G1 CLIMAX
Emily Pratt Oct 23, 2021. 15 minute read
NJPW G1 Climax 31 Night 18 and Final Review: Everything’s Cursed but at Least Shibata Is Here
Previously on NJPW’s G1 Climax 31: 85 tournament matches happened and Ibushi won A Block to make his fourth G1 final in four years. New Japan Pro Wrestling’s 2021 G1 Climax tournament came to a close earlier this week with a block-deciding Cobb vs. Okada rubber match, a quality tournament…
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WRESTLING
Emily Pratt Oct 19, 2021. 8 minute read
NJPW G1 Climax 31 Night 17 Review: The Block Final Countdown
Previously on NJPW‘s G1 Climax 31: there was so much of the G1 Climax 31. There were 70 matches of the G1 Climax 31! After nearly a month of competition, the 2021 tournament comes to a close this week with its final three shows: the A Block final, B Block…
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WRESTLING
Emily Pratt Sep 30, 2021. 6 minute read
NJPW G1 Climax 31 Night 6 Review: Chaos Rains
Previously on NJPW’s G1 Climax 31: Ishii brought out the best of Kenta and ZSJ continued his tentacle monster hot streak. New Japan Pro Wrestling‘s September 29 show at Korakuen Hall closes out the first third of the 2021 G1 Climax with what’s probably the tournament’s least appealing card so…
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WRESTLING
FOLLOW US
Emily Pratt Sep 28, 2021. 8 minute read
NJPW G1 Climax 31 Night 5 Review: Like a Squid Out of Hell
Previously on NJPW‘s G1 Climax 31: In A Block, Zack vs. Shingo! It happened! It was amazing! In B Block, Okada is still wrestling like he’s in his stem cell era, and it’s also very exciting. It sounds like a bad thing when I say that Night 5 is the…
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WRESTLING
Emily Pratt Sep 26, 2021. 12 minute read
NJPW G1 Climax 31 Nights 3-4 Review: Wrestling Brains
Previously on NJPW‘s G1 Climax 31: The tournament started strong! Its first two shows were very entertaining overall, with some standout matches and surprise results. Unfortunately, this was followed by the bad kind of surprise: Naito getting injured for real and forfeiting the rest of his matches. Nights 3-4 of…
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WRESTLING
Emily Pratt Sep 21, 2021. 15 minute read
NJPW G1 Climax 31 Nights 1-2 Review: That Rainy Day Feeling Again
New Japan Pro Wrestling‘s 31st annual G1 Climax tournament is officially underway, and it got off to a strong start. The first nights of A and B Block competition both delivered some really good matches and a few surprises. Sho’s evil gamer ways have evolved, Yujiro is now fueled by…
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WRESTLING
Emily Pratt Sep 16, 2021. 12 minute read
Everything You Need To Know About NJPW’s G1 Climax 31
After a series of stadium shows and a revamp of activity in America, it’s tournament season for New Japan Pro Wrestling. The G1 Climax 31 starts this weekend, kicking off on September 18 in Osaka and ending on October 21 at Tokyo’s Nippon Budokan. Between those dates, twenty wrestlers will…
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WRESTLING
Emily Pratt Oct 20, 2020. 22 minute read
NJPW G1 Climax Nights 17-18 And Final Review: Are You There, God? I’m You, Kota Ibushi
On October 16-18, New Japan Pro Wrestling concluded the 2020 G1 Climax, the company’s thirtieth annual heavyweight tournament to determine the challenger for the IWGP Heavyweight Championship in the main event of their biggest show of the year and send someone home with a big-ass trophy. The last three nights…
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WRESTLING
Emily Pratt Oct 15, 2020. 16 minute read
NJPW G1 Climax 30 Night 15-16 Review: The Semi-Final Countdown
Previously in the G1 Climax, A and B Block delivered some strong matches from pairings both fresh and with history behind them, and whittled down the list of potential finalists. New Japan Pro Wrestling‘s most recent shows cut that list down a little more, and clear up the stakes for…
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WRESTLING
Emily Pratt Oct 12, 2020. 8 minute read
NJPW G1 Climax 30 Night 14 Review: There Gotos My Hero
Previously on the G1 Climax, A Block’s top four pulled away from the pack; Ishii-Cobb, Suzuki-Ibushi, and Okada-Shingo banged; and the Money Clip angst continued. The night after A Block narrows itself down to four possible finalists, the October 11, 2020, B Block show in Aichi establishes a slightly messier…
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WRESTLING
Emily Pratt Oct 11, 2020. 11 minute read
