This was definitely a good match when you consider how young and inexperienced these 4 were (Shiratori, 20, was the oldest of the four, as she debuted in 1991, while the other three debuted in 1992). The early portion was pretty basic with a lot of low-level high spots, but the match kept moving so it wasn't boring. Candy & ASARI were the featured performers in this match. Candy did her nice spots first, using a nice leg trip into a Japanese leg roll clutch hold on Shiratori, with Shiratori soon returning the favor, a German suplex, and a plancha on both opponents. ASARI got her big sequence in against Nouchi at the 12-minute mark. She did a Sayama backflip from the corner followed by a dropkick and her roundoff kangaroo kicks to set up her sky twister press, but Candy came in and pulled ASARI off the top rope. ASARI & Shiratori double teamed Nouchi, and Shiratori held Candy in the corner while ASARI sky twister pressed Nouchi for the win. They showed the replay of ASARI's sky twister 3 times in a row because it was such a hot move. The first time I watched this, I was fooled by ASARI's high spots into thinking she was the best worker in this match. However, upon further review, Candy was the one who carried the match. Candy's spots, while not as glamourous, were executed as well as you could ask them to be. Candy just needed a few more spots to move up wrestling against the stars, while ASARI was more glitter than substance at that point.

13:15

Rating:

Solid Black Queens Energy: Hikari Fukuoka vs. Manami Toyota

Before the match, they did a long feature on Hikari, complete with several of Toyota's comments about her, building up to her big rematch with her idol Toyota. The purpose of this match was to elevate Fukuoka by having her make a good showing against her mentor, and in that aspect they more than succeeded. Improving upon their 6/3/93 Japan Grand Prix league bout, this was one of Hikari's first excellent matches.

Fukuoka jumped Toyota before the bell and did a few spots, including her version of the rolling cradle, before taking it to the mat. The match built slowly, as this pattern of taking control with a brief series of high spots then taking it to the mat continued for the first 15 minutes. Fukuoka did a nice plancha, but Toyota topped it later on by doing a plancha over the security rail.

The fans really got into the match when Toyota missed her moonsault and Fukuoka German suplexed her for a near fall. This fan enthusiasm continued as Toyota got near falls with a Dragon suplex and her moonsault. Toyota then tried her Japanese ocean cyclone suplex, and it appeared this was going to be the finish of the match, but she couldn't get Hikari up for it on either try. If this was to be the finish, the blown spot actually turned out to be a plus. Toyota did two German suplexes, and it appeared Toyota was looking for Hikari to stay down, but Hikari kicked out of both, did a German suplex for a near fall, and hit her moonsault. Fukuoka then tried a doublewrist armsault suplex, but Toyota did a super fast transition into her rolling cradle. After rolling Fukuoka around the ring for an incredibly long time, Toyota Japanese ocean cyclone suplexed Fukuoka for the win. The body of the match was solid and the last 7 minutes were pretty damn good.

22:55

Rating:

Most Special Persons Wrestling Jam: Devil Masami & Plum Mariko vs. Chigusa Nagayo & Cuty Suzuki

This was an excellent long match. It's surprising that these 4 could do such a strong match, even in 1993, but everyone more than served their purpose and without showing anyone up, Plum, Chigusa, and Devil all turned in great performances. One of the things that helped the match was it had a special aura. The aura was more something you see in men's puroresu matches when the two legendary old codgers that can't work a damn these days lock horns. The legendswere obviously Chigusa and Devil, and there was a lot of heat on them based on their legend's match at Dreamslam 1 where Chigusa was pinned by Devil. However, unlike Choshu or Inoki, obviously these old codgers could still get it done in the ring. Another thing that made this match special was the way they used the submissions. Most matches use submissions to build to high spots, but this was the other way around. The pacing was slower then most great women's matches, but it was way stronger in psychology and timing.

