War of the Worlds 2015 - Night 1

ROH/NJPW War of the Worlds 2015

(2015/5/12)

1.       Delirious vs. Gedo

Amusing, light-hearted opener, totally proper for a night like this. Gedo is the best.

**1/2

2.       KUSHIDA vs. Roderick Strong

Great fucking match, although little bit aimless at moments. But hey, no biggie there, the crowd was red hot and they just wanted to give them a proper adrenaline rush. Roddy is simply impeccable when working with smaller dudes and this was no exception. His backbreakers and the way he slams them down the mat in many innovative forms are the thing of beauty.

****

3.       Takaaki Watanabe vs. Jay Lethal

Started off on a high note with Watanabe stepping up and suplexing Lethal right, left and centre, it was awesome. But then Lethal took over and dumbed it down, then you got your usual Truth Martini interferences, etc. Mediocre overall.

**1/2

4.       3-WAY: Michael Bennett & Matt Taven vs. Young Bucks (Matt Jackson & Nick Jackson) vs. The Addiction (Christopher Daniels & Frankie Kazarian)

One of those multi-way tag matches with the retarded rule where one team must wait on the apron, smh… and in that light, it was as good as it gets, but only until the stupid MovesMania session and stupid finish.

**1/4

5.       Michael Elgin vs. Tetsuya Naito

Holy shit, Elgin is fucking terrible, a true walking abomination of a pro-wrestler. Everything about him is forced, contrived and sucks hairy balls: his stupid robe, his stupid stacked look, his stupid gear, his stupid gigantic kneepads, his stupid angry face of a seven year old kid, the way he moves, the way he “sells” spots and character situations, etc. He looks and acts like a parody of a powerhouse wrestler, he took all the cool powerhouse moves and made them look horrendous. Props to Naito here, he had to dig down very damn deep to carry the useless sack of shit to a decent match.

**3/4 (all Naito)

6.       reDRagon (Kyle O’Reilly & Bobby Fish) vs. Hiroshi Tanahashi & Jushin Liger

Eh… A match, some things happened I wasn’t a big fan of, but overall it was a solid exhibition. If nothing, it was really cool to see Liger owning everyone once again.

**3/4

7.       Adam Cole vs. AJ Styles

Good match with both great and hokey parts, the awesome final two minutes pretty much bumped it from 3 to 3.5.

***1/2

8.       Shinsuke Nakamura & Kazuchika Okada vs. Briscoe Brothers (Jay & Mark)

Nice, proper and fitting main event for a show like this. Heavy workrate style that did have some blank spots, but overall it was lots of fun.

***1/2