FIVE COURSE GRAPS #5 — Shane Hook

© Photography by World Wrestling Entertainment, New Japan Pro Wrestling

Something I’ve always liked to do when watching wrestling is pick out specific and small moments and try to draw them back to various points of influence in wrestling history. Wrestling’s history often finds itself going back to… well, itself and I always find it fascinating to see what sources the wrestlers of today will draw from to craft their own history, influence and visions for professional wrestling.

I had an idea of how I wanted to explore wrestling history while also drawing back to the wrestlers of today that I love and here I am finally executing it, look at me go. So now I must answer the question that some of you are hopefully asking, what is Five Course Graps?

The main reason I started this whole Wrestling Odyssey thing was to have a way for me to explore as much wrestling as I possibly can, while also having a medium through which I can review and express my thoughts on everything I see. While writing has taken much of a backseat in my creative endeavours in recent times due to burnout and general writer’s block, I am proud to say the desire is back thanks to this new Five Course Graps idea I have.

The gist is simple enough: I ask someone who works/has worked in professional wrestling in any major capacity for 5 matches that are major influences on their style of wrestling, tastes in wrestling, what they want wrestling to look like etc. and review them for this blog to both explore wrestling I (likely) haven’t seen and to get a better understanding of what influences the wrestlers of today.

I mentioned last week in Leon Cage’s piece that there was a building Welsh influence on this project and well, that influence is going to continue with today’s piece covering Leon Cage’s tag team partner in Rising Tide, Shane Hook. Like Leon, Shane has become one of the biggest breakout talents of the Welsh wrestling scene with a breath-taking junior heavyweight style, with Shane having made waves (nautical pun unintended) across promotions like ATTACK!, New Wave (double whammy) and RevPro among other places. As of writing, Shane is currently on the mend from a nasty knee injury so while the good lad’s recovering, let’s take a look at the 5 matches Shane Hook would say made Shane Hook.

MATCH #1: EDDIE GUERRERO vs REY MYSTERIO JR., 26/10/97

Rey pinning Eddie after a Hurricanrana

There have been a few things in wrestling history that I’ve had to watch a couple times to truly get. Contemporaries of mine have often cited this as being in contention for the greatest match of all time and while I always thought it was undeniably fantastic, I never quite got that shout for it. However, watching it again has made me at least understand that take on it a lot more, because this was the first time the match TRULY hit for me.

Eddie had been on a dominant run as US Champion in WCW for almost a year at that point with his run coming to a halt at the hands of fellow luchador, Rey Mysterio Jr., who had put his mask on the line in order to get the match. The story itself is unbelievably simple, 2 men from the same wrestling culture that wrestle vastly different styles out of it and they collide SO beautifully. Rey tried to gung-ho Eddie into submission with lightning quick offence and pure speed but Eddie is a calculated, strategic, unfiltered villain. He completely roadblocks Mysterio at several points in the match and it makes the cutoffs so much more potent that just when you think Rey might be building momentum, Eddie swats his ass like a fly and continues the onslaught. He bends, breaks and manipulates Mysterio for so long that you wonder when Rey’s actually going to find any respite.

When he does, though, it is absolutely breath-taking. The athleticism Rey possesses in this match is fantastic and it helps build a further contrast between the 2 that Rey’s offence is so incredibly bombastic while Eddie’s is so muted, yet both possess the same level of effectiveness. As the match progresses, Rey slowly realises that he has to rely on a window to steal the match because Eddie’s awareness is too sharp for any control to be fully maintained. It shows in the brief spells that Rey has on top of the match, chief among them being THAT Moonsault DDT off the top that is probably the most iconic visual from this match, just beating the TOPE CON DRAGONRANA Rey hits around ⅔ of the way in.

In the end, Eddie yet again cuts Rey off and aims big with a Crucifix Powerbomb from the top to the mat, but Rey manages to hurricanrana him down instead and hold the pin for JUST long enough to defeat Eddie in one of the most beautifully succinct matches ever done and one of the best of the 90s. And to think the whole thing was done on the fly, too.

When asked to provide insight on the match, Shane said:

“This was the first match that came to mind when thinking about matches that influenced me. I go back to watch this match every few months and generally speaking, Eddie Guerrero is just an unreal professional wrestler.”

SHIBRUVA RATING: 9.4/10

MATCH #2: SHAWN MICHAELS vs UNDERTAKER, 28/3/10

Undertaker goozling Shawn Michaels

In quite a cute turn of events, not only have 3 of the best young Welsh wrestlers all submitted a Taker/Michaels match, but Shane has completed what Leon started by submitting the other half the Taker/Michaels ‘Mania duology. Ain’t that sweet for the tag partners? I digress, the match at hand.

As I was watching this match, I realised just how much of an emotional connection I have to both this match and Wrestlemania 26 as a whole. ‘Mania 26 was the first wrestling DVD I ever owned as a kid as it happened around the time I started getting DVD’s & video games & such, so a lot of my earliest wrestling memories involve this show and it involved a LOT of watches of this match, the show’s main event of Michaels vs Taker in a Career vs Streak match. As the match was happening, so many memories flooded back of watching not just this match, but the whole show and I realised I have a lot more sentimental attachment to this match than I previously thought.

