Yoji Anjoh v Riki Choshu (New Japan, 10/9/95) - FUN
This wasn't much more than a squash, but it's amusing to see Anjoh stepping to the one-time biggest star in Japanese wrestling while smirking like a douchebag. Choshu's facial expression never changed once throughout the match. Anjoh never got under his skin and he stayed even-keeled from beginning to end, a man with a job to do that he took no pleasure in nor would he be perturbed in the pursuit of its completion. When Anjoh backed him into the corner and started throwing headbutts you half expected Choshu to blow a gasket, but instead he waited his turn and when he smashed Anjoh with elbows he registered no emotion whatsoever. He never even looked at Anjoh while he did it, an insult if there ever was one, though of course the crowd ate it up completely. You wish New Japan would've let any of the UWFi guys other than just Takada look halfway threatening during this feud, but it's still Choshu v Anjoh and you take the five minutes you get.
You had a decent idea of how this was going as soon as Anjoh and Takayama showed up in Super Strong Machine masks just to fuck with Hirata (the former Super Strong Machine). Hashimoto might be at his very best when he's given a reason to try and kill someone and Anjoh and Takayama are great at making smug faces you'd want to erase with a bazooka, so it's really the perfect storm. Hashimoto was phenomenal in this. He was trying to overhand chop ears off and the more Anjoh riled him up the more you knew he wanted to throttle the wee prick. Hashimoto has the all-time greatest double stomp, the way it looks like he's trying to make the recipient fart out their intestines. He about crushed Anjoh to death with it. Anjoh clearly learned his lesson so any time he tried to come in there later to break up a submission or take a cheapshot, as soon as he thought Hashimoto was aware of his intentions he immediately scooted back onto the apron. It played out almost as a recurring comedy spot, at least until he finally managed to land one of those shots because the only person laughing then was Anjoh. There were a couple strange reset spots that took me out of the flow a little, one where Anjoh seemed to just decide his team were going on offence, and as a whole the rhythm was choppy, but the latter did add to the uncooperative nature of things. There was no King's Road here and if you wanted that you could look on the other side of town. Either way there was no chance this wouldn't rule.
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