NJPW Wrestling Dontaku Review 3/5-4/5/19

Night One:

Night Two:

As the Japanese imperial era changed from Heisei to Reiwa New Japan returned to Fukuoka for their two Wrestling Dontaku shows. Last year Kazuchika Okada beat Hiroshi Tanahashi to break Tanahashi’s record of the most title defences in a single title reign, while this year was the first title defence of Okada’s new reign that began on April 6^th in Madison Square Garden. His opponent, SANADA, was the losing finalist of the New Japan Cup. There were also title matches for Dragon Lee, defending the Jr. Heavyweight Title against Taiji Ishimori, and Jeff Cobb, who faced Taichi for the NEVER Openweight Title.

The first night of Wrestling Dontaku featured the NEVER Title match, and gave the Jr. Title the headline spot, which was a welcome development. Dragon Lee has always been a really good junior in New Japan, and ever since the tragic injury to Hiromu Takahashi at Dominion last year he has been on a tear, recently promising to keep hold of the belt that he won at MSG until Hiromu returns. Since Lee won the title in a triple threat match and didn’t pin the champion Ishimori this match was booked, and on the Road to Wrestling Dontaku Ishimroi goaded Lee by stealing his mask. In response Lee came out for the title match here wearing a mask of his former rival Kamaitachi – the name that Hiromu went by during his excursion in Mexico. Both men had the chance to show off their moves in this match – Ishimori put his speed to good use and was able to counter Lee’s power, including a beautiful crucifix bomb to counter the Desnucadora. Ultimately Lee was able to overcome the Bone Soldier and put him away with a Desnucadora. After the match Lee cut a great babyface promo and shook hands with fans in the front row, including picking up some children to celebrate. This was probably my favourite junior title match of the year, and I’m glad that Dragon Lee is getting to have a run with the title. I expect that he’ll hold it until Hiromu returns after Best of the Super Juniors to set up a rematch between the two rivals.

Unfortunately the main event of night two – the IWGP Heavyweight title match – came nowhere near to living up to night one. I am unsure how to feel about SANADA, because on the one hand I don’t think he’s terrible like some people do, and I want him to succeed. On the other hand, this was probably the worst New Japan main event of 2019, and I would be happy not to see Okada face SANADA for the rest of his title reign. The blame can’t all be put on SANADA though, because Okada didn’t do himself any favours with the way that this match was laid out, and the booking gave me absolutely no reason to believe that this would end in anything but an Okada victory. The structure of this match was my biggest complaint, because it started off so slowly that it made me think that they were going for a sixty minute draw. When things did start to heat up it improved slightly, but then the finish just came out of nowhere, and one Rainmaker gave Okada the victory. I have complained in the past about the New Japan fetish for finisher reversals, but the end of this match felt like it came completely out of the blue. This was essentially a twenty minute match stretched into forty minutes, and for no discernible reason. Something also has to be said about SANADA’s Skull End finisher, which is the worst looking dragon sleeper hold I have ever seen. At one point Okada literally just slid his head out of SANADA’s arm. For the love of all the wrestling gods SANADA please stop using that move.

The semi-main events on both shows ended up stealing both shows for me. On the first night Taichi defeated Jeff Cobb to become a two-time NEVER champion. I love Taichi’s matches – perhaps because they depart from the usual New Japan formula – and to see him get the title back here was great. Cobb looked strong in defeat, hitting some big suplexes and a top rope brainbuster. I like Cobb and hope he sticks around in New Japan after this tour. After the usual Taichi shenanigans involving Miho Abe and the other members of Suzuki-gun, Taichi got down to business kicking Cobb really hard, and locked in his new submission the Holy Emperor’s Crucifix Tomb. Finally a Black Mephisto secured the win for Taichi, who celebrated in the ring with the entirety of Suzuki-gun. Taking the title off Cobb probably makes sense from a booking standpoint if he’s not going to be around full time, and hopefully this is the start of priming Taichi for his debut in the G1 Climax.

The semi-main event of night two between EVIL and Tomohiro Ishii was one of the best New Japan matches of 2019, in contrast to the main event that followed it. This was a non-title singles match, but EVIL and Ishii went out and absolutely battered each other for just over twenty minutes. The lariat sequences in this match were particularly brutal, and there were a few big top turnbuckle spots that looked painful. EVIL had a few near falls, but it was Ishii who walked away with the win after an enziguri, sliding lariat, and then finally a brainbuster. I was a bit surprised by this result, since I assumed that they might give EVIL a win to balance out SANADA’s predicted loss in the main event, but following this match Taichi appeared to lay down a challenge to Ishii for the NEVER Title so I guess they wanted to go down that road instead. Ishii in the NEVER division a few years ago was great, and Taichi and Ishii’s New Japan Cup match was very good, so I’m looking forward to this direction.

The other big news coming out of Wrestling Dontaku came from various promos that laid the groundwork for Dominion. Tanahashi unexpectedly came out on night two after surgery on his arm to announce that he would return to the ring at the Best of the Super Juniors Final on June 5^th. His promo was interrupted by Jay White and Gedo, who argued that White was next in line for a title shot and attacked Tanahashi. Presumably we will be getting White vs. Tanahashi again at Dominion. After Okada’s victory in the main event he was in the middle of cutting a promo thanking the people of Fukuoka for coming to the show, when the lights went dark and Chris Jericho appeared on screen to challenge him to a title match at Dominion. An interesting move, but I suppose it makes sense since there is no immediate challenger for Okada. Tetsuya Naito and Kota Ibushi confirmed that their Intercontinental Title match will be at Dominion so they were out of the picture. I had mixed feelings about Jericho’s New Japan run, but it could be a fun match and it will probably be different from the standard Okada title match. There’s no way Okada will drop the title to Jericho, but at least it’s a big name title match for Dominion and a new matchup.

El Phantasmo also made his debut on night two of Wrestling Dontaku as part of Bullet Club, being confirmed as the X who will be taking part in Best of the Super Juniors. Phantasmo and Ishimori beat the team of Will Ospreay and Dragon Lee, with Phantasmo getting the pin over Ospreay to make him look strong in his debut. There was also a cryptic, and quite bizarre, promo video for a new challenger for Juice Robinson’s US Title who will be debuting at the BOSJ Final. The video featured an unknown wrestler sitting at a bar who seems to be a British biker playing with a knife. Following the Switchblade promos at the end of 2017 with another knife based promo is an interesting choice. Rumours online suggest that this could be Chris Brookes or possibly Tomoyuki Oka returning with a new gimmick.

Overall, Wrestling Dontaku featured two of the better shows that New Japan has put on this year. The Okada vs. SANADA main event was dire, but the other three big matches delivered, and honestly you could just stop watching after EVIL vs. Ishii. The undercard had some good matches too, particularly the Los Ingobernables de Japon vs. CHAOS multi-man tag matches. The Road to Wrestling Dontaku was expanded this year, and honestly it doesn’t make for good viewing from home. I’m sure New Japan is doing good business running house shows across Japan, and the attendance for Wrestling Dontaku was strong, but the undercard matches on the tour were incredibly repetitive. Just watching the two nights of Wrestling Dontaku without the Road to shows would have been a more enjoyable experience for the majority of fans abroad and watching online. The next tour is Best of the Super Juniors, which has a strong lineup and should be a good change of pace before Dominion at the start of June.