Tuesday 8 August 2023

Revisiting 90s Joshi #54

KAORU v Yasha Kurenai (GAEA, 4/15/95)

Exhibit #242 as to why the inter-promotional wrestling rules. Kurenai doesn't have much of a rep, or at least not a good one, and that's a shame because at this point I'm convinced she kind of rules. KAORU seems to be fairly well regarded and I'm beginning to see that she also rules. The crowd is red hot and Kurenai slaps KAORU in the face straight off the bat, so KAORU sends her to the floor and topes head-first into a chair. This was one of those screwball Chris Benoit topes that maybe makes you wince just a bit. Kurenai then chokeslams KAORU on the chair outside, brings her back in the ring and sits her down on it before booting her head off. Kurenai was a seedy witch in this, stamping on KAORU's fingers, biting her wrist and spitting a chunk of it at the referee, whacking her with a stick, working over KAORU's throat. KAORU gets some payback by biting the wrist and stamping on the fingers, then drags Kurenai up the aisle and flings her into a wall before sitting in the chair in the middle of the ring waiting on her. I loved the visual of Kurenai from outside staring at KAORU with open contempt while the latter is entirely indifferent towards her. Kurenai's offence was mostly low level stuff, her biggest shots being springboard legdrops, but that makes her stand out in an era where joshi was going for bigger and bigger. She was fully about getting heat here and she wasn't about to turn anyone to her cause by doing something swank. KAORU on the other hand has the perfect moonsaults. I preferred the opening of this to the stretch run, but the final few minutes made for a really dramatic finish and the nearfalls had people biting big. All it missed was KAORU giving Kurenai a return smack with that stick of hers. 

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