I’m also glad to say that even after 16 years from when I first watched and god knows how many changes in wrestling taste, I still love this match as much as my younger self did. The stakes are already at a natural high with Michaels having been consumed by the fact he had gotten closer than anyone before to ending The Streak, but he still couldn’t do it and it ate away at him until he went low to get what he wanted, another shot at Taker’s Streak, but only if he put his career on the line.

It gives the match this incredible energy to it. Everything they do feels potent and rabid, elevated by how Michaels treats the match. He’s not wrestling with caution or trying to play outwardly smart, he’s dying on his sword the entire way through the match, giving everything he’s got in an attempt to right the wrong of last year’s attempt. The early stages of the match see Michaels taking a target on Taker’s left leg and not only does Michaels do well to work it with strikes & submissions and even unintentional offence like his elbow drop and the moonsault through the announcer’s table, but Taker also sells this alarmingly well compared to previous outings in these watchlists and it brings out a detail that I wish we got so much more in Taker’s career.

This doesn’t come across as Undertaker in the match. It feels like Mark Calloway is wrestling the match. There’s so much more humanity in his performance with how much more he focuses on raw emotion and vulnerability and it’s honestly the best Taker performance I can remember for just non-Taker it is. There’s visible weakness in the consistent leg selling, there’s disappointment in Michaels refusing to lay down after the first in-ring Tombstone, there’s so much vim & vigor behind the execution of things like the Chokeslam & the Last Ride, especially with that last one being a coincidental mirror image of the one at Mania 25.

Of course though, this match is about Shawn. One of the most illustrious WWE careers of all time comes to a close and the performance from Shawn here is great. Great desperation in those moments of jeopardy, a solid strategy amplified by great awareness to instantly go to the leg the MOMENT he spots Taker hobbling, amazing bumps and of course the finish of Michaels resigning himself to the grave by clawing himself up Taker’s body and asking him to finish the job with a throat slit, before slapping Taker right across the face to enrage him enough to bust out the illusive Jumping Tombstone to end the match and Michael’s career.

A rare fantastic Undertaker match, because it’s not a match wrestled by the Undertaker, it’s a match wrestled by Mark Calloway. Upon watching this again, I’ve realised this is among my personal favourite matches of all time because not only is it a sentimental one, but it’s also fantastically worked and a real treat to watch, as well as being much tighter than you’d expect.

When asked to provide insight on the match, Shane said:

“This is one from childhood that I’ve got WAYYY too much emotional attachment to so it has to be on here, I love matches that you can just get incredibly emotionally invested in to.”

SHIBRUVA RATING: 9.0/10

MATCH #3: WILL OSPREAY vs RICOCHET, 27/5/16

Ospreay & Ricochet staring down in dual superhero poses

I’ve never fully known how to feel about this match. I remember at the time, I was just getting into the IWC as a space and the discourse about this match went on for DAYS. It felt like the match that lit the fire of what would become the modern wrestling style, sacrificing a lot of substance for a LOT of style. You know on paper what the match is going to be going into it; Ospreay & Ricochet are 2 incredibly springy individuals with a penchant for the extravagant so you know going in that this match is going to be flippy dippy as all hell.

But the one problem of this match is that nothing really sticks in terms of memory, outside of a select few spots. One could argue that this is to the match’s benefit as the frenetic, hyperactive pace of the match leaves you feeling borderline light-headed by the end with just how much wondrous offence they manage to cram into the run-time but personally, I just found myself wanting to feel the people involved. What they’re doing is undeniably spectacular and full credit to them because I had to pick up my jaw a fair few times watching this (what the FUCK was that step-up twisty tornillo that Ricochet did, that shit’s nuts) but so much of it is given so little room to breathe that it comes across less as a strategic awareness of knowing not to give their opponent room, but more as them going to what’s next in their plan for the match.

There’s one particular spot in this match (outside the 19 count but that’s a blanket hatred) that will always irk me. Ricochet drops Ospreay on the apron with a DVD and goes to throw him in the ring to finish the job but Ospreay swings around tiger-feint style and hits a fucking poisonrana on the outside. That all happens within about 6 seconds. Ospreay is dropped neck & shoulders first on the APRON and has enough wherewithal to swing around and hit a poisonrana before you’ve even had time to register the DVD and personally, it just creates a massive disconnect when watching. The match flows well because their chemistry is fantastic but simultaneously, there’s no connective tissue between all the spots besides convenient positioning.

Before I wrap up this review, I do want to highlight particular aspects of their performance. Ricochet gets a hold-focused heat segment in this and while it’s honestly my favourite part of the match, serving as a grounded cooldown after a white-hot start, it’s amplified by how great Ospreay’s reactions are. He’s so vocal and expressive when Ricochet’s bending him up that it does a lot to exaggerate the damage being done and I think it added a lot more to the match for that small period.

Overall, I think I’m always going to have mixed feelings on this match. It’s an undeniable spectacle and easily one of the most influential matches of a generation, but personally, I don’t think it’s influence was completely for the better.

