2024 Joshi Discussion Thread

[username]

23 hours ago, sabremike said:

Kenny Omega never says anything bad about anyone so for him to go after Rossy like that is a real eye opener.

I was shocked reading what he said, after having voluntarily worked with Scurll and Chaysn Rance I never pegged Kenny as someone who was bothered by grown men creeping on underage women >_>

[Corwo]

Arisa Nakajima announced at today's SEAdLINNNG show that she's retiring in August. Her final opponent will be Hiroyo Matsumoto. It's great that she's going out on her own terms, but I'd be lying if I said this didn't sting a little. Nakajima's one of the best wrestlers of the 2010s/2020s and someone who made every card she was on better. https://twitter.com/elduderino112/status/1781908871000543567

[Kevin Wilson]

I'll always have a special place in my heart for Arisa Nakajima, as due to when she peaked I don't think she gets the recognition today that she deserves. Unfortunately, she was the best wrestler in a smaller promotion for many years before streaming was used by smaller promotions (JWP), and since leaving JWP and Joshi got easier to watch, she kept a pretty light schedule as she hasn't topped 50 matches in a year since 2016. I guess she'll probably be best remembered by Western fans for her tag team with Fujimoto (which was excellent of course) but her matches with Kana were so, so good. I do think in-ring she's one of the most talented Joshi wrestlers of the last 15 years, easily in my Top 10. But I'm always glad when wrestlers can retire on their own terms, maybe her last injury scared her a bit and she decided to hang it up.

[Stefanie Sparkleface]

This certainly explains why Tsukka mentioned that her return is a limited one, it wouldn't surprise me if she came back just to support Arisa's last few months in the ring and help make her final matches a little bit easier on the body since she's had some rough injuries to come back from. That's really cool if that's the case.

Arisa is very good, I wish she got more credit for her skills, but she came along at a pretty down period for joshi. She did a great amount of work to help revitalize the scene and I'll miss seeing her, but she's earned her rest.

[assfax]

I only first saw her on that first season of Monday Magic and what came to mind was "This dude is PISSED!".  Bret Hart quality stagecraft.  Unless she really was just blasting people as hard as she could. What a hardass. Is most of her best stuff just scattered around youtube and archive?

[nofuture]

22 minutes ago, assfax said:

I only first saw her on that first season of Monday Magic and what came to mind was "This dude is PISSED!".  Bret Hart quality stagecraft.  Unless she really was just blasting people as hard as she could. What a hardass. Is most of her best stuff just scattered around youtube and archive?

Her matches with Asuka are always a good place to start:

 

[dragonzombie]

They're bringing New Blood back, on 06.21

https://wwr-stardom.com/schedule/20240621_nb13/?mc_id=1025

[Corwo]

The 4/21 SEAdLINNNG main event is a good all-star tag match that some might like even more than I did. It was Best Friends & Sareee vs. Hiroyo Matsumoto, Hanako Nakamori & Miyuki Takase.

[lostinube]

NJPW to fully acquire Bushiroad Fight

Quote

At a meeting of New Japan Pro-Wrestling’s board of directors April 22, it was determined that NJPW will fully acquire all stakes in Bushiroad Fight Co. Ltd. (henceforth “Bushiroad Fight”, due to rename itself STARDOM Co. Ltd. from June 28) from parent company Bushiroad Inc. With this acquisition, Bushiroad Fight will become a fully owned subsidiary of New Japan Pro-Wrestling effective June 28.

https://www.njpw1972.com/175523

So basically, NJPW is "buying" Stardom.

Edited April 23 by lostinube

[lostinube]

Show isn't over yet but Tsukasa Fujimoto just showed up at All Star Grand Queendom.

[lostinube]

Only the High Speed title changed hands at Queendom.

It'll be Best Friends vs Mayu and whoever she chooses (she said she has a lot of friends).

Thekla came back and joined Oedo Tai while SLK was booted out of same and is maybe joining up with Tam, who saved her from the beat down.

Ami Sohrei and Natsupoi will take on each other to see who challenges Saori next.

Edited April 27 by lostinube

[Stefanie Sparkleface]

3 hours ago, lostinube said:

Show isn't over yet but Tsukasa Fujimoto just showed up at All Star Grand Queendom.

