Rating: ****1/4
This year's N-1 Victory series, a tournament previously known as the Global League from 2010-2019, was honestly pretty damn fun. I covered it a bit here and put out a special BOUT BLITZ playlist episode focused on it, as well.
NOAH in general remains a company I have a lot of respect. I also always feel that they don't get nearly as much love as they deserve. If their English commentary team wasn't the drizzling shits it'd help, I'm sure.
Oh well.
For this digest entry, we're specifically looking at the finals of this year's tournament which featured Go Shiozaki taking on Kenou. For fans of the art that aren't super familiar with NOAH, know that these are two of their best so it'd be as big of a deal as Roman versus Seth or something like that.
Someone somewhere is mad right now.
Note that this is their 7th encounter as best as I can tell/remember. It's most notably, considering the circumstances, a repeat of the 2017 finals. Oh look...
Both are very different performers today, but that maturity, alongside their mountains worth of talent, and their history and path behind them allowed for this to deliver big. A tournament is only as good as the finals. It should represent the entire set of matches that preceded it. It should give fans a display of why the finalists were worthy of their spots.
Simply put, they succeeded.
Chops and kicks galore, and a fighting spirit display with a slow burn pace; this year's N-1 Victory closed on a high note. They went epic formula for this one, putting in for over 30-minutes of drama. It's contests like these that I always believe feel like mini-movies and I'm admittedly a suck for them. It's an experience to witness two artists performing costumed murder art at this level and I was all for this latest edition to the genre.
The tributes to the legends of puro from one of my all-time favorites and Kenou's attempts to overcome through pure dickish strikery especially added nicely to the viewing experience.
In short, this is well worth your time. Consider it if you have time. I think you'll have a good time.
I said time a lot just now. Oh well.
Note that Digest 134 will cover the follow-up to this one.
Thanks to all that gave this some time. You're appreciated.
0 Comments
COMMENT