FMW Battle Field (9.20.90) review 

 

September 20, 1990 

 

If you ever wanted proof that I’m just completely nuts, I am voluntarily watching an FMW show from 1990 where a typhoon prevented the ring from being delivered and they wrestled on mats in a gymnasium. I am doing that to myself. It’s a fancam too, so there’s no commentary or anything.  

Oh, dear lord. I think it’s safe to say no one has ever reviewed this show before.  

 

Yukihido Ueno vs. The Shooter 

Losing the ring means the sensible approach is to do a lot of mat work. Which is exactly what happens. Ueno going after various submissions. Shooter throwing strikes to keep him at a distance. This feels a lot like Bloodsport, only with guys giving up on submissions that should finish. After a lot of grappling, a suplex feels quite high impact. A lot of the match is attractive mat work, but Ueno has bad ribs, and he starts to feel them. Shooter drills him with a backdrop driver and that should finish but instead Ueno gets back to his feet and is flattened by a sleeper. A surprisingly good match, although Ueno started to look like shit near the end. He was gassed. It looked like hard work. **¼ 

 

Yoshika Maedomari vs. Miwa Sato 

Sato permanently looks like she’s about to get murdered. Maedomari is not kind to her either, starting the match with hair mares and general violence. The lack of ropes clearly bothers Yoshika, so they go out into the audience instead. I can smell Sato’s fear, some 35 years into the future. Fancam guy loses the wrestlers a few times, presumably from not paying attention. I do love the Japanese obsession with filming everything. It allows stuff like this to exist.  

 

The lack of springiness of the mat really hurts Sato, who is used to kicking off the mat or ropes for spots. Sato gets a suplex as part of a comeback and she wins. Wait, what? She won? Huh. I don’t think I’ve ever seen her win before.  

 

Akihito Ichihara vs. Kim Hyun Hwan 

Ichihara is a rookie, who will switch names to Atsushi Onita Jr. Hwan is Lee Gak So’s student, so he’s into Bruce Lee and kicking the fuck out of people. Ichihara takes a savvy approach to defending this by taking the leg.  

Hwan gets pissed off and he is a kicky motherfucker. Those things come from all angles. His little “kiiiyaaaaaahhh” shuffle is very popular. It’s fascinating to watch someone taking the piss and the potential violence a shooter is going to unleash upon him. Ichihara develops a ‘ground and headbutt’ strategy. Which is unfortunately stupid but at least people find it funny. Ichihara gets kicked in the head and Hwan wins via ten count. This was great for five minutes and then it went to pieces. **½ 

 

Megumi Kudo & Yuki Morimatsu vs. Combat Toyoda & Reibun Amada 

Two of these four debuted this year. Kudo redebuted this year. There’s not a lot of experience on show. Given that it’s a tag match, they opt for brawling around the place and not bothering with tags. Which makes sense as there are no tag ropes.  

Instead, the outside wrestler must simply stand in the corner. There being no ropes does make it easier to break up pins. It frequently degenerates into everyone attacking each other with chairs. It’s an untidy match with Kudo on particularly poor form. Clearly the camera operator isn’t that bothered as the action frequently spills out of frame and he doesn’t notice. 

 

Kudo and Toyoda get mad about something and start hurling chairs at each other. Uh oh. Both look like they got worked into a shoot, brother. While that’s going on Amada pins Morimatsu. At least I think she did. I was watching the brawl. Kudo hurls another chair at the departing heels and nearly kneecaps a punter. This was carnage. It was way too messy to recommend but it was about 2 minutes away from degenerating into a full-blown shoot. 

 

Jang Yong Wow vs. Sambo Asako 

I legitimately love Sambo Asako. He’s this big fat lump who sells by screaming and collapsing. He seems to exclusively fight martial artists. I can only assume Onita thinks it’s funny when he gets kicked a lot. This is the least thrilling of his matches to date. Wow isn’t kicky enough and Asako doesn’t know what to do when he’s not taking pelters.  

 

Wow eventually gets the kicks going but a load of these martial artists think downward heel kicks look good, and they don’t. Asako spends his offence hugging Wow’s leg. Which isn’t sold anyway so he might as well not bother. Belly to belly sets up a Figure Four and Wow has no idea how to sell it, so he gives up. This was disappointing. Wow is the worst martial arts guy they’ve brought in so far.  

 

Chain Death Match 

Ricky Fuji vs. Tarzan Goto 

Oh no, who will Onita brutalise in the main event if Goto is on the undercard? Also, why is Ricky in a chain match? He dresses like a NJPW junior.  

I assume you don’t have to collect turnbuckles here! Where are the turnbuckles? In a van somewhere on the 25. Instead, they use the chain as an excuse to do some close distance brawling around the arena. Probably should have switched to falls count anywhere. Only, the main event is falls count anywhere. The cameraman finds it very hard to keep up with this action, but it is fun to watch the crowd run away from the boys when the brawl approaches them. 

 

Both guys are bloodied but you can sense Goto thinks this is a night off compared to whatever the fuck Onita usually has him doing. “I get to hit Ricky with a table? Sure!” “There’s no barbed wire, right? No explosions? No? Cool”. Goto wins with his version of the piledriver, which isn’t a million miles away from a Pedigree. This was fine but I couldn’t see half of it.  

 

Street Fight 

Atsushi Onita & Jimmy Backlund vs. Mr Pogo & The Gladiator 

OH FUCK, MIKE AWESOME IS HERE! Jimmy Del Ray is fucking dead, lads. This is literally Awesome’s FMW debut. A main event in a building with no ring. He must be wondering what he’s signed up for. This match has a wild, enegertic start where the faces charge the, uh, mats.  

This is our view for most of the match. A trail of carnage left by the boys as they head into the audience. Imagine going to a show in the middle of a typhoon and ending up with Mike Awesome in your lap? Onita has the rubes eating from the palm of his hand here. Everything he does gets popped huge. Onita’s combination of charisma and lack of fucks given makes him an incredible draw.  

 

Awesome can’t do any of his cool stuff here without the ropes. He’s got nothing to dive off. Nothing to powerbomb anyone off. He’s left walking around punching people. An inauspicious debut. Pogo hits Onita with a few spiked piledrivers and gets the pin on Onita. SILENCE. The crowd not pleased with this turn of events. I feel Onita got what he deserved by bringing a knife (del Ray) to a gunfight (Awesome). Del Ray leaves in an ambulance, covered in his own blood.  

 

The 411: 

It was certainly different! I’ve seen shows with no ring before, but this might be the earliest one I’ve seen. Along with other innovations from FMW, they may have stumbled into it, but it doesn’t make it any less cool. The matches barely delivered but I bet it was a fun show to be at. No wonder this guy kept the tape.