Joshi Spotlight: GAEA Japan in Jan-Feb.1999

You know, I think joshi wrestlers may be nuts.

GAEA JAPAN IN JAN-FEB. 1999:
* Welcome to 1999 in the Joshi Spotlight! Starting with GAEA Japan! After a pretty boring 1998 the promotion suddenly starts HOT, with Lioness Asuka coming over to betray her former tag team partner and form Super Star Unit with heel main eventers Mayumi Ozaki & Aja Kong! Then LAS CACHORRAS ORIENTALES show up and begin their famous Freelancer Run of 1999 and beyond! This is actually what LCO are mostly known for from what I understand, so it’s great to finally see it start.

oh also KAORU ends up doing THAT spot up above.

GAEA Roster: Chigusa Nagayo, Mayumi Ozaki, Akira Hokuto (still hurt), Toshiyo Yamada, KAORU, (First Class) Meiko Satomura, Sonoko Kato, Sugar Sato, Chikayo Nagashima, Toshie Uematsu, (Second Class) Makie Numao, Sakura Hirota, Hiromi Kato, Rina Ishii, (Rookies) Mizuki Ishii

JAN. 8th:
* This is some tiny little gym with wooden walls and maybe a 30-ft. ceiling.

CHIGUSA NAGAYO vs. CHIKAYO NAGASHIMA (w/ Sugar Sato): It’s Chigusa vs. one of her First Class, but Chikayo’s aligned with the evil OZ Academy (and the newly-formed Super Star Unit). Chikayo has a big bandage on her chin. Sugar freely cheats, but Chigusa just fights Chikayo into a running powerbomb for the pin at (0:58 of ??? shown). She charges Sugar on the floor and beats the shit out of her, leading to Mayumi Ozaki running out and they fight all over the small arena, Chigusa blading.

TOSHIYO YAMADA & SONOKO KATO vs. OZ ACADEMY (Mayumi Ozaki & Sugar Sato, w/ Chikayo Nagashima):
* The prior match leads right to this one, which is longer. Ozaki’s in red/black, Sugar’s in white, Yamada’s in yellow/black & Kato’s in blue. It’s more or less GAEA’s babyfaces against the heels.

A very energetic, manic little match, setting the stage with a huge brawl all over the arena, Chigusa returning with a shirt wrapped around her cut and is fighting, too. Funny bit as Ozaki eats a chair to the face and completely no-sells it with sarcastic amusement. After 2 minutes of pandemonium, everyone taking turns on offense for a regular match. Kato seemed to be getting the big showcase, taking a rocket launcher, Sugar’s flying elbow & Oz’s powerbomb, but does her dragon suplex and BULL’S POSEIDON of all things to Ozaki. Thing descend into a brawl again, Yamada getting busted open with a chair and OZ does a slow beatdown on her. She gets a big comeback with her spinkick but can’t finish and takes an assisted powerbomb for the big kickout. Sugar accidentally nails her boss to the delight of the crowd, but they seem to botch the Gory Bomb setup and it takes a while, getting two, and Ozaki backfists her for the pin (13:20)- Yamada kicking out right on 3.0 and Chigusa is angered with the count.

Very energetic, but a bit too full of “crowd brawls” to kill time- they did NOT need the last one, setting up a big “Yamada is fighting through it” segment that didn’t really have enough time or offense to develop. Yamada & Ozaki were okay, going in “House Show Mode”, but Kato seems to have stepped up again, eating offense and doing some good, precise kicks and suplexes. But then she’s out of the back half of the match and it’s all Yamada & Ozaki trading the usual stuff.

Rating: **1/4 (seemed to get hard-fought in the end, but a hot brawl & great offense to start eventually settled into “Oz slumming it” with her basic stuff)

MAYUMI OZAKI vs. SAKURA HIROTA:
(Jan. 10th)
* The pink-clad rookie takes on Ozaki again.

This one’s mostly goofy comedy, with Sakura doing stuff like going for arm-wrestling, cheating to win, then getting beat up. She gets a mini-comeback, stretching Ozaki’s nose to the amusement of the crowd, and Ozaki herself is all smiles, especially once Sakura starts butchering her offense and misapplying moves. Oz hits a backdrop suplex & cannonball, but Sakura spams urakens and gets two, but Ozaki’s powerbomb is our big “rookie kicks out of a big move” near-fall and Sakura gets more bad offense, unable to bridge right on a weird suplex. They alternate attempts at that suplex, and the Backfist/Ligerbomb finishes for Ozaki at (11:29). Really, really weak, with “amuse the house show crowd” comedy and Sakura’s offense being laughably bad.

