2023 Joshi Puroresu Discussion Thread

[Niners Fan in CT]

I saw Giulia speaking English, she seems to be fluent?  Or at least pretty decent.  I don't want her anywhere near WWE while Vince is hovering around.  I don't trust it.  

I'm perfectly fine with Giulia and Mercedes both staying in the NJPW/Stardom fold and never leaving.  Just keep building up women's wrestling around the world. They just did 5500+ fans last night.  I think that's even more than the 'Evolution' PPV that was headlined by Charlotte and Becky. 

Edit:  Actually, I don't think it's more than 'Evolution' but it's certainly the most for an all-women's promotion in a long time. 

Edited April 25, 2023 by Niners Fan in CT

[Elsalvajeloco]

15 minutes ago, Niners Fan in CT said:

I saw Giulia speaking English, she seems to be fluent?  Or at least pretty decent.  I don't want her anywhere near WWE while Vince is hovering around.  I don't trust it.  

I'm perfectly fine with Giulia and Mercedes both staying in the NJPW/Stardom fold and never leaving.  Just keep building up women's wrestling around the world. They just did 5500+ fans last night.  I think that's even more than the 'Evolution' PPV that was headlined by Charlotte and Becky. 

Edit:  Actually, I don't think it's more than 'Evolution' but it's certainly the most for an all-women's promotion in a long time. 

AFAIK, she isn't fluent at all (at least, speaking the language). When Mercedes said something to her last week or the week before, apparently her response was something along the lines of "I didn't understand anything but the curse words, bozo". However, it's clear she understands enough to retweet a lot of the English language accounts that follow her or make content directly referencing her. Someone made a "My Way" video for her feud with Tam, and she put it in her stories like 5 minutes later.

[Eivion]

People assume Giulia's speaks English fluently due to having been born in the UK, but Thekla has already confirmed she doesn't at least once or twice. Giulia's languages are Japanese and Italian. Aside from the obvious in Thekla, the English speakers of Stardom are Waka, Momo Kohgo, & Mina.

[Elsalvajeloco]

3 minutes ago, Eivion said:

People assume Giulia's speaks English fluently due to having been born in the UK, but Thekla has already confirmed she doesn't at least once or twice. Giulia's languages are Japanese and Italian. Aside from the obvious in Thekla, the English speakers of Stardom are Waka, Momo Kohgo, & Mina.

You're telling me Mayu's "I am brain....this is chicken!" quote doesn't make her an expert English speaker?

[Ace]

My favorite will always be "Hello, my name is I am Mayu."

 

[nofuture]

Rossy really taking his victory lap. 

Spoiler

The other Tam is recent departed from Ice Ribbon's Nao Ishikawa.

 

[Eivion]

2 hours ago, Elsalvajeloco said:

You're telling me Mayu's "I am brain....this is chicken!" quote doesn't make her an expert English speaker?

You joke, but I sadly think I have seen at least once over the years someone thinking Mayu could speak English.

[Elsalvajeloco]

1 hour ago, Eivion said:

You joke, but I sadly think I have seen at least once over the years someone thinking Mayu could speak English.

Maybe it is cause she is so self assured that people believe she could. For example, the quote in question that I mentioned. When Momo Kohgo translated what Mayu said and what she meant by that (I think Momo may have even been confused lol), Mayu nodding her head with the upmost confidence in agreement and saying, "yeah...yeah" gives off the vibe she isn't quite self-aware enough.

I mean I just learned about her backstory before she became a wrestler some months back, and now it all makes sense. She is an unique individual to say the least.

[dragonzombie]

I was right about 

Spoiler

Nao as new Tam.

 

[Eivion]

16 minutes ago, Elsalvajeloco said:

Maybe it is cause she is so self assured that people believe she could. For example, the quote in question that I mentioned. When Momo Kohgo translated what Mayu said and what she meant by that (I think Momo may have even been confused lol), Mayu nodding her head with the upmost confidence in agreement and saying, "yeah...yeah" gives off the vibe she isn't quite self-aware enough.

I mean I just learned about her backstory before she became a wrestler some months back, and now it all makes sense. She is an unique individual to say the least.

