The History of NJPW Dominion (2021)

Well that was a rather short Dominion PPV, wasn't it?  Only five matches, two of which were barely over ten minutes.  Not only that, we got a very unexpected main event result, as for the third time that year someone won their first IWGP Title.  

After guest commentator Hiromu Takahashi addressed the crowd assuring everyone he'd be back in action soon, NJPW Dominion 2021 opened with a ten-man tag match, pitting members of Chaos plus Hiroshi Tanahashi against a Bullet Club squad let by Evil.  This boasted fast-paced action and was enjoyable while it lasted, but a sub-twelve-minute match featuring ten dudes isn't going to leave a lot of room for folks to get their shit in.  The biggest story coming out of this match was in the Juniors division, as Taiji Ishimori and Sho carried the third act of the match, culminating in Ishimori snaring the win with a Bloody Cross.  Pretty forgettable overall, but inoffensive.  **1/2

The second multi-man tag pitted Tetsuya Naito, Sanada and Bushi against Dangerous Tekkers and Douki, with the main story being Naito and Sanada meshing well as a new tag team.  Like the opener this was fine but too short to be very memorable.  Zack Sabre and Sanada had the best exchanges, with a lot of pinning combinations and reversals.  Finally after eleven-plus minutes Sanada scored an upset by countering a ZSJ European Clutch with a cradle of his own.  Thus Naito and Sanada are your new #1 contenders for the IWGP Tag belts.  I like that matchup and it's nice to see some new blood in the heavyweight tag ranks.  The temporary demotion of Naito rather telegraphed the main event result though...  **1/2

The History of NJPW Dominion (2019)

Welp, Dominion 2019 was definitely not on the level of 2018, or 2017, or 2015.  But then those three editions are three of the best PPVs I've ever seen.  Still I have to consider this show, very good though it may have been, as a mild disappointment.  I've come to expect Dominion to automatically be a Show of the Year contender, and this wasn't that.  Fortunately it was a sellout and set up some cool stuff for the future, but I was expecting a grand slam and they only hit a triple.

The show kicked off with a Jon Moxley showcase, as he made short work of Shota Umino.  I get why this went under four minutes but I would've liked to see more from these two.  That said, this was a very good four-minute squash, with Moxley taunting Umino during a series of Umino forearms; the veteran toying with the rookie.  Moxley finished Umino with his double-arm DDT and then helped him up post-match, giving Umino his endorsement before announcing his intention to enter the G1.  Between his excellent US Title win over Juice Robinson and this match, the stage was already set for Moxley to prove how much better he was outside WWE.  This was fine for what it was.  **3/4

From Moxley's first appearance as US Champion we moved onto Shingo Takagi's first as a division crossover star, as he and Satoshi Kojima beat the tar out of each other.  As a Junior, Shingo had been able to bully and overpower every opponent, but heavyweight Kojima wasn't standing for it and gave it all right back.  These guys had some sick forearm and lariat exchanges and built to a strong finish, with Shingo hitting a Pumping Bomber and Last of the Dragon to get his first heavyweight singles win.  Shingo's run as a company MVP heavyweight was underway.  This was an excellent little fight, particularly for its place on the card.  ***3/4

The first of two mongrel tag matches was next, as Minoru Suzuki and Zack Sabre faced Yoshi-Hashi and Jushin Thunder Liger.  These four paired off for most of the bout, Suzuki building to a future match with Liger and Yoshi proving himself as a British Heavyweight Championship challenger for Zack.  Suzuki and Liger's exchanges were fun, while Yoshi wasn't the most credible opponent for Sabre.  But he stole a win here with a magistral cradle.  This was a garden variety undercard tag match.  **1/2

The weakest match on the card was the six-man tag pitting Hiroshi Tanahashi, Juice Robinson and Ryusuke Taguchi vs. Jay White, Chase Owens and Taiji Ishimori.  Usually Tanahashi is able to hide his physical limitations in a singles match, but he wasn't able to do so here.  Tana looked so beat up and tired, his offense wasn't nearly as crisp as usual.  Taguchi's story during this match was his inability to hit the Funky Weapon hip attack.  Ishimori didn't do much here, leaving Owens, Juice and White to carry most of it.  Not much to this.  **

Things picked up with the NEVER Openweight Championship, as Taichi had one of his best matches to date against Tomohiro Ishii, who had what was for him a middling encounter.  This was very solid stuff, with Taichi actually fighting for a change, begging the question, both from the announcers and myself, "Why aren't all of his matches like this?"  After some early stalling and usual Taichi antics, the second half of this match became a more typical Ishii fight, with traded strikes, suplexes and some Taichi submission attempts.  Ishii eventually won with a sliding lariat (after multiple missed attempts) and a brainbuster to recapture the NEVER Title.  This match was very good, a step below Shingo-Kojima.  ***1/2

