Control

Anyway, made it to the short list and round two of interviews: the campus visit!

I had a $10 Gift certificate for Criterion for being an early subscriber to the channel, so I used that and the 50% sale to buy the essential Jacques Demy collection for about $60. Christmas shopping for the wife done in record time!

Horror hot take: HOUSE (1985) is good. Original AMITYVILLE HORROR is bad.

Is Destroyer Memorial Night an AJPW thing, or is it independent?

The live show was even better than I’d hoped. Just a great experience. if this is MST3K’s swan song, it’s a good one. But also I’ll be sad. I need more MST3K.

Finally got an interview for a tenure-track job, after five years of adjuncting after my PhD and writing a(n award-winning) book. They gave me super short notice, so the interview is on Tuesday, and I have a long-planned trip with my wife scheduled for this weekend, so I'm not gonna get to prep much, but they'll recognize my value or they won't, I guess.

Tag league is serious stuff, usually. I don’t follow any other promotion , but AJ doesn’t give the tag titles to midcarders very often—guys who win the league and the belts are typically main even gets. Every show is gonna be on their streaming service, which is nice. this lineup is pretty similar to last year’s, but it’ll be neat to see Bodyguard and Zeus on opposite teams, and Redman in the tourney. I expect Jake and Nomura will have a good run.

2019 WSTL teams: The Bomber (James and Doering) The End (Parrow and Odinson) Kento and Yuma Jake and Nomura Yoshitatsu and Joel Redman Valetta and Cyber Kong KAI and Tajiri Violent Giants Zeus and Sai Sekimoto and Bodyguard

beefy

Criterion channel upped a bunch of cool shit, including a chunk of Herschel Gordon Lewis and Ken Russell’s THE DEVILS. What’s the “best” HGL movie? First time viewer, here.

haha fuck no Anyway, y'all should watch Kento v Ikeman, which was awesome.

Watched the September 16 AJPW Korakuen hall show (OK just the Oudou tournament matches) and it was a good time. Features: The return of KAI to AJPW. He has a very good match with Aoyagi, who decides to try to match KAI's high-flying. I know some don't like KAI, but I think he's very solid, and there's a real lack of agile heavyweights in AJ, so he's a nice fit. Hope they can keep him around--he doesn't seem like a Dragon Gate guy. Unfortunately my favourite ref, Nikkan Lee, gets injured during this match. There's some shit on the ring mat, and when she goes in for a three count at some point she must kick some stuff up into her eye, which she keeps covering for the rest of the match, and then she shows up with an eye patch later Gianni Valetta's best singles match ever. Maybe he is OK now. A good Ikeman vs Yoshitatsu match. Match is good overall, with some occasional great spots. Ikeman can really bump (though his selling is pretty shit). The return of Joe Doering, who has been injured all year, thus his crappy CC showing (and the fact that he half-assed it in the title match against the Violent Giants). He seemed all the way back here and goddamn it was good to see. Other Oudou matches worth checking out include Suwama vs Lee and Zeus vs James.

Oddly enough, this is a different, 23-year-old Yuki Ishikawa. It has confused me a few times. I'm surprised they're letting him get away with that name, really. I mean, KENTA had to quit that Kenta Kobayashi shit, and that wasn't as egregious.

I’ve not looked at today’s results, so this might already be wrong, but my prediction for the Oudou tournament:

