The 🤼 プロレス thread! Learning Japanese through pro wrestling

The one minor note I would give, is I think the やってるものが connects with the 身についてる, with the 気がします more tacked on at the end. So I’d put that part more as something like “she’s really mastering what she’s doing (in the ring).”

I think she’s saying that she wants to mix it up with everyone while everyone’s (or to make sure everyone’s) pumped for Cyberfight Festival.
I suppose her match with Arai could be an example of the kind of “stirring the pot” / かき回す she maybe means, in the sense of stirring up with it more drive in Arai to eventually overcome those obstacles, rather than suppressing it.

You’re about right, but with a bit of a different nuance! The full audio is a lot clearer for this one because she starts talking about how at first she was a rookie who had to come to the ring to politely ask for a match, but now she just has to sit around like a cool older sister in her room waiting and the challengers will come with a timid knock at the door! So she enjoyed that feeling of TJPW being her house in that sense of receiving guests/challengers instead of the other way around.

If I slice it like this would that help: お姉さん目線で思いつつ (as in, it’s the 思い that’s happening with the お姉さん目線)
She was talking in the audio about watching and remarking to herself how “ねこちゃん” has her own style, and so it’s about her, “with a bit of an older sister’s eye” (in the sense of being more experienced in TJPW) noting that she wants everyone to grow into their own unique best self, roughly. And even as she thinks that realizing she wants that for herself too so 一緒に頑張ろうね!

This is concurrence, not disagreement as that jibes generally with my experience, I’d just note that the word feels to me a bit like if “taking moves” was a completely natural thing to say in English. It’s a little hard to talk about taking moves in English without using more directly kayfabe-breaking phrasing like “bumping” or “selling” but that seems like a weird quirk of English terminology if you think about it, since the main priority of receiving a move someone else performed on you as safely as possible (and the secondary priority of looking cool!) is largely the same whether or not the move was actively trying to hurt you, so it makes sense I think the terminology would be the same as a martial art where you need to practice taking moves too like in judo.

The first main way I came across it was Mayu Iwatani in shupro (or her book, or both) being complimented on her 受け身 since she sells like death but almost never gets hurt, and then is still able to revive and win the match (hence her “zombie” nickname). So people consistently said Iwatani has great 受け身 because it’s safe and impressive.

The pro wrestling dictionary, by the way, has:
image

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Finally had the chance to watch the TJPW VOD show from April 6! No recap for this one, so I just had to work off of the comment videos on twitter.

There were two matches with, well, plot significance in this show. The first was a sort of double preview match for Yuka vs Shoko at CyberFight Fest, as well as for Yuka/Mizuki vs Shoko/Misao shortly after.

After the match, Yuka said: “最高の相手だなとは思いますし、いい緊張感を持ってフェス、うちらが一番盛り上げるので見ててください”. I was a bit unsure, but I translated this as: “I think she’s my best opponent, and the Festival will have some good tension and we’re going to be the most exciting, so please watch us.” Yuka also said that there’s no way they lose as a tag team, and she’s not worried even a little bit.

Shoko said: “やっぱりまだ(坂崎の)隠し持った手を引っ張り出すことはできなかったので。今から私は引っ張ってきたものをブラッシュアップして最高の状態で臨みたい.” This was a little hard for me, haha. Very tentatively, this was my best shot: “In the end, I still couldn’t draw out (Sakazaki’s) hidden moves. From this point forward, I’m going to brush up on what I have learned from her, and be in my best condition.”

Misao’s comment, in that same video, also confused me. She said: “向かい合って瑞希さんにもユカさんにも勝てる勝機を見出したような気もする.” I think she was saying: “I feel like I’ve finally found my chance to face Mizuki-san and Yuka-san and beat them.” But the grammar in this was confusing haha.

The other match with significance was Rhio vs Maki Itoh for the International Princess belt. It was a fun match, but my favorite part was afterward, when both Itoh and Rhio spoke to the crowd. Rhio tried to speak a little Japanese, and Itoh encouraged her, and it was just a really delightful language teaching moment in the middle of a wrestling promo, haha.

Backstage, Rhio said (in English) that she loved being in TJPW, and she invited Itoh to come fight her back in England.

An interviewer asked Itoh if a friendship sprouted between them, and Itoh said something that I thought was really interesting actually. She said that she’s shy in Japanese, but not in English! That does seem to come across in her twitter presence and in her English promos, haha (she has a tendency to be very, very crude in English).

It’s interesting that she has that kind of confidence while speaking a language that she is still learning, but not her native language. Maybe it’s part of the nature of Japanese just being more concerned with politeness in general, which sort of frees her up more in English to say ruder things without having to worry so much about it.

Itoh also said that she made a lot of friends during her last excursion, so she’s going to do her best to communicate more so that she can bring them here. Aim for the post-match drinking together!

And those are all of my comments on the TJPW show!

CyberFight Festival is today/tomorrow! It’s June 12 Japan time, if that helps. There have been a few recent developments that have made me a lot more excited about the show. One of the most exciting things to me is that NOAH’s Katsuhiko Nakajima will be taking Marufuji’s place and teaming with Kotoge and Inamura (with his new theme by the Final Fantasy composer) against DDT’s Tetsuya Endo, Jun Akiyama, and Higuchi!

I’m excited because I like all of these guys (not that I don’t like Maru :sweat_smile:), and it’ll be especially thrilling to see Nakajima, as a heel, have to somehow work together with some of NOAH’s most staunch babyfaces in order to represent the company. Maybe his “俺がノアだ” claim has some actual weight to it after all…

Also, Kenoh’s match with Daisuke Sasaki will now be a hardcore match. There has been a fair amount of mud-slinging (not literal. This is a necessary clarification when DDT is involved) between the two of them, and between the DDT and NOAH wrestlers in general, toward the other promotion. You can probably guess Kenoh’s complaints, haha. From DDT’s side, a lot of their criticisms of NOAH have been based in NOAH’s lack of ability to draw fans right now, which… well… they’re not exactly wrong there.

daisukesip
(I found Kumirei’s custom forum emote script, and migrated over some of my favorites from a discord server)

Something that’s interesting to me about that feud is that Sasaki has also had to step up, as a heel, to carry DDT on his back and represent them.

Dieno made some interesting comments about that. He said that Sasaki actually always carries DDT on his back, but now it just happens that he can say it publicly. Dieno went on to say: “In that sense, all of us carry DDT. Its not something we need to show, but we all carry DDT. It’s natural for us to. It depends on the situation if we need to say it. I’ve not been shaken enough to say.”

They uploaded a pretty funny video of Sasaki just criticizing NOAH for like eight and a half minutes. I’m delighted to say that this one not only has Japanese subtitles, but also has English subs that you can turn on!

There have also been a few funny developments centering around Kenoh’s column in shupro, but I’ll let rodan get to those without spoiling haha.

