Just like the last two years, I once again traveled to the site of that really big wrestling event that some company called WWE puts together, I think they call it WRESTLEMANIA or something like that, but that’s not why I was there at least. For me, it was all about “JoshiMANIA” because multiple joshi pro wrestling companies from Japan came over to Las Vegas to put on shows for us international fans. I also like to think that they wanted to show a lot of women wrestlers from around the world what the best women’s wrestling truly looks like, but I’m sure they wouldn’t be that cocky about it.

While I was a bit bummed that JoshiMANIA weekend would be taking place in Las Vegas again, since I had just been there the year before, the city does have a lot of stuff to do, and a lot of places to see, so at least you won’t get bored in between events. I would have loved to see what fans in New Orleans would have thought about seeing joshi pro wrestling in their proverbial backyard, but we’ll take what we can get.

This here will be a bit of a recap of everything I did joshi pro wrestling related while I was in Las Vegas for JoshiMANIA, so if you’re not looking for my point of view on the week, that’s fair enough, but I will be mentioning not only the events, but also the meet & greets I got to do while at WrestleCon and shows, so maybe that will tickle your fancy. Maybe this write-up will give you the motivation to try to go to the next WRESTLEMANIA weekend that doesn’t happen in the middle east so that you can also enjoy the spoils of having so many awesome wrestling companies come together to celebrate the sport we love.

So first things first, I live in Columbus, Ohio, so getting to Vegas isn’t exactly an easy road trip if I wanted to drive, so I flew instead to save me the entire day or so it would take to get there. The flight itself was pretty smooth, and only took just over four hours, which feels like a dream considering the last few flights I had taken were to Japan which usually takes about 14 hours. I landed pretty early in the morning because of the time change since Las Vegas is three hours behind the Eastern time zone where I am, and because of that I had a lot of time to kill. I enjoyed some of my favorite joshi-related podcasts while pressing the spin button on a few slot machines, you know, the Vegas thing to do. Eventually later on in the day though, I met up with a few friends, and after getting some lunch I finally made the decision to commit to going to my first show of the week.

That first show was none other than PoderMania which was taking place at the Horseshoe Casino, the site of all Collective-related events and WrestleCon this year, it also happened to be the place I was staying in as well since I got lucky that they announced all of that AFTER I had already booked my room in the middle of last year. PoderMania didn’t have a lot of joshi wrestlers on it overall, but they did have the official U.S. debut for Toga from Tokyo Joshi Pro Wrestling.

The card itself had a lot of the usual stalwarts of the U.S. indie women’s wrestling scene, and while there were definitely some pretty good talents on there, there were also quite a few who need a bit of work to say the least. Toga’s match was a tag team affair where she tagged with Jazzy Wang, the daughter of former WWE cruiserweight Jimmy Wang Yang, to take on Amira and Lil Marz. Amira is someone I had seen a couple of times before both live and online. She’s a very talented little powerhouse of a wrestler, and I think she looked pretty good in this match, though I think overall there were a few wires that got crossed during the match where maybe there was some breakdown in communication. Toga looked good enough, and the crowd popped for her awesome hard forearm shot to an opponent running towards her. All in all, it was a successful debut, but nothing to write home about.

Considering I had been up since the wee hours of the morning, after the show I decided not to do any meet & greets, knowing that I could get Toga later on when TJPW did their meet & greet event on Friday morning. The rest of the evening was rather relaxing as I did a bit more gambling and went to bed early. I was sad that PoderMania and Pandamonium Pro were at the same time since they had Saya Iida along with Natsupoi on that show.

I woke up the next morning feeling pretty refreshed and feeling like I was truly starting my JoshiMANIA week because the first show I was going to see on this day was TJPW Live In Las Vegas from the Pearl at the Palms Casino. This was the same venue that TJPW held their show in last year, and it honestly such a beautiful venue! I can imagine that the rent there is quite high to say the least, but at least they were doing those shows with some of the other big companies in town, so hopefully it didn’t set them back too much.

I got a chance to meet up with some of my fellow joshi wrestling media contributors, Andy from the Tokyo Joshi Pod, String6Splash from Red Belt Radio, Blitzball Champ, and HendrixJCS10. There was definitely a lot of excitement going into the show, especially considering there was three title matches and an awesome three way match that had everyone chomping at the bit to see it between Miyu Yamashita, Miu Watanabe and Mizuki. For this show I had second row seats across from the hard cam, and since one of my friends couldn’t come on the trip, I had an extra ticket that I let String6Splash use to upgrade his own ticket. He’s not someone who watched all of the TJPW stuff, or follows it super closely, as he’s more so a STARDOM fan than anything, so it was interesting to hear his reactions to the awesome wrestling we ended up getting.

The show started off with all of us getting a chance to see and hear Sayuri Namba again in a TJPW ring which is always an absolute treat for us as longtime fans of the company! Of course, after that we got our chance to see the Up Up Girls perform in the center of the ring again as they sang us a song and got the crowd all hyped up. Not everyone may enjoy their music, but I personally enjoy the energy it brings even it’s not one of my favorite songs.

The opening match of the show was a tag team match where Ober Eats (Yuki Kamifuku & Wakana Uehara) took on the team of Uta Takami and Toga. This match wasn’t anything special per se, but it was solid throughout. Ober Eats was over with the crowd a good bit, and it also seemed like the crowd really got behind Uta as the match went on. Uta is a hell of an underdog, and her getting dropkicked into the corner by Kamiyu was definitely a highlight in the match.

The second match was a six-woman tag team match with a team who tags regularly together in Pom Harajuku, Raku, and Yuki Aino taking on HIMAWARI, Shino Suzuki, and the popular guest from Singapore Alexis Lee. Anytime you have Pom Harajuku in a match with a lot of people, you know there’s going to be a lot of hijinks and this was no different. Everyone worked the match well, and it was a lot of fun seeing Alexis Lee work with the TJPW roster again, while also it being the introduction of her to probably a lot of the fans in attendance. The best moments of the match all revolved around a dice that Pom had made, taking full advantage of the casino theme and rolling it to determine how many times she’d hit her opponent. The crowd got a kick out of it, and she was quite over especially after that.

The next match was one that I think everyone who’s a joshi fan was quite excited for, the big triple threat between Miyu Yamashita, Miu Watanabe, and Mizuki, three of the strongest booked wrestlers in the company. The only thing that would have made it better was if something was on the line other than bragging rights, but we’ll take what we can get. There was a tangible excitement in the crowd as each competitor made their entrance and when the match began I felt like it started a bit slowly for my liking. With that much talent in the ring, I thought the three might throw some bombs early, but instead the first few minutes were all about Miyu Yamashita hitting her running kick to both of her opponents in various places including the ring, the entrance ramp, and the giant stage.

Once they got back into the ring, things really started to pick up between the three as we saw some awesome counters to each of their offensive moves, giving the crowd a taste of what each could do, but not giving them everything of course. I feel like all three girls got a chance to show off their assortment of moves, and really get the crowd behind them, even allowing us to get to see a “Whirling Candy” which is customary for their Mania week shows the last few years, but still not something you see all of the time. All in all, when the match ended, I felt like I had gotten to see something pretty special, but I can personally admit that my expectations for this match was through the roof, and it didn’t quite hit that level. They all should be proud of their effort, though, and I know this was a lot of people’s favorite match of the show even if it wasn’t my own.