The Tag Titles were next as GOD faced Evil & Sanada in a pretty standard tag match.  There was some good action but nothing terribly noteworthy.  Jado interfered liberally, hitting Evil with a kendo stick from the outside, and later pulling the referee out of the ring to stop him from seeing Tama Tonga tapping to Evil's Scorpion Deathlock.  After a ref bump Jado came in with the stick again but Bushi appeared, spraying black mist into his face and knocking him out with a tope.  Evil & Sanada went for the Magic Killer but Tama broke it up and rolled up Evil, hooking the tights for the cheap win.  This was fine but not much else.  ***

The real meat of the show, as expected, was the final three bouts, starting with an incredible Dragon Lee-Will Opsreay match.  Ospreay stated a few days ago he and Lee intended to steal the show here, and they did just that, with an epic 20-minute Juniors match.  After several minutes of thrilling back-and-forth, Lee propped Ospreay on the outside railing and hit a stunning tope, knocking both guys over the railing and the Japanese announce table.  Absolutely wild spot that was actually safer than it looked.  Ospreay later hit a gorgeous corkscrew moonsault to the floor.  One of my favorite spots, incredibly simple though it was, involved Dragon Lee attempting to run away from Ospreay but getting cut off by a hook kick.  Such a basic but brilliant moment.  Another great exchange saw Ospreay take a reverse rana but counter a Lee running charge with a Spanish Fly out of nowhere.  And of course they did the spot where Ospreay appears to take a top rope rana but lands on his feet and both guys sell the magnitude of that reversal.  Ospreay repeated his finish from his Shingo match a few days earlier, putting away Dragon with a top rope OsCutter/Stormbreaker sequence to once again capture the Jr. Title.  Just a spectacular performance by both men.  ****3/4

The semi-main event was one of those matches I have to reluctantly give a very high rating to.  At this point I was convinced Ibushi and Naito had a suicide pact, considering how many times they've dropped each other on their heads over the years.  This match was slower paced than their previous ones but the second half featured so many piledrivers, reverse ranas, and other spiking moves it became really uncomfortable to watch.  And don't get me started on that apron German suplex spot.  Like, obviously the plan was for Naito to flip Ibushi all the way over so he landed on the floor on his stomach (ridiculously dangerous as it is), but Ibushi didn't clear the apron and the side of his head caught the edge on the way down, which looked like it folded his head into his shoulder at a 45-degree angle.  Jeezus fucking Christ.  I spent the rest of this match saying "What the fuck are you doing??"  That Ibushi was even able to get up after that, let alone finish a match full of crazy high spots is baffling.  And from a workrate standpoint this match was pretty great.  But after this I didn't want to see them wrestle each other ever again (Fortunately their WrestleKingdom 15 main event was much safer).  Naito kicked out of a Last Ride and countered the Kamigoye with a DDT that Ibushi took like Rob Van Dam.  Naito finished him with Destino to recapture the I-C Title.   ****1/4 for the mechanics of the match, but zero stars for the common sense displayed in getting there.

The main event, following two spectacular matches, left me feeling a little underwhelmed truth be told, but there was plenty of good stuff here.  Okada and Jericho worked a very unusual style for New Japan, with Jericho playing the Terry Funk-type heel and Okada altering his usual main event style to match.  Jericho subverted several of Okada's usual spots, such as the clean rope break at the beginning, where Jericho answered Okada's pat on the chest with an eye poke.  Then later Okada tossed Jericho over the barricade and went for his high cross body but Jericho countered with a Codebreaker.   Late in the match Jericho attempted to steal the Rainmaker but Okada ducked and hit the Codebreaker for a nearfall.  Okada avoided Jericho's new Judas Effect and countered another Codebreaker by throwing Jericho over his head.  Jericho went for a sunset flip but Okada sat on top and got a quick pin, echoing the first fall with Kenny Omega last year.  Jericho was pissed and attacked Okada after the bell, using a chair and hitting the Judas Effect.  Guest commentator Tanahashi came to Okada's rescue, setting up a dream match with Jericho, at WrestleKingdom 14.  The story of this match really seemed to be Jericho robbing the fans of a typical Okada main event, with multiple signature spots broken up, a slower-than-usual pace, and an out-of-nowhere finish.  Okada never even hit the Rainmaker and certainly didn't get a post-match promo.  For what they were going for this was very well-done, it just left me slightly vexxed because it wasn't the match I expected.  On balance I'll give it **** because it was well-worked and accomplished what it set out to accomplish.  Arch-villain Chris Jericho pissed off the New Japan faithful and was protected in a loss.

So yeah, Dominion 2019 was certainly not the instant classic show we've come to expect from the annual June PPV, but it was very far from a bad show too.  On the contrary, a show like this on WWE's calendar would be considered one of their best of the year.  For New Japan though it was just good.  

Best Match: Dragon Lee vs. Will Ospreay
Worst Match: The six-man
What I'd Change: Tell Ibushi and Naito to stop trying to die.  
Most Disappointing Match: As good as it was, Ibushi-Naito was really difficult to watch.
Most Pleasant Surprise: That Taichi can actually deliver a good NEVER match when he wants to.
Overall Rating: 8.5/10


Alright, bring on the G1 Climax!  Thanks for reading - follow us on Twitter, MeWe, Facebook and YouTube!