I was always pretty sure Kagetsu outing Mayu as their dumbass friend during their anniversary show was not a joke. 

Edited April 25, 2023 by Eivion

[J.H.]

Rossy must really want that WON award for best booker with Tam v. Tam

James

[Stefanie Sparkleface]

For those not familiar with Nao Ishikawa, I think she's pretty good with a caveat... when she's healthy. She has a condition that causes occasional cerebrospinal fluid leaks, and when that flares up she'll be sidelined for a couple of months at a time. This delayed her debut for several months, and took her out last year for a couple of months as well. She also had to have an emergency surgery that sidelined her, and then had a broken wrist that made her miss a scheduled CMLL tour with Tsukasa Fujimoto and Tsukushi Haruka in 2021 (Momo Kohgo took her place). Poor thing has been cursed. But when she's out there and able to wrestle, she's got a boatload of charisma and she's a lot of fun to watch.

She is also known for having a voracious appetite. She was on a competition eating show along with Lady C and Kyoko Inoue where they defeated a competitive eater in an udon challenge, and Nao anchored the team. There are videos on the Ice Ribbon YouTube channel of her going to food trucks and taking on local eating challenges. It's... kind of scarily impressive.

The reason she left Ice Ribbon is because she was part of a group named KISSmeT Princess with Rina Amikura (of COLOR'S) and Misa Kagura (of Just Tap Out). In fall of last year, Ice Ribbon made the decision to partner with Actwresgirlz exclusively and stop using all other freelancers as well as working with other groups starting in 2023. There were two problems with this.

1) They didn't tell any of the roster members (aside from Asahi, who brokered the deal)
2) KISSmeT Princess had become rather popular, even having their own two day festival in November called Super Princess Party, and going this route meant the group would have to dissolve, as Rina Amikura and Misa Kagura would no longer be booked

The roster rejected the partnership and Ice Ribbon ended up backing out of the deal, but it was too late to save KISSmeT Princess - Rina Amikura got scheduled for Triangle Derby and got booked fairly regularly for other groups. Instead of continuing KISSmeT Princess with just Nao and Misa, the decision was made to pair Misa with Sumika Yanagawa as 1111, their regular team outside of Ice Ribbon, and, well, Nao was pissed. She stopped attending the regular Princess Party shows (the shows that, mind you, were put together exclusively for KISSmeT Princess; she said there was no point anymore because KISSmeT Princess no longer existed). She changed her gimmick from being a princess to being an adventurer. She then quit a couple of months later (and revealed that the adventurer gimmick was that she was "trying to find herself" because her princess gimmick was taken from her).

The decision was a pretty boneheaded one by Ice Ribbon, admittedly. I'm not sure AWG was worth all this trouble (this move also upset Asahi, too, since she was the one who brokered the partnership and saw it all fall apart, then took it very poorly because she felt her work was worthless, and is now with AWG on a loan).

But alas. We move on. Hopefully Nao can stay healthy and she gets to do more than Tam Nakano cosplay because she is, as mentioned, a lot of fun.

[Elsalvajeloco]

We must stop Rossy Ogawa at all costs.

[Eivion]

7 hours ago, Sparkleface said:

For those not familiar with Nao Ishikawa, I think she's pretty good with a caveat... when she's healthy. She has a condition that causes occasional cerebrospinal fluid leaks, and when that flares up she'll be sidelined for a couple of months at a time. This delayed her debut for several months, and took her out last year for a couple of months as well. She also had to have an emergency surgery that sidelined her, and then had a broken wrist that made her miss a scheduled CMLL tour with Tsukasa Fujimoto and Tsukushi Haruka in 2021 (Momo Kohgo took her place). Poor thing has been cursed. But when she's out there and able to wrestle, she's got a boatload of charisma and she's a lot of fun to watch.

She is also known for having a voracious appetite. She was on a competition eating show along with Lady C and Kyoko Inoue where they defeated a competitive eater in an udon challenge, and Nao anchored the team. There are videos on the Ice Ribbon YouTube channel of her going to food trucks and taking on local eating challenges. It's... kind of scarily impressive.