The next match was my personal favorite of the show, as I thought it not only lived up to my expectations, it actually surpassed it. Sakura Hattori has been a work in progress ever since she changed her gimmick to the ninja character from her original character of Kaya Toribami. Some of her early matches during the Texas tour weren’t really hitting for some, but she’s done a good job at really working to refine her style, to make it not only interesting, but really fun to watch. Suzume always brings it in the ring, especially when there’s something on the line, and when she defends her title, she truly does put it all on the line. Last year she had my favorite match of the TJPW show against Jada Stone, so after this year, she’s two for two when it comes to that.

The match started out with a bit of a feeling-out process, but soon it became a chess match where a lot of time Sakura was in control using her cerebral-but-flashy moveset to keep Suzume off balance. The thing about Sakura that made the match extra interesting is that when the pace quickened, she wasn’t affected all that negatively, because she, herself is quite quick as well. There was a ton of great back and forth spots, and I can admit there was a time or two where I thought Sakura may be able to take the victory, but in the end Suzume was able to fully hit her “Ring A Bell” cutter to put the ninja down for the count of three. I think I can speak for a lot of fans who came away with a new excitement and appreciation for Sakura Hattori after this match, and if she wins the title in the future, I honestly wouldn’t be upset.

From there we moved onto the Princess Tag Team championship match where we’d see the world famous tag team of “The IInspiration” Cassie Lee and Jessica McKay taking on the popular TJPW tag team “Kyoraku Kyomei” Hyper Misao and Shoko Nakajima. I know a lot of people online weren’t thrilled with the fact that the IInspriation won the tag team title in the first place, and they probably expected them to drop the title in Vegas, but that wasn’t the way things went down. While Cassie and Jessica aren’t the smoothest in-ring competitors out there, they both worked hard, using their charisma as a focus to help make this match not only fun, but also pretty good. I remember seeing Cassie and Jessica back in SHIMMER back in the day, and both showed a lot of great potential in-ring. I still feel like both are talented, but they simply work a bit of a different style that you’d see in most joshi matches.

We got to see the cold spray come into play as always, and we got to see Shoko putting on an absolute athletic show of force in the ring like she always does, but in the end it wasn’t enough to take down the two Aussies, who will now carry these tag team championship to TJPW’s next big show on May 4th to take on Miu Watanabe and Rika Tatsumi which is going to be another tough test. While I feel like it’s a bit of a step down for Miu to have the tag titles after being a great world champ who brought up everyone she faced, maybe this will be the best way to keep her high up on cards. Of course it is also possible that Cassie and Jessica could simply retain the titles.

It was finally time for the main event of the show, and a good opportunity for Yuki Arai to attempt to shut up any of her haters by having a great main event title match with J-Rod who has already proved that she can work a big Japanese style main event when she wrestled Miu for the title late last year. I think just about everyone in the crowd knew there was little chance for J-Rod to actually pick up the victory, not because she’s not strong enough, but because TJPW wouldn’t put their top two titles on foreigners at the same time. Both competitors made their entrances, and honestly Yuki Arai was pretty over with the fans from what I could tell in the building at least. She definitely doesn’t have the same fanfare that she has in Japan because of her idol background, but she’s at least respected over here in the U.S.

The match began with both trying to prove their strength, and honestly Yuki is quite a big strong girl for being a former idol as she’s been able to put on a good bit of muscle over time. J-Rod was the stronger of the two, but it wasn’t as big of a difference as you would have thought. The match itself was kind of by the book as there were a few cool spots between the two, but ultimately to me, it didn’t live up to being the main event of this show that had some other awesome matches under it. I think that might be the issue I have with Arai’s title reign unless she improves more over time, because Miu Watanabe was one of the best in the world as the top champion in the company, and Arai has a long way to go to get to that level. I’m not going to write her off completely though, as I do believe she it in her to really take things to the next level in the future.

The show overall I believe was a success as I feel TJPW does just enough each year to show the fans what it’s like going to one of their shows in Japan, while giving the fans matches big enough to make it feel like it’s one of their big shows of the year. The matches overall were all good in varying degrees, and I left with a smile, which is most important in my mind.

When I finally got up to the main concourse area of the little theater they had tables set up for all of the wrestlers where they’d be signing right after the fact, but it was a bit of a madhouse in there with a lot of fans lining up already, so I decided to just wait for the next day where they’d be doing just a signing, feeling like there’d be quite a few less fans there. Plus, I was quite hungry, so I went to the Panda Express in the food court that you might have seen the roster post about this year or last year. While sitting there and eating my food, I saw Shino Suzuki and Yuki Arai go up to the counter at Panda express wearing a jacket over their gear, no doubt feeling as hungry as I did. We exchanged a look or two and a nod, but we let them be, because there’s no reason to pester them outside of the time that they are supposed to give you.

After lunch I had another show to go to that day which was CMLL, a promotion that I don’t regularly watch, but since they were there, I figured it would be a good idea to see a real lucha show. The only women’s match on the card was Tessa Blanchard vs. Persephone, and overall I thought it was quite good, but you didn’t come to this site to hear about lucha shows, so we’ll move on.

There was a break in between shows after that, with a few of my friends deciding to go to West Coast Pro’s show to see Senka and Mio Momono perform on it before the Marvelous show late in the night. Since I had some down time in between the CMLL show and the Marvelous show later in the evening, I decided to stop by WrestleCon since it was happening at the hotel I was staying at for the week.

It was the first day the convention was open, and I was interested to see where STARDOM would be for the weekend, as well as seeing what talents were there to meet that night. I ended walking around the convention which was laid out much better this year than last year as they were using a convention hall that was big enough to house all of these wrestlers and fans. The wrestlers I ended up meeting all had ties to joshi pro wrestling in one way or another, as I met “The IInspiration” Cassie Lee & Jessica McKay, AEW’s “Divine Dominion” Megan Bayne & Lena Kross, TNA’s Lei Ying Lee, and finally Mina Shirakawa who is always a joy to meet.

All of my interactions with the talents were nice, as I was able to chit chat a bit about the TJPW show earlier in the day with Cassie and Jessica, while asking them how they enjoyed Japan even for the short time that they were there. They seemed excited to go back now that they’d get the chance. Both Lena and Megan are pretty much my height which is not what I’m used to in everyday life, but it’s pretty cool no doubt. Both are super down-to-earth, and I wished Megan luck against Syuri, which she appreciated while saying she was looking forward to it. Lei Ying Lee was pleasant to talk to for a few moments, but we didn’t really talk about anything too important to remember, and then Mina was last but definitely not least as she’s the type of person who can get anyone out of their shell. She’s charismatic, very outgoing, and I told her that I was really happy that AEW had been using her as much as they do because she deserves to be on TV with the spotlight on her. She thanked me for being a fan, and we exchanged a few more words before I took my leave. She’s also one of the few who always insists on doing multiple poses which also adds a bit of fun to meeting her.

When I arrived to the venue for the Marvelous show I was surprised to find out that the West Coast Pro show had started late, and they still had two matches left to go. I stayed on the elevated outside patio to wait for that show to end and actually ended up seeing Sareee and Takumi walk up the stairs, letting me know firsthand that Sareee had made it in time for the show I’d be watching shortly. Also, while I was waiting for the West Coast Pro show to end, I saw a car pull up outside of the venue downstairs, and multiple girls got out. I quickly noticed HIMAWARI’s goose bag that she always has with her, and also saw the hair style, as well as the stature of Shoko Nakajima. Apparently, there was four girls from TJPW in total who decided to go to the Marvelous show, with one of them being Yuki Kamifuku which I found out the next day when I met her at the TJPW signing, but I’ll touch on that later.

