I had nothing to do tonight, so I went to something called Kaiju Big Battel at the Avalon by Fenway. I didn’t know much about it other than it was some dudes in monster costumes wrestling. So I go down there, and when I show up, there’s a real wrestling ring inside the club, on the dance floor, real ropes and everything. So this isn’t some kind of little backyard promotion or nothin’. And there’s these little cardboard/balsawood buildings standing around the ring, like a Godzilla movie. So I look at my program while I wait for the show to begin. Five matches on the card. And one of them is described as such:
Pedro Plantain has a bone to pick with Silver Potato. Not only did Silver Potato murder Pedro’s beloved twin brother, Pablo, but he also killed the greatest tag team in all of Kaiju history! Shame on the tator traitor! To add insult to injury, rumors have it that Dr. Cube stole Pablo’s cold body right from his grave. Pedro wants revenge against the evil Potato and his sinister master, Dr. Cube. In accordance with the international laws of the “Street Fight,” anything goes in this no-holds-barred Battel of vengeance! Weapons, bricks, poisoned toothpicks, battery acid… all is fair in tonight’s Amazon River Street Fighto!
So now I get it; I mean, I knew it was supposed to be silly. But I also just thought it was just a bunch of crudely made costumes and a bunch of guys who only know how to wrestle from what they saw on TV. Like two guys on a trampoline, or something. I didn’t expect there to be storylines. So that’s cool, that’s funny, that’s great; even though I don’t know any of these characters they’re talking about, it’s worded pretty funny and they have funny names and there’s a funny revenge-for-my-brother’s-murder storyline thing happening.
The show starts, and this band called Gelatine gets on stage, whose lead singer is a Japanese chick with a schoolgirl shirt torn up and covered in blood, no skirt, and a diaper. Her whole routine was scream-singing, which I usually hate but I find it acceptable in the rare occasion that a cute Japanese chick does it, and dancing/contorting like crazy on stage with a ton of energy. I didn’t really dig the music that much, a sort of hardcore Japanese heavy metal thing, but only because I was deafened by standing right next to the speakers and no one seemed to bother mixing the volumes on it; everyone was just at full blast, so the girl, bass and keyboard were pretty much drowned out by the guitar and drums. But I appreciated their energy. And I’ll be damned if the chick didn’t look kinda hot, even if she was scream-singing and wearing a big puffy diaper.
So they finish up, and about 10 minutes later, the show begins. A dude comes out with crazy hair. His name is Louden Noxious. He sings a Kaiju version of “God Bless America”, with lyrics changed to reflect storylines. And the first match is on. The first guy is Giii the Space Pirate, who is wearing this elaborate brown space bug costume with a lot of minitentacles all over him, almost like villi. Big, boxy, brown, yellow and red costume. Probably immobile as hell. He didn’t even have full use of his hands, since he was wearing these huge claw gloves… like giant glove thingies, like the ones that the CAWs in Smackdown vs Raw have available but no one ever uses. According to Noxious, he’s undefeated so far, but his opponent is making his debut for Kaiju after winning a 52-man tournament. Noxius reminds me of Joey Styles, and I’m sure that’s what he was aiming for. His music hits, which is “Panama” by Van Halen. And this man in a big, elaborate chicken mask (closer to a helmet… the thing was easily two feet tall and a foot wide in diameter… I have no idea how the hell he saw out of it or even kept it on) comes out with a surfboard, and the crowd goes crazy. His name is Tad Bradley, the Hawaiian Paddler. He pretends to surf halfway through the aisle, plays his surfboard like a guitar not unlike La Parka, and the fans love it, myself included. He has a little trouble getting into the ring, but they proceed to have a pretty decent match. Of course, they can’t move around too well because of their costumes, but they pull out some decent moves; a neckbreaker, a top rope move or two, not a five star classic, but certainly better than Goldberg/Lesnar at WM20, which doesn’t say much. I mean, for what I was expecting, not a very bad match at all. Tad Bradley wins.
Noxius lets us know that the next match is the debut of the newest belt, the Double Danger Tandem Championship, which is pretty much a tornado tag title. At first I thought Noxius was gonna be pretty annoying; he was announcing the match live, not unlike an And1 Streetball announcer. But two things worked in his favor. (1)I’ve heard much, much worse from other indy promos who had guys also trying to sound like Joey Styles, and (2) he honestly seemed to not only care about what he was doing, but he really knew his shit and he was quick on his feet with quips and calls that figured into the wrestler’s character. He started to grow on me as the night went on.
