Kevin Wilson

On one hand, its dumb to imply it is related in any way. On the other hand, they really should have known that wouldn't go over well the week of the playoffs and be mentioned repeatedly if they didn't win, regardless of why they didn't win. It will blow over quickly, by the weekend at the latest, but no one should be surprised by this development.

Didn't all of them still get suspended? Is he the only lawyer that takes USADA cases?

This is the Sendai Girls' show from earlier today we are talking about, for those that don't feel like poking around: Mika Shirahime and Syuri vs. Mio Momono and Konami Cassandra Miyagi vs. Hikaru Shida Hiroyo Matsumoto and Eiger vs. Meiko Satomura and Alex Lee DASH Chisako and KAORU vs. Command Bolshoi and Kyoko Kimura Sendai Girls World Championship: Chihiro Hashimoto vs. Aja Kong Every match has at least one wrestler I like, luckily it does air next week on niconico which means it should be in full. Hopefully more Sendai Girls' events will make it onto nico this year, I have no idea how that process works but its the easiest way to keep up with Joshi so the more promotions that are on it the better.

I figured the path all along was Chihiro would win one easy defense so she wasn't a one-and-done, then lose it to an established vet. She is so early in her career I don't think a prolonged run with her beating long time vets along the way would have been the best move, sometimes the fun is in the chase.

Stardom doesn't have a working relationship with RIZIN, none of the wrestlers on the Expo were from Stardom. It was just a collection of Joshi wrestlers from different promotions (Marvelous, WAVE, Actress girl'Z, JWP, and Ice Ribbon all had wrestlers on the show), I took it more as a fun one-off type thing for the Expo than any promotion having a deal with them, although they better not somehow convince Nagayo to have a MMA match. Alpha Female has been a regular in Stardom in the past but hasn't been in the promotion since last spring and is a Freelancer, I don't think she is representing any particular promotion in RIZIN. Stardom is apparently working on a working relationship with Ring of Honor however, judging by the dirtsheets and Delirious being at the Stardom show last week. ROH has never been particularly serious about their women's division, but if they are going to try to be than working with Stardom isn't a bad place to start.

I haven't played a single one of the Lego games, even though they cover a lot of series that I like (Star Wars in particular). Am I missing anything? I assume they must be at least moderately fun if there are so many, but it also is concerning how fast they pump them out. Reviews are always solid but no one ever says they are 'must play.' Anyone play them and can recommend one or are they all just kinda the same mindless fun?

Trying to decide if this is the worst duo of teams to ever play each other in the Playoffs. Not their potential/without injuries, but how they currently are today. Poor Connor, he just isn't ready for this.

I think it would have to be AJ by default, since I think he is the best in-ring wrestler they currently have. If they felt really inspired by New Japan they could somehow do Styles/Nakamura.

Yea this is New Japan's dead zone so if he needed some time off, this would be probably the best couple months to take it. But I wouldn't be concerned about him burning a bridge with WWE, as mentioned I think only three people ever have permanently burned bridges with WWE (Jarrett, Savage, and Chyna) and there are dozens more that said/did far worse than Omega that WWE welcomed. Vince generally cares more about making money than staying mad. He may job you out after you sign, but he'll give you that contract.

I guess this is my fault for not poking around enough, but someone on Twitter alerted me today of a way to buy Tokyo Joshi Pro via a streaming service. I am not sure if this will change once DDT Universe comes out in a few weeks, but for now I get to watch the first full Tokyo Joshi Pro event I've ever seen. Not that I expect anyone else to be equally insane to pay for this, but you can find the site here. They have PG-13 content too so I wouldn't open that at work. Still no way to watch Diana. My Holy Grail But in the last few months I have gotten to watch non-televised WAVE, Stardom, JWP, REINA, Ice Ribbon, HERO, and now Tokyo Joshi Pro events so I think overall I have been successful. Finding the televised stuff is easy but I'm stubborn and need more.

New Year, New Thread. For any discussions about what is happening in Japan, except for Joshi (which has its own thread), post it here. If you want to discuss a big event, feel free to start its own thread for it.

I think GBH is just an occasional tag team, unless they got new members and I missed it. Team 2000 was just a fun one-night return type deal. Still a lot of factions. CHAOS is the most useless one.

I also chuckle at the idea that everyone has pushed someone. I am 33 and I've never pushed or poked anyone in the eye as an adult, unless it was a friend and it was a friendly push. Maybe on the playground when was 12. I'd call the police in a heartbeat if an overly angry person was pushing me and poking me in the eye, what they did when they got there would be their business.

So I did something... unique. Companies like Panini and Leaf sometimes give away/sell special packs at conventions, parties, or for other special reasons that are never sold retail. Some are for breakers, some are for holidays, all kinds of reasons. Anyway, I purchased a set of 25 various packs for about $100, and I got an odd variety of cards: Quite the assortment. As far as value goes, the Booker is likely worth the most since its a low serial jersey rookie, sells for around $25 I'd guess. Beyond that, what you see are a bunch of cards worth between $5 and $15, so I got a bunch of little hits but no big hits. More importantly, they were a lot of fun to open since I had l literally no idea what I would get, I mean I got two pylon cards, two jersey cards, an autograph card, three cards numbered less than 10, just a fun variety.

