs where Tanaka tries his usual elbow to chair spot but because his arm isn‘t 100% he busts himself. Hosaka then does a really fun job working over Tanakas arm using both nasty wristlocks and just going to town with a chair. Tanakas selling was on the money and you actually buy pudgy Hosaka pushing him to the limit. Finishing stretch was really good too with Hosaka going back to Tanakas weak arm busting out cool Fujiwara armbars and other things. I‘ve seen so many Tornado DDT reversals I kind of groan at them but Hosaka turning the move into a big sitout spinebuster was awesome. You also got the usual neck crunching powerbombs etc. Good shit.

Tarzan Goto Documentation Project #6

 

Tarzan Goto vs. Dan Severn, IWA Japan 8/20/1995 - EPIC

 

Brilliant, virtually perfectly worked match which was basically two beasts having a crazy bar fight. Goto is so awesome here, hitting the mat with Severn, getting in his head, using weapons, bleeding and potatoeing the UFC legend really hard. Imagine someone hitting Khabib with a stiff lariat and chair shots. Severn looks good in other matches, but he looks like a badass killer here, and I suspect no small part of that is Gotos doing. Loved Severn mauling and bloodying Goto on the ground, his crazy suplexes and throwing chairs. Goto escalating the violence by using the beer bottle and chairs and clocking Severn really hard in the jaw was awesome as well. This was everything you want this match up to be and more.

Tarzan Goto & Tomoaki Honma vs. Terry Funk & Abdullah the Butcher, AJPW 10/27/2002 - GREAT

This was maybe Gotos sole return match to AJPW. They really should‘ve used him more as he‘s such a great versatile worker. This was as fun as it looks on paper. You have Funk and Goto trading punches, Goto dropping elbows, Abby chopping and stabbing people, and Honma bleeding and getting bumped around. Goto is actually the first guy to bust out a fork and Abdullah turns the fork against him in a great spot that got a big face pop. 3 out of 4 guys bleed, and Goto chucks tables at the heads of 60 year old men (he is really one of the few guys who can do that kinda spot safely). Finish was unexpectedly violent too (you know, in a match with a bunch of blood and guys punching eachother in the face) with Honma eating some nasty punishment, but that‘s what Honma is for.

Tarzan Goto vs. Gran Mendoza, FMW 8/20/1990 - FUN

 

Gritty 7 minute match with a bunch of blood and guys taking nasty spills into the barbedwire. At this point the barbedwire stuff looked less like guys doing spots and more like guys actually falling into barbedwire. Mendoza was pretty generic but did one or two things I liked, such as his elbows and the cool „punch at nothing“ sell he did. Goto took a beating initially and then came back bleeding big and throwing some cool headbutts before dropping Mendoza hard with his facebuster which Mendoza didn‘t seem to know how to take. Short and very grizzly. 

 TARZAN GOTO DOCUMENTATION

Tarzan Goto Documentation Project #5

 Tarzan Goto & Mikan vs. Musashi Oyama & Lemon, Goto-Ippa 5/10/2009 - GREAT

Goto-Ippa is basically Gotos little wrestling school project. Just tiny shows held so his boys can get some experience and so Goto can carve them up. Musashi Oyama is another unknown sleaze god. He's older than dirt and sports this seedy slicked back long hair look, looking like Gran Hamadas granddad. He's awesome. Mikan and Lemon are two girl wrestlers and they look really untrained. Like "can't take a back bump" level untrained. They don't show up on any other Goto-Ippa cards so I assume they aren't affiliated to Goto. Mikan likes to kick hard so I guess I liked her. Lemon was basically constantly on the verge of killing herself. And this goes 36 MINUTES? What in the hell? It feels amazingly short though and still pushes into borderline GREAT territory, because we are evaluating Tarzan Goto performances, and the man did it all here. He's really old (he retired in the late 80s, for christs sake), but he still comfortably does his thing and never looks out of step or even fatigued. Opening Goto/Oyama sections were pretty great. Goto grappling rules, and Oyama even kicks him in the face pretty hard. Then we get Goto doing about the best job humanly possible to carry Lemon through an FIP section. Really doing the most you can with a girl who can't back bump, only throwing her to the corner and throwing safe but good looking punches and headbutts. When Lemon makes her comeback Goto takes these great bumps for her DDTs. We also get some fun sections with Oyama trying to protect Lemon from evil Goto, and of course Oyama ends up getting carved up. The latter match Goto/Oyama sections are so great as Goto is just brutalizing him with punches, headbutts and lariats as he's bleeding all over the ring in front of probably 30 people. Check this out, fast forward through the girl sections, and enjoy Goto being the man.