2018

2020

 

The History of NJPW Dominion (2018)

Okada-Omega IV.  The new wrestling yardstick.  The 60+-minute epic that made everything else feel obsolete.  The culmination of an 18-month rivalry that ranks among the greatest in the history of the business.  Oh, plus a bunch of other good stuff.....

2018's PPV of the Year may primarily be remembered for its main event, but it was anything but a one-match show.  In addition to the 6-star classic (or 7, or 8, however many snowflakes you wanna give it), this show boasted three other ****+ matches by my count, and while it took a few matches to really get going, this edition of Dominion ranks among the finest.

The opener was a short but entertaining Jr. Tag Title match, with Roppongi 3K challenging El Desperado & Kanemaru, hoping to regain the straps.  The heels took advantage of a slight ref bump and Kanemaru used a whiskey bottle on SHO for the win.  It's a shame these guys only got nine minutes for a title opener and even stranger that RPG3K didn't win.  Nothing spectacular in this opener, it was fine.  **

Next up was Jay White & Yoshi-Hashi vs. Juice Robinson & David Finlay in another short bout.  This was all about setting up White vs. Robinson, which it did nicely.  Robinson got the pin on White with Pulp Friction, and these two would deliver a fantastic US Title match at the G1 Special in San Francisco a month later.  This however was just a quick 7-minute match.  **

A third undercard tag match pitted Tomohiro Ishii & Toru Yano against Minoru Suzuki & Zack Sabre Jr.  This was the best of the three openers, mostly due to the Ishii-Suzuki interaction (Who doesn't love watching these two maniacs pummel each other?).  Sabre got the win for his team by tapping out Yano, but after the match Ishii and Suzuki brawled into the back.  Another fun little match.  **1/4

The first really noteworthy bout was the NEVER Openweight triple threat.  Hirooki Goto and Michael Elgin carried most of the weight here while Taichi played the chickenshit heel who picked his spots and tried to stay out of danger.  After some nice three-way spots and some good powerbrokering from Goto and Elgin, Elgin won by buckle bombing Taichi into Goto and then Elgin-bombing Taichi for the pin.  This match wasn't your usual NEVER slugfest, and leaving Taichi out of it would've been a major improvement, but it had some clever spots and was well worked.  ***1/2

Here's where the show really started to take off.  The Young Bucks, freshly moved up to the heavyweight tag division, challenged Evil & Sanada in an energetic, dramatic bout where both Bucks sold injuries - Matt's back became an issue again, and Nick missed a kick on the apron and whacked his foot on the post.  Both injuries played into multiple spots and the Bucks were in peril for much of the bout.  This can be considered the match where Matt and Nick Jackson successfully transitioned from spotfest wrestlers to really great storytellers, and it felt markedly different than their Jr. division stuff.  After multiple exciting false finishes, the Bucks took the match and the straps with More Bang for Your Buck.  One of the best heavyweight tag title matches I've seen in NJPW.  Seven months later the Bucks would drop the titles back to Evil & Sanada and make their New Japan exit, but this bout served as an historic template for their work in AEW.  ****1/2

The History of NJPW Dominion (2017)

NJPW follows up the superb WrestleKingdom 11 with a similarly structured Dominion, complete with four rematches from that show....

In a year when the company, especially its top champion, was churning out classics like a five-star match assembly line, NJPW Dominion 2017 was yet another homerun for the world's greatest current wrestling promotion.  Its nine-match lineup included nary a misstep; the matches ranged from "entertaining opening match fluff" to "pretty good" to "goddamn awesome" to "transcendent."  By my calculations the show included four ****+ matches, the last of which served as an in-ring Godfather 2 to its predecessor.  Five months after Kazuchika Okada and Kenny Omega lit the wrestling world ablaze with their epic Tokyo Dome main event for the ages, they did it a second time.

First though, let's look at the undercard.

The opening 8-man tag was quick, energetic and inoffensive.  Nothing much at stake but everyone got a little time to warm up the crowd, and team Tiger Mask won after Togi Makabe landed the King Kong Knee Drop on Nakanishi.  I believe this was Kota Ibushi's final Tiger Mask W appearance, thank god.  **1/4

Next up was the 6-Man Title gauntlet match, which was slightly better than its WK counterpart but ultimately entertaining without being terribly memorable.  The first and last segments were probably the strongest, but I find gauntlet six-man tags kind of a slog to sit through.  I'd have preferred a simple six-man tag for the titles.  Team Chaos won the first fall after Toru Yano hit a low blow on Yujiro Takahashi.  He tried to do the same in the second fall to Taichi and Kanemaru but Zack Sabre Jr. rolled him up in a bridging cradle to make short work of Chaos.  Taguchi, Juice and Ricochet were next and had a bit of baseball-themed fun, where Taguchi trapped Taichi in the corner and acted as a catcher, Ricochet wound up and threw an air pitch, and Juice acted as a ball, cannonballing Taichi.  Juice ended up pinning Taichi with Pulp Friction after Kanemaru accidentally whiskey-sprayed him.  Zack Sabre then trapped Juice in an Octopus Hold after the bell, until Evil, Sanada and Bushi entered.   Los Ingobernables retained in the end after Bushi hit a second-rope codebreaker on Taguchi.  Like I said, this was fine but too long for its spot and importance.  **

The History of NJPW Dominion (2016)

NJPW rebuilds their roster and sets the stage for a record-shattering IWGP Title reign.....