I also watched episode 2 of 夢プロレス-dream on the ring-, which focuses on 凛咲子 (I decided not to embed this episode because she talks about her past doing gravure, and there is some footage of that, so just a warning, it might not be the best choice for watching at work, haha).

I couldn’t resist trying to understand a little more because I wanted to find out more about her, so I ended up watching it twice, once without pausing (for the listening practice), and then again with pausing at just about every subtitle so that I could attempt to read them and look up a few unknown words.

I’m afraid that what I feared would happen is coming true. I’m starting to get attached to all four of them, and don’t want any of them to lose the competition…

feelstana

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Hey pals! Dropping in as a new Wani Kani user with my very first post in the community to say that I’m so excited to find this thread. I’m a lifelong wrestling fan who started following NJPW about eight years ago, and have been getting more into other promotions like DDT and Stardom since. I’m glad to see that other folks here see the value in the medium as a Japanese language resource — I couldn’t have said it any better than @fallynleaf’s incredibly detailed breakdown in the OP.

I kind of checked out of most wrestling during the pandemic because of the whole “This isn’t the same without a crowd” and “I am uncomfortable seeing packed venues with all these unmasked and unvaxxed people” but thankfully the whole industry has taken a turn for the better this year. And I just renewed my NJPW World subscription to catch Dominion this weekend on the road to Forbidden Door (even if barely paying attention to New Japan for a few years means I’ve got a lot of catching up to do).

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One point I’d say (maybe being wrong of course) is that 最高 gets thrown around so often that to me it doesn’t have as much contrastive weight as “my best opponent.” Like I guess I’d think of it more here like “ideal”/“you’re the best!” kind of best than “person X is my best friend” kind of best. :sweat_smile: Shoko’s a 最高の相手, but she’s not necessarily specifically ゆかの最高の相手, I think.

The other part I also think is made trickier by her kind of reaching for something to say and so the transcript not coming out as clear as a professionally written essay or anything like that.
The way I would read it is:
いい緊張感を持って → “we’re gonna have いい緊張感, so…”
(埼玉。。。) フェス、-> “… Festival audience, (she first addresses Saitama, then フェス, seemingly reaching for the right phrase or some promo energy that’s escaping her that day)”
うちらが一番盛り上げるので見ててください → “we’re gonna 盛り上げる the most so please watch.”

A tip for the future is I’d say you understandably likely got tripped up on the “持ってフェス、” part? And the て there can be a tip off that it’s the “I’m talking and need a conjunction” て, not a modification of フェス (since it doesn’t end in る). And then that might make it easier to pick apart what exactly “フェス、” is doing there, which I think ends up sort of an addressee for the “見ててください” at the end.

I’d say Shoko’s talking about how 前哨戦 are a chance to see as much of what an opponent can do as possible, and while やっぱり she wasn’t able to fully draw out 100% of what Yuka can do (so Yuka will still have tricks up her sleeve), Shoko now intends to brush-up on and review everything she did learn about Yuka so she can face her in the best possible condition.
(Which isn’t really a disagreement with your translation, just a note about nuance for you to check if you took away exactly the same thing or not - basically I think she’s talking about 手 she wasn’t able to 引っ張り出す, and then in the next sentence all the ones she has been able to up to this point, 引っ張ってきたもの)

I’d break it down like:
向かい合って(見て) → “facing them…” (in the video I think she says 見て which may make it a little clearer)
Xような気もする. → “… I feel as though X” (in this case, that she uncovered a chance of victory over Yuka and Mizuki even though it sounds like they lost this particular day) (Incidentally, I hear “気がする” distinctly in the video, so I wonder if the switch to も in the transcript is just to tie it in slightly more cohesively with what Shoko says, without the bookends from Misao of her talking about the day and then bringing it back to her hopes for their challenge that do the same job in a wordier way in the audio)

ooh, the crying Tana one seems useful… :sweat_smile:

@ironcladfolly welcome! And please don’t be scared away by long posts!

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@rodan Thank you! No worries, I’m so here for them — these are the kinds of in-depth breakdowns and translations of プロ I’ve been trying to find for years! Turns out all I needed to do was start learning a whole new language :joy:

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I’m super excited to see you here! And honored that this thread was your first post, wow! I hope you keep coming back :blush:.

Thank you for your compliment on the opening post! I spent ages drafting it, haha. I think I was posting in my study log about starting this thread for over a month before I finally actually did it. If you want more wrestling discussion, there’s also some of it happening in my study log, though I try to confine the more detailed stuff to this thread.

If you want to add anything to any of the opening posts, by the way, feel free! I’ve been too busy to check youtube to see if there have been other good free matches uploaded there recently (and I’m biased toward the promotions that I spend most of my time with), so if there’s any match that you really love that’s available for free, please add it as a recommendation!

I completely understand checking out of wrestling during the pandemic. I had times where it was very hard to keep watching. Still do, honestly, because it’s an industry that can be really awful. But I’m still here because I truly think that as a medium, it’s one of the most beautiful forms of art in the world.

Honestly, you not paying attention to NJPW for the past few years was probably for the best :pensive:. They’ve had… a rough past few years. Some of it has been misfortune outside of their control (injuries, sickness, a global pandemic and travel restrictions, etc.), but a lot of it has been problems of their own making (horrifically exploiting their workers after they get injured, continuing to book abusers and people complicit in a culture of abuse, and just bad booking in general and a lack of willingness to adapt creatively, which isn’t morally bad but does not make for compelling content).

I was originally excited about Forbidden Door, too, but actually just ended my own NJPW subscription last month, due to the ongoing situation with Kota Ibushi that I’ve been posting about in here over the past month. I’ll probably still watch the show, but not on my own dime.

The good news is that things have been much brighter for Stardom and DDT and many other companies! I’m not really watching Stardom anymore (I was putting way too much time into watching wrestling and something had to give), but from what I’ve heard from folks who still are, they’ve been on a fantastic run lately.

DDT and TJPW (and AEW) are where I’m mostly focusing my energy currently. TJPW is my favorite company, but they recently became much less accessible to English-speakers after Mr. Haku left CyberFight and they lost their translator. So I’ve been trying to translate as much as I can on my own with my (upper beginner) Japanese, haha, hence many of my recent posts in this thread.

It has definitely been hard, and I truly could not be doing this without rodan’s help. I’m hoping that when I get good enough at the language, I’ll be able to give back some, too, and help other beginners out in the same way :blush:.

But yeah, all of that is to say that I’m very grateful that I started learning the language, because I needed it a lot sooner than I thought I would when we lost TJPW (and temporarily DDT) translation. I’ve actually been able to stay more or less caught up on TJPW’s storylines for over half a year now! And I’ve made some pretty big leaps in understanding with all of the practice I’ve gotten with it, though I’m still far from being able to understand promos on the fly during shows.

Feel free to post about shows that are exciting to you, funny tweets, interesting articles or interviews, or really anything that catches your attention. Even as a beginner, you’ll be surprised at how far you can get with enough enthusiasm, haha!