The match started similar to a traditional American tag match where the top face is dying to get his hands on the leading heel, but the heel is "afraid to face the face." This was a bit different, but it's rare that two teams wait each other out to see who was going to start in any Japanese match. Chigusa petitioned for Devil to start and Devil eventually obliged. However, Plum blindsided Chigusa with a missile kick before the legends even locked up. Devil and Plum then tried to sandwich Chigusa, but Chigusa avoided it, causing them to crash into each other, then faked a plancha.

Cuty got beat on for 3 minutes before turning Devil's powerbomb into a Toyota roll and tagging Chigusa in to set up the first real confrontation.Devil & Chigusa were very cautious feeling each other out, which increased the heat and anticipation. When Plum came back in, she used nice submissions on Chigusa. While she had Chigusa in figure 4, Devil threw Cuty on top of Chigusa with her zun-mae (an overhead throw from a powerbomb position that was made famous by Jumbo Hori). At one point, Devil tried a suplex, but Chigusa turned it into a Japanese back rolling clutch cradle hold for a hot near fall. At the 11-minute mark, Chigusa used her powerbomb and wheel kick on Plum to set up her scorpion, but Devil came in and put Chigusa down with chops before she could turn Plum over. However, Chigusa never released the grip, so she got up and locked in the scorpion.

Plum came back at 15:30, turning Cuty's high cross body into a bridging fall away slam and hitting a huracanrana before tagging out. Devil hit a lariat and tried for a second, but Cuty surprised me by turning it into a wakigatame. Cuty got a near fall on Devil with her Dragon suplex, then whipped Devil into the ropes and Chigusa reached over and enzui lariated Devil. Later on, Plum came in with a sky high hip drop then put Chigusa in a Dragon sleeper, but Chigusa snapmared her way out. Devil powerbombed Chigusa then tried it again, but Chigusa turned it into a huracanrana for a near fall. Plum elbowed Chigusa to the floor and, in the highlight of the match, gave Cuty an awesome jumping takedown into her hizajujigatame (knee bar). Chigusa kept trying to get back into the ring so she could make the save, but Devil continually knocked her back to the floor. Eventually, Chigusa avoided Devil's baseball slide and high kicked her, which allowed her to reenter the ring and save Cuty. Devil & Chigusa got into an argument while Plum had Cuty in an STF. Devil turned a Chigusa high kick into a half crab, but Chigusa soon came back with a bunch of strikes, culminating in two consecutive knockdowns from crappy elbows. Chigusa used her sleeper on Devil and Plum tried to make the save, but Cuty Dragon suplexed her. Chigusa used two German suplexes on Devil for near falls, so Plum came in and German suplexed Chigusa. Before Devil could capitalize, Cuty came in and German suplexed her.

Devil and Chigusa did about the best sleeper spot I've ever seen. Devil, who had Chigusa in it, had such an intense look and she would jerk it. Chigusa not only looked half asleep, but she was even frothing at the mouth. After 1 ½ minutes of this, Cuty finally made the save. Devil followed with a powerbomb spree (done well with no crime). There was a bad spot where Plum released German suplexed Chigusa too close to the corner for Devil to follow with her guillotine leg drop, so after some confusion, Plum redid the spot closer to the center and Devil followed with the guillotine leg drop for a near fall. Devil got another near fall with a German suplex before pinning Chigusa, again, with a guillotine leg drop. So far this is the best Plum match I've seen. Her best performance is 2/11/94 against Chigusa, but Plum ruled in both. As Adrian Smith wrote and Bruce Dickinson sang, "Ain't it funny how it is, you never miss it 'til it's gone away."

33:07

Rating:

Bolshoi Kid vs. Mima Shimoda

Mima is great, but she isn't a miracle worker. Due to The Damn Clown, this was by far the worst match on the show. In fact, this may be the worst match Mima had in her entire career. This was worked at about half speed with slow setup and weak transition. There were some nice high spots by both women, but to tell you how good this was, the most notable thing about the match might have been that Mariko Yoshida was the ref. Shimoda finished the clown off with her deathlake drive followed by her Tiger suplex. This is one time I won't complain about a match being highly edited.

