Customer Reviews

FMW (Frontier Martial Arts Wrestling): King of the Death Match

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(14)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

One of the easiest ways in the US to get a taste of hardcore "garbage" Japanese wrestling. Not for the faint hearted - the best matches are the bloodiest. Painful matches include: a "Double Hell Barbed Wire Glass Crush Spider Net" deathmatchwith Cactus Jack vs. Kanemura, a "No Rope Exploding Double Hell Timebomb" deathmatch with Mr. Pogo, Terry Funk, Tanaka, and Hayabusa, and even a no-rope exploding barbed wire female wrestling match!

As with the other FMW tapes, the announcers try to imitate Insane Clown Posse's funny wrestling tapes, and fail pretty miserably at it. The DVD is recommended since you can turn the announcers off, and you get one pretty good bonus match to boot.

Note this is NOT the IWA "King of the Deathmatch" tournament that made Cactus Jack and Terry Funk famous.

First off this isn't the famous IWA Deathmatch tournament that had Cactus Jack Vs. Terry Funk in the finals, but from the FMW 7th Anniversy show from 96 (I think..). Except for the last 3, all the matches are MAJORLY and HORRIBLY clipped (about half the match) and the commentary is awful. Still the last 3 matches are some of the best Death matches you can find on DVD..

1. Bonus Match: Taka Michinoku Vs. Koji Nakagawa - Now were talking I.. Hey! Wha tha? They clipped everything?!! The Clipping totally messed up the pace of the match, more like a highlight reel - (DUD)

2. Jason da Terrible Vs. Nanjyo Hayato - Pretty neat spots early but it quickly becomes a typicaly quick RAW match (*1/2)

3. Mad Dog Nagayo Vs. Shark Tsuchiya - Womens Hardcore match, basically it's like seeing Mr. Pogo Vs. Cactus Jack in women's form. Typical bloody Garbage match but still OK. (**)

4. Mike Awesome, Horace Hogan & Hiskatsu Vs. The Headhunters & Leatherface - Kind of a letdown considering Awesome and the Headhunters (One of my favorite tag teams, imagine 2 Abdullah the Butchers doing moonsalts outside of the ring :-) are in it. (*1/2)

5. Cactus Jack Vs. W*ing Kanemura (Barbwire, Broken glass match) - Now the REAL DVD starts. Barbwired-Ropes on 2 sides of the ring, other sides have no ropes and boards of barbedwire/broken glass laying on the outside to fall on. Ouch! Kanemura shows he can hang with Cactus by taking some outlandish punishment and cactus, like always, seems to bring some fun originallity to a death match. (****1/2)

6. Megumi Kudo Vs. Combat Toyoda - (Women's Electrified Barbed Wire match) Best match on the DVD. This is Toyoda's retirment match against her ex-teammate/(and lover?) Kudo. The ropes are lined with barbedwire AND electrified. The last two moves are two of the NASTIEST! moves you'll ever see. With the storyline, match, aftermath AND seeing Onita cry it gets my only perfect Deathmatch rating ever :-) (*****)

7. Hayabusa & Masato Tanaka Vs. Terry Funk & "that crazy [...]" Mr. Pogo (Electricfied Barbedwire / Exploding Ring Deathmatch) - Terry Funk and Pogo don't think Hayabusa/Tanaka have the "heart" (balls) to represnt FMW so they challenge them to a ridiculouly crazy deathmatch. The ropes are electrified with more boards of barbed wire outside the ring. And of course Mr. Pogo and Terry Funk bring there own toys along. Oh, and the ring with explode in 15 min. Kind of a let down, but you definitly gets to see everything you'd thought you would, Fire, Blood, Knives, Terry Funk swinging and slipping around the ring... (****)

When I got this home I was a little disappointed to find that the disc is made up of 8 matches from the 5-5-96 show and tokyopop made no indication that it wasnt actually a tourney. Strange title considering IWA had the deathmatch tourney! Aside from that the matches are excellent and if you can withstand the dull and useless commentators you will find some highly entartaining and hardcore matches.

