So most of us have heard that Kota Ibushi is out because of aspiration pneumonia. But the show must go on, and the Dragon needs an opponent. Who better than the man who beat him when he was NEVER Openweight champion, and the Ace of the Universe, Hiroshi Tanahashi!

Should be well worth the price of admission. We get a Tokyo Dome special, with the New Japan Rambo, the Heavyweight & Junior Heavyweight tag titles, the Junior Heavyweight title and the recasted main event should make for a solid show.

Let’s see if the first really big event feel can finally start getting New Japan back on the right track!

Ratings:

• KOPW 2021 New Japan Rambo w/Handcuffs: Chase Owens wins via Package Piledriver @35:35 – *** – TROPHY CHANGE!
• IWGP Junior Heavyweight Tag Titles: Mega Coaches (Rocky Romero & Ryusuke Taguchi) vs Bullet Club (Taiji Ishimori & ELP) (c): ELP retains via CR2 @20:56 – *** ½
• IWGP Junior Heavyweight Championship: El Desperado (c) vs Robbie Eagles: Eagles wins via Ron Miller Special @19:56 – *** ¾ – TITLE CHANGE!!
• Jeff Cobb vs Kazuchika Okada: Okada wins via Double Legged Cradle @19:23 – ****
• IWGP Heavyweight Tag Titles: LIJ (Tetsuya Naito & SANADA) (c) vs Dangerous Tekkers (ZSJ & Taichi) w/Miho Abe: Tekkers win via European Clutch @37:58 – **** – TITLE CHANGE!!!
• IWGP World Heavyweight Championship: Shingo Takagi (c) vs Hiroshi Tanahashi: Shingo retains via Last of the Dragon @37:26 – **** ¼

Results:

KOPW 2021 New Japan Rambo w/Handcuffs

Chase Owens kicks things off with an angry Great-O-Khan. After the usual early offense spots, Tomoaki Honma comes out next. Togi Makabe is fourth, so we’ll see if GBH teams up or if Makabe remembers the January 4^th Rambo. GBH seem to be on the same page to start with, and Douki is numero 5. First match in a hot minute because he’s been filming a movie, but Makabe is the first eliminated. Here comes Tiger Mask IV! Honma got handcuffed so…he’s out…I’m pretty sure. Heel Master number 7, Kanemaru could play interesting spoiler here.

Eighth entrant is…ooohh…MINORU SUZUKI! The first real player, but if we’ve learned anything about the KOPW stuff, the higher card wrestlers tend to lose in goofy ways. SHO is 9, and it’s interesting to see that we’re now hitting a small run of bigger names. YOH is 10^th, and this feels like a good setup for Suzuki to get screwed since RPG3k can team up. BLUE JUSTICE at 11! Again, we’re seeing a few bigger names, so this should be interesting. I wonder if we’ll get any past names or surprise entrants.

Suzuki and Nagata go back to their drunk dads at the bar-be-que fight! Speaking of dads, Satoshi Kojima is 12. Suzuki and Nagata went over the rope to fight on the apron, SHO & YOH hit dual thrust kicks which knocks off Suzuki but Nagata holds on. So look…RPG3k was Suzuki’s undoing. God…dammit…Nappa.

Hiroyoshi Tenzan shows up as O-Khan eliminates SHO, YOH and Kanemaru. Well TenCozy is around and O-Khan still has history there. BUSHI is 14, ugh, talk about disappointment compared to who’s come in lately. Kojima accidentally eliminates Tenzan when they try to double team O-Khan, but O-Khan moves. Master Wato comes in, right as O-Khan eliminates Kojima. Tiger Mask and BUSHI have a similar idea, so it’s interesting to see them work together a bit.

O-Khan eliminates Tiger Mask, BUSHI is eliminated and Dick Togo is 16…coming out to EVIL’s music. So that was a cute swerve. O-Khan eliminates Wato and DOUKI with double Dominators, and a double pin. Tomohiro Ishii is 17 and he’s ready to kill Togo! Ahh it’s amazing! Yujiro’s theme gets to play and now The Tokyo Pimps is 18! YOSHI-HASHI is…next, and now I fall asleep until the next entrant. Yujiro trips Ishii so he’s eliminated off the apron, and as Togo postures, HASHI eliminates him. 20 is Hirooki Goto! They cut to Ishii chasing Togo to the back with a chair in hand.