Thanks for all of your help as always! I’m proud of myself for actually managing to figure this one out!

feelstana is one of the emoji that I believe to be honestly essential, tbh. It should be included as a default emote because no existing emoji quite captures the feeling of Tana stoically crying.

The other one that I consider absolutely essential is tamu_believes_in_you:

tamu_believes_in_you

We use that one mainly for expressing solidarity and support and sometimes gratitude. If I could make just one of our wrestlemoji part of the existing emoji canon, it would be this one.

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I watched CyberFight Festival 2022!
I didn’t have giant expectations, but I was totally ready to spend a lazy sunday watching wrestling and eating a ridiculous amount of garlic fries, and I ended up loving the show!

First of all, oh my god Kenoh’s hair, him coming out after the build-up of those entrances is one of the funniest things that’s ever happened. I feel like… Kenoh might be the best professional wrestler? No one does utterly ridiculous things with the utmost seriousness like him, huh.
Other thoughts:

  • I was very impressed with the expensive-looking presentation. So many extras! And that screen on the second-level that opens up for wrestlers to enter through is so cool.
  • Shoko Nakajima has very quickly ended up at the top of my “anxiously rooting for them to win” wrestler list so I was most looking forward to the TJPW title match and was very engaged watching it! Yuka’s amazing and is one of those people who winning a title would be a believable outcome for at anytime, anywhere so her being pre-occupied with Magical Sugar Rabbits’ reign was no reason for me to rest easy that Shoko would retain. But she did! Yaaaaay! I was very happy about that albeit quite disappointed they didn’t give her any post-match promo time.
  • Satoshi Kojima’s GHC title shot seemed a little random, and I had no expectation that he was going to win, but he seems super likeable, I’m bread club 4 life :bread: :croissant: :baguette_bread:, and of all the 剛腕s in the world, he’s the 剛腕est, so I was more than happy to root for him too, and enjoyed that match. And he actually won! Yaaaaay! The second ending lariat was a super cool moment. I should find some bread to eat…
  • The Kenoh/Sasaki no-DQ match was really fun! That last stomp off the top of the ladder has gotta be now at the top of my list of moves I’m glad to never ever take. Holy cow did that not look fun! Not in an unsafe sort of way, just in a… grown man landing directly on my stomach from some height sort of way.
  • The match with Endo and Nakajima (assuming the ending was planned) definitely did it’s job of making me really really really want to see Nakajima challenge for Endo’s title, which I’m hoping was the point. I thought the stuff between them that we saw was electric. they’re so pretty… The heavies in the match weren’t bad either. Hopefully not the last we see of whatever all that was, anyway.
  • I was surprised how good a foil Rob Van Dam was for Kiyomiya.
  • I quite liked the tag match with MAO and 朱崇花 et. al! A lot of inventive spots I feel like I hadn’t quite seen before.
  • It looked like Simon Gotch was wearing Junji Ito themed trunks, and I had mixed feelings about that. On the one hand, I was tempted to think that was cool. On the other hand… the hair situation, for starters, absolutely prevented me from thinking that.
  • I think I’m probably willing to try just reading Pheremones in a positive light. Nothing wrong in principal with sexy dudes who are clearly very very aware that they’re sexy dudes. Or butts! lots of butt
  • I should probably watch more DDT now that my listening comprehension is kinda decent. The commentary adds a consistently funny level of deadpan! Like this exchange between the commentator and a guest, Marika Tani from SKE48 who was there mainly for Saki Arai and said she’d never seen a DDT match before, as in the ring a man is hypnotized by a pair of sunglasses to uncontrollably participate in a dance battle:
    “えええ。。。谷さん”
    “はい”
    “ご説明いたします!”
    “お願いします!”
    So simple, but awfully funny while what’s happening in the ring is completely ridiculous.
  • I will say though - it seems like Cyberfight tends to tend to use celebrities / non-wrestling personalities as guests and stack up a lot of them during a show, which is somewhat less interesting to not-knowing-general-Japanese-media me than Stardom’s tendency to use active wrestlers. Though I admit, they’re probably more professional as commentators! The comedian Kendo Kobayashi for example, was good throughout (it seems like he’s longtime enjoyed/been involved in pro wrestling in some way).
  • Coulda done without the Cyberjapan dancers interlude tbh…
  • My heart goes out to those poor audience members who suffered an assisted flying cross body from Yoshihiko :pensive:

The show definitely did it’s job in the sense that I feel very positively about Wrestle Universe and would recommend it to anyone interested as clearly a great value for the money! For the future, I’m definitely bought in on Shoko Nakajima’s run at this point, and I’ll be very curious to see Kenoh’s title shot… And the Mutoh retirement run should be emotional!

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I’m really glad that you enjoyed the show! They certainly did not hold back with the production value, haha!

Sadly, DDT’s translator did not translate the TJPW comments, so it looks like I have a little work ahead of me after all! There was also a press conference leading up to TJPW’s Korakuen show. I’m going to try my best to get through both of those before the next show!

Here are some individual responses to some things re: CyberFight Fest that I'm putting under a cut to spoiler guard them:

I legitimately think that he’s one of the best comedy wrestlers in the world! He’s so good at this! His shupro column is frequently the highlight of your recaps for me, haha, and just his entire manner and character, he’s a delight!

I loved his hair, and him singing his own entrance theme (Kenoh in TJPW when??), and the way that the match had all of these little callbacks to the last CyberFight Fest, like Yoshihiko’s cameo, the bike (used by Kongoh!!), and that sort of thing. It was very much a DDT hardcore match specifically. Kenoh won it by playing DDT’s own game!

I honestly think that he’s the true star of this year’s CyberFight Fest, and that part of the reason why is because he was so involved not only in the show last year, but also in DDT’s Peter Pan show in 2020, right after NOAH had been acquired by CyberAgent. He has been an absolutely essential piece to making the whole ragtag group of companies function thematically.

I’m so glad you enjoyed this match, and that you’re enjoying Shoko! Her entrance was probably my favorite out of all of them, because how often do you see dancers wearing inflatable t-rex costumes at a huge title match??

I really enjoy Shoko and Yuka’s friendship because once upon a time, they used to be tag partners, but they ultimately ended up not being each other’s true life partner. They’ll still work together on the rare chances they have to tag, and still appreciate those moments, but they like fighting each other equally as much. It’s just an interesting dynamic that I’m not sure I’ve quite seen before in wrestling, where they’re ex-partners but without any bitterness.

My friends and I spent… I think the entire match, from his entrance all the way to the end, talking about bread, haha! I love bread dad!! That match was a delight for me because I really like Go (he’s one of my top three favorites in NOAH), and I also really enjoy Kojima, so I would be happy but also sad no matter who won. I hadn’t realized just how similar Go and Kojima’s styles were, so it made for a really compelling dynamic between them. So many chops and lariats!

