From: hekunze@jeeves.uwaterloo.ca (Herb Kunze)
Subject: Old Japanese Videos - review
Organization: University of Waterloo
Date: Thu, 8 Oct 1992 15:06:43 GMT

This is the fourth installment in a series of reviews of videos
I'm watching these days.  Still pretty busy and finding only fleeting
moments to watch videos.  Gary Will, the Fluffster and I got together
last night to watch some videos and did see a few notable things which
I'll include in this review.  Here we go: (ratings out of *****)

- Dusty Rhodes vs. Hulk Hogan from 1980
    Yeah, it was kinda neat to see them in the ring together against
  each other, but it was as bad a match as it sounds.  Dusty juiced
  big time, and Hogan pummelled him until he made a comeback, at which 
  point Hogan got counted out.  *1/2

- Bob Backlund vs. Stan Hansen from 1980
    The same scenario as above, except this time when Bob started to
  come back, Hulk Hogan charged the ring and they tried to double team
  Bob a bit before leaving.  ***

- Mil Mascaras vs. Ricky Steamboat from 1980/81
    This was 2 out of 3 falls.  My notes are brief here, but I think they 
  both got a fall and then Gypsy Joe & Tony Garea charged the ring and
  ended the match.  There was a lot more technical wrestling than you
  might expect.  Still, very good.  ****

- Ric Flair vs. Harley Race from 1984
    This was from All Japan.  Flair did a clean job from a Harley Race 
  head-butt after a pretty good match.  Neither man had the NWA Title  
  at this time.  ***1/4

- Kerry von Erich vs. Jumbo Tsuruta for the NWA Title from 1984
    This was a 2 out of 3 falls match.  Kerry gushed.  The crowd was
  really into it and Kerry actually worked alright.  Again, my notes
  are incomplete for this match.  Jumbo got the first fall after his
  jumping knee, and I think Kerry got the second with a discus punch.
  I didn't write down the finish of the third fall, but Kerry retained
  the title.  ****   	 

- There was a weird spot on one tape where the teams of Jumbo Tsuruta
  & Genichiro Tenryu, Stan Hansen & Bruiser Brody, Giant Baba & Dory Funk,
  and Greg Gagne & Jim Brunzell all came to the ring for the announcement
  of a tag title tourney.  James Blear made the announcement and clearly
  said that the date was 04/13/84 and that the tourney finals would take
  place on 04/25/84.  I didn't hear what title was on the line, but he
  said the championship would be recognized by the PWF and the AWA.
  Anybody have any info on this?

- Cobra vs. Kuniaki Kobayashi from 1984
    These guys had great matches.  One of their matches was listed in the
  top 100 in the 1989 Observer Yearbook.  This match was every bit as 
  good.  Lots of heat, some juice, lost of flying.  Awesome stuff.  ****1/2

- Dynamite Kid vs Kuniaki Kobayashi from 1984
    This was apparently for the WWF Jr. Title.  Very good, but Dynamite
  seems to work better with other wrestlers.  ****1/4

- Dynamite Kid & Davey Boy Smith vs. Cobra & Black Tiger from 1984
    This match was as good as it reads on paper.  Davey Boy was still
  able to work hard in 1984, even though he and Dynamite had already
  begun to bulk up.  ****1/4

- Bruiser Brody vs. Dory Funk Jr. from 1982
    This match was for Funk's (NWA or All Japan) International Title;
  I haven't checked the history of the titles to see which belt it was.
  Dory gushed like crazy.  Brody was in great form.  Funk ended up
  jobbing for Brody's knee drop and Brody got the belt.  ****

- Tiger Mask vs. Dynamite Kid from 07/82
    A super match.  They did a lot of their usual spots, but the finish
  was really nifty.  Bret Hart was in Dynamite's corner and he climbed
  on the apron to complain to the ref.  Tiger Mask went for a roll-up 
  on Dynamite, knocking Bret off the apron in the process.  Kid hung on 
  the ropes, but Tiger Mask just somersaulted on the mat instead of 
  taking a bump.  When Kid turned around, he was met with a drop-kick
  that sent him out of the ring.  Tiger Mask then charged from the opposite
  side of the ring, did a backflip in the ring (similar to Muta's
  run-in for his handspring elbow) and came out of the backflip high
  enough to go over the rope.  His was facing the inside of the ring
  though, so he did a half twist while going over the ropes and landed
  on Dynamite Kid with a splash.  It looked wild because Tiger Mask
  had no way of knowing exactly where Kid was.  They brawled on the
  floor for a a few seconds, with Tiger Mask taking a whip into the guard
  rail.  Dyanmite charged him and Tiger Mask backdropped him over the
  guard rail onto the heads of the first few rows of fans at ringside.
  Honest!  Some of the women were hold their heads where they got hit by
  Dynamite's flailing limbs.  It was unbelievable.  My girlfriend, Karen,
  was in the room for this spot and afterwards said she wouldn't go
  to a live show with me if we sat in the first few rows at ringside.
  I tried to assure her that the top WWF stars rarely get launched
  into the crowd like that.  ****1/2

