Joshi Spotlight: AJW/LLPW Show (March 1999)

It’s time for a huge AJW/LLPW show! With a single match I’ve found set before it! So come see a ton of AJW/LLPW matches, headlined by Eagle Sawai vs. Tomoko Watanabe in a bloodbath, a wild 8-woman tag where Manami Toyota brings “acting like a shit during a match” to a whole new level, and the main event, featuring Yumiko Hotta attempting to win the 3WA Title back from LLPW’s Shinobu Kandori!

YUMIKO HOTTA & MIHO WAKIZAWA vs. SHINOBU KANDORI & JUNKO YAGI (LLPW):
(AJW, Feb. 16th 1999)
* Oh hey! I FINALLY found a Zenjo match from 1999! I’ve been digging but even typing names into Japanese is usually producing squat. This one features an old rivalry- Shinobu Kandori defeated Hotta for the WWWA Title in early 1998 and has been carrying it around ever since, and now they’re meeting up once more, but with rookie tag partners! Junko is someone I’ve never heard of… looks like she’s six months into the business and soon left LLPW for NEO and wrestled until 2002? Hotta’s in black, Wacky’s in yellow & red, Kandori’s in a brand-new yellow singlet with red lines across it and Junko’s in yellow and looks positively ENORMOUS for a rookie. At 5’7″ she’s not THAT big, but she looks huge even next to Kandori. This is at the Athena TV studios, which is a great set-up for wrestling, as it’s both intimate (small crowd) but looks great on TV with all this futuristic nonsense around the ring and the outdoors make it less claustrophobic than a gym.

Wakizawa gets heated before the match, shoving the unimpressed Junko, and at the bell Wacky charges in and is immediately dropped with a belly-bash, so Hotta just comes in and wastes Junko with a clothesline, and the two top wrestlers brawl while the rookies roll around on the mat- good opening! The stars immediately draw a good reaction for standing off, and Kandori acts like an arrogant shit again before tagging out. Junko of course gets a beating, but Wacky becomes my hero for trying to slap it out with KANDORI, who sells it perfectly (total amusement and daring her to try again), then runs right into Hotta’s kick from the apron. Wakizawa with the plancha! Kandori takes the kid lightly again and nearly gets pinned, then Hotta bludgeons the shit out of her and the vets fight for strikes & submissions. The rookies do okay, Wacky eating a Samoan drop but reversing another to an armbar and Junko dodges her flying and hits a slow giant swing. Kandori has to save Junko from Hotta’s Tiger Driver. Wacky with two missile kicks and a shitty Fisherman’s Buster, but eats an assisted powerbomb- Hotta saves. Wacky tries rookie-fu on Kandori and nearly dies to an anklelock for it, and Hotta draws a great reaction by just booting her right in the face, haha. Kandori puts that over great by rolling to the floor and selling it, then charges the ring, so infuriated that the AJW AND LLPW locker rooms clear out for a pullapart brawl that earns a Double Disqualification at (9:34 of 15:15 shown)! Fantastic!

A pretty basic “Veteran/Rookie” tag match, with the expected spots- veterans have parity and are serious, while the kids are in most of the match and get destroyed by the veterans but are doing well against each other. Wakizawa seems better than most rookies her age, as she can fly around okay and moves well, though she’s trying lifts she’s just too skinny to handle (she’s practically 2D compared to Junko). Junko seems fine for her experience level, but is a bit slow and unsteady still. The ending was pretty great- a mass pullapart brawl with no finish is better than the typical “veteran destroys rookie/blocks for rookie’s pin” ending these matches always have, as it makes things look extra chaotic and hateful, and builds to future matches.

Rating: **1/2 (the veterans were in slow mode, but the character work was dead-on and the rookies did okay with the bulk of the match)

AJW/LLPW SHOW:
(March 10th 1999)
* The next batch of matches are from the same show- an AJW/LLPW interpromotional-themed one in a weird gym setting. It’s headlined by a big Yumiko Hotta/Shinobu Kandori match- a rematch of their Title Unification fight from the year prior! This drew 4000 to the arena, which is INCREDIBLE and would be like the #2 most successful Stardom show ever, which is saying something given how bad AJW’s business was in 1998.