But anyway, the next match was a tornado tag match with two sea creature guys called the Sea Amigos against two guys in alien monkey costumes, known as the Apes of Wraths. On the two opposite corners, there were poles with belts suspended from them. And these guys went at it pretty damn well, too. The Apes had much less restrictive costumes, so they could do more. And at this point, I realized I was watching a pretty damn entertaining wrestling show, nothing more or less. I mean, once again, these guys aren’t really doing any Lance Storm/Jerry Lynn classics here. There’s not much chain wrestling, no rest holds, not too many high spots, just a bunch of guys switching around the momentum every now and then, keeping the crowd entertained. The match ends with one guy from each team grabbing the belt at the same time, meaning the new tag champions are the halves of each team, neither of whom are happy to be champions together. Good, simple booking.
Next comes this guy named Dr. Cube, and apparently, he’s the top heel in the company. He comes out and says he’s more dangerous than a New York highrise and deadlier than the stingray that killed Steve Irwin, the latter comment ensuring that I’d be booing him instead of cheering him like half the crowd was. Apparently, Cube is kind of the symbol of Kaiju. His head is on most of the merchandise, people do graffiti on buildings with his image, he has a stable equal to about one third the roster, everyone knows him, and they either love him or hate him. His voice is not unlike Stewie Griffin, but he seems to have his own thing going. He insults Boston, and then brings out Silver Potato, who is a guy in a very baggy silver jumpsuit. Apparently, he used to be the top face, but turned heel a few months ago and stabbed Pablo Plantain in the back with a machete, killing him. Pablo and Pedro Plantain were the most popular tag team in Kaiju, despite being just two large ovaloid plantain costumes. Noxious goes into full-on face announcer mode, cursing out Silver Potato for selling out and turning his back on his fans. Noxious is really good at this; the more I see him the more I like him.
And they go on to have a very good match, wherein Pablo is brought out by Dr. Cube as a zombie and teams up with Silver Potato to double team Pedro. Things look hopeless until Powa Ranjuru, a short but built girl in a white dress, angel wings and a red Power Ranger mask comes in and gives Silver Potato an AMAZING hurricanranna. Easily the best damn wrestling move I’ve ever seen from a woman. She helps Pedro do the double team move he used to do with Pablo, which I can only describe by trying to remind you of Homer and Marge’s combo attack in the Simpsons’ arcade game a bunch of years ago, where they form a human wheel and roll across the ring to hit the opponent on the turnbuckle. This match was getting good. Pedro wins, and gets a chainsaw (working, but the chain has been removed). Noxious tells him that the only way to finish a zombie is to saw it into pieces, but he can’t do it. They bring out a red stretcher with the words “Danger Happened” on it, and carry Pablo away.
And it was right around here when I realized what Kaiju Big Battel was all about. This is what wrestling should be. Good guys vs bad guys, nothing being taken seriously, and yet, despite everyone wearing big bulky costumes, you still fall into the storylines and pick the guys you want to root for. The heels are evil, the good guys fight for justice, none of them have repetetive catchphrases (Dr. Cube is the only guy besides Noxious to speak), and they’re not even necessarily that bad in the ring. Not great, but not bad considering the circumstances.
And it turns out my expectations were far too low. This isn’t some local promotion, either. They’re on G4 almost every morning, they do shows all accross the US, they’ve been on Kimmel, CNN, MTV, this is a well-known oragnization. I don’t know how I never heard of them, but I only wish I caught on sooner.
The last two matches were even better; Super Wrong defeated Dusto Bunny after Wrong used his cell phone to trigger a PA announcement that Dusto’s lights were on, then, while Dusto was gone, dressed himself up as Dusto and had his “partner”, a pink teddy bear, pin him for the win, since the red somehow thought Wrong was Dusto. Super Wrong was great, too; he was a perennial jobber who started his own faction called the Yokosuka Jump Squadron, and comes out to the ring with “Yatta” as his theme song. The final match was the KBB champion Kung Fu Chicken Noodle Soup against an opponent of his choosing. KFCNS was a dude in black pants and a giant can covering the upper half of his body, with two ripped holes for arms. It was literally a can of soup with arms and legs. And he was fucking badass. His opponent was someone who was banned from KBB, Uchu Chu, the leader of the alien bug faction. Of course, Uchu brought all the bugs with him, about 30 in all, and KFCNS proceeded to kick the shit out of all of them at the same time in a manner that was much more believable than any time John Cena beats up 3 guys at a time.
And that’s what was so memorable about it; you can instantly believe in anything that happens, because reality is just thrown to the wind. KFCNS can fly through the air with a flying headbutt (which ends up being a flying top-of-canbutt) and knock out someone or take out a circle of 12 or so monsters with two spin kicks, because anything can happen, and you just get absorbed in it all. Noxious is amazing at his job; he makes Michael Cole look like one of the Gamelife kids. The fans go crazy over everything. I almost felt like I suddenly knew what mid 90’s ECW was like, but even then, I think this was better. If I had more free time and was even close to in-shape, it would be something I’d love to get involved in, and I’ve never had any previous thoughts about ever being a wrestler.
But now I’m rambling. Well, not now, I’ve been rambling for a while. But Jesus, what a great night.