13:55 (5:09 aired)

Rating:

Pure Heart Meets The Dangerous Queen, Only One Time Singles Match: Mayumi Ozaki vs. Akira Hokuto

They did a few angles leading up to this match, but I can't really tell what was said, so it's hard to make any judgement. It appeared Hokuto was playing heel and insulting JWP in general, so Masatoshi Yamamoto, the JWP president, was standing up for his league. Hokuto's knee was all taped up again, but she was in much better shape than she was against Aja, as it wasn't noticeably hampering her.

Though the selling was clearly superior, this pretty much followed the same structure as the 10/9 Ozaki vs. Toyota match. It started fast with Ozaki German suplexing Hokuto before the bell, but they quickly took it to the mat. The match picked up around the 10-minute mark, with Ozaki turning a back body drop into a DDT then doing her rolling senton attack out of the ring, but it was done off the top rather than the 2nd. Ozaki powerbombed Hokuto on the floor and Hokuto sold this huge, like they would sell it in AJ. It was obvious that Koji Kanemoto wasn't calling the match because when Akira finally got back into the ring 1 ½ minutes after being powerbombed on the floor, she didn't come back with an overhead belly-to-belly suplex and start doing all kinds of flying moves without selling the previous damage. Rather, Hokuto fell prey to an Ozaki's top rope superplex for a near fall. Ozaki used a series of powerbombs then tried her rounding body press, but Hokuto got her feet up and regained control.

Hokuto threw Oz over the top and followed with her tope con hilo off the top rope. Hokuto came up a bit short on the tope con hilo, but they stuck to the game plan and Ozaki sold it for a long time before reentering the ring, only to get released Northern Lights superplexed for a near fall. They went to a series of finishers, highlighted by Hokuto, as Toyota did, breaking Oz's tequila sunrise. Ozaki missed her rolling (somersault) bodyblock and Hokuto hit her devastating henkei backdrop. Hokuto then used her Northern Lights bomb finisher, and like the Toyota match, Ozaki wasn't going to break the big finisher. A very solid match that built well. The strong selling clearly added to the meaning of the high spots. If only these two, or anyone else for that matter, showed 1/20th of this brainpower in GAEA.

18:26

Rating:

Full Throttle Thunder Queen World: Dynamite Kansai vs. Kyoko Inoue

This match was very similar to the 10/9 Kansai/Yamada match, as it had the same finisher vs. finisher storyline and the build and psychology were great. This match wasn't nearly as stiff though, which is the main reason the Yamada match was better.

Kyoko missed a dropkick early, so Kansai punted her then faked a tope. Kyoko did probably the most devastating DDT I've ever seen, with Kansai's head rebounding off the mat. There was a good balance between high spots and submissions. The action picked up around the 13-minute mark, with Kyoko switching Kansai's backdrop driver and trying her springboard reverse elbow off the 2nd, but Kansai kicked her in midair. Kansai did kicks and a backdrop driver, leading up to her first attempt at the splash mountain, which resulted in Kyoko back body dropping her way out.

Kyoko took control and built toward her Niagara driver, but Kansai returned the favor and back body dropped her way out. At the 16-minute mark, Kyoko tried her Niagara driver, but Kansai shifted her weight and landed on top. Kansai then tried her splash mountain, but Kyoko turned it into a Toyota roll for a near fall. Kansai used kicks, but Kyoko eventually ducked one and did a nice released German suplex, which both sold. Kansai tried her splash mountain, but Kyoko slipped out and German suplexed Kansai for a near fall. Kansai avoided Kyoko's Niagara driver twice. Kansai hit a backdrop driver then became the first to successfully execute her main finisher, putting Kyoko away with the splash mountain. The difference in look and style of the Kyoko of 1993 as compared to the Kyoko of 1997 is the difference between night and day.

20:46

Rating:

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