The reason she left Ice Ribbon is because she was part of a group named KISSmeT Princess with Rina Amikura (of COLOR'S) and Misa Kagura (of Just Tap Out). In fall of last year, Ice Ribbon made the decision to partner with Actwresgirlz exclusively and stop using all other freelancers as well as working with other groups starting in 2023. There were two problems with this.

1) They didn't tell any of the roster members (aside from Asahi, who brokered the deal)
2) KISSmeT Princess had become rather popular, even having their own two day festival in November called Super Princess Party, and going this route meant the group would have to dissolve, as Rina Amikura and Misa Kagura would no longer be booked

The roster rejected the partnership and Ice Ribbon ended up backing out of the deal, but it was too late to save KISSmeT Princess - Rina Amikura got scheduled for Triangle Derby and got booked fairly regularly for other groups. Instead of continuing KISSmeT Princess with just Nao and Misa, the decision was made to pair Misa with Sumika Yanagawa as 1111, their regular team outside of Ice Ribbon, and, well, Nao was pissed. She stopped attending the regular Princess Party shows (the shows that, mind you, were put together exclusively for KISSmeT Princess; she said there was no point anymore because KISSmeT Princess no longer existed). She changed her gimmick from being a princess to being an adventurer. She then quit a couple of months later (and revealed that the adventurer gimmick was that she was "trying to find herself" because her princess gimmick was taken from her).

The decision was a pretty boneheaded one by Ice Ribbon, admittedly. I'm not sure AWG was worth all this trouble (this move also upset Asahi, too, since she was the one who brokered the partnership and saw it all fall apart, then took it very poorly because she felt her work was worthless, and is now with AWG on a loan).

But alas. We move on. Hopefully Nao can stay healthy and she gets to do more than Tam Nakano cosplay because she is, as mentioned, a lot of fun.

So we probably shouldn't expect Nao to join Stardom or be a regular per say? Thanks for the info. I was wondering what story here was when ishikawa announced her departure and Asahi went on loan. I just saw fans not being surprised and blaming the company. 

[Stefanie Sparkleface]

30 minutes ago, Eivion said:

So we probably shouldn't expect Nao to join Stardom or be a regular per say? Thanks for the info. I was wondering what story here was when ishikawa announced her departure and Asahi went on loan. I just saw fans not being surprised and blaming the company. 

/me shakes her Magic 8-Ball

"Cannot predict now." Huh. Well that's accurate! It's really hard to say for sure. She's had a bad run of luck when it comes to injuries and health, and as mentioned she has that condition with regards to cerebrospinal fluid. If she were to be a regular, I don't think she'd be in too many singles matches, instead in tags and trios, which suits her best. KISSmeT Princess was a perfect fit for her because it enabled her to protect her health and use her charisma with wrestlers she meshed really well with.

And glad to pass along info. Yappy did a stream on Twitch shortly after Nao's press conference to explain what happened and revealed pretty much all of that, and Yappy is been a pretty trustworthy source of info. (She also revealed that there was some pretty awful bullying that took place at the dojo and the heavy implication was that Risa Sera and Mochi Miyagi were the ones behind it.) There are those who try to discredit Yappy by saying that she is reliant on the company to maintain her visa and paints the company in a positive light, but at the same time, let's present both potential reasons as to why Nao Ishikawa left and why Asahi went on loan.

- The reason she provided (and shared in my earlier post), which makes the company look like it has some really poor communication.
- The reason being peddled by most folks on Reddit, which is that Nao and Asahi wanted to leave because they were "doing too many jobs".

I can't imagine any world where someone functioning as a company spokesperson trying to paint the company in a positive light would go "yeah we made a bunch of really boneheaded decisions and it upset people" if the reality was "these two wrestlers didn't like losing a bunch", but maybe I'm too much of an optimist.

[Eivion]

1 hour ago, Sparkleface said:

/me shakes her Magic 8-Ball

"Cannot predict now." Huh. Well that's accurate! It's really hard to say for sure. She's had a bad run of luck when it comes to injuries and health, and as mentioned she has that condition with regards to cerebrospinal fluid. If she were to be a regular, I don't think she'd be in too many singles matches, instead in tags and trios, which suits her best. KISSmeT Princess was a perfect fit for her because it enabled her to protect her health and use her charisma with wrestlers she meshed really well with.

