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Dragongate Rainbow Gate (June 5) Results & Review

Despite the barrage of bad news that has come Dragongate’s way recently, the second night of Rainbow Gate was their best outing in months.
Case Loweby Case Lowe•

DRAGONGATE
RAINBOW GATE
JUNE 5, 2026
KORAKUEN HALL
TOKYO, JAPAN

Watch: Dragongate Network

EXHIBITION MATCH
YASUSHI KANDA DEF. KOKI OSHIMA 

Koki Oshima, along with Dai Tsujiguchi, are Dragongate’s freshest faces on the roster. Last month, they made a plea to GM Ryo Saito to give them a shot. They worked a series of exhibition matches in the triple-shot in Hokkaido at the end of May. Tsujiguchi worked against Kagetora the night prior. It’s clear that the company is not bullish on either of these men in the same way that they were, say, Homare or Yoshiki Kato. They are fighting for their lives. It’s no guarantee that either man will officially debut, and the more they work middling exhibition matches, the more unlikely an official debut becomes. 

Oshima lacked fire, and worse, he failed to fire up Yasushi Kanda. This should be a foolproof-style of match. Young guy hits old guy, old guy isn’t phased, young guy hits old guy harder, old guy comes back and levels the young guy into oblivion. That’s normally done with a ton of heart and a ton of passion. They went through the motions of what a Dragongate exhibition should look like, but they lacked the intensity that I want from a match like this. NR  

MOCHIZUKI JUNIOR & RIIITA DEF. HOMARE & KAZUMA KIMURA 

My favorite thing in Dragongate this year has been the high-end tag matches produced by Jacky Kamei & Riiita. Right behind that? These continuously fun Kazuma Kimura opening tag matches. Kimura is an utter delight. He’s less than a year into his career and thus still rough around the edges, but he shows flashes of both raw power and technical dexterity that have me incredibly excited about his future. He’s one of the few guys in this promotion grabbing the bull by the horns right now. Every Kimura outing leaves an impression on me and every impression has been positive. 

Kimura has a knack for throwing bombs against the likes of Junior while also being able to keep up with quick-footed wrestlers like Riiita, which will serve him well as he progresses. I could watch him judo throw the entire roster around all day. Luckily for me, he did that to Junior, specifically, this time around, before catching him in a Cross Armbreaker that the second-generation star narrowly escaped from. Junior eventually fought back and managed to pin the rookie with a Bridging German for the win. ***1/4 

DON FUJII, MASAAKI MOCHIZUKI, SUSUMU YOKOSUKA, & ULTIMO DRAGON DEF. BXB HULK, DRAGON KID, KAGETORA, & YAMATO 

There was nothing to this. It’s hard to believe that we’re now 11-months removed from Kobe World where YAMATO lost the Dream Gate belt after a career-defining reign and they haven’t done anything with him since. They teased us with a really exciting feud between him and GuC, but that never went anywhere and now the Triangle Gate belts that were once held by Natural Vibes are being held hostage in Ryukyu Dragon Pro. I wish YAMATO were doing something interesting. I wish Dragon Kid were doing something interesting. I wish we saw way less BxB Hulk than we’re currently seeing. 

Masaaki Mochizuki pinned Kagetora following a Twister. **1/2 

JIRO SHIMBASHI SPECIAL TRAINING MATCH
JIRO SHIMBASHI DEF. DANSHUKO DINO 

Danshuko Dino of DDT turned out to be Jiro Shimbashi’s mystery opponent. 

Obviously, this was awful, and you shouldn’t spend a second of your time watching it. It made me wish I had spent the last decade covering Big Japan or NOAH instead. NR  

SHUN SKYWALKER & YUKI YOSHIOKA DEF. EL CIELO & LUIS MANTE 

How is it that one of Shun Skywalker’s final Dragongate matches is just a heatless tag plopped into the middle of a card? 

The day prior, Shun Skywalker announced that he is leaving Dragongate. Following this event, his farewell tour was officially announced by the promotion. His appearances will be few and far between. Notably, he’ll be skipping his homecoming show on 6/14. Something about that makes me incredibly sad.

This is not the time to eulogize Skywalker’s Dragongate career. That time will come and for better or worse, no one is more qualified to do that than I am. I’ve covered every step of his career since his debut. I first wrote about him a decade ago before he had his mask and was going simply by Shun Watanabe. I expected to cover him for his entire career. I made the claim throughout last year that I think he now belongs on Dragongate’s Mount Rushmore next to CIMA, Masaaki Mochizuki, and Masato Yoshino. I think his decade of work clears what YAMATO has done in twice the time. 

