This was the first ever exploding ring death match, and it took place in FMW. To be exact, it was a “No Rope Exploding Barbed Wire Time Bomb Death Match”.
Do you remember that episode of The Office, where Jim walks out of the bathroom to find Dwight and Angela kissing? And then it cuts to him back in the bathroom, with his face like this?:
Well, that was me for this entire fucking match.
Some quick back story: as far as I am aware, Junbo Tsuruta and Atsushi Onita were the first graduates of the All-Japan dojo. When they graduated, they each also went and trained with the Funks in Amarillo. So this match is essentially teacher vs. student.
I had heard about it for years upon years, but I just never sat down and really thought about watching it, until tonight that is.
I expected something pretty bloody but fun, but probably nothing to really write home about at the end of the day. One of those matches that just doesn’t live up to the hype when you’re seeing it for the first time almost 30 years later.
I thought wrong.
I have this bad habit lately of watching some wrestling at 1.5x speed. Mostly because I am trying to cram a lot of matches in to my very limited time during the work week, but also because there’s a lot of wrestling that can just drag a little bit, and the viewing becomes enhanced at a slightly faster speed. Tell me that I’m desecrating the game we love but I don’t care.
I couldn’t even think about switching the playback speed on this match from the moment the file started playing. Onita’s entrance to “Wild Thing” in a stadium full of raucous fans felt like this was a big box office attraction that was happening. Funk’s already at ringside, staring Onita down, and following his every step into the ring.
The referee is dressed like a safety scissors version of Shredder. His outfit comes into play later.
The match itself, meaning the bell to bell “work rate” if you will, isn’t really there. There’s a couple of times I laughed at Funk starting to do limb work and then quickly abandoning it. Whether that was on purpose or not, I don’t know, but it almost adds to the environment of these guys not really knowing what to expect in the match and falling back on traditional habits.
Onita’s the first to go into the exploding barbed wire, and the effects of the explosion mixed with the barbed wire menacingly piercing Onita’s back got a visceral reaction from me, which is hard to get. I am usually very emotionless when I watch things the very first time, always have been. When something gets a rise out of me upon my first viewing? I know it’s special.
Onita sells the effects of this tremendously well, and probably because it’s not really selling when you’re actually fucking hurting, I guess. They tease another spot with Funk dragging Onita by his hair to the other set of ropes, and Onita uses all of his might to overpower Funk slowly, and eventually Funk himself gets sent into it front first!
Funk begins doing what I can only describe as “Weekend At Bernie’s” style selling. Teetering back and fourth, almost falling frontwards but his balance resorts, only for the momentum to almost make him fall backwards, until he swings his arms wildly to even himself out. As over the top as it is, it adds so much to the tease of him going into the exploding barbed wire again.
Funk continues to do it after each strike Onita lands on him, and almost falls backwards into the next set of ropes. He teeters long enough that Onita goes to shove him, BUT FUNK WAS PLAYING POSSUM AND HE PULLS ONITA SO HARD INTO THE BARBED WIRE ROPES THAT THEY BREAK AND HE SPILLS TO THE FLOOR!
Now, when he gets up on the floor, he immediately looks at his one hand and holds it up, almost as if to show someone, anyone, that something was wrong. I rewinded it a few times and even played it on slow-mo, but the quality wasn’t great. Someone correct me if I’m wrong here, but — it looked like the tip of his index finger was hanging on by a thread. I mean, that shit looked like it was easily sawed 1/2 of the way off from the way he fell out of the barbed wire and to the floor.
But it doesn’t stop the sick bastard! He immediately goes back in and attacks Funk.
Suddenly — an alarm rings and a 5:00 countdown clock appears on the screen. I don’t have translations, but knowing what I know, it means in five minutes the whole place is going to blow up.
In a truly surreal scene, PEOPLE IN THE FRONT ROW RUSH AWAY. I LOVE IT.
Funk and Onita are now working against the clock, trying to throw the other into the last set of exploding barbed wire ropes and get this win before time expires. They work fast and start to not fully land things as panic mode sets in. The drama is UNREAL. Eventually, Onita is able to duck a shot from Funk and send him into the last set of exploding barbed wire, and then pins him quick for the win!
But this isn’t over! There’s about 2:30 left on the clock! Funk IMMEDIATELY gets up and attacks Onita from behind. Funk undoes some of his wrist tape and begins trying to choke Onita out, wanting to leave him for dead in the ring that’s about to explode!
But the Safety Scissors Shredder referee comes back into play, trying to reason with Funk and pull him off of Onita! Funk shoves the ref down hard, so hard in fact, that his “metal” helmet goes flying off onto the canvas! Funk turns his attention now to wanting to hurt the referee, and that’s the only opening Onita needed to grab the loose “metal” helmet and WALLOP Funk across the head with it.
Funk goes down. There’s less than a minute left. Onita sends the referee under the ropes and out of the ring, ordering his young boys to take the ref to safety. Onita himself takes a second to recover, looks back at Funk, and leaves the ring. Funk is out, and he may be about to meet his maker!
But NO! Onita angrily slides back in to the ring, mounts Funk and begins frantically slapping the hell out of him to try and wake him up. Clock’s winding down. Funk’s starting to come to, but he’s really out of it. Onita doesn’t know what to do. Time is about to expire! ONITA LAYS ON TOP OF FUNK, THE CAMERA PULLS BACK, AND…
Backstage after the match, in front of the press in the locker room, a tearful Funk tells Onita that this is not over, and there will be a next time. Onita reaches out to shake his mentor’s hand. Funk hesitates before telling Onita that he appreciates everything he did for him out there, he means that from the bottom of his heart, truly. But he cannot shake his hand, because he cannot lose to him.
Funk walks away as Onita stares at him, having suffered the true defeat of the night. Funk turns back and says next time, they play by teachers rules. He says Onita is used to barbed wire and the explosions. But next time, it’s in Funk’s territory, and he leaves.
The camera pans back and zooms in on Onita, with just this horrified expression and tears beginning to flow.
He takes a few moments in the locker room, talking softly to reporters before ultimately leaving the locker room and heading back outside, where fans are awaiting their hero with a fence in between them. The roar of the public is enough for Onita for now, as he lets out a celebratory yell.
This was a fucking movie and it was the best movie I’ve seen in quite sometime. It was something I plan on re-watching multiple times throughout the rest of my life.
I can’t in good conscience give this some kind of insane rating. I try not to go too overboard with rating death matches because as much as I absolutely love them, I can’t compare something like this to a traditional wrestling match. There was very little wrestling in this. It was an 80’s action b-movie from the camera shots, the drama of the match, the special effects down to the fucking score! It had a SCORE.
Watch this. Even if you don’t like death match wrestling, just trust me. If you’ve never seen this, you need to as soon as possible.
Sometimes, pro wrestling can be a truly magnificent art.
What’s best is that you really couldn’t do this match nowadays! Now, I know what you’re saying, AEW just did one 3 years ago this month.
And I stand by my sentiment: you can’t do this nowadays. AEW proved that. This was a spectacle, done by a company that was set up and specialized almost strictly for this type of event. I don’t know if any modern company could both pull it off AND pull it off well.
***1/2
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