The West Coast Pro show ended and the line was formed for Marvelous after that. I had only general admission tickets for this show, so I think I had my pick of anything that wasn’t front or second row I believe. I once again, got in line with String6Splash, which meant we got the chance to talk joshi which is always fun as we waited for doors to open. Once things opened up , we found a seat together in the fourth row to the side, which would normally be fine, but with it being a lowboy ring, it meant that we wouldn’t have a clear sightline of the actual mat, meaning that seeing whether someone’s shoulders were on the mat or not would be just about impossible.

Considering how great the Marvelous show as last year, there was definitely an excitement in the air, as all of these joshi wrestling fans packed themselves into this small room, ready to see some awesome action. The show started with everyone who was on the show getting announced and coming to the ring other than Aja Kong and Magenta. It was fun to see everyone get a first applause even before their scheduled match. Once the matches began, the first match was an eight-man tag team match that had some Marvelous regulars in it like Starboy Charlie and Vinnie Massaro. The match was decent enough, but it wasn’t the reason why I personally was there, so we’ll move on.

I believe the next match was Echika Miyabi vs. Amira which meant it would be the second time I’d see Amira this week already. I was really happy to see Miyabi getting a chance to wrestle here in America as she’s a contracted wrestler to P.P.P. Tokyo who I don’t think would ever try to do a show in the states, but luckily for Echika, Marvelous has taken quite a liking to her and booked her for this show. It was a pretty good back-and-forth match, with both getting to show their power, even though Echika was much bigger both in height, as well as muscle. The first time she landed a chop put everyone in the building on notice that she had absolute dynamite in her hands, and it built even more anticipation for the second chop that came later on in the match. Both women wrestled the match really well, and I hope that this will just continue the upward trajectory for Echika going forward.

There was a four-way match between women who weren’t really affiliated with Marvelous per say but were given a chance to show their stuff in front of Chigusa who was watching the show up on the stage the entire time. The match was fine, but nothing too special to really comment on. After that we moved on to Sora Ayame vs. Maya World, an interesting match between the somewhat forgotten of the two rookies in Marvelous with Senka Akatsuki and Maya World who’s been making a name for herself not only on the indies, but also in AEW recently. Maya was in control of a lot of the match early on, and while Sora showed fighting spirit, she wasn’t really able to gain much of an advantage until the very end. She hit multiple shin kicks that got the crowd revved up and cheering loudly, then she simply rolled Maya up into a small package, getting the three-count to my surprise at least. I would have thought it was a slam dunk for Maya World to win this match, but I guess I was wrong.

After that it was time for the long awaited, at least since last year, rematch between Senka Akatsuki and Aja Kong, the match that captured so many hearts last year. Senka was super over when she was announced before the show began, and when she made her entrance there was a huge pop in the room, as the crowd seemed over the moon for Senka. On the West Coast Pro show just before this, her mystery opponent was Chris Hero, something that no one would have had on their bingo cards going into the weekend, and that would play into things later on in the match. Aja made her entrance to quite a bit of applause as well, though she was flanked by Maria and Riko Kawahata from Magenta, meaning that she was taking on the role of being a bully heel for the match.

The match started as expected, with Aja showing that she had the strength advantage as she knocked Senka around the ring a bit much to the chagrin of Magenta. Eventually they work their way into having Senka knock Aja Kong down and finally gain the upper hand, which got the crowd very rowdy. After Aja took control again, and there was a little bit of lull with in the crowd, Chris Hero came out from the back to cheer Senka on from ring side, getting the entire crowd into a fever pitch and before I knew it, Senka had gotten a roll-up pin on Aja, keeping her shoulders down on the mat for the three-count for the first time in over six years (as long as you don’t count anything to do with the DDT Ironman Heavymetalweight Championship). The crowd popped huge and there were many chants for Senka that threatened to blow the roof off the place.

After the match Magenta started to bully Aja a bit, telling seemingly telling her that she shouldn’t have lost and that she was weak, which eventually caused Senka to step in to help her. With that, a tag team match was made pitting Magenta against Senka and Aja, giving us another chance to see the legend as well as the super rookie. From what I remember the match was good, with Magenta getting the upper hand for a lot of it, but eventually Aja’s strength put them down for the count, giving the fans something else to cheer about. All in all, while the singles match was pretty short, the result gives us reason to see the proverbial rubber match, and we were also lucky enough to see the two team up against a good established tag team, Magenta. Cheers to Chigusa on the booking of that.

After that, it was time for Ai Houzan’s match for the night as she was taking on Miko Alana, a wrestler who was going to be heading over to Japan pretty soon to wrestle for Marvelous. I always feel kind of bad for Ai Houzan, because a lot of what she doesn’t isn’t flashy, or overly interesting, she’s just a good solid young wrestler, but because of the other members of the roster, she’s often forgotten about. This match was good back and forth, with some pretty hard-hitting offense from both. The match ended a bit abruptly I felt with Ai getting the win over the bigger opponent with a roll-up of her own, and there seemed to be confusion with the ref holding up three, while referee Tommy who had also made the trip over with them, kept on holding up just two fingers. I’m not sure if that was supposed to be the finish of the match or not, but once the three-count happens and the bell rings, there’s really no going back.

After that, it was time for the main event of the evening, a match that everyone was looking forward to, I’d hazard to say, even worldwide. Hours after wrestling Chihiro Hashimoto and Saya Kamitani in a triple threat match that went to a 30-minute draw earlier in that day, Sareee was here to participate in this tag match in front of a couple of hundred people packed into this small room as she teamed with her Spark Rush partner Takumi Iroha. Johnnie Robbie made her entrance first, and got a lot of crowd reaction as she’s not only a favorite of the West Coast Pro fans, but she also was just in the main event of the show right before this taking on her partner Mio Momono for the women’s championship of that promotion (Mio won that match). Johnnie is the type of wrestler that I’m surprised is still unsigned, because she’s very talented, and has a really cool look to her as well. I don’t see her being unsigned for long though, especially with the awesome week she had in Vegas.

Mio Momono was the next to enter, getting a ton of cheers as well while showing off that insane energy that is always running through her small body. Part of me was sad that she wasn’t tagging with Yurika Oka, because I would have rather heard that entrance theme, but you can’t always get what you want. After that Spark Rush made their entrance to the funkiest bass line in all joshi wrestling, and don’t forget the awesome keyboard solo in the middle of the song as well. While it’s no Taiyoushin, it’s still a banger. The crowd was overjoyed to see Takumi and Sareee make their entrance, with very audible chants for the both of them even before the bell rang.

I remember Sareee and Johnnie Robbie starting the match with Sareee absolutely leveling Johnnie with a dropkick to the face that started things hot. The match itself was awesome from start to finish with each person getting their chance to shine, but Sareee and Takumi being in control for a lot of the match since they are two of the best in the world currently. The crowd was rambunctious to say the least, and the match ended with the really cool double pin that Takumi and Sareee does where Takumi puts one opponent into a submission and then delivers a German suplex to the other opponent which Sareee pins down with a rolling bridge. It’s such a beautiful move and the perfect way to end the match to the crowd’s loud applause.