Osaka-Jo Hall - 6.19.16

The 2016 edition came at a strange transitional period for New Japan, when they were still recovering from the loss of four major players a few months earlier.  While AJ Styles, Shinsuke Nakamura, Anderson and Gallows were making waves in WWE, NJPW was hard at work to fill the void.  Kenny Omega had emerged as the new top gaijin, winning the vacant Intercontinental Title (I'm still baffled they didn't have Nakamura drop the belt to him on his way out the door), while Tetsuya Naito skyrocketed to the main event scene, winning the New Japan Cup tournament on his way to a shocking IWGP Title victory over Okada at Invasion Attack.  Replacing Anderson & Gallows as the tag team division centerpiece was another pair of Bullet Club guys, Tama Tonga and Tanga Loa, who got off to a rocky start but quickly grew into the role.  And yet another emerging new star was Jr. Heavyweight sensation Will Ospreay, who defeated Ryusuke Taguchi in the Best of the Super Juniors final to earn a shot at division champion Kushida.  So in spite of the talent loss, New Japan was making the best of things and then some (as we'd see over the next year).

Dominion opened with the Bullet Club B-Team of Bad Luck Fale, Hangman Page and Yujiro Takahashi facing the Hunter Club of Captain New Japan, Yoshitatsu and Togi Makabe.  The heels attacked at the bell and worked over Yoshi momentarily, but things broke down quickly and spilled to the outside.  Fale attacked Makabe with the railing, while Page hit CNJ with a shooting star press off the apron (This spot was terrifying, as Page underrotated and was lucky not to land on his head).  Yoshi finally made the hot tag to Makabe, who worked with CNJ to dominate the heels, but Page hit Last Rites on CNJ to win the match, and hung him over the ropes after the bell.  Not much to write home about here, just a proper showcase for Page more than anything else.  *1/2

Up next was a the first of three Chaos vs. Los Ingobernables matches on the show, as the two newest LIJ members Sanada and Bushi faced Tomohiro Ishii and Yoshi-Hashi.  Bushi started right in with heel tactics, choking Yoshi with his T-shirt and opening the door for the heels to work him over for a few minutes, before Yoshi hit a neckbreaker and tagged Ishii.  Ishii ran wild on both LIJ members.  With all four men in the ring Yoshi and Sanada had some good exchanges, with Sanada hitting a top rope dropkick, lariat, and a TKO.  He went for Skull End but met an Ishii lariat.  Yoshi then countered a second Skull End attempt with his Butterfly Lock, which Bushi tried to break up but found himself snared in an Ishii choke.  Sanada tapped to give Chaos the win.  This was a decent match but pretty skippable.  **1/4

The History of NJPW Dominion (2015)

The next four Dominion shows were really something, starting with this masterpiece.....

Osaka-Jo Hall - 7.5.15

The 2015 Dominion PPV was the first NJPW show I truly anticipated as a fan, after initially diving into the product with WrestleKingdom 9.  Between January and July 2015 I perused their back catalogue and watched the big matches from New Beginning, Invasion Attack and Wrestling Dontaku.  But Dominion was the first stacked New Japan show after WK9, and I made it a point to sit down and view it from start to finish, on the day it aired.  Another bit of trivia for you, Dominion 2015 was the first NJPW show I wrote a predictions column for (I went 8 for 9).  If WrestleKingdom 9 converted me into a New Japan fan, Dominion 2015 vaulted New Japan ahead of WWE on my list of wrestling priorities, and I haven't looked back.

This show was the culmination of a year-long arc for the company's rising Ace, Kazuchika Okada, who'd been unseated for the IWGP Title by AJ Styles (partly due to Bullet Club shenanigans), and spent the intervening months trying to climb back up the mountain (with a heartbreaking loss to Tanahashi at WrestleKingdom 9).  Okada's road to Dominion had been a troubled one, with a couple losses to Bad Luck Fale before a big win at Invasion Attack that ended that feud and set the stage for a rematch with AJ at the second-biggest show of the year.  Such was the central story of Dominion 2015.

But first the undercard...