As a fan of the promotion, as well as someone who covers it, I wish it didn’t have to be this way. 

I’m hoping that his final few matches in the promotion can turn back the clock to a time in which he was “the best wrestler in the world not named Danielson or Ospreay”, a title that he’s held for most of the 2020s. This, unfortunately, was a lot like the last year of his work. It felt pointless. The first encounter between him and Cielo didn’t feel as big as I was hoping it would. His interactions with Mante, which felt sparse, didn’t exactly light the world on fire. No one came out of this match looking better, which is incredibly concerning given that A) I thought Yuki Yoshioka would challenge Madoka Kikuta for the Dream Gate belt at the end of this show B) El Cielo ended up challenging Madoka Kikuta for the Dream Gate belt at the end of this show. This would be a perfectly acceptable undercard tag if the stakes were different. The stakes, however, were far from “just an undercard tag”, and for that reason, this was a massive disappointment. 

Skywalker pinned Mante with a flash pin following a counter to the Vuelta Finale. Why Cielo, who again, CHALLENGED MADOKA KIKUTA TO A DREAM GATE MATCH AT THE END OF THIS SHOW AND MIGHT HEADLINE KOBE WORLD, couldn’t pin Yoshioka, is beyond me. 

I want to enjoy Skywalker while we still have him, but this must’ve been what hardcore New Japan fans felt like when Okada was exiting the promotion. The guy that gave 120% when it mattered for so long is now coasting at 75%? What the hell happened? What was this? ***1/4 

NATURAL VIBES SPECIAL THANKS 10-MAN TAG TEAM MATCH
GENKI HORIGUCHI, JACKY “FUNKY” KAMEI, KZY, PUNCH TOMINAGA, & SUSUMU YOKOSUKA DEF. AKEY, FLAMITA, GUC, STRONG MACHINE J, & U-T 

I’m going to start this review by saying something nice about Genki Horiguchi in 2026. There’s a moment in this match in which Horiguchi is laid out by the turnbuckles and Akey runs across the ring to deliver a Vader Bomb. As Akey begins his descent, Horiguchi’s eyes bug out of his head and his body flails around in a panic before getting squished by all 87kg of the ex-American football player. That type of selling from Horiguchi is what made me fall in love with him in the first place. It’s why I’ve hated being mad at him all year, this year. I wish he was doing way more of that and way less headlining. 

It’s so tough to review a match like this during this time in the company’s history because I think a year ago, had this match happened, I wouldn’t be as fixated on “the point” of the match. I would’ve just enjoyed it for what it was, which was a great match. As I watched this match, I couldn’t help but wonder what it would’ve looked like had they put GuC through the ringer and then had him come out on top. I wanted to see him get tested by Kamei, Kzy, and Yokosuka and then pin one of them right in the middle of the ring. I think they had an opportunity to elevate one of the most exciting young wrestlers on the planet with a match like this. GuC was a nonstop thrill ride every time he tagged in. On commentary, Jae noted that GuC in 2026 reminds people so much of Kamei when he first joined Vibes, and he’s so right. I loved GuC’s raw skillset for years, but seeing him in Vibes put him on an entirely new level for me. Seeing him get elevated in part by battling the ghosts of Vibes past would’ve been really exciting for me. 

Instead, this promotion realized that their biggest show of the year is next month and that they don’t have a main event, so they won’t “ah, fuck, Kzy, I guess?” 

After a match that featured hits such as “Flamita vs. Yokosuka”, “GuC vs. Kamei”, and an actually incredible Super PT Missile that sent Tominaga from the middle rope to the sky before crashing into everyone involved in the match, it came down to Kzy vs. Strong Machine J. I have no strong feelings on Kzy possibly headlining Kobe World 2026. I think it’s weird, he doesn’t feel that hot, but there are so many worse options they could’ve chosen. One of those options is the actual leader of Natural Vibes, Strong Machine J, who is cold as ice. I should be staunchly against the idea of a unit’s old leader pinning the unit’s current leader in a match like this, but trying to make SMJ “a thing” right now would be disastrous. He’s the least interesting part of his own unit and he has been for some time. 

He and Kzy were dynamite down the stretch together, producing SMJ’s best sample of wrestling this calendar year. In the end, Kzy dropped SMJ on his head with a CDJ, demolished him with a running elbow smash, and then pinned him following a standing KZ Time. This rocked. **** 

OPEN THE BRAVE GATE CHAMPIONSHIP MATCH
RYOYA TANAKA (c) DEF. NARUKI DOI 

This win marks the 11th successful defense for Ryoya Tanaka during this Open the Brave Gate Championship reign. He has now tied the mark set by PAC for the most defenses of the belt during a singular reign. 

