1980s Joshi Set - Vol 17

December 1988 - April 1989 After the retirement of Dump Matsumoto, AJW’s popularity has fallen considerably. This is also a period where the amount of available footage starts getting a bit more sporadic. AJW is starting to push the next generation of talent. Most noticeably at this point are the new tag teams Fire Jets (Mitsuko Nishiwaki & Yumiko Hotta) and Marine Wolves (Akira Hokuto & Suzuka Minami). On 6/26/88, Bull Nakano defeated Yumiko Hotta to win that year’s Japan Grand Prix. This is the only Japan Grand Prix final where no footage is available. For reasons unknown, Bull was never given a title shot despite that happening for every previous Grand Prix winner. Mika Suzuki is now Suzuka Minami. Hisako Uno is now Akira Hokuto. There’s not much to say about JWP at this point as the company still doesn’t have a TV deal, and its shows are only available through some sporadic and extremely low budget VHS releases which are almost indistinguishable from fancams. Here is brief intro to the new AJW and JWP roster members appearing in the video, in rough order of their debut. AJW 1. Kumiko Iwamoto - Debut 1985. She was a low-ranking member of Gokuaku Domei from very soon after debuting. With the retirements of Dump Matsumoto, Condor Saito and Crane Yu’s brief comeback as ’Dynamite Jack’ coming to an end, she’s now the #2 ranked member of Bull Nakano’s ’Gokumon To’ (means ’prison gate party’) stable. Her and Bull held the WWWA Tag Team Titles from 2/25/88 to 7/19/88. 2. Reibun Amada - Debut 1986. A rare Chinese wrestler in AJW. she was born in Shanghai but her parents moved to Japan when she was in primary school. She initially struggled to fit in as she barely understood Japanese, she spent most of her days at home watching TV and seeing Chigusa Nagayo inspired her to try become a wrestler herself. 3. Manami Toyota - Debut 1987. Manami is from a small town called Masuda on the South-West coast of Japan. She got made fun of her having a strong rural accent upon moving to Tokyo, which gave her a nervous disposition when talking. She says she wasn’t a fan of pro-wrestling until one of her high school friends convinced her to come to an AJW show main evented by Crush Gals vs. Jumping Bomb Angels, and she was immediately hooked. She’s since become a protege of Itsuki Yamazaki and has a traditionalist/throwback style based around lots of running and jumping. JWP 1. Cuty Suzuki - Debut 1986. Her real name is Yumi Harashima. She was a big fan of Beauty Pair as a young child and remained a women’s pro-wrestling fan through to the Crush Gals era. However, unlike all of her peers, she preferred Yukari Omori over Crush Gals. She tried out for AJW twice in 1985. At 155cm she was well below the 160cm height requirement at the time, so she purchased “height increasing equipment“ where she’d tie herself up at the feet and painfully stretch out her body to the ceiling to make her taller. Unfortunately for her, this was a scam and she didn’t even get 1cm taller despite doing this to herself many times. However, she later found out about JWP and its relaxed requirements, and after an interview with Jackie Sato was able to join the group. Because of her inferior athleticism compared to the other wrestlers, she was pushed mainly to look sympathetic getting beaten up. 2. Mayumi Ozaki - Debut 1986. Mayumi Ozaki also tried out to be a wrestler with AJW and trained as a trainee in AJW’s gym, however she was rejected. So she tried out for JWP instead and became part of their inaugural class. Ozaki and Cuty Suzuki actually lived in the same area of Saitama and would commute together to JWP’s training sessions. Ozaki was pushed stronger and became part of the heel faction GUREN-tai and winning the JWP Junior Title from Rumi Kazama on 10/24/87. Here are the contents of the video with timestamps. I can’t provide this without some slight spoilers, so if you wanna watch without major clues on how things unfold, maybe just don’t read it :) 1. Bull Nakano & Kumiko Iwamoto vs. Chigusa Nagayo & Lioness Asuka 12/88 - 00:00:00 2. Manami Toyota vs. Reibun Amada (AJW Junior Title) 12/11/88 - 00:21:55 3. Chigusa Nagayo vs. Madusa (IWA World Women’s Title) 1/5/89 - 00:30:22 4. Devil Masami vs. Shinobu Kandori JWP 1/16/89 - 00:44:34 5. Chigusa Nagayo vs. Lioness Asuka (WWWA Singles Title) 1/29/89 - 01:18:08 6. Akira Hokuto & Suzuka Minami vs. Mitsuko Nishiwaki & Yumiko Hotta (WWWA Tag Team Titles) 3/4/89 - 02:00:58 7. Chigusa Nagayo & Lioness Asuka vs. Mika Komatsu & Yumi Ogura 3/4/89 - 02:12:15 8. Akira Hokuto vs. Chigusa Nagayo 3/19/89 - 02:30:13 9. Kaoru Maeda vs. Rollercoaster 4/2/89 - 02:54:22 10. Cuty Suzuki vs. Mayumi Ozaki JWP 4/26/89 - 02:56:12 11. Akira Hokuto & Suzuka Minami vs. Chigusa Nagayo & Lioness Asuka (WWWA Tag Team Titles) 4/27/89 - 03:12:18