The show opened with a wild, fast-paced offering from the Jr. Heavyweight Tag division, as The Young Bucks defended their Titles against reDRagon and RPG Vice.  The Bucks took a lot of abuse early in the match from both teams but managed to outmaneuver Fish and O'Reilly on the outside, leaving Romero and Beretta to flatten reDRagon with planchas meant for Matt and Nick.  From there the Bucks staged a walkout which prompted RPG Vice to give chase, and Matt and Nick superkicked them both on the ramp before running back into the ring.  RPG Vice nearly got counted out but just made it back in.  After lots of wild exchanges, Kyle O'Reilly took out both RPG Vice members with a rebound lariat, and Fish hit a top rope Falcon Arrow on Romero for a nearfall.  But the Bucks came back, knocking reDRagon out of the match with twin superkicks, Matt superkicked Beretta out of the ring, and the Bucks hit More Bang for Your Buck on Romero to retain the belts.  A super fun opener with the type of Jr. action you'd expect from these three teams.  ***3/4  

Next up was one of only two "forgettable" matches of the night; Bad Luck Fale and Yujiro Takahashi vs. Tomoaki Honma and Tetsuya Naito.  This match was historically significant, as it marked more or less the beginning of Tetsuya Naito becoming the Ingobernable we all know and love today.  Honma was ambushed by the heels at the opening bell, and Naito sauntered down to the ring, in no hurry to help out his partner.  The opening few minutes consisted of Fale and Takahashi pounding Honma, and every time Honma escaped to his corner Naito refused to tag in.  Finally Naito agreed to do some work, leveling both heels with a dive to the outside and offering his signature pose back in the ring.  Naito locked Fale in a Figure Four but ran into some trouble and tagged Honma back in, taking a powder on the outside.  Honma flattened Takahashi with a running headbutt, and Naito detained Fale long enough for Honma to hit a top rope headbutt for the win; this was during a time when Honma lost basically always, so the crowd was jubilant at his success here.  Naito bailed after the bell and left Honma to his celebration.  The rest of course is history; Naito would soon become one of the company's top draws thanks to his transformation into an anti-hero.  A decent match with nice character development, but not a standout on a show like this.  **1/2

The really stacked portion of the card began next with the Katsuyori Shibata-Kazushi Sakuraba fight.  And I mean FIGHT.  This was one of the best simulated MMA bouts I've ever seen and I'd rank it right up there with Sakuraba-Nakamura from WK7.  The grappling looked totally convincing and snug, and Shibata's strikes were brutal.  Sakuraba mostly relied on submission holds, repeatedly locking in guillotine chokes and armbars, while Shibata fought back with sickening forearms, palm strikes, and a pair of stiff-as-hell corner dropkicks.  The most memorable moment came when Sakuraba locked a rear naked choke on a standing Shibata.  Shibata inched toward the ropes with Sakuraba on his back like a spider monkey, but as he reached out, Sakuraba converted the hold into a double butterfly lock to trap both Shibata's arms; Shibata had to resort to reaching the ropes with his teeth to break the hold.  Shibata spun Sakuraba around with a lariat but got caught in another choke that nearly passed him out.  Shibata escaped and locked in his own choke, which he released just long enough to score a match-ending Penalty Kick.  This was fantastically brutal and different from anything else on the show.  ***3/4 

The History of NJPW Dominion (2014)

The Bullet Club has taken over, folks.  It's New Japan, 2014....

BodyMaker Colosseum - 6.21.14

By June 2014 the Bullet Club had gone through a major shift, as founder Prince Devitt left New Japan for TitanLand (following a Loser Leaves NJPW match at Invasion Attack), and was replaced as leader by the industry's hottest free agent AJ Styles.  AJ made a major statement from the start, capturing the IWGP Championship in his New Japan in-ring debut.  Also by this point buzzworthy indy tag team The Young Bucks had been added to the mix, making the Bullet Club a diverse, powerful stable.  The 2014 Dominion show was fairly strange compared to the others; with no IWGP Title match on the card it would instead by headlined by an Intercontinental Championship match (the third of five such NJPW PPVs that year), while IWGP Champion Styles was in a tag match third from the top.  What's weirder about this show is that by my count three of the five pre-intermission bouts scored **** or better, while none of the final four matches did.  What is this, a WWE show??  But Dominion 2014 was still a solid, easy to watch outing with some fine wrestling.

The show opened gorgeously with The Young Bucks vs. Time Splitters for the IWGP Jr. Tag belts.  This began with lots of innovative, fast-paced action, the Splitters mostly frustrating the Bucks.  Matt and Nick eventually took control after their patented head scissor/flying kick combo, and kept outmaneuvering Alex Shelley to keep him from escaping as they worked him over.  The Bucks broke out a slew of tandem moves over several minutes, and finally Shelley evaded them and got the hot tag.  Kushida ran wild, taking out both Bucks, but fell victim to a Doomsday Device dropkick for a two-count.  Time Splitters recovered and hit a tandem Sliced Bread for a nearfall.  Kushida went for the Hoverboard Lock but Matt countered with a tombstone setup for the IndyTaker.  The pin was broken up and the Bucks hit their tandem 450 splash for another two-count.  Finally they went for More Bang for Your Buck, but it was broken up, and Kushida snared a Hoverboard lock on Nick for the tapout finish.  Just an awesome, prototypical Bucks-Splitters match to kick off the show; exactly the kind of match you'd want from these teams.  ****1/2