After the match the crowd continued to cheer, and even started cheering for Chigusa as she made her way down the stairs slowly towards the ring. She addressed the crowd, telling everyone thank you and that they would be back soon, making me think that maybe Marvelous might try to run a show in California sometime in the near future. I believe that Kitsune is supposed to be coming back in the summer, so maybe Marvelous will run a show on the same day, or at least the same weekend to get the wrestlers multiple bookings and making it a destination for joshi wrestling fans to come to more than just one show would. That’s all speculation, but for right now that’s all I have.

Once the crowd started to clear out, we were all somewhat surprised to see the Marvelous roster standing at the tables just outside of the room that the event took place in, and right away there was a big traffic jam as people stopped to try to get autographs. I took my place beside the bar to try not to clog things up right in that door way so that fans who wanted to leave could at that moment. They then had us all form a line so that we could all get autographs and pictures with the talents. I took my place towards the back of the line and waited my turn which took a while, but I wasn’t going to be impatient since I was just happy that they had actually brought merch this year unlike last year.

The first Marvelous roster member I got to meet was Maria who had already signed some autographs for a few people at the front of the line, but was a bit bored when not signing, so she went off to the side with her portraits. The person in charge of things, called out, asking if anyone wanted a meet & greet with her, and some of us towards the back of the line raised our hands. She came over to us and we were able to get an 8×10 signed, as well as a picture with her for a decent price of $30. She was still being somewhat in character, but overall she was pretty friendly, even when I met her after the Marigold Grand Destiny, her and Riko were chill, but friendly.

When I finally got up to the line of tables, I first got an autograph and picture with Senka who seemed surprised that anyone wanted her autograph or to spend money on her. Maybe it’s just the fact that she’s a rookie, but from the cheers that night, she was definitely one of the most over talents, so she should have expected us to want to meet her. She was nice, but not too talkative, as I don’t think she’s super confident in her English personally. After that I moved onto Takumi Iroha, who was also very kind, but we kept things somewhat quick as all of the girls definitely wanted to get back to their room to get some sleep considering it was pushing 2 am at that time. After that was Mio Momono who was very talkative. She only had one type of 8×10 available, which she called scary face, but it was her doing a German suplex, so it looked cool to me. She then explained that they would get to do some sightseeing the next day, then they’d leave on Saturday to head back to Japan. I can understand why a lot of the foreign talents who get to train and wrestle for Marvelous all love Mio so much, as she’s a bundle of fun from what I saw during that meet & greet.

From there I moved onto Sora Ayame, who also seemed surprised that anyone wanted her autograph or a picture with her, but while she was soft spoken, she was still quite kind. I was going to get Ai Houzan after that since she was right beside her, but I noticed that Sareee started packing up, so I jumped over to her line to get an autograph and picture with her as well. I thanked her for making the trip to be at that show, and told her it was great to see her wrestle live. She seemed in good spirits but I could definitely tell she was quite tired, so I couldn’t blame her for wanting to run whenever she’d get the chance. Lastly, I met Ai Houzan who was pretty quiet, because I think much like Senka, she’s not overly confident in her English skills. Still though, she was just as kind as everyone else, and enjoyable to meet. When it was all said and done, I had gotten to meet everyone other than Riko who didn’t come out to sign unfortunately, but overall I was quite happy that they at least did meet & greets this year since they didn’t do any last year.

It was a late night for me as I got out of there at 2:30 am, but after getting as much sleep as I could, I woke up as refreshed as I could that next morning to go to the TJPW meet & greet that was back at the Palms. I had planned to go to WrestleCon before going to the Palms for that TJPW meet & greet, but I decided that an extra hour of sleep was more important. Unfortunately, that meant that I lost my chance to possibly meet Thekla which was unfortunate. The TJPW meet & greet was definitely a lot less busy than the session was yesterday after their show, but I still think there was at least 75 to 100 people there, which is a pretty decent turnout all things considered. All of the girls came out in their casual attire, meaning that if you got a meet & greet with them that day, it would look different than the day before when they were still in their gear.

Going into that session I didn’t already have it planned who’s meet & greet I would get, so as I stood in line to buy the portraits for the wrestlers I wanted, I made a list on my phone. The wrestlers I decided to get was Sakura Hattori, Toga, Yuki Kamifuku, Suzume, Pom Harajuku, Sayuri Namba, HIMAWARI, Uta Takami, Shino Suzuki, Miu Watanabe, and Raku. This was going to be my first time meeting Sakura, Toga, Pom, Uta, and Raku, so I was excited to meet a few for the first time, and some of my favorites for the second, third or more.

After obtaining my portraits, it was time for me to decide in what order I was going to meet the girls. It seemed like everyone was instructed to stay there for at least a good bit of time even if there was no one in their line, so I didn’t feel like I was on a time crunch, but I did joke with Andy from the Tokyo Joshi Pod that I couldn’t let Kamiyu sit there by herself too long because she’s usually one of the first ones who’d decide to pack up and leave. Some might think that’s bad, but for me, it’s always felt like part of her gimmick almost, and I don’t think she means anything bad by it.

The first wrestler I got into line for what Sakura Hattori who at that moment didn’t have anyone in her line. Even while masked you could see that she was smiling a bit with her eyes as I spoke to her, telling her that I thought that she had the best match on the TJPW show the day before. She seemed very thankful, and her English seemed to be ok, even though she didn’t have to say too many different words during the interaction. While I was not a hater of the Kaya Toribami character, I do think that this new ninja character will be better for her going forward.

The next wrestler I went to meet was Toga who also didn’t have anyone in line at that moment. I told her that I watched her match on PoderMania and that I enjoyed it, which she seemed genuinely pleased to hear. She told me that she was very nervous before that match, and I told her that the crowd really seemed to enjoy her hard forearm that she throws. The interaction wasn’t too long, but it was enjoyable nonetheless.

The third wrestler I went over to meet was Kamiyu as I saw her line open up, and I didn’t want to miss my chance to see her. One of the first things she said was that she was tired, and that she had went to the Marvelous show the night before, just like I had. I told her that I had seen her and the TJPW girls at the show, because of seeing them get out of their uber when I just happened to be looking down at the street below from the balcony I was sitting on. Apparently Aja Kong told her she was wrestling that night in a couple of matches, and since Aja is her senpai, she felt the need to go, even if it messed with her beauty sleep. We shared a few laughs about everything, and I told her that I’m still trying to get her booked in Ohio because I know that she really wants to wrestle there, and it’s where I live. Maybe one day it will work out. Kamiyu always lives up to the casual beauty moniker when you meet her, because she’s very a matter-of-fact type of person. She’s quite blunt and very casual as you chitchat with her. Also it doesn’t hurt that her English is very fluent.

The fourth wrestler I went over to meet is my personal favorite in TJPW which is Suzume. She’s always smiling, and very friendly during her meet & greets, though I think she’s still a bit self-conscious of her English, so sometimes she can be a bit quiet, or not as talkative as some of the others. It was really cool to see her new International Princess Championship up close and personal, and the interaction was short but enjoyable either way.

From there I moved onto Pom Harajuku who is always a bundle of energy and joy from every meet & greet I’ve ever seen her do. Normally when I’d go to the shows, she’d always have one of the bigger lines, which is the biggest reason why I never had done one with her before, but with this being a more laid back signing, I figured I’d give it a shot. Right away she was very talkative, and while you could tell her English wasn’t perfect, she could understand enough to have a fun conversation with her. She made mention that we were both wearing black today, and I joked with her that I was wearing black to hide my fat, which she tried to play off by saying, “not fat, but strong.” We continued chitchatting for another minute or two, as she takes her time with her meet & greets which is appreciated, and when it was time to pose, she wanted to do a muscle pose, which we ended up doing. She was definitely a fun wrestler to meet, and totally lives up to her character even when you’re meeting her at her merch table.

