Revisiting 90s Joshi #12

Dynamite Kansai v Mayumi Ozaki (JWP, 7/9/92)

I liked this more than I would've five years ago (prolly). I'm not sure it's enough to make me go back and watch any of their street fights together, but as a slow-burner it had enough going for it. I'm also enjoying how the JWP style from around this period is less hectic and go-go than what was going on in AJW. This felt a bit like the Kansai/Yamazaki match I talked about a couple days ago, where Kansai uses her savagery and Ozaki has to combat it with skill, although I liked that one a bit more. My favourite stretch of this was the first few minutes as they established the story they were going for via belligerence and booting each other in the teeth. Kansai punts Ozaki clean out the ring, then when Ozaki gets back in she pump kicks Kansai in the ear a few times. She isn't here to put up with anybody's shit and considering she's about 3 feet tall and 80 pounds soaking wet it's impressive how much I bought her trading strikes. Well, not so much trading, as she was smart enough not to engage in that, but at least in bringing Kansai to her knees whenever she threw strikes of her own. The striking was supplementary, but it was effective when it needed to be. On the other hand Kansai's striking was demonic. There were parts where she was full on Wanderlei punting Ozaki in the back of the head (it was borderline disturbing, actually), and some of Ozaki's fetal position selling was great. I liked the idea of Ozaki working Kansai's arm, but it's hard for me to get on board with a Fujiwara armbar being applied for like three minutes straight as if it's a half crab or whatever. I know it's a stylistic issue, like piledrivers in Japan being treated as transition moves and not the sort of thing that kicks off a six month blood feud, but still, it's a hangup and I can't shake it. I at least liked Kansai's selling of it in that it hindered some of what she was doing for a minute there. Could've done with the setup to that arm work having a bit more build. It just sort of happened. One second Kansai had on a sharpshooter and seemed to be working Ozaki's back, then the next second Ozaki was on top and I guess now we're heading down that road of talking about transitions in joshi and nobody can be arsed with that anymore. This wasn't half bad.