Miu Watanabe & Shoko Nakajima Deliver A Great Match, FWC Defend Goddess Of Stardom Title | Weekly Joshi Guide

Tokyo Joshi Pro Wrestling

TJPW held its annual ‘Yes! Wonderland’ show at Korakuen Hall on Monday as part of Golden Week. The show drew 756 fans, which is a good number, and in the yearly calendar of Tokyo Joshi, always the second-best number at Korakuen Hall for the promotion.

Daisy Monkey made their first successful defense of the Princess Tag Team Titles by defeating HIMAWARI & Wakana Uehara. The rookies getting the spotlight is a great idea and a good step in the new era of TJPW. Wakana had a solid performance as her in-ring work isn’t as developed and advanced as her other attributes, but she’s shown a lot of potential. HIMAWARI is a future star of this promotion as she already shows how great she is in the ring. Suzume & Endo in the veteran role were great to see, and they worked that well. Overall, it is a good match that is worth checking out

The highlight of the show was the main event, as Miu Watanabe successfully defended her Princess of Princess Championship against Shoko Nakajima. Nakajima is the best in this gatekeeper role for the new generation and showed it here. A good performance by her, but the stand out was Miu, who once again proved why she’s one of the best wrestlers in the entire world. She wins the match after around 20 minutes with the Tear Drop. It was a great first defense for Watanabe as she continues to be on the top of TJPW.

STARDOM

STARDOM held a show at Korakuen Hall on Sunday with the main event being for the Goddess of Stardom Championship as Hazuki & Koguma retained their newly won belts against Miyu Amasaki & AZM, and the match was great. FWC & 02Line continue the streak of insane Tag Team Title matches in STARDOM, and it’s another stand-out match for FWC. This was Amasaki’s best performance in her young career as she worked great together with Koguma, who is back at the top of her game. The finishing stretch between the two was tremendous and showed Amasaki’s improvement over the past year.

On AEW Collision, it was announced that Tam Nakano will challenge Willow Nightingale for the TBS Championship at Flashing Champions. Willow is the first AEW wrestler to wrestle in Japan for STARDOM outside of Megan Bayne since Riho in 2020, and this is another step into a deeper AEW-STARDOM partnership. The last time Willow competed in Japan, she lost her NJPW STRONG Women’s Championship to Giulia, and now, just a week before the biggest match of her career, she has the chance to gain momentum by defeating the top star of STARDOM.

A day after, STARDOM announced the full card for Flashing Champions in the Yokohama Budokan on May 18th, but this was quickly followed by a statement revealing that due to the health of some wrestlers, matches that were announced earlier as “finalized” would be determined as “currently planned” in case someone is missing the show. At a press conference a day later, Stardom then posted an updated version of the Flashing Champions card, where four matches got changed including a No.1 Contenders Match for the Goddess of Stardom Tag Team Championships due to Rian, who was in the opening match against Ranna Yagami, missing the show.

Full Flashing Champions 2024 Card:

• Hina vs. Ranna Yagami
• Crazy Star (Suzu Suzuki & Mei Seira) vs. Mutual Love (Natsupoi & Starlight Kid)
• Maika vs. HANAKO
• E-neXus-V (Mina Shirakawa, Xena & Waka Tsukiyama) vs. Fukigen Death, Rina & Azusa Inaba
• STARS (Momo Kohgo, Hazuki & Koguma) vs. Oedo Tai (Momo Watanabe, Thekla & Natsuko Tora) vs. Cosmic Angels (Sayaka Kurara, Aya Sakura & Yuna Mizumori) vs. Queen’s Quest (Lady C, AZM & Miyu Amasaki) vs. (Konami, Saki Kashima & Syuri) – No. 1 Contenders Gauntlet Match for the Artist of Stardom Championship
• Willow Nightingale (c) vs. Tam Nakano – AEW TBS Championship
• Saya Kamitani (c) vs. Saya Iida – High Speed Championship
• Best Friends (Arisa Nakajima & Tsukasa Fujimoto) vs. Eye Contact (Mayu Iwatani & Hanan)
• Saori Anou (c) vs. Ami Sohrei – Wonder of Stardom Championship

Just Tap Out

TAKA Michinoku’s Promotion JTO held a show at Korakuen Hall on May 10th in front of 482 fans. The show featured a JTO Girls Title and Queen of JTO Title match. In the JTO Girls Championship match, Aoi was able to end the reign of Unagi Sayaka and crown herself not only the third JTO Girls Champion but also the first wrestler in JTO to win the Queen of JTO and JTO Girls Titles, which is a huge success for the 21-year-old. Sayaka’s run in the company was built around putting over Aoi by first teaming with her and now putting her over to crown her the new champion, and she succeeded in that role.

In the main event of the show, Tomoka Inaba retained her Queen of JTO Title against Yuu Yamagata and continues to be on the top of JTO. After the match, a familiar theme played, and out came the Maika. The current World of Stardom Champion made a shocking appearance on this show to confront Tomoka Inaba. Maika made her pro wrestling debut in TAKA Michinoku’s promotion before she joined STARDOM in the summer of 2020. During her time in JTO, Maika and Inaba had a rivalry, where they collided in two singles matches, with both taking one victory, but they were also sisters as the ‘Empress of Stardom’ took care of Tomoka during their time as rookies. While Maika made the next step and became the top champion of Stardom, Tomoka Inaba stayed in JTO and reigns over the promotion as a 3x Queen of JTO Champion.

The two agreed to a Singles Match in the main event of JTO’s 5th Anniversary at Korakuen Hall on July 15th. It will be their first singles match in four years, and it shows how much both have grown over time. Maika teased to put her Red Belt on the line if she is holding the Championship by then, which seems likely. It will be interesting to see how the match plays out when the two top wrestlers of their respective promotions collide.