I watched the entirety of the All Japan show from September 11th. I hadn't planned to watch the whole show, but after starting the video my dog fell asleep on my lap, and as you know, it's illegal to wake a napping dog, so I had to watch the first four matches. I then realized that there were only two matches left. So anyway, if anyone is interested in seeing a full AJ show, rather than just grabbing the occasional TC defense or tournament match, this is a pretty good one. It's a small show--just 300 people--but the audience is engaged and the wrestling is nice and breezy. Whole show is like an hour and 45 minutes long. Let's dip in, shall we? 1. All Japan Pro Wrestling vs Big Japan Pro Wrestling NEW GENERATION Six Man Tag Match: Takuho Kato , Yuki Ishikawa & Akira Hyodo [Big Japan] vs Hokuto Omori, Dan Tamura & Atsuki Aoyagi [All Japan] I've never seen the BJ guys, but they all seemed good. AJ's crop of dudes is fine, though they've got the disadvantage of AJ booking, which sticks them in the opening match to wrestle each other permanently. Hokuto Omori seems like the most advanced of the AJ guys. Not surprisingly, he's the one who got to wrestle in the junior tag league (which I haven't watched). Dan Tamura comes in at #2 because he's good at getting his character across. The mohawk helps. Which leaves Aoyagi's brother, who seems fine if very vanilla. The BJ guys are probably all Omori's level or slightly better, but I couldn't tell you who is who. Anyway, this was a great change of pace for the young boys, who got to face off against equals who were also not dudes they wrestle every night. Dan Tamura is humiliated when he taps to a crab hold, the ultimate young-boy killer and something that he shouldn't be losing to anymore, and certainly not to another whipper-snapper, so maybe this is leading to more matches. Crowd was really into this, and everyone wanted to show off their stuff, so good things all around. 2. Hikaru Sato vs Francesco Akira Francesco Akira is an Italian wrestler (Northern Italian, I'm guessing, giving his red hair and fair complexion). He's a flippy guy, which is what the AJ junior division needs. He apparently had a really good match recently with Tajiri, of all people. Here, you could tell that he was green, with his moves being a bit sloppy However, the match played out nicely: flippy guy tried to get advantage with flips, and shooty guy tried to nullify his flips by bending, kicking, and otherwise brutalizing his leg Some wrestling connoisseurs probably think a flippy guy who is selling the leg should stop doing flips; Akira believes that you should still do the flips, but then go "ow my leg" afterward. He's right, you know. Eventually, all the flippiness in the world can't save you from your leg getting bent in the wrong direction, so Sato picks up the win. 3. Jun Akiyama x Brahman Brothers ~ Let's Go, Beyond Pro-Wrestling: Jun Akiyama, Brahman Shu & Brahman Kei vs Tako Omori, Atsushi Maruyama & Black Menso~re I've not seen the Brahman Brothers before, but their thing seems to be spraying the audience and their enemies with water. The fact that more than one audience member showed up with an umbrella suggests that this is so. They also wrestle like 90s WWE hardcore wrestlers, like Spike Dudley or maybe Hardcore Holly, hitting people with road signs and briefcases and bowling balls. Which is pretty great because you don't see that stuff in AJ. I've probably mentioned this before, but if you're unaware: Jun Akiyama has virtually retired to old man comedy stuff, and he is in a forever war against the team of Takao Omori and Black Menso-Re. Usually he teams with Ultimo Dragon, but sometimes it's Atsushi Maruyama. Occasionally they'll add Fuchi to Omori's team, so that Jun can get heel heat by brutalizing the old guy. This is a pretty frustrating setup--not because of Akiyama's determination to fill this role, but because it means holding back Black Menso-Re, who is the most over junior on the roster, and it also means that Jun and Omori aren't really taking the young guys under their wing. Surely, even broken down, they can teach Dan Tamura thing or two? Anyway, the switch-up in this match is that Jun has brought in the Brahman brothers to aid him in his battle. So if shenanigans are your thing, this match is for you. Shenanigans abound. I was fond of said shenanigans. 