I enjoy going back and readying what people thought of shows closer to when they happened, offers a different perspective. Like reading how much people seemed to hate AtoZ and GAEA (not saying everyone did but I read a lot of negative shit from that time period about both) back before I got into Joshi. It doesn't change my opinion of the shows but watching something ten years later is obviously different than watching it at the time.

I don't think I've ever purchased a digital game for consoles unless it was really marked down, but I also like to sell my games after I beat them to get most of the value back which I can't do for digital. I do like the inconvenience of digital games, but not the price point. And things like 'digital art books' and 'digital comics' mean nothing to me.

I couldn't even find the Stardom thread over there so I must be blind. Yea I am not to the main matches yet but everything things good but not great. Nothing got a ton of time, it seems like they wanted to put on a show with a lot of different match types/themes plus have every title defended, so its a bit bloated.

Just got back from seeing it. I really enjoyed it, I didn't think it was slow as the story stayed interesting and moving. I didn't read this entire thread but I do think that Star Wars fans are both the best and the worst. Star Wars fans are so devoted, and that's awesome, but like Star Trek fans sometimes they get a bit carried away. Science fiction movies have never cared about making the 'time' work out, and cameos are always just supposed to be something fun for old fans. I mean Stan Lee is in all his movies, I don't think it kills the aura, its something that movies have been doing forever and its not something that is intended to be over-thought. Although fans over-analyzing a two second throw-away scene is a very Star Wars Nerd thing to do I thought the whole cast was great, there wasn't any character I thought later was poorly cast or acted, pretty much everything worked. I really have no complaints about it, it didn't have the epic feel of TFA but as a side story it was about as good as I could have hoped for. Looking forward to seeing it a second time this weekend with my parents (their first time seeing it) as they aren't hardcore Star Wars fans like I am and I like to get a different opinion from those that just see it as a sci-fi action movie and nothing more going into it.

It would be hard to tell between movies, shows, toys, etc. but also subtracting marketing, production costs, additional salaries, etc. I don't imagine they technically have made it back yet since their "take home" for the two movies is probably less than 1.3 billion (I saw an article that had Disney's profit on Force Awakens at 780 million which seems reasonable and Rogue One will be less than that), and I can't see them making a profit of over 2.7 billion on a cartoon, video games, toys, and other merchandise to get up to 4 billion. I would guess based on no real knowledge of how their finances work that they would have made their money back by the time the Han Solo movie finishes up. Most of the articles I have seen estimate that Force Awakens generated about 6 billion in sales, but that is before subtracting all the costs so I assume Disney doesn't see it as making their money back quite yet. Also, keep in mind they paid for it in 2012 but it was three years before the movie started bringing in the bulk of their profits, so they spent a lot more than 4 billion I am sure in those years on additional staffing, R&D, etc. I am sure their books are more complicated than anything I could ever imagine. There are also those things like Disney can show previews for their other movies before Star Wars that benefit indirectly but its hard to put a price tag on.

Going back and watching Cinderella 2013. What a stacked card. It took place right before I got into Joshi so I remember nothing about the impression of it at the time, I need to go see if any old threads at joshifans have any haters complaining about it so I know what people thought. But it has about six matches I'm really looking forward to, funny seeing even back in 2013 poor Io was battling the big bad gaijin.

I only read a few 'predictions' but Rogue One so far seems to be out-performing what I saw predicted. A few places said it "might" top the money list for movies that came out in 2016 but it almost already has for domestic and it may for global also which would be impressive since Star Wars isn't as much a global brand as super hero movies. I now can't find an updated predictions but I assume that 550 mil/1 billion won't be an issue. I never went into the spoiler thread since I just saw it this week myself, but I am not sure why it did better than expected. I think people forget sometimes that if movies come out in Dec/Jan, are quality movies, and appeal to a large base it is likely to do really well. There is so little competition and people are off work, movies just kinda hover for months. It seems to happen every year, I remember that Frozen shocked people with how much it made but it just kinda floated along making money every weekend. As a Star Wars fan I am glad it did well, as since its not a fluffy happy kids movie I was afraid if it didn't meet expectations that Disney would dumb down future off-shoot movies.

If given the time, Kairi/Konami vs. KLR/Newell has a real chance to steal the show on 1/8. Even though its just a house show I am really looking forward to that match, its a unique pairing but I know I like three of them and as stated I've heard good things about Newell. There is always some concern about a wrestler adapting well to a new environment but its much easier to hide that in tag matches if there is any early awkwardness.

I honestly have never seen Newell but people I trust said she was good so I am just going off of that. I have enjoyed Baszler, she wrestles as she should wrestle - strength/MMA spots without trying to do more than she probably should be doing at her experience level. I'd be a little scared if she had a 20 min singles match as I dunno how that would be, but she's good at what she does within her limits.

Stardom is starting January really hot, in regards to what I personally like anyway. I think all the gaijins they brought in range from good to great (Viper, Shayna Baszler, Nixon Newell, and Kay Lee Ray), and it looks like Konami is wrestling on at least some of the shows since she teams with Kairi on 1/8. Shame about Hana breaking her wrist since it looks like she will miss Kyoko's retirement show, but at least it doesn't seem to be a major injury.

That was the oddest promo/stipulation/result in recent memory. Either something in their plans radically changed (like the rumor that Taker was supposed to lose but wouldn't, which I find unlikely) or its just an example of WWE booking week to week with no long term planning.