The most vicious and visually arresting Backbreaker ever animated.
Continuing the review of Tiger Mask W, episode #2, our hero and his cute young partner are fighting for their lives in a Tag Team bout against the Heel team of Black Python and Tiger the Dark.
I re-posted this animation of Wakamatsu, Tiger Mask’s partner, being broken across Black Python’s knee because I think the artist did a great job drawing it.
A brutal double-team — why won’t his partner help him??
We see the “Young Lion” suffering harrowing abuse from the two big Heels, yet Tiger Mask refuses to come to his aid. It seems Tiger Mask wants to teach this boastful rookie a lesson, or perhaps wants to demonstrate the kid’s bravery and intestinal fortitude.
Or, maybe the sub-text is implying that Tiger Mask only has eyes for Takuma, his old friend, and no affinity for this Johnny Come Lately.
We get to see a nice close-up of the rookie’s snug black trunks as he is upped up by the hair — a moment of Fan Service by the artists.
Repeated German Suplexes stun the Black Python.
Tiger Mask enters the fray and destroys Black Python with a series of German Suplexes, which appears to be his patented Finishing Move.
Then Tiger the Dark rescues Black Python from being pinned, and the two best friends find themselves alone in the ring together once again. The tension is running high as we crave seeing the former BFFs hug it out.
Sure enough, the two Tigers get intimate in the corner of the ring. Tiger Mask is utterly ignoring his new partner, Wakamatsu, instead focusing his energy and attention on his old friend (although he does not realize it is Takuma under the red mask.)
So we witness Tiger Mask’s rejection of his new partner, in spite of his spectacular good looks, and a return to physical intimacy between the former friends. Wakamatsu, rejected by Tiger Mask, turns his attention to Black Python who is still stunned and vulnerable from the deadly series of Suplexes he endured.
Tiger Mask and his partner win the match and Black Python turns out to be a dud — incapable of destroying Tiger Mask as the evil members of Tiger’s Den had hoped. They plan to just keep sending stronger and stronger Heels to attack our hero until he is eventually beaten. OK — you two horny Tigers can stop hugging in the corner now, the match is over.