After that was Sayuri Namba, the person who is still my favorite ring announcer in pro wrestling of all time. The way she’d be able to interact with the entire roster, while still doing her job so well really set her apart from a lot of other ring announcers in my opinion. While I was sad to see her go from TJPW, I am always happy to see her getting booked to ring announce for TJPW when they are overseas now, as it makes those shows feel even more authentic, which I let her know as we spoke. I had also told her that I enjoyed her produce show before she had left Japan and her livestreams from Vancouver, which she seemed to appreciate, even mentioning that she thought she had seen my name in the chat. Namba’s English was already pretty good before she left Japan, but now that she’s been in Canada for almost a year, it has gotten even better. If you count her as part of the roster still, I’d say her English is probably the third best behind Kira and Kamiyu, while possibly being tied with Miyu Yamashita, who has come a long way with her English skills as well. Anytime I have a chance to meet Namba and get her autograph, I’ll take it, because it’s always an enjoyable interaction with her.

The seventh wrestler I had the opportunity to meet was HIMAWARI, who looked very nice in her casual attire with her hair down. She’s another wrestler who is a lot like her in-ring persona as she has quite a bit of energy at the merch table just like in the ring. I told her that I had seen her going to the Marvelous show the day before, because of seeing the big goose bag, which she had with her and pointed to, laughing a bit in the process. I also told her that I always enjoy her matches because they are always a lot of fun, which she seemed to enjoy hearing as well. I don’t think she’s all that confident in her English, but I think it’s probably better than she realizes at least.

The last four wrestlers I had portraits for were all of the Up Up Girls, so it was time for me to run the proverbial gauntlet. The first of the bunch didn’t have a line at the time, and it was the very small Uta Takami, who seemed to be enjoying her time in America, even if I think she was a bit nervous about stuff, because she had only come for the first time during the Texas trip a few weeks before. I spoke to her about her match the day before, and she used a translation app to basically tell me that she needed to get stronger so that she can win more. I told her that I saw that she trains in the gym with Miu, and that seemed to surprise her, which caused her to use the translation app again to say that Miu will help her muscles grow. When it came time for pictures we did a muscle pose because of what we had talked about. The interaction was fun while it lasted, and I think in time she’ll get even more relaxed about these meet & greets overseas as she goes through more of them. I still remember Shino Suzuki having a list of questions on her phone to ask in English on her first trip to the states even though she normally didn’t understand most of the answers. The fact that she tried was enough to make me appreciate her all the more.

Speaking of Shino, that’s who I ended up meeting next. I had met Shino last year as well, and like I said, she wanted to go the extra mile to try to interact with the fans even with limited English, which I really appreciated. This year she seemed a bit more confident with it, but as we spoke, there were a few times where I had to switch up what word I’d use to make it a bit easier to understand. When it came time for the picture we did her signature pose, which she commented favorably on, telling me I did it well, and after thanking her, I moved onto the next of the gauntlet.

Miu Watanabe was the tenth wrestler I got to meet, as she pretty much had a continuous line for a lot of the time that was I getting autographs from the other members of the roster. I definitely think out of everyone she was one of, if not, the most popular wrestler for people to meet at that meet & greet, and as always when you walk up to her, she flashes a big smile you’re way, making you feel like the center of attention at that moment. I remember talking to her a little bit, letting her know that her three-way match was really fun to watch the day before, and that I was sad that she lost the Princess Of Princess Championship, but I then told her that she would win it back soon, which seemed to make her happy. I still don’t think she’s all that confident in her English skills yet, but she makes due with what she can. As always, when it came to picture time, she wanted to make the heart because she L.O.V.E.’s many things, especially her fans.

The last wrestler for me to meet in this meet & greet session was none other than Raku who I was meeting for the first time because much like Pom, her line was always so large after shows that I just never wanted to stand in line for it. The main topic of discussion between us was my belly because I’m a fairly round person, and apparently Raku really like big bellies. I joked a bout it a little bit, like it’s a big pillow, and she seemed to be somewhat enamored with it, which made for a fun interaction in the end. Apparently back in the day she used to touch fans’ stomachs, but there’s probably a good chance that TJPW told her to stop just in case she’d do it someone who didn’t want her to or something. She was very pleasant and honestly her English is pretty strong as well from what I could tell. She still had some of her Up Up Girls paper pamphlets left over from the prior tours, and gave me one along with my portrait I had bought ahead of time. I can definitely understand why people say that she’s really good at getting fans to buy her stuff, because if she had other merch available still, I would have probably had to think twice about purchasing something more.

After getting some lunch with my joshi wrestling fan friends, it was time to watch the STARDOM show live and in person from the front row. If you watched the show on PPV, you probably saw me when they’d look towards what I’d think they’d consider the blue corner where the first wrestler or team announced would usually stand after their entrance. I had a great line of sight for everything which was awesome, and seeing the giant screen on the stage play the entrance videos of the STARDOM wrestlers was really cool to see. It also was pretty cool to have FUWA-Chan watch the show pretty much right beside me, as she took pictures and filmed video clips while standing just off to the side of me. I could hear her join in on the many chants, and yell out to the wrestlers from time to time, especially Hazuki during her match. It was also fun to hear her react to what the crowd was saying as well.

The first match of the night was the tag team match that had both a joshi freelancer and an American indie talent on one side with SAKI and Brittnie Brooks taking on Aya Sakura and Natsupoi. This match was fine for what it was, and the Cosmic Angels duo was definitely quite popular to say the least. I was happy to see Aya Sakura making her U.S. debut and she seemed to quite overjoyed to be there. Brittnie seemed to be a bit off when it comes to the communication in the match as she hit Natsupoi right in the forehead with her leg as Natsupoi was trying to duck under early in the match, but after that, the match was fine for what it was with the Cosmic Angels picking up the win.

The next match of the night was a six-woman tag team match that put together some original pieces of E neXus V with Mina Shirakawa teaming up with Maika and HANAKO. I was happy for Mina to get a chance to be on the show, because even though AEW works with STARDOM, it’s not a given that she’ll always get to work these shows when STARDOM goes to the US. The team they took on was the Mi Vida Loca tag team of Suzu Suzuki and Rina Yamashita, teaming up with Hazuki who is currently without a unit at the moment. One of the heartwarming things that happened during the E neXus V entrance was that Bozilla came to the railing right beside where I was sitting and got a chance to say hello to her Mi Vida Loca teammates. Bozilla’s knee was still very heavily braced, but she was seemed to be getting around pretty decently, and seemed to be in good spirits overall which is what is most important.

Once the match began, it was a good back-and-forth affair that I think gave the fans in attendance a good feel for what a house show six-woman tag match would be even in Japan. Everyone got to hit their special spots which got the crowd fired up, and Mina even got to do a bit of dancing while motioning to FUWA-Chan which got a response out of her from behind the fence that was set up between us in the ring. In the end Maika put Suzu down with her Michinoku Driver to take the win for her team in what was an enjoyable match. Obviously it was more enjoyable for me because my favorite wrestler was in the match, but still.