Rating: 1/2* (11 minutes of comedy for a house show and Sakura buggering nearly everything)

JAN. 17th:
* Back in Korakuen Hall now.

SONOKO KATO vs. SAKURA HIROTA
More Sakura comedy, doing things like failing kip-ups. Lots of “she sucks, but is spirited” things like countering stuff (like Kato’s rolling fireman’s countered to Sakura stretching her) but also getting her own moves countered to amuse the fans. Sakura keeps getting mini-comebacks (spamming backfists), but Kato finishes her with the Dragon Suplex (5:40 shown).

Rating: 1/2* (just dreadful stuff- Kato hit some good things, but Sakura was 1/10 on the accuracy of her strikes and comebacks)

MEIKO SATOMURA (GAEA) vs. CARLOS AMANO (w/ OZ Academy) (JWP):
* An Interpromotional match! This one featuring JWP’s technical-wrestling savant at the same experience level as Meiko. The former Rieko Amano is now “Carlos” for some reason, and has a blue & silver outfit with her hair dyed blonde. Meiko’s in red and has a heavily-bandaged arm.

Good catch-wrestling to start, both adequately looking like they’re fishing for limbs to break holds, Carlos doing a good job schooling Meiko and making her pay for stuff, going for that arm. Carlos does one of the cooler jujigatames I’ve seen, actually grabbing the arm and pulling Meiko down, rolling backwards and then threading to the liedown part. Carlos lands a SWEET leaping clothesline to cut off a comeback and even knees Meiko in the ass turning her over for a crab. Ten minutes in, OZ joins for a triple-LCO pose, infuriating Meiko, who soon gets beat down with a chair, and Carlos soon wins an exhausting strike war but they keep tying each other up simultaneously, establishing parity and anger.

Carlos hits flying clotheslines and OZ cheats frequently as time ticks on a bit too long as they’re killing time here. Carlos gets a butterfly superduperplex and counters the super cross-armbreaker, but Meiko fights her into it, but OZ soon cheats and Carlos nearly snaps that arm! She won’t even release in the ropes either, and an OZ beating on the floor sets up Meiko hitting a SWEET Pele Kick in the ring, but Carlos counters the Death Valley Driver to another armbar and Meiko just lies there- the bell rings but the ref waves it off and they get into another scrap- the DVD is reversed to Amano’s DDT and Meiko hits two Northern Lights suplexes- OZ knocks them over and Carlos counters to another jujigatame and THAT’S the ending at (22:32)- Meiko has to give it up.

This was going swimmingly, with very good grappling, but suffered from “too long” syndrome as they stretch out a great 13-14 minute match to 21 minutes and they just don’t have the offense for that, so Carlos starts suddenly doing things like “walk & talk”, multiple beatings on the floor, repeated spots, etc. The idea was obviously to put over Meiko’s resilience as this was ALL CARLOS with almost zero near-falls for Meiko, but nobody got into it because it was so one-sided, and Meiko of all people wasn’t being hammy for once and didn’t really sell the pain so much as the exhaustion. It did look in the end like they ground her down, though, so that reads. Meiko got one last comeback with some drama but ended up in a hold she couldn’t break- the cross-armbreaker/jujigatame remains legit.

Rating: **3/4 (looked to be ***1/2 but they just kept dragging it out)

SUPER STAR UNIT (Lioness Asuka & Mayumi Ozaki, w/ Aja Kong) vs. TOSHIYO YAMADA & KAORU:
* Wrestling 101: You build a new super-stable, and then you put them over the most vulnerable, yet still kinda credible, wrestlers. KAORU & Yamada are the classic “sub-main eventers” of GAEA, being above the Class of 1995 but way below Chigusa, Devil and others, so they’re ideal for doing jobs like this. Lioness is in black, Ozaki red/black, KAORU purple & Yamada yellow again.