While it will ultimately come down to if Dragongate sticks the landing when Tanaka’s reign eventually ends, following this match, he at least has earned being in the conversation with having the greatest Brave Gate reign ever. He’s already outpaced beloved reigns like Naruki Doi’s inaugural run with the belt in 2005, Flamita’s 2014, and Kaito Ishida’s 2019-2020. Tanaka has done more in slightly less time than Dragon Kid did during his 364-day reign in 2012-2013. Masato Yoshino held the belt six times overall and had numerous, tremendous reigns along the way. Tanaka has now surpassed any mark set by Yoshino. The only competition he faces at this point is the man with the same amount of defenses as him in PAC. 

Across 447 days, PAC’s title reign was utterly remarkable. He not only forced people to rethink what his ceiling was on a global scale, but Ricochet would not be the Ricochet that we now know and love without PAC’s Brave Gate reign and feud with Ricochet that spanned the entirety of 2011. He won the vacant belt in August 2010 in an underrated match against Susumu Yokosuka (I watched it right before typing up this match review and I was stunned at how good it was). From there, PAC went on to defend the title against K-Ness, Dragon Kid, and YAMATO to close out the year, with the Dragon Kid match from Osaka being the gem of those matches. When the calendar flipped to 2011, he was forced to battle member after member of Blood Warriors, starting with Naoki Tanizaki and eventually working his way through Ricochet, Akira Tozawa, and Naruki Doi. His Tozawa defense was the highlight of a very strong DGUSA weekend in Atlanta for WM Weekend. He’d wrestle Ricochet in three separate title matches that year, once in Korakuen, once in Fukuoka, and once in Osaka, where Ricochet finally ended PAC’s dominant title reign. Their Korakuen match is memorable for the fact that the two pulled out every move under the sun in one of wrestling’s most athletic contests ever. Eight months later when their feud concluded in Osaka, they wrestled a match with heavyweight intensity, but with some of the most mind-bending junior-heavyweight offense imaginable. It was the perfect way to cap off a historically great run. 

PAC was everything that a Brave Gate Champion should be and since then, he’s been the unquestionable gold-standard for that title. 

What’s so interesting to me is that PAC’s run was happening during a creative and in-ring peak during the company’s history with the Blood Warriors vs. Junction III feud. Ryoya Tanaka, who at press time has held the title for 330 days, has been in control of the Brave Gate belt during 330 of the worst days in company history. I can’t imagine where Dragongate would be if they weren’t getting continuously bailed out by Tanaka. Imagine if during this stretch, the promotion went gimmicky with the Brave Gate and had it bouncing in between Jiro Shimbashi and Punch Tominaga. 

His defense against Doi was his best one yet, outpacing his match last September with Jacky Kamei and his match early this year against Riiita. As it stands now, I’ve given the following ratings to Tanaka’s title matches: 

  • 7/13/25 vs. U-T, ***3/4 (a clean Stardust Press would’ve bumped this to 4) 
  • 7/23/25 vs. Jun Masaoka, ***3/4 
  • 8/17/25 vs. Masaaki Mochizuki, ***1/4 
  • 9/4/25 vs. Jacky Kamei, ****1/2 
  • 9/14/25 vs. Ryu Fuda, ***1/2 
  • 9/28/25 vs. Flamita, ****1/4 
  • 11/2/25 vs. Billy Ken Kid, ****1/4 
  • 1/8/26 vs. Riiita, ****1/4 
  • 2/23/26 vs. Genki Horiguchi, ***1/4 
  • 3/3/26 vs. Jason Lee, ***3/4 
  • 4/26/26 vs. U-T, ***3/4 
  • 6/5/26 vs. Naruki Doi, ****1/2 

Including his title win against U-T from last July, that now puts him at an average star rating of 3.89.

Just based on who he hasn’t wrestled yet that could possibly wrestle for the Brave Gate belt, he still has possible matches against: 

  • Homare (booked for Kobe World) 
  • Dragon Kid
  • GuC
  • Kagetora
  • Kzy 
  • La Estrella (objectively, this would be super fun) 
  • Mochizuki Junior
  • YAMATO 

I see no reason to fix what isn’t broken. He should storm past Homare, break the record, and keep making defenses until a worthy challenger steps up. Homare might be that worthy challenger, but he doesn’t feel that way right now. 

