NJPW On The Road Series

New Japan Pro Wrestling has launched a new documentary series on their you tube channel called On the Road.  It's not a traditional documentary it's more a day in the life type where the camera crew follows the wrestler around for various activities.

These series are in English with Japanese subtitles and when Japanese is spoken we get English subtitles.  I believe these series were made to draw in more English speaking fans.  I really enjoy them.

Series 1: Will Ospreay
So far they have posted 3 segments about 11 minutes each, overall they highlights Ospreay's first trip to Japan for NJPW.  Overall it is amazing to watch how humbled and blown away Ospreay is to be there.  It is literally a dream come true to him and gets emotional at times.

Part 1: April 7th, we meet Ospreay at the airport he seems surprised by the camera crew.  They follow him to his hotel where he unpacks and talks about getting into wrestling.  What it mean to come to New Japan, shows off his custom gear and how excited he is to a part of the CHAOS group.

Part 2: We follow Ospreay to the New Japan offices.  He meets with Okada where a press conference is held. Next it's April 10th at Sumo arena where Will is blow away at the size of the venue as this will be the largest crowd he has ever wrestled in front of. I find the seating interesting as there are no seats they audience sits on the floor on areas that are sectioned off and you have to remove your shoes. These sections are on risers, seats are on the floor.

Part 3: April 10th at Sumo Hall featuring the Will Ospreay wrestling Kushida for the IWGP Jr. Heavyweight Championship.  We get about 6 minutes of in ring clips and then a post match interview with Ospreay

Series 2: "Young Lion of Blue Eyes"Jay White
Three segments varying from 8 - 13 minutes long.  Jay has been with New Japan since early 2015 where is lives in the New Japan Dojo as a young boy.  This is the first time I have ever seen any quality footage of the dojo and it's interesting to finally see something I have heard about many times over the years.

Part 1: March 29th we find Jay training at the New Japan dojo talking about getting into wrestling.  Other gaijins in the home David Finlay and Juice Robinson formerly CJ Parker in NXT.  Jay shows us some of the tasks of the young boys. Jay shows us his room at the dojo.

Part 2: Jay talks about his journey to New Japan and how difficult it is for family and his girlfriend.

Part 3: April 1st, Korakuen Hall Road to Invasion Attack 2016: opens with Jay finishing up setting up the ring.  We cut to Jushin Thunder Liger who has a mask on but there is no hair attached and the mouth area is completely open the eyes are not screened over.  It looks so odd!!  He is very complimentary of Jay.  We get a clipped match of Jay vs. David Finlay where he wins with the lion tamer.  We see Jay backstage talking about the match with the interviewer.  As with all young boys Jay wears black trunks and black boots to the ring.

These two series are really fantastic and I hope that they continue to do and release them on their you tube channel or New Japan World.

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Random Wrestling: From the WWE Network and You Tube

WWE Network

World Class Championship Wrestling

Episode 66, Monday March 21, 1983

Decent episode featuring a midget match Little CoCoa vs. Billy The Kid, Iceman King Parsons vs. The Great Kabuki, Killer Karl Krupp in action, and David Von Erich vs. Buddy Roberts of the Fabulous Freebirds.  I always like the opening theme to this show, best match was David Von Erich vs. Roberts continuing the Freebirds and Von Erich feud, a surprising clean finish to this one, also the ring announcer forgets Billy The Kid’s name.

You Tube

Brian Myers Making Towns

Episode 24 posted June 4^th

This episode is my favorite episode to date of his show.  Footage from Wrestlemarica in North Carolina and a Create a Pro show in Long Island.  Best part of this episode is the footage he shot from her merchandise table of the Bullet Club: Big LG & Karl Anderson’s tag team match wrestling in and around the merchandise tables.  

Colt Cabana Cut My Promo

Episode 10 posted June 8^th

Featuring CM Punk cutting Colt’s promo for his upcoming show on June 14^th in London, England for Revolution Pro Wrestling.