Things get wild immediately with Team GAEA charging the heels, but it quickly goes badly with Aja helping as they brawl all over Korakuen with KAORU being HUNG OVER THE BALCONY via a big tube- one slip and she drops 20 feet. Thankfully they just lower her the full way while she hangs there (the tube under one arm so she’s not actually choking). Piledriver through a table keeps up on her. KAORU bleeds & suffers, but isn’t a terribly compelling seller so it’s a bit flat. They actually do a US-style ref-bump “no tag” as Yamada is forced back (okay I have NEVER seen that in my joshi watches, ever!). How do you justify that when you can bring out a howitzer in the ring and not get DQ’d, lol? By the time KAORU finally tags out, the crowd is just sitting on their hands after 11 minutes of this, and Yamada mostly only nails her spinkick before Aja comes in and she’s nearly pinned by an Oz backfist.

Ligerbomb gets two and SSU stacks up chairs, but ASUKA gets German’d onto them! Yamada keeps it going with kicks, but KAORU eats a blue thunder bomb thanks to more cheating. But Yamada fires back and it’s stereo Michinoku Driver/Gory Bomb time! The goons cheat to break it up and KAORU directs traffic so the GAEA locker room pours out to deal with them, and Yamada gets her Flying Spinkick on Asuka. The ref misses a pin off KAORU’s Moonsault thanks to Ozaki, so Asuka hits two straight Ligerbombs, broken up by Yamada, so they deal with her and set up Asuka’s Towerhacker Powerbomb (inverted fireman’s carry to spinning ligerbomb) for the pin at (16:45). Super Star Unit wins a surprisingly fighty one.

This was another “a bit too long” match, as they do good brawling to start into the match’s signature spot… but then it’s 13 more minutes. The ENDLESS beating on KAORU was a buzzkill after that, as she doesn’t really “sell” so much as “lie down and act hurt” so nobody really gets into it, and you can see the crowd buzzing from the giant hanging spot die because once Yamada gets the false tag there’s not a reaction to be had from the fans, nor for her actual hot tag. So they have to fight the fans back into caring again via Yamada’s good reversal kicks, then SSU cheat again and again to pull one over on the babyfaces and win. Asuka was good for the heels, usually staring down Yamada while bludgeoning her partner, and doing great “WTF?” faces whenever reversed.

Rating: *** (a spectacular brawl with a signature spot to start… then it gets super dead and they have to fight it into a good match again)

But wait! There’s more! SSU hits the ring and beats down Yamada & KAORU again, leading CHIGUSA to charge the ring and attack her former Crush Gals partner! But Sakura Hirota does the crimson mask from the beating as SSU drags her into the Korakuen lobby… and there’s LAS CACHORRAS ORIENTALES, dressed in their civvies and they just have to get involved, and start throwing GAEA kids all over the place! They’re just kinda like “Hey, we were in town, so…”, casually talking shit to Yamada, who is backed up by Meiko, and we have a match for next show!

FEB. 3rd:

KAORU vs. SAKURA HIROTA: Standard comedy match, with Sakura doing deliberate “botches” to amuse the crowd (like tumbling over trying a springboard). Sakura spams backfists and kicks out after 3-4 Moonsaults, hitting her new flying backfist & that weird straightjacket German she does, hitting it twice, but the Michinoku Driver finishes it at (9:07 of 13:48 shown).

Rating: * (basic comedy match, but Sakura’s stuff is so bad you can’t tell when she’s doing comedy or if her accuracy just sucks)

FEB. 11th:

LAS CACHORRAS ORIENTALES (Mima Shimoda & Etsuko Mita) vs. TOSHIYO YAMADA & SONOKO KATO:
* LCO properly invades GAEA! They’re taking on the typical “first match duo” in these matters, Yamada with the 4th-year. Shimoda’s in red & Mita’s in black.

We’re JIP with Shimoda scoring a flying ax kick to Yamada and Mita swatting her spinkick out of midair, leading to the crowd brawl and twin powerbombs setting up the guardrail drop. Yamada kicks out of a weird double superbomb, but Kato guillotine legdrops Mita once she hits the Death Valley Driver! Yamada gets a comeback but eats the DVD again… for two! She comes back with the Reverse Gory Bomb but THAT gets 2.8, and they’re exhausted- they each try finishers, but Shimoda sets up another DVD with a leg-hook, and that barely gets the pin at (7:20 of 23:09 shown).