When asked to provide insight on the match, Shane said:

“It was the first proper experience I had of wrestling outside the WWE and as a teenager, I thought it was the coolest thing I’d ever seen so this is definitely up there.”

SHIBRUVA RATING: 7.6/10

MATCH #4: SAMI ZAYN vs SHINSUKE NAKAMURA, 1/4/16

*In a miraculous turn of events, this match has cropped up for the THIRD time in as many weeks as this match was also recommended by Tommy Vril & Leon Cage in the previous 2 installments. After another rewatch, I think my opinions on this match are pretty set in stone so like last week, this review has been lifted from both my pieces with Vril & Cage respectively.

Onto the match though, this match exists as both a celebration of wrestling and a passing of a torch. That term is usually reserved for an older wrestler letting a younger wrestler take the spotlight, but this is more about the role Zayn occupies going into this match. He had effectively been Mr. NXT from the moment he joined the brand, but everyone’s time to move up must come and his call-up to the main roster beckoned only a day later at Wrestlemania 32. As he departs the throne of NXT, another king slides in to take it, that being the King of Strong Style.

Nakamura had arrived with much fanfare after his lauded work in NJPW after the turn of the decade, and the fanfare proved to be justified to the uninitiated the MOMENT his entrance begins with THAT theme song and he appears in silhouette while the bow slides along the strings of that iconic violin like a figure skater on ice. The bell goes and the occasion feels immense from the off. The match itself plays quite similarly to a typical NJPW main event; the feeling out process plays out as you’d expect with Zayn overwhelmed by Nakamura’s sheer presence and applications of Strong Style, but once Zayn figures it out the bombs start flying. Cavalcades of forearms, high kicks, knee strikes, armbars, the whole war chest is brought out and Nakamura is made to draw blood from the nose as the crowd is so deeply engrossed in everything that’s happening. In the end, Zayn gets caught flush with a high kick when attempting his outside Tornado DDT before being rolled back into the ring, and his Exploder Suplex attempt is blocked by a barrage of elbows to stun him for TWO Kinshasa knee strikes to end one of the most lauded matches in NXT history.

A very good and incredibly special match, but I personally don’t think it’s in any true great pantheons.

When asked to provide insight on the match, Shane said:

“Another one I go back to and watch again every few months, it’s just so good. I remember seeing it for the first time and being blown away by what they did and it’s just kinda stuck with me ever since.”

SHIBRUVA RATING: 8.4/10

MATCH #5: BRYAN DANIELSON vs KENNY OMEGA, 22/9/21

Danielson kicking Omega in the chest

Outside of retirement matches, I don’t think any match this decade has come even close to matching this bout in terms of pure occasion and spectacle. There was such a hype and a fervour and intangible FEELING to this match in both the build & as it was happening that I don’t think any match since has come close to replicating. The major spectacle of this obviously comes down to it being Bryan Danielson’s debut in AEW combined with the fact it’s against Kenny Omega, a pairing that many have touted as being one of the most sought after & pondered dream matches of our generation.

But I think within that former notion, there’s something on the flipside of it which is that this is also Bryan Danielson’s return. We had gotten used to Daniel Bryan for the past 11 years that seeing Bryan Danielson come back and play all the old tricks was just magical. Reminding the referee of the 5 count, kicking Kenny’s fucking head in, the psychotic bumps & twitch selling, the surgical precision in his offence, there’s such a wondrous feeling of seeing the greatest of all time doing what made him the greatest of all time. Kenny is a fantastic match of course, he’s one of the best pure match craftsmen the sport has ever seen and the chemistry is palpable from the moment they lock up to a GIANT pop. The match follows the typical epic structure of a feeling out process that eventually makes way for bombs to start dropping, but everything surrounding this match just makes the bombs hit even harder; the sense of occasion gives everything this ‘je nais se quios’ that pulls you in so much more.

The action in this match also feels so much thicker because it’s the first time in over a decade that Danielson has been able to wrestle fully with the chains off. He absolutely sends it in both giving & receiving offence in the match and as time ticks away, you realise that no man has given their opponent any space. There’s this awareness throughout the match that both men carry that they can’t let up for even a SECOND, lest their opponent recover and drop them with a kick, knee strike or a suplex so nothing is given time to breathe and yet, it still does? Everything done still has resonance despite so little time being left between them and it’s legitimately one of the greatest balancing acts in wrestling that I can remember.

Both men ultimately go the distance in a draw that was the PERFECT way to end it. The whole mini-feud was built around who the best was and it going to a draw left it open-ended to also leave further questions about what could’ve happened in a different year or under a different setting between the 2, especially considering Danielson was only a few seconds away from locking in the Lebell Lock until the bell went. Overall, I’m not sure if this match is even top 10 in AEW history (which speaks more to AEW’s nuts catalogue) but it is still a spellbinding match and one of the most unique wrestling exhibitions of modern times.

Despite all these paragraphs, it’s a match beyond words.

When asked to provide insight on the match, Shane said:

“This one sticks with me too, I can’t quite put my finger on why, though. There was just such a special atmosphere around it and it helps that the two are both absolutely ridiculous wrestlers as well.”

SHIBRUVA RATING: 9.5/10