The shortest match of the night, and the only one under ten minutes, pitted Tetsuya Naito against Tama Tonga in a crisp, energetic match.  Tonga attacked before the bell and controlled most of the early moments, taking the action outside and hitting a TKO-type move to drop Naito throat-first on the railing, which looked brutal.  Naito beat the 20-count and took over the match with a neckbreaker, and the remaining minutes featured quick back-and-forth action.  Tonga got the advantage with a backdrop suplex and the finishing sequence was full of reversals until Naito found a break and hit the Stardust Press for the win.  This was fun.  ***

Maybe the unexpected hit of the night for me (and I'm not sure why I was surprised by this) was Goto and Shibata vs. Yuji Nagata and Tomoaki Honma.  These four guys beat the shit out of each other for eleven minutes and it was glorious.  Honma attacked before the bell, pummeling Shibata with chops and stomps, but Shibata wasn't having it and engaged both guys with traded forearms.  Later in the match Shibata and Honma had an incredible striking battle, trading rapid-fire palm strikes until Honma leveled him with a lariat and tagged Nagata.  Shibata and Nagata then had a sick striking war of their own and traded backdrop suplexes.  Shibata and Nagata eventually spilled out of the ring as Goto and Honma fought inside.  Honma hit a blockbuster but missed his diving headbutt.  Goto landed a yushi guroshi but Honma countered the Shouten with a small package for a nearfall.  Goto then hit a Dominator-type move for the win.  Shibata and Nagata continued brawling all the way to the dressing room.  This was like a NEVER Openweight tag match, stiff as fuck and full of nonstop action.  ****

The History of NJPW Dominion (2013)

We've entered the Bullet Club era!

BodyMaker Colosseum - 6.22.13

New Japan was firing on all cylinders in 2013, with an incredible slew of big PPVs plus an awesome G1 tournament, and Dominion was no exception.  The company had found its second Ace in Kazuchika Okada, who now enjoyed a lengthy second IWGP Title reign, but a brand new stable was creating a huge buzz and would take the puroresu world by storm.  Jr. Heavyweight babyface Prince Devitt had turned on his Apollo 55 partner Taguchi and formed Bullet Club, a foursome consisting of gaijin wrestlers that also included Bad Luck Fale, Tama Tonga and Karl Anderson (by year's end The Young Bucks and Doc Gallows would be added to the group).  Bullet Club usurped Chaos as the most notorious heel stable and would assert their dominance over the next several years.  But the first top for Devitt was NJPW's Ace, Hiroshi Tanahashi!

But first the undercard...

The opener featured the burgeoning Jr. Tag division, as Forever Hooligans defended the championship against Time Splitters.  Alex Kozlov began the proceedings by singing the Russian anthem, and all I have to say is Kozlov is no Nikolai Volkoff.  The match started with Alex Shelley putting on a grappling clinic against Kozlov, making use of European style wrestling to control the action.  Soon Kushida and Romero tagged in and provided the wild, fast-paced Jr. moves.  After a skirmish on the outside involving the railing, the heels took over and worked Shelley while Kushida was down, repeatedly cutting off the tag attempts.  Finally Kushida got the hot tag in and cleaned house.  Romero blocked a Time Splitter attempt and nearly won with a small package, then Kozlov came back in and the Hooligans hit their Demolition-style finisher on Kushida for a nearfall.  Time Splitters hit their signature sequence of chain moves, but the Hooligans nailed Kushida with a Torture Rack/flying knee combination to retain the belts.  This was a very fun Jr. tag bout that would soon become the standard match type for New Japan PPV openers.  ***1/2

The next available match on NJPW World (they're missing the Bullet Club-Nagata/Honma/Captin NJ six-man for some reason) is a triple threat IWGP Heavyweight Tag Title match, with champions Tencozy vs. Toru Yano & Iizuka vs. Killer Elite Squad.  KES attacked Tencozy at the bell and dominated both teams during the opening stretch, but Chaos took the fight outside, taping Archer and Davey to the railing and going to work on Tencozy.  After a few minutes KES broke free and had back and forth exchanges with Tencozy.  KES hit their double powerbomb on Yano but the referee had been bumped and there was no pin.  Tencozy hit their Tencozy Cutter on Archer for a nearfall before Kojima lariated the crap out of him to get the pin.  This was mildly fun and chaotic, but a bit tedious at times.  **1/2

Next up was the NWA Championship, with Manabu Nakanishi challenging Rob Conway.  This match was fun after a few minutes when Nakanishi made a comeback, but pretty dull when Conway was in control.  After hitting a dive to the outside, Nakanishi leveled Conway with a lariat and a spear, and slapped on the Torture Rack, but Conway escaped.  Nakanishi went to the top rope but Bruce Tharpe distracted him, allowing Conway to use his Ego Trip neckbreaker for the win.  This was mediocre.  **

The History of NJPW Dominion (2012)

In 2012 Dominion begins to feel like the company's second-biggest show of the year.....