I was really happy for Kojima, though I was a little sad that Go’s run with the belt ended so soon. I’m hoping they’ll get a rematch so that we get to see that match again, haha, and that Go wins the next time. Kojima posted on twitter about how much he loved getting to have an entrance like that, and it made me so happy for him that he got the chance to be on this show, because he’d never get that treatment in NJPW, not at this point in his career.

I thought the same as you when I watched it live, but unfortunately, the ending was not a work, and Endo got concussed for real :pensive:. I do hope they revisit that match at some point, because I loved what little we did get. I really like Nakajima typically, so it’s unfortunate that he messed up here, but unfortunately that’s always a risk with wrestling.

despair_kagetsu

That match was great because it truly felt like DDT showing off the wild side of the company that’s just the incredibly athletic side of it. I love Mao and Asuka’s team, and I’m glad that Asuka gets to tag with the 37Kamiina sometimes, so it just made for great fun.

The Pheromones have done some matches that I’ve enjoyed, and some that I have really not enjoyed, haha, so the gimmick is pretty hit or miss for me (the sexual aspects don’t inherently bother me, but it does bother me when it’s portrayed as very non-consensual, which really just gets back to the core issue with Dieno’s gimmick for me), but admittedly I did really enjoy Akito joining them. They seem like a great fit for him. His gear upgrade was pretty incredible!

I think you’ll definitely get more out of it now, yeah! It’s certainly a company where the ability to understand Japanese is more important than it is with other companies because it’s often a pretty big part of the humor. If you’re feeling especially ambitious, you should absolutely try watching a ひらがなまっする show at some point!

In agreement there…

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週刊プロレス No.2175 (from late march/early april, around Wrestlemania)

There’s an interview with SHO which came across to me like a pretty straightforward heel interview, with SHO seeming particularly intent on convincing the interviewer that the Bullet Club / House of Torture version of himself is who he’s been deep down all along.

In Tanahashi’s column he talks about returning to promotional and fan events, incl. one that involved him and two comedian Tanahashi impersonators! He’s impressed that their Tanahashi costumes are homemade and surprisingly up to date with his costume changes, and says he’s happy to be impersonated because like Mickey Mouse he can be in more places than once, though it may cause some to wonder 「今日の棚橋は小さいな」… The interviewer offers for free the name タナーズ if he does events with them as a group in the future.

AJPW’s Champion Carnival is starting up, and there’s an interview with Jake Lee, who won the championship with a harder edge last year and went into this anniversary year on top but had to vacate the title due to an eye injury. The vibe I’d say he has in this interview as a character is “guy being frank and thruthful about the state of the company, and demanding more, but being kind of a jerk about it” if that makes sense. Despite being from Hokkaido he says he doesn’t want to win the title at an upcoming Sapporo show because the stage would be too small.

Yuma Aoyagi says in the metaphorical cafeteria of AJPW and the Champion Carnival, wrestlers like Jake or Suwama or Ishikawa are 定食 but sometimes you get tired of that and he’s a ゲテモノ like チョコラーメン.
On wrestling X tokusatsu watch, for some reason the picture for Aoyagi here has him posing with Daimajin!

The blocks for the Champion Carnival look pretty nice! I enjoyed the one of those I watched, and I’m glad it’s a little bigger of a tournament this time. If time weren’t a factor and if the matches hadn’t all happened like months ago at this point I’d definitely be curious to see how Jake, Miyahara, and Aoyagi would do.

Kenoh talks about Hideki Suzuki in his column and is complimentary of his fighting style, which can connect with the crowd and ゼニを取れる in any era. I feel like he also complains about something or other in a Kenohish sort of way but I don’t have quite enough context to parse exactly what. :sweat_smile:

There’s an interview with Tetsuya Endo following his championship win over Takeshita in DDT. He says since Takeshita and him both debuted in 2012 and Takeshita devloped and succeeded earlier than him, some jealousy burnt, and while now he still doesn’t like him it’s at least as equals. He suggests bringing back some of the DDT-ish “まさか” element to the title, and floats the idea of picking a challenger via election, which, of course Yuki Arai would win thanks to SKE fans…

A nice picture of 路上プロレス from that train show a while back! I guess they were on a small private scenic route in Chiba, based on the station sign. don’t gotta blur anything if I crop carefully!

Giulia’s column is about the Cinderella Tournament and how the オーバー・ザ・トップロープルール is it’s 面白いところ. I agree!

The ad for the back issues available on the app shows a snippet from a time in 1989 when (newly elected to real life government, I think) Antonio Inoki got attacked and stabbed in the head by a “暴漢.” Geez!
also there’s a picture of young Minoru Suzuki - as always, with absolutely no noticeable things different from how he looks today.
image

The history column recounts an odd bit of wrestling history – in 1980, New Japan and All Japan had a softball game against each other! Apparently it was a good day for Inoki, as he struck out Baba as pitcher, hit a home run as batter, and New Japan routed All Japan 22 to 5.
This despite something I didn’t know – Giant Baba had a baseball career before wrestling! Who did he play for? The Giants of course! Go figure.

Suzume and Arisu Endo are interviewed ahead of their challenge for Magical Sugar Rabbits’ tag belts in TJPW. They decide on a new team name and go with “Daisy Monkey,” recounting how they came up with it:

「でいじー」は2人が好きな花の名前で、そこに何を付け加えるかファミレスでずっと悩んでて。そこで奇跡的に2人同時に「もんきー」を思いついたんですよ。

なる。。。ほど?

Assemble, the 女子プロレス combination / benefit show that started during the pandemic tried a proof of concept for a new format: an outdoor wrestling show at a theme park called Lake Sagami Resort Pleasure Forest, where you can bring your dog, so there’s an interview with Akira Hokuto about it, and here she is with Paddington Bear and some puppies:

Mutoh’s column wraps up his comments on the 50th anniversary year of NJPW/AJPW with some pondering the impermanence of life… He says in 焼肉屋 terms, 50 years of continued business is really something, but it’s not like a 老舗店 with a name and secret タレ stretching back to the Edo period - in terms of イズム he feels both companies have changed completely along the way. He says he didn’t know Baba when he went to All Japan and ran the company after Baba died but there was a 匂い that remained that faded by the time Mutoh left, even though nowadays Suwama for example admires Jumbo Tsuruta and Baba and the old AJPW and picked the company for that reason.