Reviewer Problems: I was unable to find this show looking at “AJW 1999” and had to find individual (clipped) matches searching individually in Japanese. BUT THEN someone showed me that “AJW ATHENA 1999” was the trick and immediately found a card of full matches. Which meant I had to re-do like 4 recaps and add ratings and new commentary, lol. My annoyance at this probably led to me underrating the opener so I had to watch it again. THE PROBLEMS OF BEING A JOSHI PURO FAN!

ZAP ISOZAKI (AJW) vs. MIHO WATABE (LLPW):
* These two don’t even show up on the Cagematch page. Isozaki is a goon of the ZAP heel team and Miho’s another rookie, who looks to be about twelve and is TINY. Oh right, this is baby-A, the 4’9″ rookie. ZAP’s wearing a goofy-ass martial arts uniform with a flesh-colored suit under it, and stands out with the giant ears.

Isozaki does karate poses and beats up the teeny child for AGES, torturing her with eye-gouging and biting, mouthing off and pouring water on her, etc. Watabe does okay with the selling (and does some REALLY nice bumping off some missile kicks, flipping ass-over-teakettle) and manages a mini (hee) comback, using a missile kick & DDT, a rollup, and a REALLY slick rana for two- okay that was impressive- got her feet right under the armpits there. She gets a rollup out of an electric chair drop and kicks out of a flying splash, and a snap Bridging German gets a nearfall. 2 missile kicks & 3 Germans end it for Miho at (10:59). This was very clearly a “you do your shit, then I do my shit” as it’s almost divided evenly between the two. Isozaki was a bit awkward but good enough to act like a bully, while Miho was good enough to be super agile and had decent selling and REALLY good bumping that actually got the fans into the rookie match more than some of the later ones! The crowd was popping for all the nearfalls by the end, which is the mark of a good rookie match.

Rating: **1/4 (Miho’s bits were pretty decent, and her comeback got over, but otherwise too long)

NANAE TAKAHASHI & MIYUKI FUJII (AJW) vs. CAROL MIDORI & SAYORI OKINO (LLPW):
* This is a pair of semi-recent rookies against a somewhat higher equivalent from LLPW, as Midori was around in 1995 and Okino was part of a big heel stable. Nanae is now openly mimicking Kyoko/Tomoko with a tasselled red outfit and similar physique, while Fujii has a buzzcut and ugly yellow/blue gear. Midori’s in army pants and a black shirt while Okino’s in black & purple like usual.

Nanae dominates Team LLPW with power, but Fujii of course gets her ass kicked for the bulk of the match. Okino heels it up with a chair and uses pink mist on Nanae, but Nanae eventually gets the hot tag and starts her stuff up again. Vader bomb hits but Midori uses a chain on her and she gets bounced around, but Fujii CHEATS and holds LLPW for a tope! Superplex/missile kick/flying back senton get two on Carol! Fujii does okay for a bit, but Okino starts cheating with a stick and puts Nanae through a table on the floor, then chokes her out there while Midori puts Fujii away in the ring with an Exploder suplex (14:08).

The match was decent-ish, but was mostly a long heat sequence on Fujii, who is green and doesn’t bump or sell that well. She had some okay “Oh my god, this hurts SO MUCH and I’m a poor innocent rookie!” stuff but nothing that compelling and the fans were mostly into Nanae’s body attacking the heels. Nanae already looks pretty ordinary as a seasoned wrestler and Okino carried things with her heelish personality.

Rating: ** (it was mostly okay, but Fujii isn’t very compelling yet and Nanae doesn’t have a ton of babyface fire, either)

ALL JAPAN TAG TITLES:
MIHO WAKIZAWA & KAYO NOUMI (AJW) vs. KEIKO AONO & MEGUMI SATO (LLPW):
* Two rookie-ish tag teams fight it out- Sato & Aono were simply AWFUL, though, having dragged Sayuri Okino & Rumi Kazama to DUDs in botch-filled disasters at the same show in 1998. Sato in particularly bombed out quickly. Team AJW are in my favorite thing- matching gear! Blue & yellow versions of the same outfit! Aono’s in yellow & Sato’s in pink & white.

