WAR Wrestle Association-R WAR-RISE 05/05/97
By Maffew Gregg on 12 January 2025
Wrestle Association-R
Korakuen Hall
Attendance: 2,100
Battle Ranger vs. Tomohiro Ishii
Ranger is the current light heavyweight tag champ with Masaaki Mochizuki so naturally we’re JIP to him taking a mammoth lariat from Ishii. Ranger kicks him very hard in the corner in response before landing an Asai Moonsault that Ishii has to back up to catch, a nice sign he’d be a proper pro one day. Diving headbutt off the top gets two from the man with a still-visible neck. Ishii lands move after move until Ranger bothers to comeback with a side suplex until Ranger lands the in-ring Asai Moonsault for two. Man they’re not missing Ultimo at all are they? Yeah course not. Ranger lands a Liger Bomb before trying a jumping elevated DDT which ends up spiking Ishii horribly to the crowd’s disgust so Ranger taps him out very soon at 11:35.
Ranger shakes his head in disgust afterwards. Mate, you did that to him! You’re the problem! Ranger usually looks at least decent but now he’s forced to be a replacement Ultimo and do all his moves, he’s stiffer and not exactly hiding his displeasure at the situation. Ishii was his usual neck-hating self.
Osamu Tachihikari vs. Yoshikazu Taru (Kitao Dojo)
Taru is still listed as being part of the Kitao Dojo, even though they’ve not run a proper show in months and would only hold one more after this. They’re holding on harder than Hiroo Onoda. Osamu is slow and fat so Taru kicks him quickly until Osamu sumo strikes him down.
We clip ahead to Taru kicking and kicking and kicking and oh god. Taru’s head gets scraped as he ducks a lariat leading to a pause and a “ooh!” from the man until a cross armbar stops the fun. This goes on and on, even in clipped form thankfully ending with Osamu winning with a rolling leg pin like Ryuma Go. More like Ryuma Stop Wrestling HOW BOUT IT.
Masaaki Mochizuki & Takashi Okamura (Wrestle Yume Factory) vs. Umibos Gokuaku & Shinigami (Wrestle Yume Factory)
Oh no, the WYF has imploded. Let’s see if we can carry on somehow. Umibos locks a hold on Mochizuki so Okamura stretches over the ropes and gives his bald head a good slap. Crowd like that.
We clip ahead to Umibos and his glacial crowd brawling, with Shinigami (looking like Frankensteiner’s monster) trying to choke Okamura over the ropes with a rope like Gangrel that one time on Raw when he nearly died for real. If it meant he didn’t have to watch these two wrestle Gangrel would have died happy.
Shinigami is doing an undead thing which requires him to lurch around which would be nice against anyone else other than WYF lads as it means they have to do all the kicking and also the selling. If you shove a broom up their arse they can do the cleaning too. Shinigami gets a rubbish choke as we clip ahead to Umibos having to pick up the slack. Mochizuki misses a springboard swinging kick before landing a load of others until a double-jump off the top ends it at 12:12 with Lurch having the audacity to kick out at three.
What a complete waste of two talented lads this was. Undertaker vs. Shamrock this wasn’t. Umibos and his crap mate wouldn’t return.
Super Junior Bout
Yuji Yasuraoka vs. Masashi Aoyagi
Yuji has dropped the tag titles but he’s still relevant to WAR’s plans so we get this match against the lovely legend who was moonlighting in WYF.
Aoyagi naturally kicks Yuji directly in the face a bunch of times before he is pushed off the apron and into fans. Aoyagi follows this up with a plancha (!) and a clip ahead to Aoyagi landing outside so Yuji can follow with his high crossbody.
Clip ahead some more to Aoyagi not tapping to the WAR Special and no-one believing it was happening anyway. Yuji lands a Fisherman’s Buster as this is not grabbing people’s attentions. Yuji’s double jump kick that Mochizuki has blatantly stolen from him sets up a DDT for the pin at 13:13 and a shocked crowd.
Nice for Yuji that he gets to brag about beating Aoyagi but after seeing this match, it’ll only mean something to him.
Nobutaka Araya & Lance Storm vs. Koji Kitao & Nobukazu Hirai
Kitao’s back and he’s in the pre-main slot again. Hirai still has his Bigelow gear on so I’m guessing that tag team was supposed to last longer than it did.
We’re JIP to Hirai and Araya killing the business by spamming piledrivers and no selling them until Hirai counters a powerbomb into a Frankensteiner. Kitao is no longer wearing a gi thankfully but his tights are still near his tits. Bertha Faye more tastefully dressed. Kitao lands a judo throw and a massive back senton to pop the crowd. Fire Thunder Driver nearly kills Araya but Lance saves the day.