Tarzan Goto & Mr. Gannosuke vs. Kendo Nagasaki & Bruiser Okamoto, Big Japan 7/25/1995 - EPIC

This was another one of those stretched out tags from the era where it starts with lots of quality wrestling and then turns into a bloodbath. Goto and Gannosuke are one hell of a unit here. Okamoto is a big, non-descript young guy who works kind of like a shooter, so he‘s a very good dude to slot intot his match. Starts with a great section where he and Gannosuke grapple it out doing kneebars like this is a BattlARTS match, followed by another great section where he tries to grapple Tarzan Goto and Goto just outclassing him. I especially loved how Goto stuffed an Okamoto takedown and just yanked his face with a nasty facelock, it was like something Fujiwara would do. If course this is just a warmup for the inevitable as referee Great Kojika acts shady and this causes Goto and Gannosuke to go to town on Okamoto with chairs and what have. I liked how Nagasaki, when Goto took the match to the floor also started floor brawling and crowbarring Mr. Gannosuke. Nagasaki was in full on pissed off dad mode here and swinging chairs and tables at people. It builds to a great second half with Nagasaki beating the piss out of Mr. Gannosuke while Goto breaks a bottle. The whole matchs was building to a Goto/Nagasaki interaction and when it happens it‘s just Goto coming in to break up a Nagasaki pinfall by cutting his face open. It was such a psycho move and so beautifully well timed. I also liked how Okamoto challenged Gannosuke to another wrestling face off only for Gannosuke to take him down and immediately start clawing at his cut. Beautiful tag psychology crossed with some serious street fighting violence, you can‘t tell me these guys weren‘t masters at this.

Tarzan Goto & Damian 666 vs. Goro Tsurumi & Hisakatsu Oya, FMW 6/19/1994 - FUN

The very definition of a FUN match. Starts out as just an offensive slaughter from Damian, as Goto wails on people with hard lariats and Damian does cool lucha spots and impressions of other wrestlers. You wouldn‘t think these two would work well together but damn they acted like best buddies here. Oya got his ass beaten – taking some tailbone breaking bumps into a table and getting walloped by Goto. Even during the brief section where Damian was in peril Goto came over to kick Oyas ass. Tsurumi looked decent and there was a cool section where he and Goto wailed on each other, I would‘ve liked that to go longer than 20 seconds. Brief but an all around good time.

TARZAN GOTO DOCUMENTATION PROJECT MASTER LIST

Assorted Japanese Indy Wrestling

Takashi Ishikawa & Ryo Miyake vs. Yuichi Fukaya & Shigekazu Tajiri, Tokyo Pro 2/23/1995

Is there anything that says 90s sleaze like a pair of sleazy heavyweights taking on a pair of random karatekas? Judging by the way Fukaya and Tajiri try to run the ropes here, it seems neither of them have had any wrestling training, and that rules. Both of them kick hard and they have some cool spinkicks. Miyake is pretty lame but gets his ass kicked and bleeds, and Ishikawa is predictably violent in this kicking the karatekas in the face. Fun times.