- Great Muta vs. Hiro Hase from 1990
    I don't have the exact date with me.  We watched this last night.
  Muta worked as a heel, posted Hase and Hase overbladed himself.  His
  face and torso were covered in blood.  Within a few minutes, Muta
  was covered in Hase's blood.  The blood took away from the match 
  in all of our opinions.  Hase basically got pummelled by Muta.  He
  did his northern lights suplex but Muta kicked out.  Muta then went
  nuts, reloaded his mist, and sprayed Hase with the green stuff.  Hase
  was a mess now, covered in red and green.  Muta nailed the ref and 
  pulled the stretcher out from under the ring, set Hase on it, and
  then did a moonsault on him.  I think we gave this ***.

- UWF Lucha Rumble from 11/17/90
    One of the unlabelled tapes that had recently come into my hands
  had this show on it.  Mexico's UWA, booked by Gran Hamada, tours
  Japan as the UWF, working with All Japan Women.  This show ran
  two hours and fifteen minutes.  One of the highlights was seeing the gay
  antics of El Bello Greco and Sergio El Hermoso - really bad wrestling,
  but funny comedy.  Yoshihiro Asai was in a tag match too, but it was
  quite lackluster.  The real stars of the show were Los Brazos: El Brazo,
  Brazo de Oro, and Brazo de Plata.  We fell in love with Brazo de Plata.
  He's a stubby fat guy, but he does all sorts of great moves like
  planchas, dropkicks, etc.  They worked against Gram Hamada, Kendo,
  and Blackman for the UWA trios titles in a 2 out of 3 falls match.
  We gave the match ****.  Then came the All Japan Women's match.  It
  was a ten woman elimination tag match featuring Manami Toyota, 
  Esther Moreno, Mariko Yoshida & the Honey Wings against Aja Kong,
  Bison Kimura, Madusa, La Diabolica, and Xochi Hamada.  The match was
  great.  Hamada (the booker's daughter) was first out.  Then Esther
  went to town, doing lots of great moves.  I think she eliminated
  Diabolica.  Esther then got eliminated.  Somewhere along the way
  Madusa got eliminated - Madusa was dressed like Cactus Jack and
  worked like him too, screaming like a stuck pig while choking.
  There was some confusion as all the girls were in the ring and
  there were several different pinfalls happening.  The ref counted
  them all and eliminated a group of girls.  It wound down to Aja Kong
  vs. both Honey Wings - a sheer mismatch.  ;-).  Aja climbed on the 
  ropes to nail one of the girls, but they both managed to get up on the
  ropes with Aja and it looked like they were going for a double superplex
  or something, but Aja butted their heads together.  They fell to the mat
  and Aja did a splash onto both their heads, pinning both of them.  The
  highlights of this match included Aja's dive off the top rope to the
  floor onto an opponent and anything Esther Moreno did (including an
  Asai moonsault from the second rope onto the floor).  We gave
  this match ****1/4.  The show ended with a Royal Rumble style battle
  royale.  There was one difference: instead of one wrestler coming in 
  every few minutes, two came in.  Asai won it. ***

- Aja Kong vs. Bull Nakano for the WWWA Title from 11/14/90
    This was from WrestleMarinpiad I.  It was an insane cage match where the
  winner is the first to get out.  The other AJW women were at ringside
  and they kept throwing foreign objects into the rings.  We saw:
  scissors, chain, tri-sectional staff, nunchakus, oil cans, two-by-four,
  and lord knows what else.  The match ended with Aja lying in the ring
  and Bull nailing her with a leg drop from the top of the cage.  Bull
  then climbed out.  Wild.  I think we gave it ****.

That's all for now.  I'm not sure what tapes I'll be watching next.
I've only got about 40 or 50 to go. ;-)  (And lots more in the mail to me)

                                                             Herb...