“I fucking hate Shingo Takagi”: the story of the eternal rivalry of Dragon Gate’s first trueborns (part 2)

By Paul K

Part one is here!

Sixty Minute Men

May 2008: Takagi and Hulk were once again in opposing units, and now bitter enemies. Takagi saw Hulk as weak, and blamed him for the lack of success of New Hazard, their shared faction. Hulk felt personally betrayed by a man he had formed a huge bond with. 

Their first singles match since Ota-ku 2006 would take place at Osaka Prefectural Gym #2 on 29th June 2008, once again with a Dream Gate key on the line. The result was shocking, a sixty-minute draw – a first in Dragon Gate history, and by far its longest match up to this point. The aftermath was even more shocking, as current champion CIMA announced he was vacating the title due to injury. Shingo and Hulk would re-match with the title on the line the following month at Kobe World, DG’s biggest show of the year.

The buzz among fans leading up to World was palpable, with opinions split over who would take home the big one. Shingo had been positioned stronger than Hulk practically since Day One, but on the other hand he was a heel, and heels never win the main events of DG’s big shows, especially not World. So, was this Hulk’s time? He had looked very strong in recently disposing of veteran Yasushi Kanda, although that was technically a different character, Darkside Hulk. He was the number three in WORLD-1, but with DoiYoshi likely focusing on their tag team, maybe Hulk was in position to represent WORLD-1 as champion, and eventually rise to becoming its leader. One could argue his look and persona was more suited to being Dream Gate champion than Shingo, however he really struggled with microphone performances, an aspect of DG that’s very important.

After a near 40-minute battle, Shingo was the one who prevailed. In another surprising development Takagi showed respect for his rival after the match, taking back calling him weak. Real Hazard promptly kicked him out – not a complete shock, as Shingo had held off an Real Hazard attack on CIMA at the previous Korakuen. 

Shingo left Kobe with Dragon Gate’s most prestigious title in tow. While the victory was somewhat tainted by not beating the previous holder, he at least could stake a claim to being the top guy in the company for now. As for Hulk, despite proving to Shingo that he was not in fact weak, this result proved to the DG faithful that Hulk was well behind Shingo in the pecking order.

Cabellera contra Cabellera

Takagi and Hulk had once again reached a truce, although they were far from friends. The following year would see them both have mixed fortunes. While Takagi would remain Dream champion until December, he never really connected with the fans and seemed very far from replacing CIMA as company ace. He did temporarily replace CIMA as leader of Typhoon, although that unit’s popularity stalled as he lacked chemistry with his team-mates. After leaving Typhoon he formed his own unit Kamikaze, along with Tozawa-juku refugees Akira Tozawa and Taku Iwasa, and later KAGETORA, Cyber Kong, and YAMATO. While the unit was somewhat successful, it paled in fan support to the likes of WORLD-1 and WARRIORS-5, CIMA’s post-Typhoon project. While the fans respected Takagi and enjoyed his matches he just lacked that certain something. It’s very difficult to put into words, but to be a true top guy in Dragon Gate, you need more than just ring ability. You even need more than mere charisma. You need a certain type of charisma. The type of charisma that the likes of CIMA, Doi, and YAMATO exude. The difference between being well-liked and truly loved. This would become exacerbated by his murky involvement in the Cora situation (long, and grim, story – look it up if you dare).

Hulk was in a similar predicament. He would indeed be a distant number three to DoiYoshi in WORLD-1, with Doi starting a record-length Dream run in 2009, and Yoshino beginning a serious push as a singles top guy. Hulk was just kind of there. He had come no nearer to fulfilling the “endless possibility” promised on his debut. During this time, Hulk and Takagi would find themselves across the ring in tags, trios, eight-mans etc., but there were no hostilities to speak of. Hulk and Takagi found themselves drawn together again in autumn/winter 2009, as the Veteran Army (CIMA, Masaaki Mochizuki, Don Fujii, Dragon Kid, Gamma, Magnitude Kishiwada, Super Shisa and inexplicably Takuya Sugawara) formed and declared war on the younger generation. New Generation, a loose affiliation between WORLD-1 and Kamikaze meant Shingo and Hulk were once again on the same side. Veteran vs. New Generation, while promising much, was a big disappointment, fizzling out quickly with only a wild Korakuen Naniwa-shiki elimination match being memorable. 

In spring 2010, Takagi and Hulk once again met in a King of Gate semi-final, with Takagi getting the victory en route to winning the whole tournament. Around this time, both men were showing signs of character change. Takagi was having a lot of strife with his fellow Kamikaze members, showing heelish tendencies culminating in invading Hulk’s pre-match dance to challenge Hulk to a singles at World. Shortly after, Hulk announced he would be scrapping the dance routine entirely in order to focus on his matches. He really wanted a singles victory over Takagi, and to move to the next level. During a verbal battle, Takagi scoffed at Hulk’s confidence, challenging Hulk to put something truly important on the line if he was so sure he could win. Hulk accepted, and the hair vs. hair stipulation was added.