4. Koji Iwamoto vs Yusuke Okada Now the two best juniors on the roster face off. This is a good match. If you're more familiar with NJ juniors, well, this is a different beast. Almost all AJ juniors wrestle like 90s strong-style heavyweights. The most junior-y Okada gets is a diving headbutt. The two have a really good, sub-10 minute match, which gives you the idea that they can have a really good match on a bigger stage. There is a scary part where Iwamoto's judo flip looks like it lands Okada right on his head, and I thought he was dead. 5. Dylan James & UTAMARO vs Yuma Aoyagi & Yoshitatsu UTAMARO sighting!! If you haven't seen UTAMARO, he was a Wrestle-1 guy trained by Tajiri and Animal Hamaguchi who went freelance (or was fired, idk), tried to make it in America, and now just shows up randomly. He comes to the ring wearing a camouflage kimono and a fox mask. He's listed as six foot tall and 232 lbs, lol, he's not that big. He's also very over with a particularly vocal part of the audience. He's also very OK as a wrestler. Like he will never set the world on fire I don't think, but he's more than adequate ring meat. Yuma apparently had a great singles match against James recently. Cannot confirm. UTAMARO wants a piece of Tatsu, and Aoyagi and James are, I guess, rivals, so they more-or-less pair off. Some fun heavyweight action, including some nice exchanges between Aoyagi and James, and UTAMARO doing a moonsault to nowhere that lands him square in the middle of the ring. After the bell, UTAMARO gives a promo and points at Tatsu alot, so I assume he's challenging for either the GAORA TV title or the Corona Belt. Either way: more UTAMARO! The fans love it. Hire this weird guy! 6. The Road to 7th Oudou Tournamen Six Man Tag Match: Shuji Ishikawa, Zeus & Jake Lee vs Kento Miyahara, Suwama & Naoya Nomura This is to get us all jazzed for the Ouduo Tournament, though only Jake Lee and Suwama face off in the first round. Otherwise, it's basically the top heavyweights in the company on randomized teams. Shuji and Suwama shake hands right away, indicating that they are bros for life and will not fight each other. Nomura shoves Kento around a bit to show him he's boss. Fans are into it. Nomura might legit be the #2 guy in the company right now. And anyway! These dudes all came to wrestle! Though there's some posturing and stuff to start things off, they really go at it. Six-man tags as main events really let everyone go in, do their flashiest shit, and get out. While I was watching, I was expecting a 30 minute draw, because who takes the pin? You want to keep Nomura and Lee hot; Zeus just won the tag titles; Kento is Kento. But Suwama and Ishikawa are lumbering giants. Hmmmm. Suwama solves this riddle for us by clobbering Kento when he tries to capture-suplex Ishikawa, letting his fellow giant of violence get the other hand and take the win. That's kinda weird, since Ishikawa has recently wrestled for the TC. But so has everyone in the match except Jake Lee (who has not wrestled for the TC since his return, BTW). Everyone gives a promo after the bell. When Suwama grabs the mic, he gets lots of laughs. Shit, the last time I saw Suwama on the mic he got lots of laughs. I'm imagining Wama with an effervescent, Michelle-Wolf-esque comedy persona. Jake Lee gets the last speech, confirming my suspicion that he's winning the Oudou tournament.

Watched this for shits and giggles. It was not particularly great. Best parts were the Hase-Nomura exchanges. And Nomura was the most over guy, which was nice to see. Hase is still pretty good-I’d watch him and Nomura do a nice, tight 8 minute singles match. The best that can be said about the legends team is that a 58 year old semi-retired wrestler and politician can still go.

Lost power for about 40 hours. House is remarkably unscathed. Trees less than 200 meters away were blown over into houses, so really dodged a bullet.

Already getting rain and wind this morning, with Dorian making landfall in Atlantic Canada later today. Pretty worried about the roof and the asbestos -shingle siding of my 80 year-old house.

Nomura v Kento had a very exciting and unpredictable ending sequence. I think Kento’s TC reign is going to get overlooked for various legit reasons—i.e. it’s AJPW, he’s wrestling the same ol’ Group of challengers, etc.—but he’s having an incredible year.

Finally saw IT cuz it’s on Netflix. It was pretty good—wish they’d opted for more conventional FX when possible.

Someone needs to update the GLOW edits so they wrestle like joshi legends.

Lol, that poster is amazing. What is Okada doing?