You know those indy matches where people do spots to impress the crowd but the crowd just isn't into it no matter how much work they put in? This was one of those.
I've been watching a little STARDOM lately and it seems they are lacking heat for some of their matches. I don't know if I should blame that on the workers or on the fans or both. But, crowd heat really affects matches.
A good example of how crowd heat affects matches for the better is in old school WWF from the 80's. The fans cared about the wrestlers and were so into everything that happened that the match seemed better than it was and both wrestlers seemed better than they were.
A bad example of how crowd heat affects matches is this match. These girls had a heck of a match. They went at a pace so fast that I think only Natsuki Taiyo can do it. They went about a hundred miles an hour during the beginning of this and actually didn't let up. The crowd was a little into it, but not as much as they should have been. As they went on, they had to slow it down a little, but it was still a good pace.
The girls busted out huge moves in this and the crowd could have cared less. It seemed like generic indy spot-fu, and to a degree, it probably was. The two biggest moves in this match were the Solo Spanish Fly and probably the second or third nastiest move ever, the Spider German. Leon looked at the crowd after hitting Natsuki with the German and the crickets only responded. They even got a shot of Natsuki looked at the crowd going "Hello?".
Crowd Heat really affects matches and I would have liked to have seen what would have happened if they had a hotter crowd for this match. I think this legitimately could have been in the 4 star range. They had a great match but no one cared, and no match that I review can really reach the 4-star plateau without heat. Therefore, I have to give it ***3/4.
The one criticism I have besides the wrestlers taking really stupid bumps is the wrestlers not listening to the crowd. If I was Natsuki in this and the crowd was still dead after the Solo Spanish Fly, I would have ended it immediately. Doing moves for no reaction makes you a bigger fan than the people in the audience, and in this case, they were. This match also shows the dangers of scripting your matches ahead of time. Had they been calling it in the ring, this would have been avoided.
Good match but a terrible crowd.
Rating: ***3/4
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