That is great. Stardom collaborating with groups like Ice Ribbon and Wave (if I'm not mistaken, a couple of Stardom wrestlers are in this year's Catch the Wave) can only benefit everyone. I'd love to see Stardom working with all the smaller groups, like Pure-J or Diana as well. Things work better when there's collaboration. Hopefully this will still be going on when Ibuki Hoshi and Kaho Matsushita are back in action, because those two would be great in this kind of environment.

It'd be massively beneficial for everyone, really. Stardom's younger/less-experienced wrestlers can get more time and variance in working with different people in different environments (Ice Ribbon, Pure-J, and Diana's dojo shows are perfect for this), and Stardom can benefit by having people like Tsukasa Fujimoto or Hanako Nakamori come in and give some fresh matchups to the top of Stardom's card. The smaller groups get more eyes, Stardom gets fresh matchups, everyone gets more experience, it's win-win all around as far as I'm concerned.

And I really do hope they work with Pure-J too, because Crea and AKARI are both great and I think they deserve more attention on them.

[Mr. Monday Morning]

Mayu - Sareee was great. Not sure it quite hit the heights, maybe there will be a rematch, but still very good. Will have to rewatch the Mayu-Syuri match to compare.

4 way tag was super fun as well, just non-stop throughout.

Meltear bumped their absolute asses off, not quite sure what it really accomplishes but it went better than I thought.

Oh and Hanan did very well vs Saori. I was a little worried as the crowd were burnt out but she showed real poise just letting the match play out and allowing them to come back into it.  Impressive for someone so young (IMO, anyway)

[lostinube]

3 hours ago, Stefanie Sparkleface said:

That is great. Stardom collaborating with groups like Ice Ribbon and Wave (if I'm not mistaken, a couple of Stardom wrestlers are in this year's Catch the Wave) can only benefit everyone. I'd love to see Stardom working with all the smaller groups, like Pure-J or Diana as well. Things work better when there's collaboration. Hopefully this will still be going on when Ibuki Hoshi and Kaho Matsushita are back in action, because those two would be great in this kind of environment.

It'd be massively beneficial for everyone, really. Stardom's younger/less-experienced wrestlers can get more time and variance in working with different people in different environments (Ice Ribbon, Pure-J, and Diana's dojo shows are perfect for this), and Stardom can benefit by having people like Tsukasa Fujimoto or Hanako Nakamori come in and give some fresh matchups to the top of Stardom's card. The smaller groups get more eyes, Stardom gets fresh matchups, everyone gets more experience, it's win-win all around as far as I'm concerned.

And I really do hope they work with Pure-J too, because Crea and AKARI are both great and I think they deserve more attention on them.

Tall Saya and Ranna Yagami are going to be in Catch the Wave, albeit in different blocks. And Mei Seira will be on the 4/29 Diana card taking on Haruka Umesaki for the Diana title.

[dragonzombie]

High Speed Chicken Borb Saya.

I'm waiting for dancing Starlight Kid in Cosmic Angels.

[Ace]

Hopefully, this means Saki gets a rest. She's been wrestling with a screwed up ankle/foot for over a week.

Thekla's aim is to kill idol culture in Stardom. She's going after Mina first, then wants to go after Tam and Poi.

AWG's CatMASK Calico was spotted practicing at Marigold's gym.

Edited Saturday at 07:19 PM by Ace

[Eivion]

7 hours ago, Stefanie Sparkleface said:

I'd love to see Stardom working with all the smaller groups, like Pure-J or Diana as well.

They have been working with Diana for two years now.

[Stefanie Sparkleface]

47 minutes ago, Eivion said:

They have been working with Diana for two years now.

I mean with more regularity; an occasional appearance every few months is nice but I don't know how helpful that is.

 

1 hour ago, Ace said:

AWG's CatMASK Calico was spotted practicing at Marigold's gym.

HOW WOULD THEY HAVE KNOWN?!!?! KAYFABE!!!

[Eivion]

25 minutes ago, Stefanie Sparkleface said:

I mean with more regularity; an occasional appearance every few months is nice but I don't know how helpful that is.

If it becomes a norm it stops being special for both sides. That said, I did think it was more often than it actually was after doing a quick check so it would be nice to see it increase a pinch.

[Stefanie Sparkleface]

7 minutes ago, Eivion said:

If it becomes a norm it stops being special for both sides. That said, I did think it was more often than it actually was after doing a quick check so it would be nice to see it increase a pinch.

