Joshi Puroresu Discussion Thread

[Hoope]

Well there goes all my caring for this tournament 

[Sky Blue Sam]

Toni Storm is really good. Seen her have quite a few good matches in the UK, and she's not afraid to take a beating as the absolute shellacking she took from Hojo and Alpha Female at the BEW/Stardom show proved.

By the by, what's Act Yasukawa's current status? I know she's retired and been managing Oedo Tai, but I've not noticed her on some recent shows. I especially thought she'd appear at the 16/6 show for Oedo Tai v Thunder Rock, but no. All the members seem to wear her t-shirt in interviews, so is she just having time off?

[J.H.]

She has left wrestling to pursue other ventures. I think she said that she would be back but not for quite some time

James

[donsem43]

10 hours ago, Sky Blue Sam said:

Toni Storm is really good. Seen her have quite a few good matches in the UK, and she's not afraid to take a beating as the absolute shellacking she took from Hojo and Alpha Female at the BEW/Stardom show proved.

Her match with Io in the SWA Title tournament final is up at Stardom World. It's pretty good, looking forward to seeing how she does in the next few months.

[Kevin Wilson]

I know it has been a dead sub-forum for awhile, just wanted to make sure that Joshi fans saw that I am uploading older Joshi matches in the Matches folder. Hope to have a new match at least every two or three days, trying to find bigger matches that aren't currently uploaded on Youtube or DM.

[Eivion]

You have any 10-women tags from the 80s?

[Kevin Wilson]

Maybe, do you have any dates of famous/important ones? I am woefully behind in my personal education of 80s and 90s Joshi, still catching up.

[Eivion]

Not offhand. Its actually why i was asking. I recall seeing something about one with Dump's Army that I think I saw with a good rating, but I can't remember where and never found the match when I was looking for it.

[Kevin Wilson]

Only one I could quickly find was AJW on 12/13/86 (well it is a 12 wrestler elimination match but same theory): Chigusa Nagayo, Yumi Ogura, Kazue Nagahori, Yumiko Hotta, Yachiyo Hirata, and Bison Kimura vs. Dump Matsumoto, Bull Nakano,  Condor Saito, Kaoru Kage, Drill Nakamae, and Yasuko Ishiguro. Don't think I have that one but I'll check.

[Trocar Slush Weasel]

15 hours ago, donsem43 said:

Her match with Io in the SWA Title tournament final is up at Stardom World. It's pretty good, looking forward to seeing how she does in the next few months.

I don't know if anybody's watched the episodes of Rossy's World.  But I'll give him credit for having an excellent memory and big balls.  He sorta craps on Lioness Asuka and Jaguar Yokota.  Then talks himself up, "My idea" seems to be a recurring line.

[Eivion]

39 minutes ago, Kevin Wilson said:

Only one I could quickly find was AJW on 12/13/86 (well it is a 12 wrestler elimination match but same theory): Chigusa Nagayo, Yumi Ogura, Kazue Nagahori, Yumiko Hotta, Yachiyo Hirata, and Bison Kimura vs. Dump Matsumoto, Bull Nakano,  Condor Saito, Kaoru Kage, Drill Nakamae, and Yasuko Ishiguro. Don't think I have that one but I'll check.

That is probably the one I'm thinking of.

22 minutes ago, Trocar Slush Weasel said:

I don't know if anybody's watched the episodes of Rossy's World.  But I'll give him credit for having an excellent memory and big balls.  He sorta craps on Lioness Asuka and Jaguar Yokota.  Then talks himself up, "My idea" seems to be a recurring line.

I only saw the first episode which was nice enough. Why does he crap on Asuka & Yokota?

[Trocar Slush Weasel]

Just now, Eivion said:

That is probably the one I'm thinking of.

I only saw the first episode which was nice enough. Why does he crap on Asuka & Yokota?

He says something about Asuka not being very good.  Forget the exact phrase.  Also said that Yokota was just a trainer of the basics and then compares her to Fuuka.