The match was promoted as almost the equal of the main event (Yoshino beating YAMATO for the Dream Gate) and it didn’t disappoint. This was easily their best match to date, wrestled with an energy and ferocity that really conveyed their bitterness and hatred towards each other. I like to think they were taking out their frustrations over failing to ascend to ace level out on each other. Hulk, in particular, was wrestling with a new-found energy and intensity. However, it wasn’t enough to retain his coiffured locks and was shaved bald to the horror of many a female fan. Shingo taunted him after the match, and told him that now he’d lost both his entrance and his hair he should revert to his real name.

All-out war

Hulk did revert to his real name, albeit for only one match – forming a strange tag team with Jinsei Shinzaki where he took on Shinzaki’s monk gimmick. Other than that it was business as usual for Hulk. He continued to forgo the dance but his entrance music, costume, ring style and character were all as before. Takagi also showed no movement in character – continuing to be ostensibly a babyface, but showing somewhat heelish tendencies occasionally, generally being very stoic, and continuing to get only limited fan support.

However, great change was afoot in Dragon Gate. A long series of events including Doi’s betrayal of WORLD-1, the dismissal of the worst heel unit of all time, and some strange men in metal masks led to the January 2011 unveiling of the 12-strong super unit Blood Warriors (BW), immediately declaring war on all other units. Their numbers were too much for Kamikaze, WORLD-1 and the remnants of Veteran Army, and on Mochizuki’s winning of the Dream Gate he urged the other units to come together to face off the Blood Warriors threat. Everyone was in agreement. Well, almost everyone. The big stumbling block was the Hulk/Takagi problem. No way would they be on the same side. BxB Hulk well, fucking hates Shingo Takagi. And the feeling was mutual. Nevertheless, Mochy’s persuasive skills forced the rivals into a handshake and an agreement to both join the nascent JUNCTION-THREE and to team at the June Korakuen. 

Problems were apparent from JIII’s opening Korakuen address, with Hulk and Takagi far from comfortable in each other’s company. Again, Mochizuki played facilitator and they each pledged their loyalty to the JIII cause. However, when Takagi made his entrance for the main event Hulk was nowhere to be seen. Suddenly, emerging from the audience…Darkside Hulk? What?? Well, it was actually Blood Warriors member Naoki Tanizaki in disguise. But the confusion was enough to create an opening for newest member BxB Hulk to attack Takagi from behind. Hulk’s joining of JIII had been a ruse, and he was now a heel for the first time in his career, complete with an image change that was an odd hybrid of his regular gimmick and Darkside. BxB Hulk was the penultimate piece of CIMA’s “shift change” of BW, removing the weak (Gamma) and virtuous (Dragon Kid) and adding new members to drive the group further into heel territory. The final piece arrived moments later when Akira Tozawa made his return from a long US excursion. Hulk would get his long-awaited singles victory over Takagi at the next Korakuen, before unsuccessfully challenging Mochy at World. Takagi would be in a mini-slump, his loss to Hulk compounded at World by a huge upset loss to Tozawa, whose previous DG career was as a comedy match loser turned low-card scrappy underdog. 

The BW-JIII war raged for the rest of the year. While CIMA was undoubtedly the leader of BW, and the main events were dominated by Mochy defending against a BW challenger-of-the-month, for me the beating heart of the BW-JIII feud was the rivalry between the four DG trueborns, TakaYAMA (Takagi and YAMATO) vs. Darkside Tension AKA Hulk & Akira. The heel team could claim decisive victory in the rivalry, both from beating TakaYAMA for the Twin Gate titles at Final Gate, and from Hulk and Tozawa beating YAMATO and Takagi respectively in no-rope singles matches in January 2012. Insult was added to injury by virtue of no-rope being YAMATO’s signature match. 

What had been a one-sided rivalry up to now had changed tide – it seemed turning heel had given Hulk the impetus to start dominating Takagi.

8th June 2011 (Photo credit: battle-news.com)

Nothing to lose

The aforementioned no-ropes matches actually took place after the BW-JIII war had ended. As 2011 drew to a close, a rift started to develop between the younger and older members of BW. In a Loser Of The Fall Leaves Their Unit trios match in January 2012 Hulk and Akira turned on CIMA, purposely having him take the fall to have him leave the unit. Hulk and Akira were now de facto leaders of the unit and challenged JIII to a 14-man Unit Disbands elimination match for the following month’s Korakuen. BW won to consign JIII to history. However, Hulk and Akira had no interest in continuing what was started by old man CIMA. They remolded the unit in their image – kicking out the old guys, changing the colour scheme and renaming it Mad Blankey. Hulk and Akira would be co-leaders, with Hulk officially the higher-ranked top guy, but the charismatic and loud-mouthed Tozawa as the spokesman.