Koji Nakagawa vs. Hayabusa, FMW 10/6/1998

I just had to see this match. Nakagawa is like a proto-Ogawa here. Very ratty and sleazy. I love me a good ratboy story and this was a good one. Hayabusa initially dominates the match, hitting a reckless dive and equally reckless kneelift until Nakagawa is able to catch him in a nifty backbreaker. We get a cool Bret Hart like performance from Nakagawa working over Hayabusas back - actually making the audience give a shit about things like a camel clutch. Hayabusa no sells his way back to offense, so Nakagawa says Fuck This and busts out a fork. He stabs the fuck out of Hayabusas arm and we get a full on Funks vs. Abby/Sheikh style end run peppered up with FMW style big moves. To be fair Hayabusa sold the arm work extremely well - dug that desperate tiger driver - and the last minutes of this were really good puro epic material. Seems like an extremely underrated match considering I enjoyed myself more here than during the usual late FMW era bomb throwing.

Kinya Oyanagi vs. Kazuhiro Tamura, Secret Base 3/22/2010

Exciting match on paper, which came out really fun. I was expecting some U-Style vs. T2P matwork, but instead they did more of a junior match. These are two guys who will hit hard and wrench tight holds, so they work a really cool juniors match. Tamura works over Oyanagis arm and Oyanagi works over Tamuras leg after a cool transition. Tamura completely neglects selling the leg, but he does blast Oyanagi with some stiff kicks, so I am ambivalent to his performance here. Lots of really really neat reversals in the finishing run. Especially dug all the teases of Oyanagis Octopus Hold and the flying armbar was extremely well timed. Good stuff, made me long for an extended run of Oyanagi singles matches that never seemed to happen.

Tarzan Goto Documentation Project #4

 Tarzan Goto & Jun Kikuzawa vs. Masayoshi Motegi & Shinichi Nakano, WYF 8/9/1997 - GREAT

This was another piece of fucking great pro wrestling. This was not quite the same chaotic, savage massacre as the previous Goto vs. WDF guys tag, but more of a great southern style tag. Some really fun back and forth wrestling early on which was damn cool to see from such a fat guy as Goto, before Motegi ends up suicide diving right into a Goto chairshot (did I mention Motegi is actually awesome?) which sets up the heat section of Goto again mercilessly fucking up Motegi with various foreign objects, including drilling his face with an umbrella. Motegi screaming for his life while Goto was stubbornly trying to crack a beer bottle over his head before he just breaks it and carves him up gave the whole thing a Hillbilly slasher movie feel. Goto has fucking great punches, too. It all builds very well to Nakano getting the hot tag and in turn messing up everyone with his simple, violent offense. Aside from Goto being awesome you also had the future Kikutaro who at this point was a fun fatboy wrestler that gets messed up by the veterans for being a newbie, at one point Nakano just grabs him and drills his face with knee strikes. Really well worked match that blends southern psychology and japanese hierarchy thinking.

 Tarzan Goto & Jun Kikuzawa vs. Basara & Shinichi Nakano, WYF 9/23/1997 - GREAT

Another very good entry in the shockingly awesome WDF vs. Shin FMW series. In this match Nakano teams with Basara, who is a pudgy low ranked guy in an awesome mask (it has a beard). This matchup gives Nakano and Goto the opportunity to work a really nice opening match section, where both guys have great armdrags, firemans carries etc. and then kick the shit out of the lower ranked guy on the other team. Nakano stomps the hell out of future Kikutaro (take that you unfunny motherfucker!) but Basara gets it worse as Goto piledrives him on the floor, ripping his mask open and bloodying him. Goto's awesome and unique use of foreign objects continues in this match as he grabs a broom, then breaks it in half and stabs Basara in the face with the wooden splinters. It's shit that happens in any lousy deathmatch but the way Goto does it makes it look like some horrific inventive abuse. The crowd actually gets into Basara as he absorbs a beatdown and he arguably has his finest moments ever in this match (not a high bar, but it's something), including landing a big diving headbutt that leaves a pool of blood on the other guys chest. Kikuzawa also busts out the fatboy moonsault and Goto makes uses of the ring bell guy's hammer which I am always a sucker for. Really good stuff, Goto always does the same shit, but he can do no wrong in this formular and the WDF guys were perfect foils as usual.

