Stan Hansen & Ted DiBiase vs. Genichiro Tenryu & Ashura Hara-AJPW 23.7.1987.

The body of the match lacked the focus for this to reach greatness, but it's definitely good enough to seek out if you dig this type of match. After the initial Tenryu-Hansen face off and big chop battle there isn't much memorable for a while-the action is good, there's some nice hoss potatoing, but it doesn't go further than that. Dibiase feels like a total utility player, just filling the role of Hansen's partner, which makes the finish that much more fitting, as Hansen is isolated and just nuked by Tenryu and Hara, and you see some signs of what would come from Tenryu later in his career when he hits a beautiful running head stomp. Hansen taking advantage off the chaos and managing to Lariat Tenryu who had just run over Dibiase felt like he'd barely escaped defeat, so it's understandable they wanted him to get some heat back, but it looked quite silly to have Tenryu and Hara running away from him just because he had a broom now. Oh well. ***1/4

Genichiro Tenryu & Ashura Hara vs Stan Hansen & Terry Gordy-AJPW 5.3.1988.

This match wasn't much, mostly because Terry Gordy's performance was god awful, Memphis TV undercard matches had more intensity than he did in this match. The structure was quite dull too, the foreigners pretty much took the entire match, and it just doesn't make for an interesting experience to see someone get cut off over and over and over again, especially knowing more shitty worked punches await. There were some nice moments of violence when Hansen would get it on, and Hara's comeback punches looked great (unlike his headbutts, which looked terrible, backyard level headbutting your own hand), Tenryu's role was kept to a minimum, he had a couple off stare offs with Hansen's and managed to Lariat him in a throat near the end, but he wasn't the focus off the match. Hansen going on one of his signature rampages at the end and destroying everything in sight is enough for me to call this above average but if you're itching for some 80s All Japan tag action there are better choices out there. **3/4

Genichiro Tenryu & Ashura Hara vs Yoshiaki Yatsu & Shinichi Nakano-AJPW 9.6.1987.

Quite an odd structure here-the match starts with awesome brawling, as Tenryu and Hara just beat the hell out of Nakano, and light Yatsu up goint toe to toe with him, but then that's broken up by a limbwork section that serves no purpose (from a narrative standpoint, you could argue its use in terms of pacing) and then the match turns into a spotfest. Still, the good prevails-Tenryu and Hara make everything they do vicious, Yatsu has some neat moves like the German Suplex and his cut-off Sliding Lariat was fantastic, and Nakano fired up well and made the crowd buy into him, together with Tenryu's selling and timing on the kick-outs late in the match. ***1/4

Genichiro Tenryu & Ashura Hara vs Takashi Ishikawa & Hiroshi Wajima-AJPW 8.6.1987.

Neat neat neat! Exactly what I had hoped for-Tenryu-Wajima is the biggest match-up, and they smartly tease it, and while they do so Ishikawa carries the workload, not only does he bust out awesome chops and knees, he even makes the sloppy middle kicks seemingly everyone in 80s All Japan did look great. Hara is just so on point here too-really bringing the violence, his Headbutts looked vicious here, and his chops and Lariats are just on another level, he's like a whole smashing into something. Wajima is hardly a super worker, but the crowd buys into him and he has solid offence, that's enough to reach greatness when everyone else is so good. Loved how he and Tenryu provoked each other, how they played mind games by tagging out, when they finally got their hands on each other it was exactly as rough as gritty as you'd expect, they were getting into these awesome positions that are really hard to explain, something between sumo and wrestling, just getting into each other's face, it ruled so much. I also loved the sequence where Wajima just dared Tenryu to chop him and after he'd failed to cut him down Tenryu just sweeped his leg. ****

Genichiro Tenryu vs Tatsuo Nakano-WAR 26.5.1996.

I was surprised to see how this match actually looked like, since I remembered it just as a couple of minutes of awesome striking. On a rewatch the almost five minutes were still awesome, but their content and what made it work quite different. It's true that there were strike exchanges-and they worked for the characters, Nakano is an undercard shoot wrestler overmatched by Tenryu, who uses sumo-style slapping shoves to corner Nakano time and time again. Nakano's only chances are in going for a submission and utilizing kicks-and even in such a short match they'll take their time in Tenryu recuperating from an Armbar and setting the pace for their next show-off instead of just going straight to it, it really makes a difference in how the crowd perceives the match and reacts to it. It's remarkable how much thought they put into the finish of a match like this-Tenryu goes for a Hiptoss, Nakano stops it by palm striking Tenryu's face off, and as he's about to get on top of him Tenryu kicks his leg out from the bottom, injuring it, and then quickly takes care of Nakano with a Half Crab. If you think about it Tenryu's matches vs UWFi guys really were basically Battlarts style. ***1/4

Kensuke Sasaki vs Genichiro Tenryu-NJPW 15.8.2004.

The world's strongest 54 year old man clashes with a "Muscle Volcano" in one of my favourite sprints. It's funny, I mainly remembered the match for them busting out a bunch of junior offence, and on a rewatch that ruled too, but I also noticed other things that made the match as badass as it is. Tenryu's facial expressions when Kensuke corners him and starts pounding on him are a thing of beauty and really remind you this man is old enough to be a grandparent, particularly how he'd act like he was out of breath after being Lariated on the neck. Kensuke winding up for a Lariat and then eating a punch just as he was about to execute it ruled and the counter flash finish was great and caught me off guard yet again, and as great as Tenryu is that kind of quick counter really feels like the onyl way he could beat Kensuke at this point. Hectically kicking the air while being pinned can look silly but it was absolutely fitting here. Bonus points for Tenryu continuing to sell after the match. ***3/4