In the short industry column, there’s recommendations for NXT 2.0 and comments on what it’s like following a show in a different language (noting there’s more fun in the skits and stuff outside the ring than the matches themselves). Just kinda fun to see the other side of the coin…

The long industry column is about deathmatch wrestler Jun Kasai, who lost a belt in Freedoms recently. It remarks on how the documentary about him last year brought more popularity to him and the promotion, and how of non Cyberfight or Bushiroad affiliated wrestlers in Shupro’s 好きな wrestler reader poll, Kasai ranked the highest at 21. Kasai says ”これやめちゃったら死んだも同然。だから死までやるしかない。”
The included photo is of one photogenic crazy monkey! Content warning: blood (of course)


And the best part is he’d be really really grumpy about that! :sweat_smile:

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I translated some things a little out of order this week because I decided to prioritize the press conference that TJPW had on June 13 before finishing the CyberFight Fest translations. So I will start with that! I’m not sure I’ll be able to finish the CyberFight Fest translations before the Korakuen show tomorrow, but I’m getting a little faster at this, so I’ll try.

First of all, here’s the recap for the tag team championship part of the conference. Here’s the video of it.

I’m excited for this one because I really like both teams, and I honestly can’t decide who I think needs to win it more :sweat_smile:. Shoko and Misao have never held the tag team titles (with each other). If Shoko wins, she’ll become the first double champion in TJPW history. So, on the one hand, I really want them to win, and I think it would be very deserved after everything they’ve been through as a tag team, especially recently, but… well, I also really love MagiRabbi and don’t want their reign to end so soon! So I’m torn.

During the press conference, Misao said that she saw Yuka and Shoko’s match at CyberFight Fest, and she was happy to see Shoko defend her belt. She felt proud of their match, and was very inspired by it, and she wants the tag title match to make the other TJPW wrestlers feel proud in that same way. She thinks it can be said that as far as TJPW is concerned, MagiRabbi really stand out. She feels like they can be called a 看板 (I struggled with how to translate this, but ultimately settled on “draw”, despite the slightly insider-y language) for TJPW, which is why she wants to beat them.

I think I figured it out, but her last sentences here confused me a bit. She said: “すごく価値のある状態になったマジラビに勝ったら、“東京女子に享楽共鳴がいるぞ”って言えるような存在になれると思ってます。享楽共鳴の価値を上げるためにも、絶対にこの試合は勝ちたいと思ってます.”

Here was my attempt at a translation:

MagiRabbi are in a very valuable state, and if we can beat them, I think we’ll be able to say ‘For TJPW, it’s Kyoraku Kyomei’ in that same way. For the sake of raising Kyoraku Kyomei’s value, we have to win this match.”

Shoko said that until her match with Yuka, that was the only thing that she was thinking about, so she’s only just now getting excited about the tag title match. She wants to have a friendly competition with their best rivals as a team, “引っ張ったり引っ張られたり”, pulling each other and being pulled. She’s looking forward to seeing what kind of match they’ll have next.

She said: “ハイパーミサヲと力を合わせて、私たちらしい戦い方で勝ちにいこうと思っています.” I was a little confused, but translated it as: “I’m going to join forces with Misao, and we’re going to fight in our own typical style and win!”

Mizuki said that she couldn’t win the fourway match and felt really frustrated, and then when she watched Yuka and Shoko’s match and Yuka lost, she felt Yuka’s frustration as if it were her own. She said: “ユカっちが私を選んでパートナーとしてやってくれてるので、私も東京女子を大きくしたいと思う.” The first part of this sentence really confused me, haha. This was my translation: “Since Yuka-chi chose me, as her partner, I also want to make TJPW bigger.”

Mizuki went on to say that she wants to defend the belts together with Yuka, and spread the message all throughout Japan, throughout the world, throughout the universe, that “MagiRabbi are the tag champions of TJPW.”

Yuka said that her match with Shoko was about the pride of TJPW, and carrying her pride in a match, but the tag belts are a different thing entirely. She says they’re belts that expand the diversity, fun, and possibility of TJPW (I think I would agree with this!). I got a little bit tripped up on her last sentence here, partially because it was long. She said: “対戦相手が享楽共鳴ってことは、もっと可能性が広がった、どんな試合になるのか分からないような試合になると思いますので、また違った楽しみ方があるのかなと思います.”

Here was my attempted translation:

I think that as our opponents, Kyoraku Kyomei will expand the possibilities even more, and because we don’t know what kind of match it will be, I think it’ll offer a different kind of fun.

Concerning what to watch out for from the other team, Misao said that they’ve defended the belts many times, so she’s very wary of the strength of their tag team power. She said: “しかも油断させつつの感じなんです。見た目かわいい感じで、ハピハピな感じだけど、やることがえげつない.” Both of these sentences confused me, haha. Here was my attempt: “They always catch you off guard. They put up a cute appearance and say ‘HAPPY HAPPY’, but the things they do are despicable.”

Shoko said that she thinks 享楽共鳴’s strength is that they’re able to have matches that feel like upturning a toy box. MagiRabbi are a tag team that breaks toys with smiles on their faces. That’s what scares her.

Mizuki answered: “パミさん(ミサヲ)のふざけてるというか、ずる賢い部分に翔子さんが乗っかっちゃうというか.” Another tricky one for me. My translation was: “Pami-san’s (Misao’s) pranks, or maybe I should say that Shoko-san takes advantage of her devious side.”

She said that they have excellent synergy, so even though Misao is the number one concern, surprisingly Shoko is also someone to watch out for. It feels like the two of them are sharing their brains.

Yuka said: “タッグには色が違う面があるので。スピードだったり、悪さ、ずるさ、2チームともあると思いますので、だまし合いをしていきたいと思ってます.” This one caused me some trouble both in understanding the Japanese, and in figuring out how to word it in English, haha. Here was my (very not confident) attempt: “They wear a different face as a tag team. I think both teams have speed, mean mischief, and cunning, so I want to outsmart them when we meet.”

Shoko talked about how feelings were a big part of her match with Yuka, who is a wrestler who is very special and who she thinks is incredibly strong. She said that that doesn’t mean she doesn’t have big feelings toward the tag title match. Then pretty much the whole rest of her comment here confused me: “ただ、2人いるんで、気持ちが半分になってるような気がしてるんです。そんな気負わずとも思いっきり羽を伸ばして試合をすれば、もし私がつまずいても、ミサヲがなんとかしてくれるっていう気持ちあるので。その分、1対1より、思い切りバクチができる気はします.”

Here was my best shot at it:

But there are two people, so it feels like my emotions are halved. Even if I don’t get worked up and have as much fun as I possibly can, if I falter during the match, I feel like Misao will somehow save me. Because of that, I feel like I’m able to take more risks than I could in a one-on-one match.

And finally, Yuka said that since Mizuki is here, she doesn’t have anything to worry about. She says: “私以上に私のことを分かってくれてる子なので。そこは安心して、完全に乗っかって、おんぶにだっこ.” My attempt was: “She knows me better than I know myself. So I can rest assured there, and climb on and completely rely on her.”

Then Yuka asks Mizuki to “お姫さまだっこしてもらって・・・”, to carry her like a princess, ahaha. I was very disappointed that they did not show the actual princess carrying in the video. But there are photos of it, and I feel like I have to share this one specifically because it’s such a great representation of both of these teams:

The other half of the press conference was devoted to Shoko’s upcoming title defense against Rika Tatsumi. Here’s a transcript of that one.