March 2012 (Photo credit: battle-news.com)

At this time, DG reverted to its typical format of the entire roster split into 5-6 person-strong units. TakaYAMA, however, were slightly adrift for a while, not really fitting into any of the other units they just stayed doing their own thing as a tag team until they eventually were coerced into forming a unit by a couple of rookies. -akatsuki- (daybreak) was an odd unit, comprising TakaYAMA and two low-ranked rookies, Chihiro (the future Punch) Tominaga and Super Shenlong III (Yosuke Watanabe, the future Yosuke♡SantaMaria). DG units are typically balanced, with an even distribution in terms of rank – using Mad Blankey as an example, Akira and Hulk as leaders/top guys, Cyber Kong as upper midcarder/occasional Dream challenger, foreign assassin Uhaa Nation, promising rookie “Naoki Tanizaki” (not the real Naoki Tanizaki but the future T-Hawk, long story), long-term lower-rank heel Kzy and bottom feeder Mondai Ryu. -akatsuki-, by comparison,  had two top guys in TakaYAMA, then a huge gap, then Tomi and Shenlong. In reality, this meant TakaYAMA continued almost exclusively as a tag team, as the rookies weren’t strong enough to compete in major trios or 8-mans. The idea of the unit was that TakaYAMA would lift the two rookies to a higher level. That never happened.

Mad Blankey was a far more successful unit, becoming arguably Dragon Gate’s most popular heel unit ever. This was a feather in Hulk’s cap – MB was his vision, named after his two favourite bands (The Mad Capsule Markets and Blankey Jet City) and with him choosing the colour scheme and designing the logo/merch.

Let’s get back to CIMA, who was still holding strong as the undisputed ace. He had a great 2012, retaining the Dream Gate throughout the year, and remaining the undisputed ace of the promotion. As the year drew to a close, it seemed nailed on that CIMA was on course to drop the title at Final Gate – it was DG’s last “big match” show until the following spring and it was unheard for title changes outside of these shows. Surely CIMA wouldn’t be keeping it that long, so it was a certainty Final Gate would see a title change – but to who? The champ already had successful defences against the other “Top 6” New Generation guys Tozawa, YAMATO, Yoshino and Doi, that left only Hulk and Takagi. In a surprise, CIMA defended against both Hulk and Takagi in a three-way. In an even bigger surprise, CIMA retained and gave his victory/end-of-year address standing on a car in his gear on a bitterly cold December evening – because he is CIMA. This result was an indictment, depending on your perspective, either on CIMA’s ego or on the failure of the New Generation to step up to his level.

As 2013 dawned, Mad Blankey continued to chug along, while -akatsuki- somehow got into a feud with Windows, the bottom feeder unit of DG. This laid bare what a failure -akatsuki- was. Not only were they reduced to a feud with Windows, but they actually lost – with Shingo getting pinned by K-ness (in a miracle comeback year) in the blowoff. Something had to give, and YAMATO finally snapped in June, turning on Shingo and -akatsuki- and joining MB. Shingo rebounded from this betrayal by beating his fellow New Generation rivals in a 6-man battle royal to gain the Dream key for World. CIMA was still champion at this point having defeated an array of challengers in his “every month Dream Gate defence series”. Surely Shingo had to win this time? It spoke volumes as to how cold Takagi was that many fans actually picked CIMA to retain. However, in an epic main event Shingo managed to score the win to end CIMA’s record-breaking reign.

It seemed like Shingo was the chosen one to take over CIMA’s role as both long-term champion and ace. But YAMATO, drunk on his new heel status, had other ideas. After MB both sent -akatsuki- into the history books and ousted Tozawa the new MB leader challenged Takagi for his newly-won title. The match took place at the September Korakuen and YAMATO walked out the new champion. This was a shocking result on many levels. First, the Dream Gate never changed hands at Korakuen. Furthermore, the belt was never won by heels apart from very rare occasions. What’s more, YAMATO cheated to win (via Mondai Ryu’s salt) – unheard of for something as prestigious as the Dream Gate. 

1 August 2013: YAMATO challenges (photo credit @pkdx)

Shingo was once again as far from the ace position as he’d ever been – he formed the super babyface unit Monster Express with Tozawa and Yoshino. However with the addition of popular gaikokujin Ricochet and Uhaa Nation, he was arguably the number 5 in his unit in terms of crowd support. BxB Hulk was in a similar predicament- Naruki Doi once again betrayed Yoshino to turn heel and join MB leaving BxB Hulk as a distant number 3 in the unit he created.

Shingo and Hulk found themselves as far from ace status as they’d ever been, superseded in popularity by their senpai, kouhai, and outsiders. The next few years would see many changes however, encompassing heel turns, babyface turns, long Dream Gate reigns, and of course many unit shakeups. The rivalry will seemingly come to a permanent end when one man changes company and goes on to have more success than anyone would have guessed.

You can find Paul @PaulK667 on twitter. Say hi!

Final part 3