10 Times Wrestling Got Real

From whatculture.com

posted

They highlight what they feel is the top ten shoot wrestling moments

John Tenta vs Koji Kitao 1991 Japan

New Jack vs. The American Gangstas

ECW One Night Stand JBL vs. Meanie incident

Perry Saturn vs. Mike Bell

New Jack random kids he murders with a chair

Kurt Angle vs. Daniel Puder

Stevie Richard chair shot to JBL

Antonio Inoki vs. Great Antonio from December 8, 1977

Hardcore Holly vs. Brock Lesnar

New Jack vs. Gypsy Joe

 TNA Explosion NWA TNA PPV 61

Fairgrounds Coliseum Nashville, TN

Taped September 17, 2003

CM Punk & Julio Dinero vs. Cliff Compton & J-Rocc

Basically it’s a squash match with Punk and Dinero getting the win in 3.5 minutes

NWA World Championship Wrestling Saturday Night Edition

December 31, 1988 Superstation TBS

Commentators: Jim Ross & Tony Schiavone

6 Woman Tag Team Match

NWA US Women’s Champion: Misty Blue Simmes, Heidi Lee Morgan & Zula vs. Kat Leroux, Linda Dallas, & Mad Dog Debbie.  Teddy Long was the referee

Decent match, Zulu was the only one that I hadn’t heard of before.  Very large black woman wrestling in  a pleather jacket, I was assume very green based her bumps.  Of all these girls Kat Leroux was my favorite, she usually played the heel to Misty Blue’s face.  Misty Blue picked up the victory for her team after a splash off the top rope onto Mad Dog Debbie. 

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Wrestling and You Tube

A lot of wrestlers and wrestling companies have turned to You Tube to put themselves and their product out there.  Where previously it may have been difficult or expensive to get air time on a local channel and you were subject to early morning or late night hours for the most part, now with You Tube you can post your “Television” show each week and it is essentially available on demand for viewing consumption. 

WWE is all over You Tube posting a couple dozen new videos every week, but for me Zach Ryder and his “Z! True Long Island Story” was the first individual wrestler to use You Tube to get himself over with the fans.  And rightfully so, his show was creative and funny and had a few long lasting story arcs that made it interesting.  Ryder no longer produces new episodes. 

Colt Cabana was another pioneer of You Tube with two successful shows at different times that went well over 1 year.  The first was “Creative Has Nothing For You” launched in June 2011 and the second was “Worst Promo Ever” Launched in Feb 2013.  Both of these shows co-starred comedian Marty Derosa and while they only averaged 1 – 3 minutes in length they were quite hilarious.  Neither one of these shows are in production.  This is my all time favorite Worst Promo Ever

Kevin Steen’s “Weekend Escapades” was a different mold as it featured commentary from Steen as he was heading out on the road for that weekends shows and the video was innercut with footage from that weekend and concluded with a rap up of events that was filmed on his drive home.  That show debuted July 2013 and concluded about year later.  These shows averaged 10 – 20 plus minutes and at times could drag, but for the most part were pretty ingenious. 

The Joey Ryan and Candice LaRae produced “The Candice and Joey Show” premiered October 24, 2013 and is still active.  Their show’s concept is similar to “Weekend Escapades” as it is a show featuring footage filmed over a weekend of shows and also heavily features other wrestlers.  It’s a fun show and they average 10 – 15 minutes in length.

I recently discovered Brian Myers “Making Towns” and have only watched the first two episodes.  Debuting November 11, 2014 there are 13 episodes to date averaging about 10 minutes long.  He openly admits to stealing Kevin Steen’s format, which he did, but Myers also added graphics, a theme song, and screen graphics of who people are and their twitter accounts.  Brian Myers was in the WWE as Curt Hawkins and is now making a name for himself, once again, on the independent scene.

I’m sure there plenty more similar shows that I haven’t mentioned and if you know of one that is fantastic then please let me know.

I would be remiss if I didn’t mention one my favorites that isn’t on Facebook but instead is on Instagram.  Chuck Taylor’s Instagram page Chuckietea is almost entirely dedicated to wrestling matches featuring the 24/7 defense of the Hardcore Championship.  The catch, as it is Instagram the matches all have a 15 second time limit!  He has posted 90 so far the first 81 weeks ago and the last 14 weeks ago.   It’s possible he is done posting the matches, but you never know when one will pop up.  Either way if you haven’t seen them, then what are you waiting for go watch some matches!

Here are the links these great shows:

Z! True Long Island Story

Creative Has Nothing For You

Worst Promo Ever

Weekend Escapades

The Candice and Joey Show

Making Towns

Chuckietea Instagram

Later Readers!!