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leaveharmony · 6 years

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Hogwarts Foeyay: A History

Because the box marked coping mechanisms / self care is empty save for a napkin with “hyperfixate on nonsense” scribbled on it, ‘cos @breadclubrising suggested once I redo it in post form, and because I've been meaning to anyway.

Why do I ship Shinsuke & Tana*, by T’Sora, age 5.

*(OBVIOUSLY I mean in kayfabe**)

**(although tbh the statements “No of course they’ve never had that kind of relationship in actuality” and “Yeah they were at it like rabbits” would cause in me the exact same lack of surprise. It’s my only wresting ship tbh but this canoe paddles itself)

The first time I saw Tana, I thought he was a heel. A perfect storm of complete ignorance of New Japan and blind love for Shinsuke resulted in my assumption that he was a beloved babyface, and therefore anyone fighting him was by default a heel; this ignoring the fact that I'd watched him use blatant heel tactics against Ibushi mere minutes before, and swat Red Shoes aside like an irritating mosquito, besides. I forget what specific match it was but it was definitely a multi-man tag. I know for certain Yujiro was in it, because the Tanahashi / Takahashi problem had me distracted for most of the match, with a further YOSHI-HASHI complication thrown in for good measure. YOSHI's was the first name I learned, which may go some way towards explaining my unwavering love for Tacos. If I recall rightly, I solved it with TaNahashi, Not in CHAOS, TaKahashi, CHAOS but spelled wrong. (or right, depending on how much fearless leader'd had to drink that day)

But I digress. Tana had the Intercontinental title, which was clearly Shinsuke's belt, and my first read on the situation was that he must be a jerk, and they probably hated each other. We all of us sometimes make mistakes. -_-

I think it was the pre-WK8 VTR that caused me to reassess this conclusion...I used to watch anything I could find in a frantic attempt to play catch-up and learn everything there was to learn.

(it ends with this, because blowing kisses at your rival is definitely a thing people do)

It of course included some scenes from what I affectionately call the ‘Wrestleprom invitation,’ which reads less like a mocking challenge to a mortal enemy and more like a flirtatious dare which would have started with “What are you wearing?” if it was a late-night phonecall.

Key moments: When Shinsuke, all fired up after his title defense & having laid out an invitation to the ring sees that Tana is on his way down the aisle, lets loose a radiant smile that could have powered a continent for about half a year:

When Tana comes out with his lips puckered in what he probably meant to be a skeptical or cautious way but just hilariously makes it look like he thinks a dip-kiss is a forgone conclusion to this encounter

This fucking exchange of expressions. This is like...a time-stop, right here. Everybody comes in footloose and fancy free until they stop avoiding eye contact; when they stop looking at beruto and start looking at each-other, this happens. Shinsuke's tone goes from cocky to soft, his face goes from arrogant to almost tender. Tana's apparently so thrown by the sudden shift in mood that he, the Ace of New Japan, can't handle the intensity of the look on Shinsuke's face and actually drops his gaze for a few seconds. Not, looking off to the side or looking at the crowd, the camera, the title...not an act of defiance or gesture of indifference, but something like a flicker of momentary vulnerability or uncertainty. Like it's painful or overwhelming for some reason and he involuntarily shows this, which is just...for someone as poised as Tana who probably started perfecting his facial expressions in the mirror at age 13, is almost startling.

When Tana recovers himself after being momentarily wrong-footed, and makes Shinsuke PAY for that half-second loss of control with a torturous wait for him to actually speak. Shinsuke, ham that he is, runs through about 18 different facial variations of "Oh please oh please oh please please please" even while he looks like he's trying not to laugh at the way Tana's toying with him.

Tana's opening gambit and Shinsuke's immediate reaction to it: “It's been a while.”

After that everything reverts back to normal, with Tana being a dork and Shinsuke being a dork right back, and it's a date.

In the same VTR, iirc the first thing Tana says is to call them “Rivals,” but something about the way he smiles when he says it made me laugh and think “Ohhhhhh - it's rivals with quotation marks.”

Of course it didn't take me long to run into what has become my favourite match: the G1 Climax 25 final.

Which had

Its share

Of moments

That may

Have contributed

To shipping them.

