Jesus Christ.
This is an easy match for someone to not think about. It is only the second ever match in the career of Shoji, who would go on to be known as Jado, and is fairly basic accordingly. On top of only being seven minutes, due to the trimming an undercard match gets on a one hour commercial tape, we only see a little under four minutes of a seven minute match, and as far as clipping goes, something that close to 50% is not ideal at all.
It’s just that what we do see whips so much ass that none of that matters.
With the few exceptions of basic rookie offense, which all looks good too, this is a Kurisu beating and it is one of the greatest beatings I’ve seen in some time. The kicks to the face are, of course, nasty as hell, but it’s the stomps perfectly down onto the face or the ear that really get me, along with the hardest chair shots thrown in FMW yet. If I was good at video editing, I would put together a highlight reel so you could hear just how horrifying some of these smacks and thuds are, but it would just be every single bit of Kurisu offense. Even the few things without an audible connection, like his punches or headbutts, look absolutely perfect.
The entire match is a highlight reel.
Following the fourth or fifth appallingly loud unprotected punt right to the face, Kurisu wins, in the absolute perfect ending to an assault like this, seemingly having enough and/or growing tired of it, and kicking the kid exactly hard enough to knock him out.
Genuinely, one of the best of its kind ever.
I could write more about it. Someone else likely could too or has already. Every single thing about it and in it is unbelievably awesome, but at some point, words are bullshit and although maddeningly short given the quality of every minute of it, this clipped version is short enough that there are no excuses, so just get to it already.
The best sounding match of the year.
HANDWERK 