This felt like the back third of the Standard LCO Match Template, except the entire ending sequence was just the former Dream Orca teammates fishing for finishers on each other, usually the same two moves. Not really a fan of Mita needing THREE of her former MDK to pin people, but that’s progress for you. Mita & Yamada both looked good, Yamada doing a good job flopping around off of kickouts and looking like she was fighting for energy to hit her things, and Mita was precise as always, which is impressive given 23 minutes usually makes everyone go noodly.

Rating: ** (looks like the back third of a ***1/2 match)

SUPER STAR UNIT (Lioness Asuka & Mayumi Ozaki) vs. KAORU & MEIKO SATOMURA:
* SSU now takes on KAORU with Meiko instead of Yamada.

They go nuts immediately with a doomsday device, moonsault & frog splash to Asuka immediately, but she grabs and chain and now Meiko’s in deep. KAORU gets worked over by Lioness in her usual precise stuff. KAORU/Meiko keep getting mini-comebacks but are getting gobbled alive out there, as they’re inevitably countered (Ozaki once slides in a chair so Meiko’s missed frog splash crashes onto it, for example). A crowd brawl transitions to Meiko’s Pele kick comeback and the Super Cross-Armbreaker, but Oz breaks it up. KAORU & Asuka keep reversing on each other in a cool bit- KAORU leaps into a powerbomb, but gets a rana out of another, but then Lioness counters the next one by swinging her back up into a ligerbomb- you need a LOT of strength to do that! Meiko sets up KAORU’s Michinoku Driver but gets caught in the blue thunder bomb. Ozaki with backfists & a ligerbomb, but she clobbers Lioness and takes a Moonsault/DVD combo for two. Two more powerbombs have Meiko doomed, but Sonoko Kato charges in to break the pin, but SSU overwhelm Meiko (KAORU chairshots her by mistake) and the Tequila Sunrise finishes her at (14:56).

Another pretty typical match for “Cheating Heels” in joshi wrestling, with the babyfaces eating long, arduous beatings, ending in tons and tons of powerbombs (seriously, SSU tend to do like 4-5 PER MATCH now). Meiko & KAORU tried comebacks, but they were pretty barebones and often swiftly countered as the heels ate them alive. Even their attempts at cheating didn’t really work out well. It did the job of making SSU look overwhelming and dominant without totally squashing the opposition, but they never looked that in danger of losing (even a moonsault/dvd combo can’t finish a main eventer with no prior work done).

Rating: **1/2 (a very long one-sided beatdown with a few comebacks)

CHIGUSA NAGAYO & TOSHIE UEMATSU vs. SUPER STAR UNIT (Aja Kong & Chikayo Nagashima):
* A “Veteran & Class of 1995” match, as Chigusa takes on Aja in a tag match again, each backed by GAEA originals.

Fun bit to start as Toshie DEMANDS Aja and won’t accept no, but Aja refuses to sully herself with a small scrub. So Chikayo runs in, but leapfrogs… right into a German for the pin (0:06)! Chigusa AND the fans mark out for this, and Lioness is slack-jawed on the floor! SSU are pissed as Toshie cuts a “how ’bout THAT?” promo that has Chigusa and the fans into it again, so Aja talks some smack… then just bullrushes Toshie over and it’s on! Full-on brawl as Aja & Chigusa hit their finishers on each other and soon the entirely locker room pours into the ring (lol I love how there’s 13-14 people in there and I can still hear Shimoda clear as day- that raspy screech).

Everything settles down for promos, but Shimoda (LCO siding with SSU) says something that provokes Chigusa and it’s on again! Everyone makes sure to stand aside while we get a CHIGUSA/ASUKA BRAWL dead-center, but then just like with Hogan/Andre in that 1987 battle royal, in comes everyone else to spoil it, then we get this wild shot of Chikayo throwing powder into the ring until the entire hard cam looks like the inside of Tony Khan’s nose. Double guardrail drop to the entire GAEA locker room! Okay that ended up pretty awesome despite no match.

Holy shit nothing from this entire bunch was over *** but suddenly GAEA Japan is AWESOME again! Just complete mayhem and locker-room-clearing brawls from top to bottom, GAEA being incensed by these new invading heels and them being joined by *LCO*, the top heels of 1997. Chigusa wants blood and the heels are dominant enough to do a full takeover. I love it.