A show review written by: Lee Sonogan
EST 3hrs (2018) Live show, professional wrestling
I went to one of the first house shows in Australia for NJPW (Fallout Down Under Tour). The show I went to was located in Melbourne, Australia at Festival hall. A house show or live event is a professional wrestling event produced by a major promotion that is not televised, though they can be recorded. Promotions use house shows mainly to cash in on the exposure that they and their wrestlers receive during tv events, as well as to test reactions to matches, wrestlers, and gimmicks that are being considered for the main televised programming.
I am a WWE fan and a NJPW fan. NJPW is the second best wrestling company in the world for a good reason. The reason is strong style. It makes professional wrestling look more legitimate. Wrestling matches are reviewed higher in NJPW because of it. I am not an absolute follower of NJPW though. That is why it was interesting to me to see in person. These Japanese wrestlers with many other famous wrestlers make me believe in them. Live or certain wrestling matches I have seen them in.
Comparing WWE and NJPW, you can clearly see strong style is a more stiff and fast paced formatted kind of wrestling match. You could hear most of the shots all the wrestler were doing where I was sitting. If you believe wrestling matches can tell storys, NJPW is full of them. You do not need English commentary to understand. They tell the storys in the ring. At the house show they showed many storys with some they might use on their main shows.
The attendance of the show was an average 1000 people or more. Having good seats helped me enjoy the show. I got to see many wrestlers I have not seen before wrestle up close. Names like Kenny Omega, Cody Rhodes, The Young bucks, Tomohiro Ishii, Juice Robinson, Kazuchika Okada, and many more. some of the names I mentioned did the biggest wrestling spots of the night. There was even Australian wrestlers there and they contributed to the overall show. I think I have seen Slex before?
Matchcard for houseshow:
- Singles Match – Elliot Sexton vs. Lance Archer
- Singles Match – Chase Owens vs. Yuji Nagata
- Tag Team Match – BULLET CLUB (Bad Luck Fale & Gino Gambino) vs. Los Ingobernables de Japon (EVIL & SANADA)
- Six Man Tag Team Match – BULLET CLUB (Cody, Matt Jackson & Nick Jackson) vs. Juice Robinson, KUSHIDA & Toa Henare
- Tag Team Match – Mick Moretti & Robbie Eagles vs. TMDK (Damian Slater & Marcius Pitt)
- Singles Match – Jay White vs. Slex
- Singles Match – Jonah Rock vs. Minoru Suzuki
- Six Man Tag Team Match – BULLET CLUB (Kenny Omega, Tama Tonga & Tanga Loa) vs. CHAOS (Kazuchika Okada, Rocky Romero & Tomohiro Ishii)
In the aftermath of the show, I brought a large bullet club t-shirt, drank some Jack Daniels and saw a few great wrestling matches to watch and enjoy. After the intermission the show began to grow and pull of more feats of greatness of wrestling. My favourite match of the night would have to be either one of the two six man tag matches. In the main event they went out side and fought right next to us. Our whole area had to stand up and back away. Anyway, the house show was worth the price of admission. I would be interested in seeing more live performances by NJPW.
7.2/10
PS – For a wrestling house show it had more than I was expecting. If your going to check out professional wrestling, I highly reccomend watching New Japan Pro Wrestling and the wrestlers I have mentioned on this review.
“The New Japan Pro Wrestling show in Melbourne was a great experience, it showcased some of the company’s best talent while also giving a stage to some Australian talent. Hearing the crowd react to Kenny Omega, Kazuchika Okada, Minoru Suzuki, The Young Bucks and Cody in such a big way, showed me that they are worldwide stars and that this product has reached a larger Australian audience than I had thought.” – Clay Wilson
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