And glad to pass along info. Yappy did a stream on Twitch shortly after Nao's press conference to explain what happened and revealed pretty much all of that, and Yappy is been a pretty trustworthy source of info. (She also revealed that there was some pretty awful bullying that took place at the dojo and the heavy implication was that Risa Sera and Mochi Miyagi were the ones behind it.) There are those who try to discredit Yappy by saying that she is reliant on the company to maintain her visa and paints the company in a positive light, but at the same time, let's present both potential reasons as to why Nao Ishikawa left and why Asahi went on loan.

- The reason she provided (and shared in my earlier post), which makes the company look like it has some really poor communication.
- The reason being peddled by most folks on Reddit, which is that Nao and Asahi wanted to leave because they were "doing too many jobs".

I can't imagine any world where someone functioning as a company spokesperson trying to paint the company in a positive light would go "yeah we made a bunch of really boneheaded decisions and it upset people" if the reality was "these two wrestlers didn't like losing a bunch", but maybe I'm too much of an optimist.

I can see it being a case where there is a bit of truth in all of it. People aren't really wrong that Yappy is dependent on the company. Her talking about this stuff is pretty much the company trying to get in front of issues. Sometimes that does mean the company taking some responsibility. Doesn't mean she is lying or wrong per say though either. 

[Stefanie Sparkleface]

15 minutes ago, Eivion said:

I can see it being a case where there is a bit of truth in all of it. People aren't really wrong that Yappy is dependent on the company. Her talking about this stuff is pretty much the company trying to get in front of issues. Sometimes that does mean the company taking some responsibility. Doesn't mean she is lying or wrong per say though either. 

Yeah, that was my thought too. Like yeah, her visa is definitely thanks to Neoplus (Ice Ribbon's parent company), but she revealed a LOT of things on that stream that I doubt she would have revealed unless she had permission to do so, nor do I think she would have revealed if it was as simple as "these wrestlers were unhappy about having to do jobs".

It's one of those situations where folks have made up their minds about what they think the issue is, and refuse to listen to any information otherwise. Nuance? On the internet? IMPOSSIBLE!!!

[lostinube]

 

[dragonzombie]

Stardom roster page updated, with the Cosmic Angels/Club Venus split. And Unagi removed.

https://wwr-stardom.com/fighters/

[John E. Dynamite]

Finally watched the Big STARDOM show and I have absolutely no idea how A) anyone thinks the Mercedes/Mayu match was too short B) isn't gushing over the Syuri/Hashimoto match. In my Top 10 for 2023 immediately. Chihiro's emotive chonky suplexes are exactly what that company is missing, Syuri looked like the shooter she actually is, and going no-pinfalls nipped the neverending kickout problem right in the bud.

[Stefanie Sparkleface]

Ice Ribbon revealed the lineup for Hamuko Hoshi's produced show on May 14, with a main event of Hamuko vs. Hiroyo Matsumoto, then ASUKA making her Ice Ribbon debut teaming with Makoto against Ibuki Hoshi and Ryo Mizunami in the semimain. There's also a Hanako Nakamori vs. Kaho Matsushita match, the first time Hanako has been in Ice Ribbon since 2016, and Yuu vs. Yappy as well.

So uh... that's kinda cool? It's at Shin-Kiba 1st Ring so the hope is that it'll be livestreamed.

[dragonzombie]

[Stefanie Sparkleface]

Stephanie Vaquer is awesome. Since they definitely won't book it for this show, I'd like to manifest a Stephanie Vaquer/Willow Nightingale match into happening at some point.

[J.H.]

So what is going on with Unagi?

Is she done with Stardom altogether?

James

[Eivion]

16 minutes ago, J.H. said:

So what is going on with Unagi?

Is she done with Stardom altogether?

James

She went freelance last year. I assume they are still open to using her occasionally, but she isn't around enough to keep on the roster page now. 

Edited April 29, 2023 by Eivion