Team LLPW heels it up, while Team AJW fires back with rookie pluck. They’re obviously going long, as they work basic holds, alternating control, but Wacky actually gets a pop from DROPKICKS. They do a double-team figure-four/flying splashes (Wacky hilariously forgetting which side the bent leg goes on at first) and when Aono comes in they double-team her with cheating until LLPW responds in kind, Wacky zealously selling weak holds from Sato. Every once in a while someone just dodges a move and immediately bursts up for a tag, so they kill time by alternating pairings a lot- Aono looks okay and Wakizawa is clearly a LOT better than Noumi- athletic and precise, with more effort. Aono gets a killer rolling senton that gets over, but misses a splash and Wacky planchas Team LLPW. Noumi gets rocket launchered to the floor! 4 missile kicks, a German & Northern Lights gets 2s on Aono, but Wacky manages to fly off onto feet and takes a rocket launcher/flying senton combo. Noumi flies in to interfere, but Wacky gets bumped to the floor and Team AJW gets plancha’d, but they start whipping out desperation pin attempts and it works really well. Wakizawa gets a Wheelbarrow German for two, hits three more regular ones, and tries her Fisherman’s Buster but gets reversed for a near-fall. The crowd was way into this judging by what we saw, desperately behind the AJW rookies, which is always a good sign. Wacky hits two missile kicks and is disappointed by the kickout (having gotten cocky and counted along), but hits the Buster for the pin at (18:51!!). The champs retain in a LONG match!

The clipped version made it seem like a better match than what we got- a 4 minute “digest” of 19 minutes can do that, as it cuts out 2-3 minute “Sato does weak submissions” stuff. Aono looked better, though, believably powering around her skinny opponents and throwing out some bitching sentons. Wakizawa already looks like a pro, doing good, athletic movements and selling big on moves- she’s showing the effort of someone who wants a push.

Rating: **3/4 (Alternates effort and skill level and was REALLY long, but Wakizawa has it)

JUDO JACKET MATCH:
KAORU ITO (AJW) vs. JUNKO YAGI (LLPW):
* More of Junko, but it’s a Judo match against Ito. Ito is not a “ZAP” (which stands for Zenjo Afflict Purpose, I’ve just learned!).

This is worked shoot that quickly just becomes an obvious work, as we get some “pro wrestling” bits in this like flourishes, facial expressions and posing. They fight for a while in a basic uninteresting “they’re grabbing the gi” kind of way, then Junko gets the first big takedown and fights for a cross-armbreaker, then Ito gets one in the ropes. Ito blocks a move by lifting Junko up and slamming her down, strolling away arrogantly to regather herself, then whips her into a big backdrop suplex throw out of a headlock to a great reaction. But Junko comes back with a juji attempt and throws forearm shots. Ito gets stood up and no-sells a clothesline and then they do a DOUBLE CLOTHESLINE spot and this is getting a way better reaction than the “it’s supposed to look real” stuff does. And then they’re like “NOPE! PRO WRESTLING!” and whip off their gi to reveal t-shirts and commence to doing an Irish whip into Junko’s Samoan drop into a Vader bomb for two. Powerbomb! But Ito lands on her out of another one and then throws an AMAZING running dropkick and powerbombs the shit out of her and the Flying Stomp finishes at (8:01). FUCK JUDO! PRO WRESTLING RULES!

THEY MADE ME LIKE WORKED SHOOTS!! By almost immediately dropping the facade and doing pro wrestling spots, with a great t-shirt reveal to show their “True Selves” as they get hot and ignore the stipulations just to whup on each other some more. Of course Ito is vastly Junko’s senior and so that was only going one way, but the stipulations (and Junko being a legit judoka) really made every move seem more important.

Rating: **1/2 (great fun while it lasted)

ZAP T (AJW) vs. EAGLE SAWAI (LLPW):
* Another ZAP match! ZAP T is Tomoko Watanabe under a mask, and a heel (the worst possible role for Tomoko, who was the best babyface seller her in promotion). This seems on-paper like a political “if Zenjo wins, LLPW gets one win” like how their old IP cards always had Eagle beating a Zenjo midcarder. Eagle, in red & black, absolutely towers over Tomoko, in her white & black cartoonish villain gear.