 Tarzan Goto vs. Battle Ranger, FMW 7/31/1994 - EPIC

Really great match which was way better than a Battle Ranger match had any right to be. To be fair, Ranger brings it hard, as hard as you need when you are fighting Tarzan Goto. Ranger goes right at Goto throwing hard palm strikes. Goto goes to par terre and challenges the Ranger to grapple him which rules, but  Ranger throws a stiff kick at his shoulder instead. It's an awesome beginning to a match and it leads to Tarzan in turn levelling an epic gruesome beating on the Ranger, as he rips his mask open, bloodies him and kicks him around, all the while Tarzan was surprisingly great at eating Rangers surprise high spots. Battle Ranger was hitting hard and getting punched in the face, selling big, taking big bumps and getting tables chucked at his head, clearly having the night of his life. The fans got really into Battle Ranger too, after they initially saw him as having no chance, and Goto is really great in his psycho Tenryu role punching Ranger in the face and throwing great looking headbutts and lariats. It builds to a finish that feels extremely dramatic and violent even by FMW, they made it look as if getting your ass kicked was just as bad as getting blown up in a cage, and the stretcher job really underlines that. Fantastic Goto show against an inspiring opponent, and another case for Goto being so much more than just a gorehound.

 TARZAN GOTO DOCUMENTATION MASTER LIST

Tarzan Goto Documentation Project #3

BATHHOUSE DEATHMATCH: Tarzan Goto & Mr. Gannosuke vs. Keisuke Yamada & Shoji Nakamaki, IWA Japan 8/20/1995 - GREAT

This is the Bathhouse Deathmatch. They put a wrestling mat into a bathhouse and tag partners have to stay in hot tubs until tagged in.

The concepts sounds flat, but they actually manage to keep this entertaining the whole way through a combination of wrestling and surreality. Goto and Yamada start out with a bunch of fast mat exchanges, with Goto busting out Fujiwara armbars and Magistral Cradles and whatnot. In order to win you have to pin the opponent and then drown him in a nearby tub for 5 seconds. Lots of running around the bathhouse ensues, in the process of which lots of naked japanese women and men are scattering about the place looking for cover. I wonder if they put some of these tit and ass shots on the commercial tape cover. Goto also bashes the fuck out of Yamada with plastic buckets and then throws wooden baskets at him, while Yamada bumps like a madman for all that.

 Gannosuke and Nakamaki eventually get tagged in and immediately take the brawl to the streets. Another amazing thing here is the video editing, as there are constant cuts (including a dual screen while Gannosuke and Nakamaki are outside), they also constantly cut to a female host (who is holding a giant walkie talkie and a microphone in front of her face) and a bathhouse worker that keeps adding wood to the fire. I assume the bathhouse worker also explains some of the intricacies of hot tub heating in the process. Also, bluesy riffs play in the background here and there, and an announcer that is occasionally dubbed in shouts the names of some wrestling moves.

 Then this match also has it's tag psychology in place. Wrestlers keep leaving the hot tubs to break up submissions or pour cool water on themselves and get yellow carded for it. Yamada is the babyface in peril, gets bowled across the slippery floor and soaped up in a pretty creepy scene by Goto, he also does another slide across the floor to get the literal hot tag. Then it finally dawns on you that this is a partially inverted southern tag where the heat is on the guy who is tagged out, as Gannosuke and Yamazaki are selling the hot tubs like motherfuckers. In the end the video editing and inverted heat section come together for this amazing shot:

 

There's also one woman who tries her darndest to not let her day at the bathhouse be disturbed by wrestlers drowning eachother nearby and stays in the tub. Eventually Goto beats Yamada and then shoves his face into her butt to make the invasion of privacy scenario complete.

Truely a crowning achievement of our civilization, best japanese arthouse movie of 1995. What would YOU do if you saw a literally boiling Tarzan Goto coming your way at the bathhouse?