Rika said: “4WAYなんだから、もっと場外で潜んでたり、休んだりとか作戦を練ってやれたらよかったとか思ったんですけど・・・。ぶつかって当たっていくしかできなくて、結果的にそれでよかったのかなとも思っていて.” Various bits and pieces of this were confusing to me, but I think I got the general idea at least? Here was my translation:

Since it was a fourway, I thought it would have been better if I’d planned more tactics like lurking outside the ring and taking a rest… I had no choice except to hit and hit, but it got results, so I think it was the right thing to do.

She said that her opponents were all really cool wrestlers, so the fact that she was able to survive them gave her a lot of confidence. She said: “自信とかすぐになくしちゃうタイプで、もともと自信ってあってないようなもの.” This one had a little too much going on for me to be able to figure it out unassisted, so my heavily DeepL-influenced translation was: “I’m the type of person who loses confidence easily, and I never had that much confidence to begin with.” Rika says that she was able to regain it, so with her chest held high, she wants to challenge Shoko at 大田区 on July 9.

Rika also said that concerning Shoko vs Yuka, she’s happy no matter who wins, but she also really doesn’t want to see either of them win. But she also thought “no matter who wins, we’ll be able to do something great”. She says that she was on the edge of her seat, and was cheering so hard her hands hurt.

She said that Shoko is unbeatable. She’s invincible, and she doesn’t have any blind spots. But that kind of state can’t continue for long, so how is Rika going to disrupt it? Rika said that at Ota Ward, she’s going to bloom again a second time as the champion. This next part of her comment was a little tricky, but I think I managed to figure it out? She said: “私はクレイジーな人間が好きなんですけど。好きでい続けたら自分もそう言っていただくことが増えて。だから私はチャンピオンに“狂い咲きたい”と思ってます。辰巳リカは狂い咲くのほうが似合うと思うので.”

Here was my translation, with my attempt at sort of keeping her pun, haha:

I like crazy people. If I continue liking them, more and more people will say that about me, too. So that’s why I want to ‘bloom out of season’ and become champion. I think ‘crazy blooming’ is more suitable for Rika Tatsumi.

狂い apparently means “insanity” or “deviation”, and 咲く means “to bloom”. 狂い咲く means “to bloom out of season”, but the phrase literally translates to “crazy blooming”.

They ask her about fighting in the main event at a big show, and she said: “ビッグマッチでメインに立つのは初めてなんで、いろんなものがのしかかるなって思うんですけど。自分で勝ち取ったものなので、胸を張って、思い切りやるしかない.” The beginning of the last sentence there was particularly confusing to me. I felt like I understood the literal meaning of the words, but what she meant by saying it was unclear to me.

Here was my attempt at that whole chunk:

But this is my first time being in the main event at a big show, so it’s a lot of responsibility. I won by myself, so I have no choice except to hold my chest high and give it my all.

Rika says that she has been away from the singles front, but she seized her chance. She thinks the time for a “チャンピオンに狂い咲き” is now. She wants to become champ again and make TJPW even bigger, and stir things up even more.

And finally, I have one last question, haha. Rika talks a little bit about her upcoming preview match at the Korakuen show (she’s teaming with Suzume against Maki Itoh and Hikari Noa). She says that she has no choice except to win all of her matches until the title match, then says: “相手の伊藤ちゃんも、(インターナショナル・プリンセスの)チャンピオンではあるんですけど、鈴芽と協力して勝ちにいきたい。勢いつけます.”

I translated the first sentence as: “My opponent, Itoh-chan, is also a (International Princess) champion, but I want to cooperate with Suzume to win.” But that very last sentence completely lost me. I couldn’t figure out つけます at all :sweat_smile:.

That’s all from me for now!

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Not really much to correct! Only small nuance comments for the most part.

For the “東京女子に享楽共鳴がいるぞ” part, I think it’s as simple as “享楽共鳴 are in 東京女子” like it’s about them prominently being there, like in a “on the map” sort of way.
The audio is a little bit clearer – her part about “東京女子に享楽共鳴がいるぞ” refers back to a part that was truncated in what she said before about マジラビ being a 看板. After that in the video she says something like “東京女子プロレスにはマジラビがいるというように、いるような存在だと感じています。” and while I don’t think I transcribed that in a way that completely makes sense, I believe she’s talking about how マジラビ are a stable and established tag team to the point that you’d say like, ah, Tokyo Joshi, they’ve got マジラビ, and go watch the show because of that. And by beating マジラビ, 享楽共鳴 will be put on the map and be able to achieve a similar existence as an established marquee tag team.

No notes!

I would read the “ユカっちが私を選んでパートナーとしてやってくれてるので” part as one block.
“ユカっち chose me and やってくれてる’s as my partner, so…” with やってくれてる being very roughly like, “is doing stuff/this for me.” So I’d just tweak your translation very slightly and say “Since Yuka-chi chose me as her partner, I also want to make TJPW bigger”!
Incidentally – as seems to be a common theme with confusing clauses, right before this she says something that leads into this that didn’t make it into the transcript. Something about how Yuka had a lot of something but still picked Mizuki. Perhaps it would be easier to make out if I knew more about マジラビ’s history.
P.S. Yuka’s reaction when Mizuki says 宇宙中にも is very good!

No notes!

She’s saying like – even though you know how how strong a tag team マジラビ there’s something about them that makes you let your guard down - their cute and happy-go-lucky aesthetic. I’d maybe go with something like “viscous” rather than “despicable.”

Not really any notes! (ふざけてる is tricky to translate but you can understand it by just seeing most anything Misao does :sweat_smile: and “pranks” is fine I suppose!)
I just wanted to mention a fun thing from the audio is when she’s looking for words what she says ends up like:
ずる賢い部分が。。。を。。。に
I’m sure if I held any conversations in Japanese that particle cycling would feel very relatable!

I think the transcript tidies up what she says in the first part, as it’s constructed differently from what she said in-person. But I think the transcript is clearer to me? I think it says like, “there’s different sides to tag team wrestling” as in like – different flavored sides, or like, the above-board side and the cunning side, that kind of thing, I think. And because of those shared qualities she lists, she wants to have a battle of wits.
After this there’s some batter and I can’t make out really at all what everybody says but it sounds to me I think like Mizuki and then also Shoko light-heartedly declaring an intent to take the match seriously (since だまし合い implied some ふざけてる might go on…), with Yuka and Misao perhaps being a bit less vocal on that front.

The first thought is elaborated a little in the video where she says something like – it’s not that the emotions for a tag match aren’t big too, but since there’s too people in some ways the 緊張 is lessened. Then in the video she says そんなに気負わず not そんな気負わず so it’s a bit clearer for me (I thought maybe the そんな気 was referring to the 気 in the previous thought but I think not).
So anyway, yeah, I believe she’s saying even if she doesn’t work herself up tension-wise, and fights the match freely, if she trips up, Misao will be there to catch her so she can take more risks.