The game immediately becomes “can you top this?”, as Tomoko uses a stick and Eagle uses a chain, but Tomoko comes back on the floor in a slow beatdown that ends with Eagle handcuffed and getting stabbed with scissors (the ref noticeably blades her- does Eagle just not like to do this herself, lol?). Eagle mostly does a lot of grimacing, but her “flop to the mat” bump is excellent, used repeatedly. Eagle’s allies get involved and uncuff her, which isn’t really much of a babyface comeback, but Tomoko gets her mask ripped off and also blades. Eagle uses BOLT-CUTTERS and a chair and now Tomoko’s flat-backing, then fight over the cuffs until they end up cuffed TOGETHER, which is a unique spot. This ends up with a lot of close-range (duh) clotheslines as both are just a MESS of blood by this point, and each get dramatic counters into slams. Eagle slowly takes Tomoko apart as the cuffs are cut, but gets countered and then Tomoko DESTROYS her with a gigantic Screwdriver (backdrop lift to head-drop). Holy CRAP that looked vicious, and you can see her head hit at 0.25x speed, and Eagle bails to the floor for a good while. She gets the shittiest Boss Man slam ever and they really need to end this. Lariat & Powerbomb get two, and Tomoko avoids an MDK with a lariat for two, but Eagle punches her down and hits a big Thunderfire (over the shoulder) Powerbomb for the pin (18:59).

This was a weird one- like they wanted a “Bloodbath Spectacle” but also wanted to go long, so instead of manic and hateful they just did a slow, steady march of head-stabbing and long periods of selling. And that kind of takes away from the mania of it, dulling crowd reactions as they pop a BIT, but only for certain spots, and we get the “random yelling” thing more often than not. The “they’re cuffed together” spot is a great idea, but I feel like it would have been a cool ending, but instead they fight it out for a few minutes into a double-down, then the head-drop happens and Eagle’s so hurt that most of the rest is just a wash until they figure things out. Tomoko was also doing “big comebacks” but without the babyface selling, while Eagle was KIND of doing it but less sympathy-inducing with her selling.

Rating: *** (there’s bits and pieces of a TREMENDOUS brawl in there, but it’s a bit too long and casual for a lot of the spots throughout)

AJW vs. LLPW SCRAMBLE 8:
MANAMI TOYOTA, TAKAKO INOUE, KUMIKO MAEKAWA & MOMOE NAKANISHI vs. HARLEY SAITO, YASHA KURENAI, RUMI KAZAMA & NORIYO TATENO:
* Oh, this’ll be feisty. The former Ace of AJW (Manami) leads a squad of their nasty idol, the kicky upstart and the “desperate to impress” rookie against LLPW’s booker (Rumi), an old legend (Tateno, whose JB Angels team inspired Toyota to wrestle), Harley (a top LLPW star) and Yasha, who holds AJW’s White Belt, which she won from Kumiko. Toyota flips off and thumbs-down the LLPW fans before the match, so you know this will be spicy. Tateno looks humorously like a Pokemon evolution of Toyota here.

Instantaneously things go nuts, as Team AJW flies off onto LLPW and do a victory lap, then Yasha/Kumiko go, Toyota flying in to dropkick the former and they all take turns flying off onto Harley in a figure-four, then Tateno flies onto Kumiko but Toyota gets her to NO-SELL and flips off Tateno at the same time, then starts clapping to signal her “dropkick to the back” spot, only for Harley to be like “NOPE” and interrupt the spot, and Toyota starts ignoring her kicks until Harley seems to MAKE her sell (right in the breast), at which point Tateno (the veteran) comes in. But Manami immediately botches her springboard and then sandbags her brutally on a piledriver, so Tateno just drops her in a front variant for a brutal landing before Toyota pops up and NO-SELLS right in her face. Tateno’s just “ugh, whatever” and tags out while LLPW deathglares from the apron. Rumi comes in and Manami trolls her height and then no-sells her kicks.