Highlights include Mick Foley as you've never seen him before in a brutal double hell barbed wire glass crush spider net death match and another highlight is two women having one helluva wrestling contest in a ring surrounded by electricifed barbed-wire!

A must for anyone who hasnt seen anything like this before and who wants to see how seriously the Japanese treat it as a sport instead of entertainment.

Oh yeah, its region free as well so it will work on ALL dvd players!

When I first purchased this DVD, I was under the impression that it was an uncut video of the King of the Death Match 2000 tournament, but instead, it was a montage of some of the most memorable FMW matches to date. Included in its allstar cast of wrestlers including Hayabusa, Mr. Pogo, The Gladiator Mike Awesome, Mick Foley, Horace Hogan, The Headhunters, and the one and only "Drunk" Terry Funk, is an incredible match that some of you hardcore wrestling fans may remember from ICP's Stranglemania 2 between "Mother-in-Law" Toyota and Ho Kudo. This match alone is reason enough to buy this DVD. (You have to see it to believe it.) The only problems I have with this DVD is, for one, the American announcer hired by Tokyopop to do the color commentary absolutely reek of mediocrity, and the second reason being that This is not a complete coherant tournament. There's no shortage of barbed wire or the red stuff in this one though, but if you were strictly looking for the King of Death Match 2000 Tournament, no luck this time, but for this price I certainly don't regret the purchase.

This wasnt the best FMW DVD that they have to offer.

When it comes to death matches this pretty much serves its purpose, on exception of the very first match. The rest were bloody and brutal in true death match fashion.

I have to say that the Combat "Mother in Law" Toyoda vs. Megumi Kudo match is on my personal top 10. You dont look at them as just some female competitors tryin to wrestle like the big dogs. All you see are two intense wrestlers giving their all and producing a quality death match.

Overall a good piece to add to a wrestling fans collection.

Man, the main event is AWESOME and Brutal. This is the real BLOODSHED Hardcore Wrestling should always be like. Wrestlers are risking them selves for HONOR and FAME and Who's the man, that's the question you'll find in this DVD. IT'S GONNA TAKE BLOOD. SWEAT. AND MORE BLOOD TO BE THE KING OF THE DEATH MATCH. Here are the matches and ratings of each match:

Match 1: Nanjyo vs. Jason the Terrible (Poor)
It's the introduction match which mostly be average or below average. (*)

Match 2: Mad Dog Nagayo vs. Shark Tsuchiya (Good)
Well, it's a tough girls match that hell breaks loose. Knives, Kerosine, and chains are all fair game so stand clear...

Match 3: Horrace "CPA" Boulder, Mike "GLADIATOR" Awesome, and Ooya vs Super Leather and the Head Hunter Twins (Good)
NO COMMENTS...

Match 4: Cactus Jack vs. Kanemura (Excellent)
BARBED WIRE, BROKEN GLASS, NO RULES APPLY DEATH MATCH. BANG! BANG! As everyone know Cactus in ECW, He's a 100% HARDCORE SON OF a GUN that loves pain and BLOOD...

Match 5: Combat "Mother in Law" Toyoda vs. Megumi Kudo (Excellent Ending)
It's Combat "Mother in Law" Toyoda's final match in the FMW and she is pitted against onetime partner Megumi Kudo. Watch out! The ring is surrounded with electric barbed wire--so, ground yourself because the sparks are gonna fly. It's very SAD ending, sometimes you have to cry...
Electric barbed wire in the ring and on the floor, knives, Fire, Gasoline,and what ever it should take to win this match...

HIGHLY RECOMENDED for All HARDCORE Fans of FMW and ECW... THIS IS WRESTLING AT ITS HARDEST!
FMW DVD is beyond WWF(Entertainment wrestling) and WCW(Entertainment). This is HARCORE, VIOLENCE, AND CHAOS.

I think it's more harsh than ECW DVD's but at least ECW and FMW are MUCH better than WWF and WCW. It's Worth your $money$, beleive me, especially the Main Event. GO FOR IT.