The third match of the night is one of the matches that I think most fans were looking forward to the most because Rina was getting a big time singles match against the forever ROH Women’s champion Athena. I think most of us over here in America know that Athena is a really awesome wrestler, and while she doesn’t always get to show it, when she’s put in there with other very talented ladies, she puts on match of the night performances. Tonight was no different as Rina brought her “A” game making the match feel like a big fight even though there was nothing on the line other than bragging right in the end. The two hit each other incredibly hard, and by the end of it, it felt like either of them could come out the winner, but in the end it was Athena who was able to put Rina down, making her tap out, but giving her respect after the match. In my opinion, the most over wrestler on that entire show was Rina, and hopefully Taro Okada will recognize that while continuing to push her up the card, with it hopefully leading to Rina holding a big-time singles belt by the end of the year.

The penultimate match of the show was a singles match for the NJPW STRONG Women’s Championship with the champion Alex Windsor taking on Saya Iida, and boy was this match fun. Just like you’d expect from any match from these two wrestlers, it was very hard hitting, with both absolutely clobbering each other with clotheslines, chops and hard forearms. The crowd was very hot for Iida in this match as it seemed like most of the fans were more so STARDOM fans than AEW fans, so it made for a really fun match with a pretty damn hot crowd. Unfortunately for Iida she came out on the wrong end of the result, but she showed the heart and determination that we all love her for, leading to the two combatants showing each other respect after it was all said and done.

The main event was a six-woman tag match that truly set up the idea of STARDOM vs. AEW even more so than the two singles matches before this. On one side, we had team AEW made up of Harley Cameron, Willow Nightingale, and Kris Statlander. On the opposite side, we had the Neo Genesis trio of Starlight Kid, AZM, and Mei Seira, which is probably the fastest wrestling trio in the world. I was looking forward to this match even before the show because I knew that both Willow and Kris could be excellent bases for the much smaller trio on the other side, which it is exactly what ended up happening.

It was a great battle of power versus speed, and honestly I have to give props to Harley Cameron who really didn’t seem to out of place in the match like many might have thought going in. She’s definitely developing better with more in-ring time. There were many great back- and-forth spots between the two teams, but in the end, Team STARDOM reigned supreme to send the fans home happy. If this is the type of match we could expect to see on Forbidden Door with STARDOM confirmed participation in it this year, then I’m definitely looking forward to what they cook up. All three of the Neo Genesis wrestlers were very popular with the crowd, with AZM possibly being the most popular, which Starlight Kid will never fully accept I’m sure.

All in all, the STARDOM show was definitely one of the best I had gotten to witness during a WRESTLEMANIA weekend so far, giving the crowd a good feel of what a STARDOM show is in Japan, while only having a bit more than a dozen of their wrestlers over here from Japan. Some people have complained over the years about STARDOM shows just not really bringing it, especially after their two shows last year, but I think they really put their best foot forward this year, which leaves me excited for what is to come in the future for their overseas shows.

I decided not to go to any shows that evening as I was feeling a bit tired from the late night the night before, so I ended up just resting, but I did have to get up early that next morning because I had STARDOM meet & greets to go to at WrestleCon. For the last two years before this, I made sure to go to WrestleCon for the STARDOM meet & greets because it gave me the opportunity to not only meet the wrestlers but also pose beside them, which is honestly more access than Japanese fans gets with them during their meet & greets overseas. This year they didn’t have as much room to pose, but a lot of the wrestlers still made an effort to pose beside you, even if they were sort of stuck behind the table.

The way they broke it up this year was that they had up to two wrestlers signing at the same time at their booth, and each time they did hour- long sessions. There were a couple of meet & greets that ended up selling out, and while I don’t know the number on what would be considered a sellout, my guess is probably around 50, which is still quite a bit at $50 a ticket. I went ahead and purchased all of the meet & greets available for STARDOM related wrestlers right when they became available, which meant that I ended up getting refunds for the couple of wrestlers who weren’t able to make it overseas because of VISA problems.

The first two wrestlers available from 9 am to 10 am that morning were the Cosmic Angels duo of Aya Sakura and Natsupoi. Both seemed to be full of energy and all smiles as they walked up to the table seeing that lines had already started to form for them. The first of the two I met was Aya, and while I think she wasn’t too confident in her English, we were able to communicate a bit with the help of the STARDOM representative who was there to take the picture of us. Having someone there to help explain things definitely helped, and having your name already pulled up on your phone really helped the talent be able to write it quickly and effectively when you first got to meet them. It was fun hear each of them say the name “Justin” after looking at it for a moment, because some had a bit more of an accent than others. After exchanging a few words back and forth, it was time for the photo, and I threw up my usual peace sign, while Aya decided to go into Tam mode while doing her signature pose.

After that I moved into the line for Natsupoi, and luckily it didn’t take too long to get up to her. She was about as upbeat as you’d expect from the high-speed fairy, and I’m not sure if she did it for everyone, but when she wrote my name, she added “poi” to it, laughing a little bit as she did so. We didn’t talk too much as Natsupoi isn’t really one of my personal favorites, but she liked my HZK Mode shirt that the Stardom Cast guys had made, so that’s a plus. The pose was obviously the poi pose because of course it was.

The next hour only had one wrestler signing because of Maki Itoh’s cancellation, and it was none other than Rina, who apparently had her meet & greets sell out, which was awesome to hear! Like I said, the day before at the STARDOM show, she was definitely the most over on the entire show, so to see that also translate to the meet & greets made me feel good. With Rina I see a lot of Hana Kimura in her, and it makes my heart feel good to see her succeed. She was also all smiles when she made it to the table, and honestly, she didn’t seem overwhelmed or anything, which is kind of surprising considering how young she is on her first trip to the states.

When it was time to walk up to her table, she spoke a bit, but she seemed to be a bit shy with her English at least. I told her that I liked her match the best yesterday and that it was very hard-hitting, which the helper helped translate to her a bit, making her quite happy. We went pretty simple with the pose, as she had a lot of people in line at that moment, and I didn’t want to try to think of anything too intricate to ask for. Part of me wanted to ask for the TCS salute, but I don’t know how well she would be able to take something like that considering how close to Hana she was at such a early part of her life. The last thing I’d want to do is drum up thoughts about Hana and possibly make her emotional even if I didn’t mean any harm by it.

The next session had my personal favorite wrestler Hazuki in it along with Mei Seira, a wrestler who Hazuki already showed she respects a lot after their battles for the High Speed Championship and the CMLL-Japan Women’s Championship in the past. Of course, I had to get into Hazuki’s line first as I had brought a gift for her. Last year, I purchased her a Curious George shirt, because I knew she liked the character with what she posts on social media, and this year, since I know she enjoys going to baseball games, while also showing support to various teams when she makes her entrance to the ring, I wanted to get her a personalized jersey of my favorite MLB team the Cleveland Guardians.

I made sure to remove the jersey from by backpack before getting to the table, not wanting them to worry that I might pull something out that could be harmful, and I handed the jersey over to her, while telling her it was a gift. She seemed quite surprised, and the helper asked me what team, which I filled him in on, which he translated over to her. She seemed excited to add another jersey to her collection, and after seeing that it was personalized to her, she became even more happy. By that time she had already been given another jersey or two, so she was working up quite a collection. She quickly threw the jersey on for our photo together, and she gave me three different poses with the last one showing off the back of the jersey with her name and the number 82 on it, which she usually has on her personalized jerseys in Japan. Last year, I met Hazuki twice during the weekend, and every time she’s all smiles while seeming to genuinely appreciate her overseas fans. Anytime you post something about her online, especially if she’s tagged, she’ll usually give it a like, letting you know that she sees the support, which is a nice feeling as a fan.