The LLPW corner when Manami pulls her “LOL I NO-SELL U!” act.

Then Momoe goes INSANE with javelin-like dropkicks that shoot-kicks Rumi straight off the apron, sending Tateno into hysterics as she tries to boot her from under the ropes and Harley comes in to sort her out by shoot-kicking her until Momoe finally settles down! Yasha uses her stick and works her over, then Takako’s in and works a normal match by eating offense and building heat (little chance of HER shooting on people or being weird). Takako purposefully cools everyone’s jets by taking all this stuff, but in comes Momoe like a rocket as she batters Harley around with dropkicks to a great reaction, until Harley rolls them over and keeps having to counter, then Momoe moonsaults Tateno and Germans her while everyone starts running in, interrupting each other’s stuff. Momoe eats corner shots from all four women then a quadruple-headbutt (lol Tateno lands right on Saito), doing the “Fuck YOU!” bridge and then repeatedly ignoring Tateno’s piledriver attempts while Yasha guillotine legdrops Takako during the schmozz. Triple-Assisted Powerbomb gets two- Kumiko saves- but Toyota sets up a Dragon Suplex for two, only for Tateno to ignore a triple-dropkick. Takako misses her Destiny Hammer (flying knee) but Toyota missile kicks Harley SQUARE in the back and Takako gets the Hammer- Rumi saves!

Harley at this point has to be like “Oh COME ON!”

Harley gets a backdrop & rolling kick to escape, then Kumiko goes with Yasha and BAM- Pump Kick! Yasha kicks out, then everyone runs in, setting up a Doomsday Chokeslam from her for two. Yasha hits her guillotine and then her submissions finisher for a dramatic near-fall, but it’s broken up and now Manami’s in- she takes a rolling cradle, but soon gets her own- Tateno gleefully stops her Moonsault so Yasha can whack her in the ass with a stick, but Toyota soon GRABS IT and starts cheering, but Yasha easily avoids it and chokeslams her. Manami & Momoe missile kick Rumi for two, but Rumi then sandbags Toyota TWICE on the Japanese Ocean Cyclone Suplex (that has GOT to be a receipt) as she is suddenly all “concussed” and dead-weight, causing Manami to shoot-deadlift her into a pair of bridging Germans. Everyone takes turns charging the ring for a move in a great spot, then Rumi miraculously recovers in time to Straightjacket German Kumiko, only to get hoisted into a Doomsday Chokeslam & mistimed flying headbutts from Momoe & Manami (as Rumi deliberately gets up before they’re off the ropes). Kumiko with a rolling kick and her Ax Kick for BIG near-falls, but Rumi sweep-kicks her and puts on a nasty dragon sleeper for the Tap-Out (18:37)! Team LLPW wins!

haha this was AMAZING. But a total mess, as it seems like Manami comes in all hot and competitive like “YEAH FUCK YOUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU” and they were all up in LLPW’s faces immediately and wouldn’t settle down until they were forced to, causing weird shit like Harley ignoring Toyota’s clapping spot (as if to say “that’s shit you pull on rookies, not me” and “that’s enough out of YOU”) and Toyota immediately big-timing LLPW by no-selling and daring them to do something about it, then Momoe shoot-punting Rumi all hyper and having to be taught a lesson, and more. Thankfully Takako & Yasha were staying professional and things mostly settled down until it was time for Rumi to sandbag the shit out of Manami as a receipt. As Manami is the “Senior” AJW person it’s difficult to bring her back into line without just shooting on her, so Rumi (the “Senior” LLPW person) probably did the sandbagging as a lesson/lolz move, especially after Manami practically made a game out of no-selling them all earlier. But it just comes off like Manami was being a shit and daring them to try something (which they’re not gonna do, cuz it’s a big important show and nobody wants a brawl to break out… Kumiko would probably run the gauntlet in that case). Momoe meanwhile seems less competitive and more like she has the zoomies (all “YEAH WOOOOOOOOO!” and going hyper).

