[Please note: there are full incidental spoilers for all other nights of G1 Climax 33 action so far. You can start the journey of non-spoiler reviews of each night here.]
[Please note: this year, all 19 nights will be entirely G1 Climax 33 Block matches, without the opening preliminary tags or young lions matches, with A/B and C/D across alternating nights. I am reviewing every tournament match, but this year I am being brutal: if a match is only ‘good’, it doesn’t get the positive check mark next to it. It’s hard to have a ‘bad’ match in the G1, so you can unofficially use the +/- marks as ‘must see’/’can be missed’. That said, damn I love G1 season.]
Nineteen nights of action across the next three weeks can only mean one thing: it’s time for New Japan Pro Wrestling’s (NJPW) G1 Climax 33, a round robin tournament where the winner earns the chance to main event the Tokyo Dome at Wrestle Kingdom next year. In the G1 Climax, a win earns a competitor 1 point with the loser getting 0 points, while a time limit draw or double countout earns 1 each. For the first time, all matches will have a 20 minute time limit. At the end of the round robin format, top two of each of the four groups advance into an elimination phase, before the quarterfinals, semifinals and finals to crown the overall winner.
Night seven is a return to the legendary Korakuen Hall as the A Block and B Block competitors meet in their fourth matches, including a cross-promotional bout between the currently undefeated IWGP World Heavyweight Champion SANADA, and Kaito Kiyomiya from pro Wrestling NOAH. Kazuchika Okada will be in action in the semi-main event when he battles YOSHI-HAHSI, and while Ren Narita has two points, it is off the back of two draws as both he and his opponent HIKULEO are winless at this point of the tournament. Tanga Loa looks to keep El Phantasmo winless when they face off, and Yota Tsuji battles the veteran Chase Owens. A first time ever meeting between Taichi and KENTA will take place, and two youngsters are set to absolutely go to war when Shota Umino and Gabe Kidd meet in A Block action. Last but not least, two members of the United Empire will meet in the opening contest as Will Ospreay and Great-O-Khan come face to face for the first time ever.
+ SANADA vs Kaito Kiyomiya (G1 Climax 33 A Block Match): start to finish, this one was incredibly exciting. There was a lot of talk on commentary that both men needed the win for differing reasons, and that translated really well into the match itself. SANADA being the bigger man is not neessarily a new thing, but he really got to play up his strength in this one. I admit I wasn’t expecting much, but I have never been so happy to be proven wrong
+ Kazuchika Okada vs YOSHI-HASHI (G1 Climax 33 B Block Match): if YOSHI-HASHI/Ospreay opened some people’s eyes to how YOSHI-HASHI is no longer a joke to be made, then hopefully this one has future proofed him even further. Of course Okada is a good wrestler, but this was a YOSHI-HASHI crowd and that made me into a YOSHI-HASHI crowd as I watched from home. This one had some ridiculously close near falls to the point even the live audience was booing at times, but that just made is all even more exciting
+ Shota Umino vs Gabe Kidd (G1 Climax 33 A Block Match): I mean no offence to phrase this next sentence how I do, but this was so much better than I expected it was going to be. This was intense, and hard hitting, and back and forth, and Gabe Kidd really showed himself off well to a red hot crowd. I don’t think this was a match of the tournament, but I can’t think of a better way to try and get two young stars some support, or hate, from a crowd than what these two did
+ Will Ospreay vs Great-O-Khan (G1 Climax 33 B Block Match): this was easily O-Khan’s best match. It would be easy to say that is all because of Ospreay, but O-Khan looked more switched on than usual as well. I really enjoyed this, and I’m surprised it went on first
– Ren Narita vs HIKULEO (G1 Climax 33 A Block Match): simply this was not good. I’ve made my stand on HIKUELO clear; he is not yet good enough to be in matches this late on a show, after so many other, better matches. Narita tried, but they didn’t work well together
– Tanga Loa vs El Phantasmo (G1 Climax 33 B Block Match): truthfully, completely forgettable. The comedy-ish stuff before the match began properly was probably my favourite part, outside of ELP nearly taking out the ringside doctor. They tried hard, and I got a kick out of their trash talking in the middle of the match, but overall this was not special
– Yota Tsuji vs Chase Owens (G1 Climax 33 A Block Match): this was one of those perfectly cromulent matches that can be summed up as ‘okay, but never great’. I am such a fan of big Tsuj, but nothing about seeing him in a match with Chase Owens is appealing to me
– Taichi vs KENTA (G1 Climax 33 B Block Match): I had really high hopes for this after Taichi/Okada and KENTA/Ospreay, and the excitement from the crowd make sme think they were ready, too. Unfortunately, that excitement was not rewarded in any capacity. The less I say about this the better
> I am so far behind
Should you watch this event: It’s perhaps unfortunate that the four best matches were the two first and two last, but that at least means you can skip the entire middle portion of the show and pretend this was just four matches back to back that were all great.
MoshFish Reviews 