Osaka BodyMaker Colosseum - 6.16.12

The 2012 Dominion show was a very solid PPV headlined by the company's big new drawing card, the Hiroshi Tanahashi-Kazuchika Okada feud.  Tanahashi had carried the company on his back for five years already, dragging them out of their financial doldrums, but up until this point he hadn't yet faced a definitive opponent, the Rock to his Steve Austin.  That opponent finally arrived in 2012, in the personage of Okada, a prodigiously gifted 24-year-old who had shockingly dethroned Tana at that year's New Beginning and announced himself as New Japan's future centerpiece.  This edition of Dominion would center around the highly anticipated rematch, while the rest of the card would showcase the company's growing roster of supporting characters.

The opening six-man tag featured an insane amount of talent, as the DDT promotion's hottest stars crashed the party.  Kota Ibushi, Kenny Omega and Daisuka Sasaki faced Prince Devitt, Bushi and Kushida.  Ibushi and Devitt kicked off this incredibly athletic contest with mat-based grappling before tagging in Sasuke and Kushida, who demonstrated their impossibly quick Jr. style, and then Omega and Bushi paired off to hit the big crowd-pleasing moves.  This match got plenty of time for an opener and built to some spectacular moves and counters.  It boiled down to Ibushi and Bushi; the latter hit a top rope Spanish Fly but fell victim to Ibushi's Last Ride for the pin.  This was a super-fun opener with tons of Jr. Heavyweight action.  ***1/2

Another six-man tag followed, with a totally different style of wrestling, as Tomohiro Ishii led Chaos partners Yoshi-Hashi and Rocky Romero against Yuji Nagata, Wataru Inoue and Captain New Japan.  Ishii and Nagata began and largely closed this match, with awesome stiff back-and-forth fighting.  Inoue got a few moments to shine as well, at one pointing leveling Yoshi and Romero with a double rolling spear, but then Chaos got the advantage and Rocky and Yoshi had an amusing moment, arguing over taking turns with Rocky's signature corner clotheslines.  Finally Captain New Japan tagged in and controlled the match for a bit, but while holding Ishii for a Nagata lariat, Ishii ducked and Nagata nailed the Cap.  Ishii then hit his brain buster for the win.  Ishii and Nagata continued fighting after the bell and had to be separated.  Also a fun little match.  **3/4

Third up was Taichi & Taka Michinoku vs. Jushin Thunder Liger and Tiger Mask IV.  This started out with mucho stalling from the heels, who spent the first half cheating and double-teaming both masked opponents.  Taichi tried on numerous occasions to unmask Liger, and after a ref bump Taichi used a chair and started tearing off pieces of Liger's headgear.  But Liger had prepped for this, revealing that his face was heavily painted beneath the mask, and red-misted both Taichi and Taka before powerbombing Taichi through a table.  Tiger Mask then hit the tiger suplex for the win and presented Liger with a new mask after the bell.  This was chaotic but entertaining.  **1/2

The History of NJPW Dominion (2011)

The Tanahashi Magic Train keeps rollin' on and this would be the final Dominion powered exclusively by The Ace.

Osaka Prefectural Gymnasium - 6.18.11

**NOTE: NJPW World is missing three matches from this show: Koji Kanemoto-Hiromu Takahashi, the Kendrick/Gedo/Jado-Liger/Kushida/Tiger Mask six-man, and the Tenza/Seigigun-Ishii/Tanaka/Iizuka six-man.  Their combined running time is a shade under 21 minutes though, so I get the feeling I wasn't missing anything essential.**

Dominion 2011 was for me kind of a middling show with a couple standouts.  There wasn't anything bad, but most of the card fell into the 2s and 3s for me.  NJPW was still running on high-octane Tanahashi fuel but the Jr. division also featured some of the best talent in the company.  One thing I found odd about these first three Dominions is that Chaos was the top heel stable but wasn't being featured much in title matches.  And strangely absent from this show altogether was Chaos's leader, Shinsuke Nakamura.  This show could've used his presence for sure.

The first match available on New Japan World was Ryusuke Taguchi vs Mascara Dorada for the CMLL Welterweight Title.  This bout started off somewhat methodically with some initial feeling out but both guys pretty quickly brought out the top rope dives.  Dorada nearly killed himself on a botched second-rope springboard, when his foot caught the top rope causing him to under-rotate; the back of his head hit the apron on the way down and it looked like he hyperextended his knee on the floor.  Miraculously he was able to continue, attempting the same move moments later and nailing it, much to the crowd's delight.  The second half of the match had some good lucha-style exchanges, leading to a series of traded victory rolls with Dorada holding one long enough for the three-count.  This match was solid but too short to be much more.  **3/4

Skipping ahead to the fifth match of the night, former No Limit tag partners Tetsuya Naito and Yujiro Takahashi locked horns in a match that started out very heated but settled into an oddly slow pace for a grudge match.  Naito top-rope dropkicked Takahashi at the bell and followed it up outside with a running dropkick on the ramp.  Back in the ring Takahashi took over for a long stretch that was fine but a bit tedious at times.  One thing was evident from this match though - Tetsuya Naito has seemingly always had a recklessness about landing on his head.  Three times during this match he would do a running dive or a flipping bump and just barely avoid breaking his neck.  Late in the match he also took a high-angle Olympic slam that looked crippling.  After about eleven minutes Takahashi won with a Dominator.  This was decent but I expected more given the nature of their feud.  From this match it's clear why Naito became a huge star and Takahashi did not.  *** 

The History of NJPW Dominion (2010)

Welcome to our second installment of NJPW Dominion History, here at Enuffa.com!