After that I moved into Mei Seira’s line which was honestly quite large as well. Even though Mei Seira is probably the third or fourth most popular member of her faction, she’s still very popular, especially with overseas fans it seems. I had gotten the chance to meet her before in Philadelphia two years back, and this year she seemed a bit more talkative, though she still seemed a bit self-conscious about her English. As always, it was an enjoyable interaction, and we did two poses together which included her signature heart pose.

After finishing up with Mei Seira’s line, I was walking around the WrestleCon floor with a few friends, and we came across Johnnie Robbie who had her own little table set up in front of where a table not being used was. Considering how good she had been all weekend thus far, and personally loving that tag match I saw her participate in against Spark Rush, I made an effort to go over to purchase a portrait of her. She seemed to really appreciate that anyone had come over to see her considering how many big names from both the past and present in pro wrestling were in that room at that moment, showing me that she was honestly quite humble.

I spoke to her for a minute or two about that tag team match, and facing Sareee in that ring, before taking a picture with her after getting the portrait signed. Surprisingly she was only charging $20, and pictures with her were free. Johnnie Robbie is definitely a wrestler who I can see doing some amazing things in the future, especially if she’s able to go to Japan for a extended period because she can train and work with some of the best wresters in the world.

After that, it was time to head back to the STARDOM booth as both of the last two wrestlers for the day were also sold out ahead of time. Both AZM and Starlight Kid had made the trip the last two years, and you can tell that overall to overseas fans, they are definitely two of the most recognizable wrestlers on the STARDOM roster. The lines were long for both, and when I finally got up to AZM’s table, she was quick to point out my shirt much like Natsupoi did, asking me if I made it myself. I told her that a friend made it, adding the word tomodachi, since it’s one of the few Japanese words I know well enough to use. AZM is always pretty full of energy during these meet & greets, and this time was no different. We hit the gyarupi pose that Neo Genesis often does, and then I was on my way to Starlight Kid’s line.

With both meet & greets being sold out, I was bit worried about whether we’d get done in time before the convention closed, but after thinking about it for a moment, I figured that the convention organizers would probably give them a bit of leeway to finish up the line since everything was pre-purchased. I eventually got up to SLK’s table with a bit of time to spare, and as always we had an enjoyable interaction. I mentioned to her that her match yesterday was a lot of fun to watch going against those bigger opponents, and she called them dekai which means big. After trading a few more words back and forth, we hit the same gyarupi pose, and then moved the peace sign up to make a cat ear much like Starlight Kid does for her own poses.

After that, I joined my friends down on Freemont Street at the Nerd Bar where we enjoyed a watch party for the first night of WRESTLEMANIA. The show itself wasn’t all that special, but it was fun having drinks with friends while watching some wrasslin’. Even though they were going to do some wrestling outside of that bar a few hours after Mania concluded, we decided to just head back so that I could get some rest since I had to be up early again the next morning for another round of meet & greets.

I woke up early again the next morning because I once again had to get down to WrestleCon bright and early just like the day before for more STARDOM meet & greets. The first session only had one wrestler in it from 9 am to 10 am because the second wrestler was supposed to be Yuria Hime who couldn’t make the trip because of VISA issues. It was very nice of Iida though to bring a Yuria Hime t-shirt with her to put on the chair beside her, making it feel like Yuria was here in spirit at least. As always, Saya Iida is very short, but is absolutely yoked! We talked for a moment or two while she was signing my portrait and I told her that her match on Friday was very hard-hitting and very good, which she seemed to appreciate. I think her English is still a work in progress, but since she came over last year to the U.S. with STARDOM, I think she felt more comfortable dealing with everything this time around.

The next session started at 10 am with the Mi Vida Loca duo of Suzu Suzuki and Rina Yamashita signing beside each other, and the line for the two of them seemed to be pretty big in comparison to Iida’s. It’s possible that some people just didn’t want to wake up as early, which I can’t blame them for it since it’s Vegas right? I met Suzu first and the conversation was kept somewhat short, but she was all smiles, seemingly enjoying her time here in America. I wore my RESURA shirt this day as well, and Suzu did take notice of it, which caused the helper to mention it to me, and I tried to explain what RESURA Mag was and that we’re trying to help bring more eyes to joshi wrestling. Right after that, it was picture time and we hit a few peace sign poses which then let me move over to Rina Yamashita’s line to get her autograph as well.

Rina Yamashita was quite a busy woman during WRESTLEMANIA week wrestling in three matches over the time she was there. Since she loves to yell to get the crowd fired up, her voice had gone a bit, so she was very soft-spoken during the meet & greet which is different from the norm. She was still all smiles even though her body was beaten and scarred from the hardcore match she took part in on the Death Vegas show that El Desperado put on. As always, she was very kind to meet, and her English is honestly quite good because of all of the tours she’s been on with GCW over the years. I told her that I always have so much fun watching her matches, not only in STARDOM but in many other promotions in Japan as well, which seemed to tickle her quite a bit. We posed together giving the camera man the middle finger since she was doing that with most of the fans in line anyway, and all in all, it was an enjoyable experience. If you ever have the chance to meet Rina Yamashita at a show, you should definitely do it.

After getting through both of those lines, I had some time to kill before the last session came which was Maika and HANAKO. I walked around with my joshi wrestling fan friends and we came across J-Rod who had wrestled in the main event on the TJPW show a few days before. We had gone to look for her yesterday during WrestleCon, but she wasn’t around, most likely because she was in the main event of the JCW show that was very late at night the night before, but at least today we were able to see her.

I had personally never met her before, but I knew she was from Ohio, and as a fellow Ohioan, I had to at least say hello. She had been doing a good job in her matches in TJPW, and I had heard good things about what she’s done in OVW, among other indie federations, but I just hadn’t had the chance to watch her much outside of the joshi realm. She was incredibly kind, and we were able to chitchat for a good five or 10 minutes after I purchased a portrait, along with a picture with her. It’s pretty awesome that she’s gotten the chance to do some matches in Japan, because being a big, strong, foreign monster in a place like TJPW really fits her well. I’m hopeful that she’ll get her chance to work for one of the bigger companies in America someday because I think she deserves the opportunity at least.

Since SPARK Joshi was starting at noon that day, I needed to get through Maika and HANAKO’s lines rather quickly to make it over to the Luxor in time, so I lined up a bit early in Maika’s line, figuring that HANAKO’s would be a bit shorter to move to after the fact. Once Maika and HANAKO arrived, it didn’t take long to get up to Maika’s table, and this was my third time meeting her as she’s been on the last two Mania week tours before this as well. I told her it was really cool seeing her get to go to Mexico, and she quickly said she wants to go back soon. We exchanged a few more words and then it was time for the picture. I think they had an idea that quite a few people were going to try to make it to the SPARK show, so I think they wanted to get the line through as quickly as possible which is totally understandable.

After that I moved over to HANAKO’s line which was A LOT shorter, though I think part of that is because a lot of people probably got in Maika’s line first, knowing it would be longer much like I did. Still though, with only a few people in front of me, it didn’t take too long to get up to the table. Since she had extra time with her fans, she drew my name in bubble letters and seemed somewhat confident with her English use, most likely using what she picked up during her random one-month excursion to America she did two years ago. She was very kind, and we also talked about RESURA a little bit when she noticed the shirt, which the helper helped to translate a bit for anything she didn’t understand. It always surprises me how tall HANAKO is, because she’s basically my height which isn’t super tall, but it’s definitely tall for a Japanese woman, that’s for sure.