KENTA is 21! Okay so this could be a real threat to the KoPW trophy. KENTA low bridge eliminates Goto. 22, last entrant is of course the Sublime Master Thief Toru Yano! O-Khan eliminates Nagata via handcuffs on the outside. Yano rushes O-Khan and handcuffs him immediately! O-Khan may still have an elimination record at…I believe 8. KENTA gets handcuffed by HASHI and continues the gimmick of “the good wrestlers” lose to dumb stuff.

YOSHI-HASHI, Toru Yano, Chase Owens and Yujiro Takahashi are the last four. But Chase and Yujiro team up to handcuff HASHI. Yujiro gets eliminated, KENTA keeps trying to interfere for Bullet Club. BC bumps the ref, Yujiro hits Yano with the Pimp Cane, Chase uses powder to blind Yano and then Jewel Heist, V Trigger and Package Piledriver finally gives Chase the win! Yano has finally lost the KOPW trophy after a year!

IWGP Junior Heavyweight Tag Titles: Mega Coaches (Rocky Romero & Ryusuke Taguchi) vs Bullet Club (Taiji Ishimori & ELP) (c)

The Mega Coaches had a plan more to expose ELP than to win straight up. After early fake outs from both teams, it took a while, but the match picked up solidly. We even got to see a throwback to Apollo 55 with Black Hole Vacation.

Rocky played towards their earlier encounters with a Hurricanrana near fall, ELP hit a great Springboard Moonsault but landed funny on the loaded foot. The Bullet Club duo went for an Electric Chair combination attack, but Rocky turns it into a Springboard Lariat that causes Taiji to Poison Rana ELP. Hell Taiji even makes reference to his old Sailor Boy gimmick during the Avalanche Back Rakes.

There was a lot of fun back and forth, Taguchi was able to catch the loaded boot to knock out Taiji; then he went to work on getting the boot off. When Taguchi finally gets the boot, he tries to show the referee, but Taiji recovered enough to run interference, ELP hits a Low Blow, followed by CR2, and the Bullet Club boys retain!

IWGP Junior Heavyweight Championship: El Desperado (c) vs Robbie Eagles

Despy came out with a really good game plan where he focused on Eagles’ left leg. Which works since a lot of Eagles’ offense is high flying or based around leg locks. The major thread though, was that Eagles came in fighting for Australia. He barely made it out before the new lockdown went into place, and Australia in general has had a rough last few years. If Eagles wins, he’d be the first Australian wrestler to hold NJPW gold.

Eagles sells Despy’s attacks well, as he’s limping and selling the leg only a few minutes into the match. Despy is relentless, but Eagles’ heart continues to shine through. Eventually Eagles gets space when they go to the outside, hitting the Apron Rewind Tiger Feint to send Despy over the guardrail and buy time. Despy tries to go for Stretch Mufflers, Escalero and Numero Dos multiple times, but Eagles manages to find a way out.

Eagles throws everything at Despy. Some of the offense wasn’t pretty, and he sold the knee masterfully as he grits his teeth, powers through the pain and aims to win in an upset just like the man his submission is named after. Eagles hits the 450 Splash on the leg, then locks in the Ron Miller Special, pulls back twice as Despy fights, hits the knee a few more times; sinks in the Ron Miller Special one more time, and Desperado taps out!

Jeff Cobb vs Kazuchika Okada

Cobb matched Okada early, which seemed to throw Okada off his game. A heavy focus on attack to the back were also what Cobb brought to the table. Cobb hit a corner Dropkick while Okada was perched sending him to the outside, and then Surfing on Okada’s back.

A good bit of this match was Okada getting pummeled and finding moments to catch his breath. Lifting Cobb was never really in the books, but Shotgun Dropkicks, the Million Dollar Dropkick and a quick attempt at the Money Clip gave him time to think during the match.

This was that version of Jeff Cobb that was missing before he signed with NJPW, but he’s done a damn good job keeping his quality high this year. Okada ate every move in the book, aside from Tour of the Islands. We see great glimmers that Okada is starting to heal and recover. His Dropkicks are looking better, his resilience is getting closer to that Superman level, and he’s having better matches.

After dodging the Tour of the Islands a handful of times, Okada tries the Neckbreaker, but Cobb floats over Sunset style, but Okada sits down, hooks the legs and wins with a wrestling move during the Olympics on the Olympian! Okada has pulled this off a few times, against Suzuki and maybe most notably, how he won the 1 fall in the 2 out of the 3 falls match with Kenny Omega.

Cobb brought a great fight, but Okada is still Okada.