 

Tarzan Goto vs. Hisakatsu Oya, FMW 8/28/1994 - EPIC

Another treasure of a match. This goes 24 minutes and a good 15 of that is freaked out MUGA hold for hold work. It’s something you don’t see Goto do much, but he is great sinking into Fujiwara armbars, working cool backbreaker variations and cutting off Oya in methodical ways like he’s Bret Hart or something. There’s some really cool work around Goto countering Oyas backdrop attempts by grapevining and armbaring him, and Oya has some great counters into his own Octopus Stretch. Because its FMW they end up going for chairs and bleeding, Goto brains Oya with one of the hardest chairshots I’ve ever seen and works him over with the timekeepers hammer (one of my favourite spots) before both guys settle into an AJPWesque finishing run dropping each other with sick brainbusters and headdrops. Totally awesome stuff and an example of Goto working a match that suits his opponents style while still doing his gruesome thing.

TARZAN GOTO DOCUMENTATION PROJECT

Tarzan Goto Documentation Project #2

 Atsushi Onita vs. Tarzan Goto (FMW 2/26/1991) - EPIC

Okay, wow. This was brutal as hell. Essentially the world's sleaziest WAR match. Forget about explosions and barbedwire, this was about crazy headbutts, lariats and punches in the face.

 
This was also a total fight. Normally in hardcore type matches there will be some lulls when guys are rummaging around, but here they are just killing eachother the whole way. Right out the gate they are ramming their heads into eachother, Goto's face in a pool of blood immediately, and I love how Goto was selling that he is clearly rattled by Onita's headbutts but still trying to push back. Onita comes out on top and immediately goes for a suicide dive that doesn't go well, and Goto immediately grabs a chair and waffles Onita in the face. Next you know Onita is bleeding and Goto continues to beat the life out of him, just killing him chucking tables and stomping him in the face. When that doesn't do it Goto briefly works Onita's leg to set up an STF, altough he is still laying in a fucking stiff beating kicking Onita in the hamstring.
 
One headbutt exchange later and Onita has proven that he is still tougher, sending Goto outside altough Goto immediately goes for a fucking dropkick there. Neither of these guys will stop attacking, altough Onita gets the advantage again body slamming him into chairs and landing a table-cracking piledriver that looked like a potential KO as much as anything. Back in the ring and both guys are a mess at this point. Goto with the blistering lariats and huge superfly splash again, but Onita catches him with his DDTs and goes on to drill him with the big damn powerbombs. I actually liked the "kick out at 1 spot" here, it's become such a cliche at this point, but Goto's facial expression really gets it across, he's thinking "I know I'm dead on my feet, but I'm not quitting now, fuck you" then punches Onita in the face. Onita just keeps dropping Goto with one nastier powerbomb after another until he stays down, making this almost a Steve Williams Backdrop moment.
 
I dunno. This is probably not as fine as Kawada/Taue, but in way it feels like the ultimate 90s indy sleaze massacre. It's easily the best match of that kind that I can recall seeing. It's gruesome, primitive, savage as hell and unlike many other matches of that kind had me enthralled the whole way through. Yeah maybe it's not a Top 40 match in 1991, who gives a shit. I loved this.

 

Tarzan Goto & Mitsunobu Kikuzawa vs. Masayoshi Motegi & Shinichi Nakano, WYF 8/9/1997 - GREAT

 

This was another piece of fucking great pro wrestling. This was not quite the same chaotic, savage massacre as the previous Goto vs. WDF guys tag, but more of a great southern style tag. Some really fun back and forth wrestling early on which was damn cool to see from such a fat guy as Goto, before Motegi ends up suicide diving right into a Goto chairshot (did I mention Motegi is actually awesome?) which sets up the heat section of Goto again mercilessly fucking up Motegi with various foreign objects, including drilling his face with an umbrella. Motegi screaming for his life while Goto was stubbornly trying to crack a beer bottle over his head before he just breaks it and carves him up gave the whole thing a Hillbilly slasher movie feel. Goto has fucking great punches, too. It all builds very well to Nakano getting the hot tag and in turn messing up everyone with his simple, violent offense. Aside from Goto being awesome you also had the future Kikutaro who at this point was a fun fatboy wrestler that gets messed up by the veterans for being a newbie, at one point Nakano just grabs him and drills his face with knee strikes. Really well worked match that blends southern psychology and japanese hierarchy thinking.

 

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