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YOU Proudly Present...

The Cewsh Reviews Super Mega Ultra Technicolor Dream Card 4

Welcome, cats and kittens, to yet another installment of the only reviews who take fan interactions so seriously that they place restraining order against us, Cewsh Reviews! We have a VERY special treat for you tonight, as the time has finally come for our yearly foray into fan interaction and good time fun having. If you haven't been keeping up recently, the gist of the Dream Card is that we ask our readers to suggest any individual matches that they'd like to see us review, we put the matches in a hat, and draw out 8 matches to comprise a full card that we review like a real show. All the winners get prizes, and everyone goes home happy as a clam, (aside from the people who don't get picked, who are released back into the wild angry and intoxicated.) Every match on this show was handpicked by our readers, and therefore we take absolutely no responsibility for what is to come, whether its good, (as it sometimes is,) or torturously bad, (way more frequent.) Luckily, here to help me carry the load are an unprecedented 5 DIFFERENT GUEST REVIEWERS! Will our guests from other blogs feel the full blunt force of your decisions? There's only one way to find out.

So with no further ado, let's do a motherfucking review!

To Be Continued »

Wrestlemania XXX

World Wrestling Entertainment Proudly Presents...

WWE Wrestlemania XXX

Welcome, cats and kittens to yet another installment of the only reviews that are so popular that even Triple H is willing to put them over, Cewsh Reviews! We have a special treat for you tonight, as we come together once again to cover the crowning moment of the wrestling year, WWE Wrestlemania XXX! Boy, what a year it has been since the last time we did one of these, huh? A new top star has risen from seemingly nowhere to take the wrestling world by storm, the corporation has reformed just in time to fight him and a whole new generation of superstars has grown up right in front of our eyes, from the Shield to Bray Wyatt and beyond. And into this whirlwind of change and renewal steps the gallant warriors of Cewsh Reviews, to lend our thoughts, opinions, freak outs, and assorted neuroses to the story of legend of Wrestlemania. And hoo boy, do we ever have some crazy shit to talk about. With all that in mind, let us roll out the red carpet for you as we assemble once more to tackle one of the most talked about events in wrestling history.

So without any further ado, let's do a motherfucking review!

To Be Continued »

Empty Budokan: How AJPW and NOAH Survived The 00s To Die In The 10s

Nothing lasts forever.

No matter how mighty or unassailable something may seem in the peak of it's strength, it can easily crumble and fall apart if not properly tended to. Staying on top in any industry is all about changing with the times, keeping an eye towards the future and ensuring that your company has everything it needs to keep performing at the highest possible level. As you might have guessed from the title of this post, this is the story of two companies who did not take these lessons to heart. And now, despite both being, at various times, the top promotion in all of Japan, they now both sit on the precipice of obscurity and failure.

How did things get this way? How did the fertile ground that birthed the Four Pillars, (Kenta Kobashi, Mitsuharu Misawa, Toshiaki Kawada and Akira Taue,) later become known for fights in the locker room? How did a company founded by the most popular wrestler in the nation, and built in his image, lead all of wrestling in failed main event pushes? Today, we'll do our best to answer those questions.

To Be Continued »

WWE Royal Rumble 2013

World Wrestling Entertainment Proudly Presents...

WWE ROYAL RUMBLE 2013

Welcome, cats and kittens, to yet another installment of the reviews that will hide under the ring until all the other reviews are eliminated, Cewsh Reviews! We have a special treat for you tonight as we have finally reached what many people consider to be the funnest and most interesting wrestling event of the year, the Royal Rumble. And this one is shaping up to be a doozy, which 30 men ready to enter and seemingly 10 odds on favorites to win. Will the monster Ryback destroy everything in his first Rumble match? Will John Cena erase the stink of 2012 with some redemption? Will Heath Slater make it all the way to the ring before someone beats him up? All great questions. And, for once, the Rumble isn't the only place for rampant speculation and interest. Because we will also see the match up that would have blown 2003 Cewsh's mind out of his ears, CM Punk vs. The Rock. Will Punk rise to the challenge and hold off the greatest threat to his title in his entire 400+ day reign? Or will The Rock find his inner champion one more time and show that he's still as good as it gets? How many more questions can I pack into this intro? I don't know?!

So without any further ado, let's do a motherfucking review!

To Be Continued »

Kenta Kobashi And The Reign Of Excellence

Kenta Kobashi is the greatest professional wrestler who ever lived.

Do I have your attention?