[Kevin Wilson]

On one hand, he is clearly wrong, Yokota in particular was amazing. On the other hand, I respect that he is just saying whatever the hell he wants and not being PC about things. But common sense would say he is just mad that both 'retired' from AJW before wrestling in other promotions that competed with AJW in the mid-90s. Which was partly due to AJW's policy that forced wrestlers into retirement before they were ready to retire (plus other factors, probably a book could be written about that).

[Kevin Wilson]

Anyone that was into Joshi back in the day know the story of what happened to GAEA? From what I have read, from 1998 to 2000 it was the #1 Joshi promotion with the Crush Gals angle, Aja Kong, a young Meiko Satomura, etc. but it shut down in 2005. In 2004 they were still getting 1.2K+ fans at Korakuen Hall all year, and had over 3K at their big April event so there was still some interest. Plus even though they lost wrestlers they had gained regular participation from Toyota and Hamada, they still had a stacked roster up until the end. Since today I am used to promotions floating along just find with 600 to 800 averages at Korakuen it just seems like it was doing too well to dissolve.

My theory (based on nothing) is that around that time wrestling in general in Japan was starting to go down, especially Joshi, and maybe back then the promotions weren't structured financially to manage with the smaller crowds while promotions these days know how to manage. But it still just seems unusual looking back at it without any backstory. I mean I know by then they had announced they were closing but their last two shows had attendances of 2,300 and 5,800 (I know those both had 'retirement matches' but its still a massive turnout) so they clearly still had their fans, unless there was just some major backstage drama or Nagayo at the time was serious about retiring and wasn't interested in running the promotion.

[Trocar Slush Weasel]

8 hours ago, Kevin Wilson said:

Anyone that was into Joshi back in the day know the story of what happened to GAEA? From what I have read, from 1998 to 2000 it was the #1 Joshi promotion with the Crush Gals angle, Aja Kong, a young Meiko Satomura, etc. but it shut down in 2005. In 2004 they were still getting 1.2K+ fans at Korakuen Hall all year, and had over 3K at their big April event so there was still some interest. Plus even though they lost wrestlers they had gained regular participation from Toyota and Hamada, they still had a stacked roster up until the end. Since today I am used to promotions floating along just find with 600 to 800 averages at Korakuen it just seems like it was doing too well to dissolve.

My theory (based on nothing) is that around that time wrestling in general in Japan was starting to go down, especially Joshi, and maybe back then the promotions weren't structured financially to manage with the smaller crowds while promotions these days know how to manage. But it still just seems unusual looking back at it without any backstory. I mean I know by then they had announced they were closing but their last two shows had attendances of 2,300 and 5,800 (I know those both had 'retirement matches' but its still a massive turnout) so they clearly still had their fans, unless there was just some major backstage drama or Nagayo at the time was serious about retiring and wasn't interested in running the promotion.

My theory was that they were the ECW of joshi.  They were still selling out but had run up some big debts.  Nothing to back that up but running things like 80s AJW did without as premier a tv contract probably caught up to them.  Maybe I'll try and find out when I'm there in September.

[JML]

23 hours ago, Kevin Wilson said:

On one hand, he is clearly wrong, Yokota in particular was amazing. On the other hand, I respect that he is just saying whatever the hell he wants and not being PC about things. But common sense would say he is just mad that both 'retired' from AJW before wrestling in other promotions that competed with AJW in the mid-90s. Which was partly due to AJW's policy that forced wrestlers into retirement before they were ready to retire (plus other factors, probably a book could be written about that).

 

I think he talked about them in a not so good light cause his dealings with them in J'd and ARSION. My timeline might be off with when Ogawa was promoting J'd but Jaguar ended up leaving in 98. 

With Lioness, didn't he make her the booker in ARSION around 2001? The promotion looked like it went bad when she took over and Ayako dropped the belt to her. Maybe I'm wrong but I get that feeling that he said that cause of business he did with them. 

[Eivion]

On 7/5/2016 at 3:27 PM, Trocar Slush Weasel said:

I don't know if anybody's watched the episodes of Rossy's World.  But I'll give him credit for having an excellent memory and big balls.  He sorta craps on Lioness Asuka and Jaguar Yokota.  Then talks himself up, "My idea" seems to be a recurring line.