Osaka Prefectural Gymnasium - 6.9.10

Dominion returned to Osaka in 2010 with another solid if not stacked show, with some frankly odd star placements.  Manabu Nakanishi for example, who headlined Dominion 2009 as the IWGP Champion, showed up here in the second match of the night with five other dudes.  Shinsuke Nakamura, another former IWGP Champ, was billed fourth from the bottom in a brief MMA-infused fight with Daniel Puder of all people.  And Tanahashi, the company's golden goose was in the hair vs. hair semi-main event instead of contending for the strap.  Some strange choices to be sure, but the show itself managed to be very watchable and a few bouts were pleasantly surprising.

The 2010 edition opened with one of two six-man tags, with Akira, El Samurai and Koji Kanemoto squaring off against Ryusuke Taguchi, Super Strong Machine and baby Tama Tonga (sporting short hair and a clean-shaven look)! This was not much of a match, running under nine minutes and not featuring a lot of memorable action. El Samurai pinned Tonga with an abdominal stretch rollup thingy.  Moving on.  *1/2

The second six-man was a little better but still just sorta there, as Chaos members Tomohiro Ishii, Iizuka and Gedo faced Manabu Nakanishi, Mitsuhide Hirasawa and a blond-haired Kushida.  There was a big brawl before the bell to kick things off, climaxing in Kushida and Nakanishi dives over the ropes.  Then the match settled into the heels getting heat on Hirasawa after hitting him with chairshots outside.  Eventually Nakanishi tagged in for some big power moves, Kushida and Gedo did some fun Jr. exchanges, and Iizuka distracted the referee while Gedo nailed Kushida with a kendo stick.  Iizuka then choked Kushida out for the win.  Another forgettable affair.  *3/4

The good stuff started next, as Tomaki Honma vaced Muhammed Yone in a solid, super stiff contest.  We got tons of brutal chops, forearm shots and running lariats over the bout's nine minutes and finally Honma hit his big top rope headbutt for a near fall but Yone came back and delivered a muscle buster for the win.  Not too shabby, this one.  **3/4

The History of NJPW Dominion (2009)

Oh yes, oh yes, the wrestling-obsessed weirdo is back with another PPV History series, here at Enuffa.com!  This time we'll be looking at the decade-long lineage of NJPW's second-biggest PPV of the year, Dominion!

Set the way-back machine for 2009, when New Japan Pro-Wrestling was still in serious rebuilding mode, having weathered the lull of the early 2000s.  They'd hitched their wagon to a dynamic young performer named Hiroshi Tanahashi, and his gargantuan charisma, coupled with his incredible knack for in-ring storytelling, almost singlehandedly lifted NJPW out of its financial woes.  At this point Tanahashi was head-and-shoulders above everyone else in the company, but numerous young stars were being groomed for big things and by 2009 a few were starting to nip at Tana's heels.  The modern New Japan product as we know it was taking shape, with a combination of native stars and talented gaijin, and only a few years later it would start to blow everyone else out of the water from a creative standpoint.  So sit back and let's take a stroll through recent New Japan lore....

Osaka Prefectural Gymnasium - 6.20.09

Things kicked off with a solid little opener, as Jushin Thunder Liger and Akira faced Koji Kanemoto and a young lion named Nobuo Yoshihashi. Everyone worked hard in the seven-or-so minutes alotted. Finally Yoshi-Hashi ate a top rope splash from Akira for the pin.  Shockingly little from Liger in this match.  Not terribly memorable but decent.  **1/4

Next up was Takao Omori and Yutaka Yoshie vs. Mitsuhide Hirasawa and Super Strong Machine.  This was another short match, only five-and-a-half minutes, but it was full of action. Yoshie at 300+ pounds got to show off his deceptive agility.  The match ended with Omori hitting a running STO on Hirasawa. Nothing special here, but this was well worked.  **

The first really noteworthy match was third, as Apollo 55 faced Taichi and Milano Collection AT for a Jr. Heavyweight Tag Title shot.  These guys cut a crazy fast pace for the first few minutes, then Taichi and Milano slowed it down to work over Taguchi.  After the eventual hot tag to Devitt we got a crazy series of big moves and nearfalls, including an outside-the-ring Doomsday Device cross body on Taichi, a Devitt double stomp for a near fall, and a big Tower of Doom spot.  Finally Taguchi pinned Taichi after a (surprisingly safe-looking) vertebreaker and chicken wing face buster.  One thing really struck me about this match: Taichi used to be a worker!  When did that change?  Anyway this was a damn good match.  ***3/4