As a match it was a ton of fun with non-stop action, revenge spots, people being shitty, etc. Metatextually it was this amazing showcase of Manami in particular just trying to big-time everybody and laugh off the LLPW team just enough to avoid starting an actual fight, as she relentlessly trolls the entire team and tries to no-sell them. Rumi then is suddenly “so hurt” she makes all of Manami’s finisher attempts look like shit until magically recovering in time for a complicated routine with Kumiko, and of course LLPW’s President & booker is able to weather this storm of offense and score the win.

Rating: **** (so many fun spots and a lot of shitty behavior, but it also METATEXTUALLY rules because Toyota looks like she’s big-timing everyone because she’s either pissy about the loss or wants everyone to know she was taking this lightly and was better than everyone here, so it “didn’t matter”)

WWWA WORLD TITLE:
K.O. OR SUBMISSION ONLY:
SHINOBU KANDORI (LLPW) vs. YUMIKO HOTTA (AJW):
* It all comes down to this. A year ago, Kandori walked into the embattled, nearly bankrupt AJW and defeated their Champion, Hotta, and has held the Red Belt ever since. Now Hotta gets her chance at redemption. Hotta’s in black, Kandori’s in orange/gold.

Kandori attempts to end it immediately, but they end up at a stalemate on the mat- five minutes of that mostly has them ready for each other, but Kandori actually wins the strike war and headbutts Hotta down before getting her leg tied up. Hotta catches her with a knee, sold more like frustration, but Kandori catches the second one and swats her down for a “7” count. Hotta gets a rear mount and just lies there for a WHILE, killing time but also kinda looking like she’s grinding Kandori out a bit, especially when she takes advantage of a weight-shift to try for a cross-armbreaker and DRAMATICALLY pulls for it, but Kandori twists out. She fights for a triangle choke (which is how she won the belt in the first place), and when that doesn’t work she just tries to wear Hotta down with kicks and suplexes, but charges into the rolling kick and Hotta fires up for the corner version! Tiger Driver… into the cross-armbreaker attempt, and Kandori nearly ends up in the triangle herself getting out of it.

Kandori fights into the ropes, but Hotta gets a kick from there and hits her Pyramid Driver (straightjacket ligerbomb), then another, only for Kandori to nearly take the arm on a third. Hotta scores another rolling kick for a double-down, but trying another just has Kandori lie down on her and try a kimura! She even gets a pop for physically dragging Hotta away from the ropes to get another. Kandori’s fading and can’t get anything going, allowing Hotta a judo-flip into a sweep-kick to the head for an “8” count. But Kandori just gets another arm thing and nearly pops her by refusing to release into the ropes, drawing huge boos from the crowd and anger from the AJW wrestlers on the floor. Hotta bails to buy time, kicking Kandori in the head to stall her out, and after a minute Kandori tries to tear at the arm, only to get headbutted to the floor! And when she tries to get back in, Hotta just kicks her right in the eyeballs on the apron, scoring the TKO! Kandori can barely roll into the ring and isn’t on her feet at “10”! YUMIKO HOTTA IS 3WA CHAMPION AGAIN AT (18:03)!

This was a bit different- more of a human chessmatch than the more manic match from 1998- much slower and more thought-out (to the point where sometimes they’re just killing time). Lots of callbacks to the same 3-4 moves throughout as they each had a gameplan and were sticking to it. It didn’t really have a lot of “peaks”, to me, and was more slow-going and methodical. The ending also saves face for Kandori, as she got knocked to the floor and was caught coming in and couldn’t get to her feet JUST quite in time, with the caveat that she was at least capable enough to get back into the ring so it came off like more of a fluke than a careful bit of strategy or a true clean victory to me.

Rating: ***1/4 (thoughtful and interesting, with a lot of focus required, without being that awe-inspiring or exciting)

And that’s another AJW show! This one shares billing with LLPW, and has a lot of the usual political shenanigans (Zenjo wins their belt back, but loses the other two big matches), but at least there was that wild “Scramble” match. Which is really kind of a damning indictment of Manami Toyota’s professionalism, as much as it’s hilarious and notable primarily because of that. The rest of the matches are in that “Good” range- not that exciting but solid enough up and down the card.