Would “she’ll carry me” be edging too close to insider-y language? Since she quite literally asks to be carried here, like a princess. :sweat_smile:
The video is significantly more fun than the transcript! Mizuki interjects “無理!” and Yuka insists she wants to be carried like a princess and it’s gonna happen!
From the picture, Yuka clearly got her way and Mizuki 頑張る’d. :smile:

No notes!

No notes!

I don’t really have any help with the translation for this one, but yeah, the phrase 狂い咲く comes up like, a bunch in Stardom too. Giulia and Maika’s tag team name in one of the tournaments was “Crazy Bloom” for example. I honestly don’t have an incredible handle on it but I guess it just means blooming/succeeding at an unexpected time.

I’d say like, “I won it myself” rather than “by myself” – the point is she won the right to challenge in that match at Cyberfight Festival, so there’s nothing to do but wear that with pride and give it her all.

A good tip off with something like 勢いつけます that looks like a noun and verb squished together is it’s probably had a particle like が or を dropped, and googling around shows indeed, 勢いをつける means like, to build momentum. Which fits with the context of her building up momentum until her title shot.

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週刊プロレス No.2176 (from early april, around the time of NJPW’s 両国国技館 show and wrestlemania day 2)

During the match recaps for the New Japan show, there’s a little section about that time Great O-Khan (in real life) saved a young girl in distress from a creep. His account is interesting – he does still use 余 as his personal pronoun. He says at first when the girl and her parent were thanking him and asking who he was he said 「いえ、名乗るほどの者ではございません」 in an “I always wanted to say that” sort of way, but when the police arrived and were taking information and heard he was an NJPW wrester they said ”名乗った方がいいですよ” so here we are. He says to help if you see someone in distress, and “人生のスパイスが欲しくなったときはプロレスラーを見よ、新日本プロレスを見よ。”
Later there’s this fan photo of him looking oddly photogenic.
image

In his column, Naito talks a bit about 後楽園ホール and says that while he went earlier times when he was a kid, the first time he paid for a show there himself was, it sounds like, coincidentally the day Hiroshi Tanahashi debuted!

There’s some really rough pictures from the Zero-1 “20&21” (it was delayed a year) anniversary show where Ohtani very badly injured his neck. The end of show confetti going off with Ohtani still lying in the corner, unable to move… :frowning_face:
The match recapper says Ohtani particularly always drew strength from crowd cheers and that he would say 「ハラの底から声をだせたい」, so it’s especially sad that these were the circumstances when the crowd would chant 「オオタニ」 again, when the audience simply had to put aside covid protocols for a moment and show their support him and his recovery. We can all only hope and trust that the 「立ち上がり続けてきた」男 will “立ち上がってくれる.”

On a lighter note, Kenoh’s column is about how he launched a youtube channel! There’s a lot of back and forth about his ambitions for the channel and what youtubers he watches (I think mostly martial arts related stuff?) and a lot of name dropping. Among the loftier ambitions mentioned is to rival Logan Paul in subscriber count and, like him, fight Floyd Mayweather and perhaps have a match at Wrestlemania as well.

The papaya ads are back! This one has an insert where Tatsumi Fujinami and his wife extol the virtues of papayas and some promotional papaya dish they got to make. I feel like some papaya mogul must just be wrestling adjacent and have connections or something, the ads in this magazine are still just wrestling-wrelated things, cigarettes, horse racing, and papayas.

Giulia’s column is an admirably frank run-down of all of the various injuries she’s accumulated over her (still rather short) career. It’s a good source for unpleasant medical vocabulary, and another important reminder about the toll the regular wear and tear of sports/performance like this takes on the body. She says looking back on injuries like this and how they happened is important for accumulating information about how to avoid them, not just for yourself but for the wrestlers who come after you, saying 「こうして培った知識を、次の世代にも伝えて、リスクを最小限に抑えていくのは、先輩レスラー達の大きな役割だ」

Genichiro Tenryu’s column includes talk about DDT’s Konosuke Takeshita excursion to America and Tenryu is all for it, saying the experienced learned from that kind of a trip is invaluable, with the only main risk being the chance that he likes it too much and wants to stay…

I like this 3コマ featuring Hyper Misao and Shoko Nakajima!
さすがヒーローですね!

The short industry column is about the Up Up Girls (pro-wrestling division) auditions. They talk to someone from YU-M Entertainment, and apparently there’s no set number of people they’re looking for, and very little in the way of restrictions for who can apply (basically, healthy girls/women who are older than 13 is it), so they’re just looking for whoever the right people are, and apparently while it presumably would be very unlikely to happen from just these auditions, the end-goal is like… 30 people (which seems like uh, way more than the 3 they currently have). They talk a bit about the possibility of running full Up Up Girls cards and how with just a few more people that could be possible for small shows.

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Just thought I'd post some more updates on the Kota Ibushi/NJPW situation, for anyone who isn't following it but would like to know more.

First of all, a couple weeks ago, NJPW announced the punishments they’re issuing for Kota, Ohbari, and Kikuchi (who is not named). I was… really not fond of the way they gave Kota and Ohbari basically exactly the same penalty (a 10% pay cut) :expressionless:, not to mention barely punishing Kikuchi more than that.

I think at bare minimum, they should have forgiven Kota any punishment for this. They do not need to punish him any more on top of what already happened to him. He is (ostensibly) being punished not for whistleblowing/breaking kayfabe, but for breaching his contract and appearing at the Just Tap Out show. I really hate the way this equates “minor contract violation” with being just as bad as “labor exploitation to the point of causing life-threatening distress.”

On a more positive note, though, Kota was posting about trying to acquire a triangle or star shaped wrestling ring, which is much more in line with his old self. (It reminds me of something he said in one of my favorite interviews). There were a few other tweets that seem to suggest he was getting excited about wrestling again, and he had some sort of project in mind, though he seemed to make it clear that it couldn’t be done through NJPW (he rejected a fan’s suggestion that he try to do something with the KOPW title). He also changed his twitter account to a business account.

Just this past weekend, there was a big kickboxing(?) event, which Kota attended, seemingly on NJPW’s dime. But Kota made it quite clear that despite that gift, he’s still not happy with how things were handled with Ohbari, and he’s still planning on pushing the matter.

Also, Karl Fredericks, an English-speaking wrestler from a recent batch of Young Lions, started making some very negative tweets about NJPW and the workplace culture there. He mentioned “physical/mental/emotional abuse”, and alluded to the company treating him poorly and not believing in him or respecting the work that he’s done. He sounded really discouraged.

I wasn’t following Karl super closely, so I don’t know what else he’s been saying besides those recent tweets, but it’s unfortunate that he was treated poorly as well. Reading between the lines, it sounds like NJPW gets a lot of wrestlers to put up with exploitation by promising to give them opportunities if they tough it out.