I know I talk about this every single time but the bit where Shinsuke raises Tana's hand only after Tana's taken two steps forward because he thinks they're going to hug and the subsequent grumpy look on his face when Shinsuke swerves him is forever hilarious to me.

Of course as I became more familiar with everything I learned they were once a tag team, and lost my entire shit about it. I've only found a few matches from that time (the most fun of which was the match from Mexico where they won one fall by pinning the guy together).

But there are a fair number of absolutely fucking quality pictures of their Mexican excursion which in the right viewing order absolutely makes them look like newlyweds on honeymoon.

Probably some of the dynamic stems from them + Shibata having been slated as the new “Three Musketeers,” only for Shibata to fuck off & leave them as two people shouldering a burden rather than three, in the middle of a difficult time and with the future anything but assured.

There's literally a whole book about them - which I can't yet actually read without some considerable effort over like, at least a year (it's in the to-read pile but so are four of Shinsuke's books and one of Tana's). Probably for reasons of Vince Owns His Soul Now Shinsuke didn't do a lot of hyping for it so it fell to Tana, who, roughly translated, offered this gem about their relationship: “If I'm the sun, Shinsuke is like the moon. Even if one of us is gone, there's no New Japan without Tanahashi and Nakamura.”

Verbally, most things come from Tana. Calling Shinsuke ‘a good-looking guy,’ talking about being ‘lonely’ without Shinsuke & hoping they'll ‘meet again someday,’ because ‘surely, this can’t be it,’ referring to the Intercontinental title as his ‘lifeline’ (and chasing it so hard, and shouting-out with Shinsuke's signature gesture when he won it, and refusing to tap out & lose it even up to the point of injury & referee stoppage). When talking about them, Tana almost always uses ‘ 二人’ which means two people but also means ‘couple’ - one of the few words I had actually retained from a first aborted attempt to learn the language, because of a line in a Gackt song which was....not platonic in tone or meaning. Or I’d think I was tinhatting. Tana definitely sees them as a matched & indivisible pair, though, regardless of context.

Shinsuke's cues are both more and less subtle, as he rarely says anything on the subject but often does things like this

And this

When interacting with or talking about his....rival.

“Rival”

This is how he chose to finally look at him during the press conference for G1 24, little sigh and all.

I suppose the really painful smoking gun is the part I hate most. If Tana's grumpy face after G1 25 suggested “What's a guy gotta do to get a Moment around here?!” than the answer was, “Lose his other half forever, maybe.” Because the last match is like being stabbed 47 times in the heart with a dull spork and then rolling around in hot sauce & vinegar. For lots of reasons! But extra-specially because of all their interactions. The crowd, first off, literally boos Goto for inserting himself into the Moment & delaying their face-off. Which is....charged, when it comes.

The best and worst thing Kenny has ever done was walk out into this sea of emotion and try to make it about him. I remember actually yelling curses at the screen as soon as I heard his voice (while still sobbing uncontrollably), because how fucking dare he, who the fuck does he think he is to imagine himself important or even significant in this moment if all moments? But it wasn't...about...Kenny. It was a quiet little stroke of genius, Kenny could have been anything or anyone, he was a non-entity and a means to an end; he was there for no other reason than to be an irritating twit yammering nonsense at the most important person in the building. Because as soon as he started, this happened.

A man being Once Again ditched by someone who ought to be holding up a share of the burden reacted not with hostility towards his departing rival, but in his defense. Shinsuke, as soon as Tana literally placed himself between them gets this brilliant “Well, holy shit.” look on his face.

And Tana, reading Kenny the riot act, finally gets his Moment.

Which I think I may have found pictures of from every angle in Korakuen by now

(I'd just like to shout-out in appreciation of the frozen rictus on Kenny's face, which is very articulately saying “This is the gayest shit I've ever seen, and I literally told a member of the press I was gonna marry my tag partner”)

When the dust settles, we're again left with futari, two people, a couple. Asked about the scene later, Tana would say that it was the last moments for CHAOS together, too, and he didn't want to distract from that so he pulled away quickly. “But....I couldn't help but look back one more time at Nakamura.” “"He didn't seem to notice,” the interviewer pointed out. “"No, he didn't notice,” laughed Tana. “I guess it's unrequited love forever.”

#Pretty Soldier Nakamura #Tanariffic #Rasslin'#OTP: In the Cards

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