NJPW G1 Climax 30 Night 13 Review: Hijos de Toryumon
Previously on New Japan Pro Wrestling‘s annual expedition up the Mount Everest of pro wrestling, Goto/Yoshi-Hashi and Shingo/Ibushi had IRL friend battles! Also, Taichi insincerely said that Jay White should team up with him, and they should actually do that and take over the world. With only two nights of…
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WRESTLING
Emily Pratt Oct 9, 2020. 13 minute read
NJPW G1 Climax Nights 11-12 Review: Real Friends
Previously on the G1 Climax, Ibushi and Tanahashi sent crowds home happy and Jay and Evil started sniping at each other across the aisle. NJPW‘s latest events are a step up from its previous two, and feature battles between real-life friends, matches that show wrestlers at their best (which is…
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WRESTLING
Emily Pratt Oct 7, 2020. 11 minute read
NJPW G1 Climax Nights 9-10 Review: Air Guitar Serotonin
Previously on the G1, Sanada moonsaulted his way out of the jaws of mathematical elimination, and no wrestler was left undefeated. Nights 9 and 10 of New Japan Pro Wrestling‘s annual heavyweight tournament are less dramatic, with no big upsets or shakeups in either block and with fewer exciting matches…
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WRESTLING
Emily Pratt Oct 2, 2020. 13 minute read
NJPW G1 Climax Nights 7-8 Review: A Gift from our Collective Boyfriend
When we last left New Japan Pro Wrestling, both A and B Block were led by two undefeated wrestlers, Jay White and Taichi for A and Toru Yano and Tetsuya Naito for B. In the two most recent G1 Climax events, nobody turns their 3-0 into a perfect 4-0, one…
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WRESTLING
Emily Pratt Sep 30, 2020. 5 minute read
NJPW G1 Climax 30 Night 6 Review: Yano Is Winning
Previously on NJPW’s G1 Climax 30, A Block delivered some exciting matches, with the results leaving only Taichi and Jay White undefeated in the group. At New Japan‘s September 29 show at Korakuen Hall in Tokyo, B Block brings its weakest show yet, but one that’s not without highlights. Yoshi-Hashi…
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WRESTLING
Emily Pratt Sep 28, 2020. 9 minute read
NJPW G1 Climax 30 Night 5 Review: Kobe Beefs
Previously on NJPW G1 Climax 30, the double champ continued his winning streak and Yoshi-Hashi and Evil had the surprise hit of the tournament. Also, could that be Taichi-gun I see on the horizon? Now we’re back with a review of only one G1 show (what???), September 27’s night of…
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WRESTLING
Emily Pratt Sep 25, 2020. 13 minute read
NJPW G1 Climax 30 Nights 3-4 Review: Breath Heavily with the Switchblade
Previously on NJPW G1 Climax 30, many real-life things about wrestling are terrible, but Ishii and Suzuki, Naito and Tanahashi, and a bunch of other wrestlers still tore the house down on the first two nights of the tournament. New Japan Pro Wrestling hit Hokkaido on September 23-24, 2020, for…
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WRESTLING
Emily Pratt Sep 21, 2020. 13 minute read
NJPW G1 Climax 30 Nights 1-2 Review: The Most G1derful Time of the Year
G1 Climax 30, New Japan Pro Wrestling‘s sixth out of seven tournaments so far this year, begins with two nights in Osaka. These September 19-20 G1 shows don’t totally avoid the worst things about wrestling in 2020, but they deliver, soundtracked by organic crowd noise, some of New Japan’s most…
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WRESTLING
Emily Pratt Sep 20, 2020. 12 minute read
When NJPW Ignores #SpeakingOut Allegations Against Wrestlers, How Can Fans Respond?
Recently, I wrote about New Japan Pro Wrestling’s choice to ignore allegations made about Chase Owens and Will Ospreay during Speaking Out, with a focus on Ospreay’s situation since it’s less straightforward, he just started wrestling for NJPW again after months of pandemic-induced time on the bench, and he seems…
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WRESTLING
Emily Pratt Sep 18, 2020. 18 minute read
Welcomed with Open Arms: The Importance of NJPW Ignoring Allegations Against International Talent
As the 2020 G1 Climax approached, fans wondered how New Japan Pro Wrestling‘s annual heavyweight tournament would look in the time of a global pandemic. Travel restrictions in place because of COVID-19 had kept members of the NJPW roster who lived outside of Japan from entering the country for months,…
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WRESTLING