Hayabusa & Masato Tanaka vs. Mr. Pogo & Terry Funk

[9.0] "If you had to ask me to describe Onita's boardroom meeting before this match this is what I would say. "Ok guys lets have everything be on fire, or barbed wire and on top of that when they hit anything that isn't the ring mat it blows up." because that's exactly what this match is and its awesome. Great to see Funk and Pogo even at their older age against the young guns of the promotion. My one gripe is they just didn't choose the right winner. ****(1/2) - Stars"

[8.0] "An insane display of hardcore spectacle that merges blood and brutality with serious production value. Lots of suspense and emotion and gimmicks galore. Though as much as I respect Mr. Pogo being a hardcore legend, I selfishly wish he were a bit more mobile."

[8.0] "Really good match, the explosions can only really be called epic, Tanaka and Funk fighting in the smoke is an amazing visual. Hayabusa and Tanaka do the majority of hard graft here including some really nice spots like a Tanaka pop up into a Hayabusa drop kick, Hayabusa's customary dive to the outside and Tanaka doing a tornado ddt of a chair, Funk takes some big spots and its decent throughout, the one issue is... Mr Pogo, he's just terrible with his slicing people up, and he gets away lightly on the fact he takes one big spot. Slow start followed by a really damn good second half."

[9.0] "It is obviously overkill to have this after Kudo vs Toyoda (and even Cactus vs Kanemaru) but they pull it off by escalating gimmicks to a new level."

[6.0] "Certainly a crazy match with blood and gimmicks galore that resulted in a huge stitch count for Hayabusa & Tanaka. Some people say this is the second best match on the show, but I wouldn't rate it better than fourth, which in part shows what a great show this is by FMW standards, as usually you're lucky if there's two matches worth mentioning. That said, the match was rather disappointing because Kudo & Combat had just demonstrated how to use the essential lack of ropes to your benefit. Since these guys didn't put much time or effort into selling their moves, the lack of them very noticeably hurt the match by removing most of the flow and possibility for sequences. They did a good job of teasing the explosive barbed wire ropes (on two sides) and explosive barbed wire barricades (on the floor on the other two sides), but this wasn't so much a match as a collection of gimmick spots. That being said, everyone did as good a job as you could ask. Hayabusa's strengths are negated because you need something to fly off, but he made the best of it hitting a rolling senton, standing moonsault, and diving over the barbed wire barricade with a kind of lariat/body attack combo. Tanaka's style holds up pretty well because he can do his DDTs and elbows, and he was more than willing to sacrifice his body. One of my favorite spots was the first explosion where Tanaka came ever so close to dropkicking Pogo into the electrified barbed wire, trying to seal the deal with his jumping elbow, which Pogo of course avoided. Funk may be old enough to be Hayabusa & Tanaka's father, but he did almost all the selling for his team, including getting double front suplexed onto the exploding wire. He's smart enough to mix his brawling with actual wrestling, including repeatedly bashing Hayabusa's leg with a chair to set up his spinning toe hold. Pogo was Pogo. He's incapable of wrestling, so it's just going through is bag of weapons. It was quite disgusting the way Pogo sliced and diced Tanaka with his assortment of sharp objects. The fact all four were always fighting helped given you couldn't do too much traditional wrestling, and they spaced the various gimmick spots out well enough to always hold your interest. Pogo cut Hayabusa's mask off after the match and they called out Atsushi Onita, who could do little more than dip his head in shame as his protege was stretchered off."

[5.0] "I respect that FMW have their own style and view of what wrestling should be, but did they really have to take Hayabusa and Tanaka -- two very animated and explosive wrestlers -- and pair them up against two such immobile dudes to thereby limit what they can do? I didn't outright dislike this match, since the general cheesiness of the weapon brawling still had a certain appeal even if it technically wasnt 'good'. The massive explosions were all really cool too, since they were so loud and visually impactful with the massive pluming smoke clouds that they definitely felt like credibly damaging attacks. Hayabusa also got a few cool spots, but nothing too crazy, so this definitely is not a match I'd recommend if you're looking to see him at his best. **3/4"

[9.0] "This was great for FMW's 7th year anniversary. 4 tough guys just doing brutal stuff, the fire stuff was sick. Great psychology with them avoiding the ropes. ****"

[10.0] "I don't always go in for "deathmatch" stuff but this was such a smart and fun match, albeit a pretty bloody one. The "explosions" are very visually cool and I love the psychology of everyone involved fighting to avoid taking the brunt of the damage, it's a unique kind of storytelling that's done very well here. Plus there are some cool stunts with FIRE, which I am a sucker for. :) Four tough guys doing their thing in a match with several jump out of your seat moments, what can I say? Thought this was fantastic."