Stardom Review And Analysis: January 14 at Korakuen Hall

Tag Team Gauntlet: Mary Apache & Natsumi vs Starlight Kid & Alex Gracia vs Hanan & Ruaka vs Hina & Rina

No prize was announced for the winners of this gauntlet, but one has to assume that whoever comes out on top would have a Goddesses of Stardom Title shot in their future. Things kicked off with the team of Starlight Kid and Alex Gracia squaring off with rookie sisters Hina and Rina.

Hina and Rina started off strong with some solid double-teaming on Kid, pummeling her with a series of dropkicks in the corner before locking her in their double cross armbreaker. Kid was eventually able to break free long enough to tag Gracia before the duo found a way to isolate Rina. With a twisting top-rope splash, Kid scored the pinfall on Rina to give us the first elimination.

Up next, Mary Apache and Natsumi!

Mary and Alex started things off with Mary showing quite a bit more speed and agility than we’ve seen thus far on this tour. After a stalemate, Natsumi and Kid were tagged in leading to Kid being trapped in the Paradise Lock. Natsumi tagged Mary in to release Kid via a running dropkick. It’s nice when mother and daughter can bond over the shared delivery of punishment to others.

At some point, with Gracia and Mary legal, it looked like a miscommunication between the two caused a hiccup in the action. Moments later, a frustrated-looking Mary leveled Gracia with a rough lariat. Maybe a receipt for the earlier mix-up? In any event, it was enough to send Kid and Gracia packing.

The final team was a combination of STARS and JAN, Hanan and Ruaka!

Things didn’t go too well for the cross-faction team outside of an opening rush of offense on Natsumi. After escaping the grasp of Hanan, Natsumi tagged in Mary who took down the freshly tagged Ruaka to turn the tides.

Natsumi was tagged back in and delivered her full Paradise Lock to Ruaka which is one of the more devastating versions I’ve seen. Rather than ending with a dropkick to the hip, she breaks her opponent free with a double stomp to the back. One hurricanrana later was enough for Natsumi to wrap Ruaka up for the victory!

Post-match, Natsumi jumped into the arms of her mother to celebrate before being pushed to the mat and abandoned by the former High Speed Champion. We’ll have to see if that spells the end for the pairing in Stardom rings.

Thoughts: A fun gauntlet with just a little bit of sloppiness. Alex Gracia has been the least impressive out of the round of new faces on this tour, and she didn’t do much to sway me in another direction in this match.

I loved the team of Mary and Natsumi here and enjoyed the dynamic of the juxtaposition of the ornery mother and babyface daughter. Hopefully, we’ll see them flesh out the relationship a bit more before all is said and done.