From there, it was time for me and two others to race over to the Luxor and their e-sports arena Hyper X to watch SPARK Joshi’s Lady Luck 2. This show was especially important for me because I had not only purchased front-row tickets to it, but I had also spent money on sponsoring a match which happened to be the main event of the evening between Hazuki and Jada Stone. It was cool seeing RESURA on the graphics for the show, and I’m honestly happy that I made the decision to sponsor, because it shows that I’m willing to put my money where my mouth is at least.

First thing’s first, the e-sports arena is absolutely gorgeous and would be a pretty cool place to do a studio setup for pro wrestling on a somewhat regular basis. You can only get so many people into the place with the ring, but it still made for a really cool atmosphere. The last two times I had seen SPARK shows on Mania week, there seemed to be a lot of people running around and confusion when it came to the show running, but this time things seemed to be much more figured out ahead of time which is a plus.

It was awesome to see Sayuri Namba once again, though this time we would have the pleasure of hearing her announce names from STARDOM which is something I would have never expected a few years ago. After saying her hellos and enjoyed a Namba chant from the crowd, she turned things over to SAKI and Chibi C.B. to sing their opening song like they always do for their events. The crowd clapped along, and it everyone seemed to be in a good mood, ready for the action that was to come once it finished.

The first match of the show didn’t really include any Japanese pro wrestlers, however with Super P being from the Philippines, we’ll accept her as our own. The opening triple threat wasn’t too long of a match with Super P taking on Airica Demia and Kaia McKenna. The entire story for this match was about the fact that all of them had magic powers by either being a hero, or a witch. It was fun while it lasted, but there wasn’t a ton to really sink your teeth into. I would love to see Super P get some shots in Japan though, because I think she could be quite popular if given the chance.

The next match was another triple threat, but with this one having an actual joshi pro wrestler with Aya Sakura taking on Vipress and Brittany Blake. This match was a little bit better than the first match of the night, with Aya getting a lot crowd support throughout. Eventually, Dani Mo hit the ring, and cheated on Vipress’ behalf, leading to Vipress picking up the win while joining the companies’ heel faction “Extinguish.”

After that we had a tag team match that had a bit of a change to it as Rina had picked up a minor injury on the STARDOM show a few days prior, and couldn’t work this show because of it. Mei Seira swooped in to save the day, entering the match to face off against her faction mate as we saw Mei Seira and Alexis Lee from Singapore, take on AZM and Aleah James from the UK. The two teams were quite interesting to see chemistry wise, and I think everyone did a good job doing their part in the match to make it entertaining for the fans. Getting to see Mei Seira and AZM tear things up with high-speed action to start really got the crowd fired up, eventually the AZM and Aleah James team was able to pick up the victory. I feel like everyone got over in this match, which is truly all you can ask for.

After that, we moved onto a fatal four way with two more of the talented STARDOM roster in it as we saw Starlight Kid face of against Natsupoi, Dani Mo and Maya World. The main thing all of these competitors had in common was that they are all tremendous athletes, and they really got to show that off in this one. We got to see some more fun high-speed action with Starlight Kid and Natsupoi showing off their chemistry, not only against each other, but also working together as their short time team of “Mutual Love”. Vipress tried to interfere to help Dani Mo get the victory as a thanks for earlier in the show, but it didn’t play out the way they had hoped with Natsupoi picking up the victory instead.

The penultimate match of the show was a SPARK Joshi Atlantic Championship title defense where SAKI took on Jazmin Allure. Sometimes SAKI’s matches aren’t the most entertaining for me personally, but honestly, I think her and Jazmin told a really fun story throughout the match that also included some nice hard-hitting action along with it. Jazmin is definitely someone to watch out for in the future, as every time I see her wrestle she’s more impressive than she was before. Hopefully she’ll get some opportunities to go abroad as well to really hone her craft in the land of the rising sun. In the end, SAKI’s strength and experience was too much for Jazmin, and she picked up the victory, defending her title once again.

Finally it was time for the main event, and the match I was selfishly looking forward to the most because my favorite wrestler was in it. It was a one on one match for the SPARK Joshi World Championship pitting the champion Hazuki against the ultra-talented Jada Stone. Jada had always been very impressive in her matches in TJPW, so I was excited to see how she’d fair against a STARDOM wrestler instead this time and she didn’t disappoint. Right away, Hazuki brought the fire and hard hitting that you’d expect from her, but Jada didn’t back down, trying to fight her way back each time. Both women were able to show off their great athleticism during the match, including an awesome suicide dive from Hazuki onto Jada on the outside, causing the crowd to run for the hills in that area while cheering quite loudly.

When Hazuki was on the outside right near my feet selling, I attempted to call timeout on Hazuki’s behalf, only to get scolded by the ref about there being no timeouts, but I made Hazuki laugh a little, so it was well worth it. Even though Jada kept on fighting back, Hazuki continued to be one step ahead, and even though she couldn’t put Jada away with her Atomic Bombs Away senton from the top, she was able to eventually put her away with her patented brainbuster to score the victory. After the match Hazuki addressed the crowd in English, thanking us for coming, and that she will return soon to SPARK Joshi, which I will look forward to. In my opinion, Hazuki is America’s champion, so the more she’s able to come over here to wrestle, the better. After that the two wrestlers in the main event showed respect and love towards each other, while also getting the entire roster of the show out from the back to take a group picture, much like TJPW does for their shows overseas.

For me, this was the best SPARK Joshi show I had been to so far, and I think it really showed that the company has learned from prior mistakes to improve their product over time. Having a joshi wrestling company in America where you’ll need to fly talents over from Japan is not an easy undertaking, and it’s definitely not cheap, but at the same time the fans have certain expectations for a company that has joshi in their name, with this show being one that truly deserved it from start to finish. If you haven’t watched the show, you should go out of your way to check it out, as I think you’ll come away entertained, plus you’ll get to see Hazuki with a singles championship, which I think we all want to see happen in Japan as well.

After getting some lunch with a few friends, I made my way over to the Palms pool party to watch the second half of WRESTLEMANIA night two, and while the matches were definitely better than the first night, it still didn’t leave me wishing I was at the stadium seeing it live that’s for sure. From that point on, I just relaxed and enjoyed an extra day in Vegas before flying back on Tuesday morning.

Just like I said way up above, for me WRESTLEMANIA week isn’t about WRESTLEMANIA at all, it’s about the joshi companies that decide to make their way across the ocean to put on shows for us fans here in the United States. Whether you simply went to a show or two, or did everything you could like I did when it came to meet & greets and the such, there’s an experience that any joshi wrestling fan could enjoy. It’s not cheap, but it’s definitely cheaper than flying over to Japan, I can say that from experience, and while I’d much rather watch joshi wrestling in Japan itself, being on a plane for four hours rather than fourteen definitely has its advantages.

Next year’s WRESTLEMANIA is expected to be over in Saudi Arabia, and I definitely don’t expect to see the Japanese companies or other indie wrestling companies to follow them over there. It will be interesting to see if someone else decides to create a destination weekend around pro wrestling during that same time frame so that these companies can continue to build off their previous Mania week shows, while gaining new fans in the process. If that happens, I will probably decide to go again, but if not, I’ll happy go to Japan to see these awesome performers wrestle live, because in my opinion, joshi pro wrestling is the best pro wrestling!