BRM Reviews NJPW Wrestling Dontaku 2013

[Big Red Machine]

NJPW Wrestling Dontaku 2013 (5/3/2013)- Fukuoka, Japan

JUSHIN “THUNDER” LIGER, TIGER MASK IV, YUJI NAGATA, & MAXIMO vs. JADO, GEDO, TOMOHIRO ISHII, & YOHSI-HASHI- 4.25/10
Well, it seems that somebody at New Japan heard my complaining about these random ten man tags that only feel like poor excuses to get legendary names like Liger, Nagata, Jado, & Gedo on the show, because they switched things up a lot… by adding in an exotico. Unfortunately it didn’t help the match any. After the match, the side that I assumed was the babyfaces holds the referee while Maximo forces himself on him.... then Liger holds Tiger mask in a full nelson so Maximo can kiss him. This was just pointless and weird and forcing yourself on unwilling people is wrong.

IWGP JR. HEAVYWEIGHT TAG TEAM TITLE MATCH: Time Splitters (Alex Shelley & KUSHIDA)(c) vs. Forever Hooligans (Alex Koslov & Rocky Romero)- 7.25/10
Are these, like, the only two junior heavyweight tag teams New Japan has? I feel like I’ve seen this match so many times already.

PRINCE DEVITT & BAD LUCK FALE vs. CAPTAIN NEW JAPAN & RYUSUKE TAGUCHI- 5/10
Devitt is an excellent heel, and I really enjoyed the brief part of the match where Taguchi was kicking his ass. I can’t wait to see those two go at it one-on-one. Fale’s finisher looks stupid (he tosses the guy up and then hits the Asiatic Spike

4 WAY MATCH FOR THE IWGP TAG TEAM TITLES: Lance Archer & Davey Boy Smith Jr.(c) vs. Hiroyoshi Tenzan & Satoshi Kojima vs. Toru Yano & Takashi Iizuka vs. Strong Man & Manabu Nakanishi- 4.5/10
I really just couldn’t get into this match.

NEVER OPENWEIGHT TITLE MATCH: Masato Tanaka vs. Tamaoki Honma- 4.5/10

TOGI MAKABE vs. YUJIRO TAKAHASHI- 4.75/10
Takahashi is a good heel, but I couldn’t get into the match at all until the low blow.

KATSUYURI SHIBATA vs. HIROOKI GOTO- 5.75/10

HIROSHI TANASHI vs. KARL “MACHINE GUN” ANDERSON- 7.5/10
Tons of awesome counters!

IWGP INTERCONTINENTAL TITLE MATCH: Shinsuke Nakamura(c) vs. Shelton Benjamin- 6.75/10
A good showing from Shelton, but Nakamura seemed to forget to sell his leg at times.

IWGP HEAVYWEIGHT MATCH: Kazuchika Okada(c) vs. Minoru Suzuki- 8/10
An awesome match, with some great selling and a great story. I also loved the sleeper hold spots. The biggest problem with this match was that Suzuki got in about 85% of the offense, and it almost didn’t feel like he had taken enough to put him down when finally went down.

On paper, the show was pretty good, but as an overall whole I can’t recommend this show because I got SOOOO bored while watching almost everything from the Jr. Heavyweight match until the Anderson vs. Tanahashi match. These New Japan shows are just too damn long, too.