I'm not sure we're on the same page. If the younger wrestlers are going to smaller groups for experience, I'm not sure it needs to be "special". Venues like Ice Ribbon's dojo or Post di Amistad barely seat more than 60 anyway. If you're saying that they shouldn't be on the dojo-level shows, then fine, groups like Ice Ribbon do a larger venue like Skip City or 176Box each month, run... I dunno, Lady C vs. Totoro Satsuki there. Or Pure-J typically has an Itabashi Green Hall show each month, send someone to that. It seems realistic.

[Eivion]

48 minutes ago, Stefanie Sparkleface said:

I'm not sure we're on the same page. If the younger wrestlers are going to smaller groups for experience, I'm not sure it needs to be "special". Venues like Ice Ribbon's dojo or Post di Amistad barely seat more than 60 anyway. If you're saying that they shouldn't be on the dojo-level shows, then fine, groups like Ice Ribbon do a larger venue like Skip City or 176Box each month, run... I dunno, Lady C vs. Totoro Satsuki there. Or Pure-J typically has an Itabashi Green Hall show each month, send someone to that. It seems realistic.

You are correct. We were not on same page. I totally missed that you meant younger wrestlers. I'm all for more that. I dug the New Blood stuff specifically for that. Wish it was done more often.

[Stefanie Sparkleface]

28 minutes ago, Eivion said:

You are correct. We were not on same page. I totally missed that you meant younger wrestlers. I'm all for more that. I dug the New Blood stuff specifically for that. Wish it was done more often.

Yeah, with Ibuki and Kaho out, Ice Ribbon's best role is Tsukka functioning as a bridge to other promotions and having their younger wrestlers come there to get more experience with their fellow younger wrestlers and steady veterans like Hamuko Hoshi, Totoro Satsuki, and Kyuuri that aren't going to be big draws or anything. Pure-J's going to be the same way; Hanako Nakamori and Leon might be a fresh match and wouldn't be out of place at the top of the line elsewhere, but the rest of the roster (Crea, AKARI, Momo Tani, Rydeen Hagane, Chie Ozora) are solid matches to help the younger talent grow by the fact that they can give them a weekly match where they can put in some time.

Think of it this way, there's a ton of value in getting to go work a twelve minute singles match and work out the kinks at Kame Dojo against Crea before trying to do it against Mayu Iwatani, and Stardom's shows right now are too full, even with the exodus, to give them that sort of time. New Blood helps, but having a partnership with all of these other groups would be nice to see. I get the feeling Stardom would rather not try to manage a developmental brand, so why not work with smaller groups? 

[Stefanie Sparkleface]

Yuuki Minami quit Ice Ribbon today in a move that wasn't entirely unexpected. She only wrestled six actual matches, none of which were at the dojo. Of the Challengers, Yuuki, Yuu Hanaya, and Mayuka Koike appeared the least likely to stick around, as none have appeared on dojo shows, whereas Asuka Fujitaki, Mifu Ashida, and Nanae Furukawa have all had matches there. (Nanae even appeared as a second on Saturday's dojo show without wrestling.)

Of course, the rumor mill is churning that she'll show up in Marigold (because it seems any movement will get people thinking someone's going to Marigold), but this seems unlikely. Yuuki is busy with her idol group CLIPCLIP, and this is likely a situation similar to Amu Yumesaki and Aiki, where they were idols who tried wrestling out and found it wasn't for them after a few matches. If Yuuki does continue to wrestle, she'll need to be a lot more active; she was only working a match every few weeks, and while she has a lot of potential, she doesn't seem to put a lot towards using that potential. Time will tell.

[dragonzombie]

Tam whispering in Starlight Kid's ear is so silly and cute.

[Stefanie Sparkleface]

I'm starting to think the ICExInfinity league is cursed. Totoro Satsuki has a knee injury and has withdrawn from the league. No word yet on how serious the injury is and if it means she'll also need to vacate the International Ribbon Tag Titles that she holds with Yuna Manase. Ice Ribbon has said she'll be replaced in the league, and they'll need to do so quickly because her first match was scheduled against Yappy on May 4.

As I was typing this, Unagi Sayaka sent a tweet out mocking Totoro for her injury and saying that you can't just make wrestling happy by saying it, so she'll clean Ice Ribbon up and make it happy herself. Could be hinting that she's the replacement, could be Unagi being good at promotion! Too soon to say either way, but if Totoro's out and they can get Unagi for all of Totoro's dates, that'd be a heck of a replacement.