Who fears the thief
Note: I’m slowly editing and adapting blog posts I’ve written elsewhere to this new blog, so it’s going to be things that aren’t necessarily timely. I hope you’ll enjoy them anyway!
This piece was originally published elsewhere on October 24th, 2017, prior to Minoru Suzuki’s successful defense of his Never Openweight Championship, against Toru Yano at Power Struggle on November 5th, 2017.
I was thinking about the amazing relationship between Toru Yano and Minoru Suzuki, and how their real life selves play out delightfully in their kayfabe rivalry.
Yano is Suzuki’s white whale. Yano, of course, is a clown prince, the “sublime master thief.” Comic relief, the one no one takes seriously, there for laughs and the occasional win-by-cheating upset. Suzuki, of course, strikes fear in the heart of all who see him, beats up Young Boys for yuks, and cows a whole stable of mooks into abject loyalty. And the fear is well-placed: he’s an old salty MMA fighter and he is never ever afraid to hurt people. Shit, he enjoys it. He loves it.
But Yano is 4–0 in G1 competition against Suzuki, and, I believe, in their rivalry all-time is comfortably ahead of Suzuki in terms of wins. In-ring, Yano vexes Suzuki: no matter how brutal or vicious Suzuki gets, no matter how many members of Suzuki’s army are there to interfere, Yano remains one step ahead. Suzuki can get mad or stay cool, it doesn’t matter: Yano is always able to wriggle away, sneak in a low blow, or use Suzuki’s weapon du jour (the one that is definitely going to bring down Yano this time) against him.
So obviously it is fucking hilarious that the one man Minoru Suzuki cannot figure out is the person the rest of the company looks down on and laughs at. Similarly, it’s hilarious that the one person who has been forced, time and again, to take Yano seriously is the hands-down scariest, the one every other member of the roster fears and dreads. It’s beautiful long-term storytelling and the two make surprisingly satisfying foils.
And it’s particularly excellent because this booking angle would not happen without Minoru Suzuki’s permission and (likely enthusiastic) consent. Minoru is respected enough that if he thought constantly losing to the comic relief would be bad for his image, it wouldn’t happen. But it wouldn’t be, and he knows that.
There’s something interesting and kind of touching here. Minoru is of course decorated, the father of Pancrase, a living legend. But many people don’t know that Yano is also decorated. Here’s a good summary from a Tumblr post on the subject:
Yano-san’s achievements in amateur wrestling is indeed extraordinary. He won all 4 titles (both freestyle and Greco-Roman) of intercollegiate championship (only 4 before him achieved that).
Even Shinsuke Nakamura had to take a tryout to join NJPW, but Yano-san was such a big name in amateur wrestling world, he joined NJPW (well, at first Tokon-Club, NJPW’s amateur wrestling division, to be precise) through recommendation from the President of Japan Wrestling Federation. Yano-san is a true wrestling elite.
But as Masahiro Chono says in the gifs on that post, Yano doesn’t have the look to match his talent. So he created a heel character, a comedic goof who constantly cheats to win.
We know that IRL, MiSu is a pretty good-natured guy. With all he’s achieved, it seems like he’d want to see others who are talented get recognition for their work. Yeah, it’s funny, but maybe he’s doing what he can to put over someone who really deserves to have their talent recognized. Maybe he’s making sure that even if Toru Yano doesn’t win tons of titles or set records, people will remember him — after all, someone with his talent deserves to be remembered. Maybe Suzuki’s doing what he can to ensure that even if Yano never gets to be a superstar, he does get the honor of being the one person to strike fear in the heart of the most feared man in wrestling.
