Global Wars (2016)

Background In February 2014, the American Ring of Honor (ROH) promotion announced a partnership with the Japanese New Japan Pro-Wrestling (NJPW) promotion, which led to the two co-producing the Global Wars and War of the Worlds events in Toronto and New York City, respectively, the following May. A year later, the partnership continued with War of the Worlds '15 and Global Wars '15, which were both two-day events, taking place in Philadelphia and Toronto, respectively. On August 21, 2015, representatives of NJPW and ROH declared that the relationship between the two promotions was stronger than ever, announcing another North American tour for May 2016, featuring new locations and wrestlers, as well as the first co-produced shows between the two promotions in Tokyo. The two-day event, entitled Honor Rising: Japan 2016, took place on February 19 and 20, 2016. On January 11, 2016, ROH officially announced that the 2016 Global Wars would take place in Chicago Ridge, Illinois on May 8 and would be broadcast live on pay-per-view (PPV). In addition to airing on traditional cable/satellite PPV, the event also aired on internet PPV through ROHWrestling.com and the FITE TV App. On April 14, the first four matches for the event were revealed. According to the Wrestling Observer Newsletter, the reveal of the full card had been delayed due to ROH hoping that Katsuyori Shibata and Kenny Omega would get their visas in time to work the event. On April 16, ROH announced the NJPW wrestlers taking part in the event; IWGP Heavyweight Champion Tetsuya Naito, ROH World Television Champion Tomohiro Ishii, IWGP Junior Heavyweight Champion Kushida, Gedo, Hiroshi Tanahashi, Jyushin Thunder Liger and Kazuchika Okada. On April 18, ROH added NJPW's IWGP Tag Team Champions Guerrillas of Destiny (Tama Tonga and Tanga Loa) to the event, while also officially announcing the main event of the show. Storylines Global Wars featured eight professional wrestling matches that involved different wrestlers from pre-existing scripted feuds and storylines. Wrestlers portrayed villains, heroes, or less distinguishable characters in the scripted events that built tension and culminated in a wrestling match or series of matches. , who defended the ROH World Championship in the main event of Global Wars Global Wars was main evented by Jay Lethal defending the ROH World Championship against Colt Cabana. This marked Cabana's first appearance for ROH in five years. The following night, Lethal handpicked Cheeseburger as his next challenger, stating that he deserved a title shot more than Cabana. After defeating Cheeseburger, Lethal was again challenged by Cabana, who then proceeded to defeat Lethal in an impromptu non-title match. Fish was previously scheduled to challenge his rival Roderick Strong for the title on February 26, 2016, at ROH's 14th Anniversary Show, where Ishii retained his title by pinning Strong. Afterwards, Ishii went on to defend the title in NJPW, while in ROH Fish went on an undefeated streak in singles competition, which included wins over Christopher Daniels and a decisive win over Strong in a two out of three falls match, establishing himself as the number one contender to the ROH World Television Championship in the process. Also on April 20, ROH announced that at Global Wars War Machine (Hanson and Raymond Rowe) would defend the ROH World Tag Team Championship against The Briscoes (Jay Briscoe and Mark Briscoe). On April 21, ROH added a tag team match, which would see Hiroshi Tanahashi and Michael Elgin take on Kazuchika Okada and Moose, to the event. Tanahashi and Elgin had been wrestling regularly as a tag team since NJPW's 2015 World Tag League and recently had become two thirds of the promotion's NEVER Openweight 6-Man Tag Team Champions. Meanwhile, Okada and Moose's partnership was built at ROH's 14th Anniversary Show, where then IWGP Heavyweight Champion Okada defeated Moose in a non-title match. The two had previously faced off during the second night of the 2015 War of the Worlds event, where Naito defeated O'Reilly. ==Event==

, who joined Bullet Club in the show-closing angle, which polarized reviewers The main event match between Jay Lethal and Colt Cabana for the ROH World Championship ended in a no contest. Prior to the event, The Young Bucks (Matt Jackson and Nick Jackson) had promised the "world's largest superkick party" and a new member to their Bullet Club stable, but went through their own match without performing any superkicks or revealing the new member. At the conclusion of the main event, the two entered the ring and gave both Cabana and Lethal Bullet Club shirts, before the lights in the arena went out. When they came back on, Adam Cole was in the ring wearing a Bullet Club shirt, while The Young Bucks superkicked both Cabana and Lethal. The show concluded with the Bullet Club quintet of Cole, The Young Bucks and the Guerrillas of Destiny taking over the ring, bringing the total number of superkicks to 51. ==Reception==

Several reviewers compared the show-closing angle to a New World Order takeover of a World Championship Wrestling (WCW) show. James Caldwell of Pro Wrestling Torch described the angle with a simple "Eh". Caldwell went further into the booking by stating that ROH had moved to "lukewarm characters not really doing anything excessively heelish or exceedingly heroic getting reactions mainly for cool spots or big moments with very little follow-through", calling it "just not a sustainable approach". In making the statement, he pointed to the main event segment, noting that the Chicago crowd was conflicted in how to respond, despite Bullet Club costing their "hometown hero" Colt Cabana his first ROH World Championship. Meanwhile, Mike Metzger from the same site called Global Wars "an above-average show that was taken to another level with the angle during the main event" with him dubbing the show-closing angle "masterful work" and a "five-star segment". Nathan Kyght, also of Pro Wrestling Torch, called the show a "letdown", stating "[i]t wasn't a terrible show, but the ending left a bad taste with me and it just didn't have the memorable feel I was hoping for". Larry Csonka of 411Mania called the angle "bullshit" and gave the show a rating of "extremely horrendous", stating that ROH should be ashamed of themselves for producing it and asking $45 for it. Csonka also stated that the show made ROH performers look like "second class citizens" compared to NJPW performers, who came across as the real stars. Dave Meltzer of the Wrestling Observer Newsletter, who stated that Matt Jackson was one of the key people behind the design and layout of the finish, called it "polarizing", stating that history had shown that similar angles in WCW had been "great short-term but not so great long-term". Meltzer also called the angle a statement from NJPW to WWE, who had recently introduced The Club, which Meltzer called a blatant copy of Bullet Club. He also acknowledged the criticism of NJPW domination in the relationship with ROH, stating "[t]he reality is that New Japan's biggest stars like Kazuchika Okada, Tetsuya Naito and Hiroshi Tanahashi come across far more like major league stars than anyone on the ROH roster". ==Results==