How about if I told you that the man who might well be the greatest babyface ever to draw breath once held a World Championship for 2 straight years, and that that reign is considered by people smarter even than me to be the greatest accomplishment involving gold since 4 old ladies decided to live together and keep it real? What follows here is a chronicle, a review, and an accounting of this reign, and not only what it accomplished, but what it meant to the history of Japanese wrestling as a whole. And if you're the type who immediately dismisses anything that happens in a ring on the other side of whatever ocean or landmass Japan is from where you are, just this once let that wall down and let the incredible battles, triumphs and sacrifices of the man who wields the Burning Hammer wash over you. DDT and Defrost will be your tour guides through the strange and exhilarating world the awaits you, and will tell you everything from the years and years of backstory leading through the matches, to the very specific reason why the way the reign ended may have been the death knell for Pro Wrestling NOAH, even years before the cracks began to show.

So ice your knees in sympathy and lariat the cat, because the greatest reign of Kenta Kobashi is coming. And the world it left behind was forever changed.

To Be Continued »

ROH on HDNET - Episode 1: A New Era.

Ring of Honor Proudly Presents...

ROH on HDNET

Episode 1: A New Era.

Welcome, cats and kittens, to yet another...hey, wait a second. This isn't the Cewsh Reviews that we've come to know and love over the years and read to our children right before they go to bed. Who is this new guy? Why is this a review of a tv show? WHAT'S GOING ON?!

Deep breath. Deeeeep breath. Okay? Okay. Good.

Now then, this is the first review of many to come that will head in an altogether different direction than normal. This review will center around Ring of Honor's weekly television program ROH on HDNET on a weekly (or close to it) basis. "But why ROH?" you may be asking. Well the simple fact is that once upon a time Ring of Honor was the toast of the wrestling world, and was on the tip of the tongue of every hardcore wrestling fan, but in recent years it has fallen into obscurity, so this is not only a weekly review, but an opportunity to shine a spotlight on the various changes since everyone stopped watching, and to answer the burning question "Is Ring of Honor worth watching again?" We hope to find some semblance of an answer here. Or, at the very least, endless opportunities to mock Gabe Sapolsky, who will hitherto be referred to simply as "The Tool". Also you may have noticed i'm calling it ROH on HDNET Episode 1. This is not the first episode, but rather the first episode we will be covering. Consider this as a new dawn for ROH, and everything starting from this review onwards will be treated as a new era entirely.

So let's jump right in and...wait, hold on. I'm forgetting something. AH YES, i'm forgetting about the portion of you who have no idea what Ring of Honor is or why you should care. Well fear not my young squires and squirettes, we have you covered too. In fact, let's get started with a little history...

To Be Continued »

NOAH Departure 2004

Cewsh: This is DDT's debut as a first run contributor to Cewsh Reviews and he had been begging me for months to review this show. Once we finally did I could definitely see why. (And if you want to meet DDT and see what a wrestling fan that is also a physicist looks like, attend any Shimmer show. He'll be the skinny one talking about the complexities of the Japanese independent scene.)

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Pro Wrestling NOAH Proudly Presents…

NOAH Departure 2004

Welcome, cats and kittens, to yet another installment of the only reviews that take a lariat from Kobashi and live to tell the tale, Cewsh Reviews! We have a special treat for you tonight as we travel back to our very first classic show outside of American borders. The reason for the occasion, you ask? Well just a little thing called KENTA FUCKING KOBASHI. Also other various things that have names I’d be more than happy to put into caps and yell at you, but the point is that this was an exciting show by any standards, even for people are aren’t conventional fans of Japanese wrestling. Here we have the conclusion to a rivalry between two of Japan’s biggest stars 5 years in the making, an appearance by my favorite tag team in wrestling history, and generally a card loaded up with the pick of the litter back when NOAH was the hottest promotion on the planet hosted in the historic Tokyo Dome. How does this all play out? How did NOAH fall apart from here? Where are they now? To answer these questions and gives all the backstory your heart can desire, we’ve brought in noted Pro Wrestling historian DDT. Any thoughts DDT?


DDT: Pro Wrestling NOAH from 2000 to 2006 was quite possibly the greatest wrestling promotion on Earth in terms of match quality and “big fight feels”. They were what all the American Indy’s tried to copy, and what all big Japan promotions wanted to be. Eventually, they squandered that with lack of building stars and poor booking, but those six years were jaw-dropping amazing, and still remain a sight to behold. So what are we waiting for, mon capitan? Let’s do a motherfucking review!


Cewsh: Whoa. Bro, BRO.


DDT: Yeah, I stole your line. Deal with it.

To Be Continued »