Karl is not a very big name wrestler, and his tweets unfortunately didn’t seem to get a lot of attention (granted, it has been. quite the month or so in wrestling). I hope that other NJPW wrestlers feel emboldened by him and Kota and speak about their own experiences, because I’m sure the two of them aren’t the only people who have been exploited by the company. It’s good that someone was tweeting about it in English, too, because that way, English-speaking fans can’t use the language barrier as an excuse not to listen.

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On a much lighter note, I think I forgot to share the first video, but Mr. Haku started a series of English-subbed interviews with Japanese wrestlers!

The first one was with Rina Yamashita:

The second was with Asuka/Veny:

I thought the section in this where she talked about her gender identity, and just the concept of pronouns and such in Japanese, was really interesting. The whole interview was great!

I also watched the third episode of 夢プロレス-dream on the ring-:

It was fun to learn more about 上原わかな! I thought it was sad that she faced opposition from her parents when she wanted to get into the entertainment industry. She seems like she has a decent skillset for wrestling, with experience in cheerleading and kickboxing and working as an idol. She also really loves food.

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Thanks for the warm welcome! I’m excited to join you all in the discussion of this niche but wonderful world — even if I’ve been away for nearly two weeks since my last post :joy:

The only thing better than meeting fellow wrestling fans in a community is meeting fellow wrestling fans who are also willing to look at it through a critical, progressive lens. Because, yeah — it can be a super scummy industry! I was really disappointed to hear about all the stuff that went down behind the scenes in NJPW, and yet not remotely surprised. The ongoing struggle with being a pro wrestling fan is that your favs will always be problematic, no ethical consumption, etc etc. But yet, there’s still so much wonderful stuff out there, and I’m so glad to be able to find so much of it in プロレス.

I’ve been the biggest Okada mark for years, so him finally showing up on Dynamite last night was the biggest pop I’ve had in a good long while. I’ve never been too hot on Adam Cole, but if there’s any match that can get him over for me, it’ll be with Okada, Page, and White.

Outside of the NJPW/AEW scene, I’ve long tried to get more into DDT and other promotions, but it’s a lot harder to consistently find their content in a way that’s easily accessible. I’m sure I missed it in the posts above, but can y’all direct me to the best places to dive in to other promotions, whether it’s DDT, TJPW, or anything else that you’re following closely these days?

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Hi! I’m not very active here (yet) but I agree it’s nice to meet other wrestling fans. If you go to wrestle-universe.com you can sign up for a two week trial. It will give you access to NOAH, DDT, TJPW and Ganbare. The sign up is in English so you won’t have to navigate around a language barrier while you’re learning Japanese.

I find that these companies have really become more accessible to international fans in the past couple of years, and the big shows all have English commentary. All 4 promotions recently teamed up to do a show called CyberFight Festival, and I think that will give you a good taste of what each company is all about. Also if you love big flashy entrances, this show had some great ones.

I hope you give it a try! DDT will be different than what you’re used to but they really have some of the most outstanding wrestlers around.

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Thank you for this! That looks like a great entry point for Puro-Outside-NJPW-Puro. CFF sounds super fun.

I’ve casually followed DDT for years, insofar that their comedy matches are entirely my jam and I’ve picked up on them in bits and pieces. Much as I love a good technical match, wrestling is an inherently ridiculous art form, so I’ve got a deep appreciation for any match or character that leans fully into that. (See also: Kaiju Big Battel).

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I would enthusiastically second the recommendation for https://www.wrestle-universe.com/ (as I’m sure will @fallynleaf :sweat_smile:).
At this point with the renovations and support they’ve put into it I’d say it’s pretty much undisputedly the best wrestling-related streaming service, and videos go up quickly and accessibly for all the promotions under that umbrella, with easy access to options like switching between English and Japanese commentary. I pretty much don’t have any complaints at all except the videos are sorted a little confusingly sometimes.

Otherwise I use https://www.stardom-world.com/ to follow Stardom – it’s pretty much like https://njpwworld.com/ but for Stardom. A major drawback is there’s a fairly lengthy delay between when shows happen and when they go up on Stardom World (I think it would be possible to buy the PPVs somewhere or something sooner but I’ve honestly never done it since I wouldn’t be able to watch live anyway due to timezones).

there’s some other options out there beyond those too, like All Japan has a site, and I know there’s some intriguing nico nico channels… but those are the main ones, I think, and honestly just Wrestle Universe is plenty to sate any appetite!

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Yes! I totally agree. The comedy/avant garde stuff is so special to me. Check out Kazuki Hirata, he’s amazing. He is very good at wrestling inanimate objects.

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I’m glad you appreciate it! I don’t engage a lot with most internet wrestling communities because, well, I’m an asexual lesbian, and many of those communities aren’t exactly welcoming places, so I try to at least make this one a good place to be. And, yeah, it can be a struggle to be a wrestling fan for sure. I try to be well-rounded when talking about it, addressing the good along with the bad, because it feels disingenuous to leave out, well, the material conditions of how the medium is made.

I do hope that you (and @bonessa) end up posting more here! It often ends up primarily just being rodan and I making the majority of the posts, but feel free to share stuff of your own!

For better or for worse, Kenny Omega was the wrestler (along with Kota Ibushi) who got me into this whole thing, so the appeal of that match to me is that it’s four people who all have such deep history with Kenny.

Overall, my feelings on Forbidden Door are, well, extremely complicated. Mostly for Kota Ibushi reasons. But I think my biggest complaint (besides all of the shoot issues) is that they didn’t really book the show around much of the actual history that exists between many of the AEW wrestlers and the NJPW wrestlers. I think the main event and the semi main event are a little bit better built, though, in terms of stuff they can draw on, so I’m looking forward to both of those matches.

If you want info and links for following DDT and TJPW (and several other companies), check out the second post in this thread :wink:. I can say that you’re in the right place if you want to learn more about TJPW specifically, haha! Unfortunately it has gotten way harder for English-speaking fans to follow since their translator, Mr. Haku, left CyberFight at the end of last year. So I’ve been trying my best to translate what I can myself, though at this point I’m pretty limited to what I have in text form (so mainly the official recaps and the captions on the tweets for post-match interviews).

With TJPW, their big shows these days typically have English commentary (usually DDT wrestler Chris Brookes and Baliyan Akki from ChocoPro, who are actually I think my favorite commentary team in wrestling, haha), but don’t expect pretty much anything else to be in English. There are a couple fan accounts that report on various news and translate extremely occasional things, but if you want to know in detail what the wrestlers are actually saying, your best bet is either translating it yourself or reading my ongoing attempted translations here :sweat_smile:.

With DDT, you’re in much better luck, as they actually hired another English translator after Mr. Haku. So they have live translation on twitter for all of their shows, and the post-match comments also get translated, as well as press conferences and such.

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