While devoted hardcore fans may be unimpressed, this tape makes an excellent introduction to Japanese hardcore for new fans, particularly those mourning the death of ECW. The women's barbed wire match and the Cactus Jack match are the best (and bloodiest) matches on the tape, while the Funk/Pogo/Tanaka/ Hayabusa match is somewhat spoiled by some spots (falling into the landmine, the bulldog into the flaming chair) that just didn't look impressive). The six-man match would have been better shown in its entirety rather than being clipped (clipping has been a problem with all the Tokyopop FMW releases). And yes, the announcers are moronic enough to make you long for Tony Schiavone and Mike Tenay. Still, the good outweighs the bad enough to make the show a solid must-see.

If you're more than a casual WWF or WCW fan and want to watch some wrestling action that's a bit different, then this tape is worth picking up. I know that I've only given the tape 3 stars, but with the clipping of the matches and the horrible commentary, I can't give it 4 stars. The first two matches are decent, for what they are - the first a squash match and the second a women's garbage match - but the rest of the DVD is quite good. I actually liked the Megumi Kudo/Combat Toyoda match, which surprised me, as I can't get into womens wrestling. Hayabusa & Masato Tanaka vs. Terry Funk & Mr. Pogo was pretty cool, but since this is showing off the deathmatch show, Hayabusa isn't able to work towards his strengths. Mick Foley has a great match as Cactus Jack takes on Kanemura.

Also, there's a bonus match of TAKA Michinoku vs. Koji Nakagawa that looked like it would've been really good, but they only give you 7 minutes or so out of the 19 minutes that the match lasted. If you want to see a good overview of what FMW is all about and get a decent introduction to the wrestlers and whatnot, then pick this DVD up. And set the audio to the original Japanese commentary. Even if you don't understand what is being said, it's more interesting than what the American commentators have to say. I'd always thought that the commentators should know the names of the moves that the wrestlers use...

I was really surprised to see this and immediately bought it. Some of the wrestlers included in this DVD are Cactus Jack (Mick Foley), Hayabusa, Terry Funk, Masato Tanaka, Wing Kanemura and Super Leather (Leatherface).This DVD includes 7 matches, one being a bonus match found in the "extras" section, the best being the Hayabusa & Tanaka vs Terry Funk & Mr.Pogo in a electric barbed wire match with weapons. Three of the matches unfortunetly are very boring in my opinion, two of them being women's matches and the other being the opening match between Nanjyo and Jason the Terrible which only lasts about 5 minutes. The english commentary hurts this DVD as well, the announcers frankly stink and try to hard to be funny. But, all in all, its not a bad DVD but could have been a lot better. Pick it up if you're interested in seeing some good wrestling action but if you already have a bunch of FMW tapes I would recommend saving your money.

I must admit, seeing this on DVD totally surprised me. You must understand, as wonderful as puroresu is, it seems that it has little chance of becoming popular in the states--probably due to the lack of disqualifications and no-contests we see in the American variety. Anyhow, I must admit that I've seen better from FMW--just not on any DVD's you can find at a store. If you are a fan of any American wrestling, I would recommend that you see this if for no other reason than to see what's happening in the Nippon. Puroresu has been, and always will be, more enjoyable and more atheletic than any WWF or WCW ...-athon. Specifically, this DVD is quite good, with some of the better matches in FMW history being featured. I was disappointed that Atsushi Onita was not included, but I suppose this can be overlooked by anyone who is not familiar with the FMW. On this DVD American fans will see: Mike Awesome, Cactus Jack, Terry Funk, Masato Tanaka, Taka Michinoku and Hulk Hogan's nephew, Horace Boulder amongst others. The match between Combat Toyota and Megumi Kudo could be called one of the greatest matches FMW; and for that matter, wrestling in general, has ever put out. Really, if you're a fan of the FMW, All Japan, or simply a casual, American viewer, you cannot go wrong with this purchase.