IWGP Heavyweight Tag Titles: LIJ (Tetsuya Naito & SANADA) (c) vs Dangerous Tekkers (ZSJ & Taichi) w/Miho Abe

This was an interesting start to the match. LIJ and the Tekkers have this weird love/hate relationship were they really do fight like siblings. ZSJ and Taichi buttered up SANADA a little to try and get a rematch, and Naito is always game to mess with people. ZSJ came into the match with his knee being worked on, so they had a target, which they chose to attack slowly.

Naito and ZSJ start and mess with each other, as SANADA and Taichi continue their own personal rivalry around respect and pec dancing.

Most of Naito’s offense focused on ZSJ’s knee, but a huge portion of this match felt more like a tornado tag. We saw plenty of time where all four men were in the ring at the same time. Dueling submissions, stereo submissions, everyone hitting a finish/signature, just a lot of hard work. Call backs galore to previous encounters, but unless I blinked, no cheating. The beauty of the Tekkers this year have been that they are more tweeners than heels.

SANADA cut off Taichi at many times, but we saw great babyface moments from the Suzuki-Gun duo. ZSJ asking Red Shoes to stop the double knockout count so they could finish it correctly, Taichi imploring Zack that what ended up being the ending sequence was “their last chance”. So there was great desperation, great mutual needling. ZSJ pulled off the counter he couldn’t figure out when they lost the belts; and ends up surprising Naito by turning a Destino into the European Clutch.

If it wasn’t nearly 40 minutes, this match would’ve ranked higher. It told a great story, great desperation and all four men looked great…but damn did it last forever.

IWGP World Heavyweight Championship: Shingo Takagi (c) vs Hiroshi Tanahashi

As I said in the beginning, Tanahashi technically did have a win over Takagi to help validate this beyond beating KENTA on the road to events. Early on, we saw the effects of Tanahashi’s age and the 25 minute ordeal against KENTA; and he didn’t quite have the spring to land early offense. So the match did start off a little rough.

In typical Tanahashi fashion though, he powers through and gets better as the match pushes forward. His desperation attacks were well-timed and looked great. Tana had callbacks and all of his finishers and signatures come to mind. Texas Cloverhold was used to weaken Takagi’s base, just like earlier in the year, Slingblade countered Last of the Dragon once, and Dragon Suplex, were all kicked out of. These all won Tanahashi titles in the past and Takagi overtook them. The major moment was when Tana hit the first High Fly Flow to take Takagi off his feet, but Takagi grabbed the Ace’s foot. He refused to let him hit the follow up, so Tana smacked him around more and even pulled out the reference to Ibushi with a Kamigoye! God uses the move invented to surpass him!

A second High Fly Flow…BUT TAKAGI KICKED OUT! That’s the first time, in quite a long time that anyone kicked out of the sequential High Fly Flow. Also as we saw during his match with KENTA, Shibata handed Tanahashi a few new moves as well. The corner Dropkick and a resounding Headbutt kept Tanahashi alive at many times in the match.

This had a lot of moments of the “old gunslinger” style of fight, but I feel like that’s been consistent with Tanahashi the last 3 or 4 years. Tana took a beating, even ate Stay Dream, and kept kicking. A desperation strike exchange turned into Takagi getting the better of it and putting down the Ace with Last of the Dragon.

After the match Takagi did acknowledge this only really makes them even, and they need a rubber match in the future. However, before Takagi can finish all his thoughts, lights go out, EVIL has a video message claiming he’s next. When the lights come back up, EVIL is in the ring and attacks Shingo!

Overall Score: 7.25/10

Holy over indulgence Batman! Every damn match was basically 20 minutes or more…this has to stop. We really don’t need over 4 hours when there’s no huge return or challenge. I miss the days where everything below the main was 10-20 minutes, like how NOAH does it. Sure the last 2 could go 25+, that’s fine. But everything shouldn’t go 20+, no matter how good the matches are, my brain starts to melt when everything has 10 minutes of “story work or setting the table” and then we get to the real meat and potatoes of the match.

That being said, a few title changes, solid work from all and our Holy Emperor Taichi with gold again makes me happy. Robbie Eagles is a great story, great feel good moment and he’s a damn good wrestler so it’s not like they just threw him a bone for clout. Also Toru Yano finally being unseated as the KOPW Trophy owner is well, something, right? Do I care about Chase Owens? Nope. Could this make him more interesting and help him up the card? I suppose.

So we got a lot of good ring work, it just definitely feels like a chore by the time you hit intermission and know the last 2 matches go like an hour and half between VTR, entrances and the matches themselves.