I just saw this part and you somewhat of blew this out of proportion. He felt Asuka was so-so until she started teaming with Chigusa. He thought she got better from then on. He mentioned Yokota being a bit arrogant and some of the girls disliking her as a result. His comparison of Yokota to Fuka was purely based around training wrestlers where both only teach the basics. Essentially how good wrestlers got afterward was completely up to themselves and other people helping them.

The "My idea" talk was purely related to Hokuto and at the very end. He talked about working close with her and regularly giving her advice.

The person he was probably meanest to was Bull Nakano. Even that seemed to be based more around her debut time than what she became later.

 

[ka-to]

GAEA Corp. had other businesses going on. They felt that the small profit from wrestling was not worth the effort. Chigusa was very angry that they stopped.

 

[Kevin Wilson]

32 minutes ago, Eivion said:

I just saw this part and you somewhat of blew this out of proportion. He felt Asuka was so-so until she started teaming with Chigusa. He thought she got better from then on. He mentioned Yokota being a bit arrogant and some of the girls disliking her as a result. His comparison of Yokota to Fuka was purely based around training wrestlers where both only teach the basics. Essentially how good wrestlers got afterward was completely up to themselves and other people helping them.

The "My idea" talk was purely related to Hokuto and at the very end. He talked about working close with her and regularly giving her advice.

The person he was probably meanest to was Bull Nakano. Even that seemed to be based more around her debut time than what she became later.

 

I'll be honest, I haven't re-subbed so I didn't watch it myself yet. That doesn't sound as bad and seems plausible.

[Kevin Wilson]

I was just reading this thread from the beginning (don't worry, I won't hold anyone to an opinion they held three years ago) and at least Joshi shows are easy to see again which was a common complaint. I mean on DM right now there are events from late June for Ice Ribbon, JWP, Oz Academy, WAVE, and Gatoh Move (that isn't necessarily normal but with niconico airing shows so often they aren't hard to find online somewhere). Stardom is of course super easy to watch, and if WAVE ever figures out how to run their online subscription they will be too. I know a lot of people fell off of Joshi during their 'dark ages' but I hope some will consider poking around again now that it is so easy to watch.

[Trocar Slush Weasel]

HANA is teaming with her mom at the 7/24 JWP show at Korakuen.

[Kevin Wilson]

I'll a video up at some point if it helps but I am trying to find out all the wrestlers in the AJW "OG Battle Royal" on their 30th Anniversary Show (5/11/03). Everywhere I can find a match list doesn't list who is in the match. Any ideas, old school fans? When even Mike Lorefice doesn't have it listed I know I am going too far down the rabbit hole.

[JML]

1 hour ago, Trocar Slush Weasel said:

HANA is teaming with her mom at the 7/24 JWP show at Korakuen.

I've recently seen two of her matches from Wrestle-1 shows. She's just "ok". Interesting if she improves and becomes a star in the future. 

[Kevin Wilson]

If she is just OK after like three matches then maybe she will be good down the road  A little early to really form an opinion one way or the other I think, she just graduated from wrestling school (whatever that entails) in March.

[rzombie1988]

13 hours ago, Kevin Wilson said:

I was just reading this thread from the beginning (don't worry, I won't hold anyone to an opinion they held three years ago) and at least Joshi shows are easy to see again which was a common complaint. I mean on DM right now there are events from late June for Ice Ribbon, JWP, Oz Academy, WAVE, and Gatoh Move (that isn't necessarily normal but with niconico airing shows so often they aren't hard to find online somewhere). Stardom is of course super easy to watch, and if WAVE ever figures out how to run their online subscription they will be too. I know a lot of people fell off of Joshi during their 'dark ages' but I hope some will consider poking around again now that it is so easy to watch.

All the companies need to do is offer a paid youtube subscription service. Stardom got posted on reddit everyday for a while and more people seem aware of it now than ever. Youtube is also used enough that casual fans will find it. The problem is Japanese companies don't think outside of Japan.