We’re clipped to Lance somehow missing a dropkick on Kitao. He’s the size of Luxembourg. Kitao makes up for it by failing to catch Lance on a top rope slam. Crowd boo and laugh so we clip ahead (WHY LEAVE THAT IN) to Araya taking a Frankensteiner off the top from Hirai. Araya moonsaults Hirai but Kitao saves to more boos. Lance tries to backdrop Kitao but only manages when Araya joins in with a lariat. Lance tags in to springboard dropkick Hirai beautifully while Kitao fails to catch Araya on a dive outside. It was the best of times, it was the blurst of times. Storm lands a spinning wheel kick variation of a Doomsday Device, it looks OK I guess but he seems to hit Araya as much as his opponent. Kitao breaks up the pin to boos almost as massive as him.
We then clip to Hirai landing his top rope elbow on Lance before getting the submission win at 15:39.
Kitao sometimes shows a lot of promise and seems nowhere near as bad as history has decided he was. And then you get matches like this where he’s even worse than suggested. Lance tried but there’s no storm strong enough to move this blubber.
Super Match in War Cage
Genichiro Tenryu & Koki Kitahara & Jun Kikuchi vs. Abdullah The Butcher & Tarzan Goto & Ryo Miyake
Goto is being pushed as the new top bad guy which is about two years too late. Meanwhile Abby is here because he’s a(round) now that Tokyo Pro has died. Ryo is another TPW cast-off, I assume he carried Abby’s forks for him.
Goto’s crew decide to start throwing chairs during Tenryu’s entrance to kick start a brawl in the entrance way. Tenryu gets buried under a pile of chairs while Abby chokes Jun as fans scatter and yell a lot. It’s a cool image with the fans trying to cheer on Tenryu as they run away from Abby’s wiggling tits.
After this, the bad guys head inside as Abby dares Tenryu to step inside in another cool image. As soon as he does, Abby stabs him. Tenryu has enough and sends everyone bouncing off the cage wall. Well Ryo and Goto anyway, Abby’s too fat. After all that excitement, we settle down and start doing tags (!?) leading to Kitahara attacking Ryo and then taunting at Abby. When did he get a personality? Goto tags in and crowd is at least reacting to him like he’s a big deal which motivates him to elbow drop Jun a few times before kicking Tenryu into the cage wall for the hell of it. Abby tags in and it’s like watching him in fast forward compared to Abby a few years after this. Elbow drops and posing, by God. Goto sends Jun into the cage wall and he hits it HARD which causes the women to shriek.
Goto flays his forehead to help the bleeding before Abby starts with the forks. Jun is a virtual nobody so he’s here to get worked by the big bad guys. It’s effective action but crowd isn’t really caring about him because he’s a goon. They care about him making the hot tag to Tenryu, who instantly enziguris Abby to make sure he’s still working. Tenryu chops his titties but Abby no-sells because those things must be harder than Contra III. Goto pulls the ropes to send Tenryu flying and allowing the fat evil dudes to take advantage once they start disregarding the rules and ignore the tags. What are they going to do, DQ them? Jun and Ryo escape the cage and change nothing about the match except the camera can cut to them brawling outside the cage when there’s nothing happening in it. Yuji of all people runs in to do his double-jump spin kick using the cage but predictably makes a mess of it so Goto immediately sit-out piledrives him. Yeah thanks for coming.
Goto and Abby get stuck in Tenryu’s forehead, giving him the type of suffering you usually only see in Chief O’Brien episodes of Deep Space Nine. Kitahara tries to help but it’s stabby time for him too as everyone hits that point in the match where they’re wrestling for the photographers at ringside. Lots of “ah no i’m dying ah help me” poses. Ryo starts attacking Tenryu and poses with him on top of the cage, which is enough to make Tenryu WAR UP and knock the idiot off before following with a crossbody off the top of the bloody thing before jumping right back up!
Why? Because he’s MR. WRESTLING, that’s why.
Kitahara launches Ryo into the cage wall multiple times while Tenryu chair shots Abby in the crowd. Jun tries to lariat Goto who doesn’t even ignore him. Tenryu chases Abby out of the Hall leaving Kitahara to drop Ryo with a Liger Bomb to end it 19:07
This was a lot of mostly senseless fun that worked to the strength of the heels, with everyone getting a chance to either look good or make the large lads look lairy. Nice of Tenryu to let others get some time to shine, even if they’re nowhere near ready to be at his level because WAR hasn’t got time to build new stars properly.
The match didn’t save the tape but by this point RikidÅzan vs. Necro Butcher couldn’t have done that.
Overall: Yikes. Yeah probably not a good idea to stack your main event with the remaining stars when your undercard is as dry and flimsy as this. Maybe watch the main event if you’re that way inclined and run away from the rest.