As for the match with Doi, the sequence that will live in my mind long after the Tanaka reign has concluded is when Doi connected with the Doi 5’s and then went for a Bakatare Sliding Kick that Tanaka avoided. Without missing a beat, Tanaka lunged towards the ropes and attempted a Lionsault, but Doi was able to get the knees up. That sequence, to me, is still what makes Dragongate so great. There was a level of speed, intensity, and most importantly, precision, that still sets this promotion apart from everywhere else. El Desperado is not capable of doing that spot in the same way that Doi and Tanaka did it. The same is true for Kevin Knight, Mascara Dorada, or any other hyped, young wrestler that is known for mixing in some high-flying. 

Tanaka is now in “survive and advance” mode at this stage of his title run. Doi was his toughest foe yet, which makes sense given Doi’s pedigree and the fact that he came into this match hungry, as it was his first Brave Gate match in 13 years. He assaulted Tanaka, not in a way that belittled the champion, but in a way that made Tanaka’s eventual comeback all that more impressive. Early in the match, Doi delivered a snap suplex on the floor, then pulled up the protective mat and delivered a second snap suplex to the hardwood floor. Tanaka’s ankle snapped against the floor and it paved the way for Doi to hone in on Tanaka’s ankle throughout the course of the match. He was vicious in his pursuit and unforgiving in his execution. Tanaka would rely on that ankle a lot, occasionally leaping around the ring, occasionally sprinting from place to place, but he did just enough to remind the audience that he wasn’t 100% that the selling worked for me. 

They started trading finisher attempts as the match grew on. Doi was able to plant Tanaka with the Doi 5’s but struggled to follow through with the Bakatare Sliding Kick. Tanaka tried numerous times to hit the Cross Sabre before finally connecting with one, and even when he eventually did, it wasn’t enough to put Doi away. I loved Tanaka countering a Bakatare attempt with a jackknife that he rolled through and into the Koumori Tsuri Otoshi, a move gifted to him by his mentor, Billy Ken Kid. That got me out of my seat. 

Doi would respond by taking Tanaka to the middle rope and dumping him on his face once more with a Doi 5’s from the middle rope. He followed that up with a brainbuster, then another Doi 5’s, and then finally a Bakatare Sliding Kick that sent Tanaka flipping backwards in a shooting star press motion. 

That still wasn’t enough to put the champion away. 

When Tanaka kicked out of that ensuing pinfall attempt, Korakuen Hall began “Ta-na-ka” chants that warmed my soul. It did the opposite for Doi, who found himself in a deranged state after that. He went for his super finisher, the Muscular Bomb (I cannot remember the last time Doi used the Muscular Bomb). Tanaka flipped out of the first attempt and caught Doi by surprise with a Cross Sabre, but he was unable to pin the challenger immediately and the match raged on. 

Tanaka rolled through a second Muscular Bomb attempt, but Doi rolled with him and caught him back in position, then dumped Tanaka on his neck, connecting with the most protected move in Dragongate. Unfortunately for Doi, he was exhausted by this point, as the 27-year-old champion had pushed him to his limit. His pinfall attempt was severely delayed and the champion was able to get his shoulder up before it was too late. 

Out of options, Doi went for the move again, but this time Tanaka escaped. After a brief struggle, Doi found himself attempting a Cross Sabre, but Tanaka slipped out and then nearly kicked Doi’s head into the grandstands with a Bakatare Sliding Kick of his own. He drilled a Cross Sabre, then nailed the challenger with a Stardust Press for the win.

Over the course of these last 11 months, we’ve seen Tanaka faced with a number of different struggles. He had to prove himself against contemporaries like Jacky Kamei and Riiita. He had to survive against crafty veterans like Billy Ken Kid and U-T. He got through hard-hitting affairs with Masaaki Mochizuki and Ryu Fuda and survived a heel onslaught from Jason Lee. The Doi match felt like an elevated version of all of those struggles, combined. Doi pushed him to his limit, and Tanaka showed that he has more fight than Doi does. The opening minutes of this match saw Doi thrashing on Tanaka in a way that, under different circumstances, might’ve been counter productive. If Tanaka hadn’t looked like a star in his comeback, it would’ve looked like Doi ate this kid alive. I had zero doubt as the match progressed that Tanaka would have that issue, though. 

This kid is a star. This Brave Gate run is belt-defining. This match with Doi was his best match yet. Essential viewing, one of the best things in the promotion this year. ****1/2 

After the match, Ryoya Tanaka cut a promo to rally the troops, reminding people that he wasn’t going anywhere. Homare came out shortly after Tanaka’s promo began and challenged him to a Brave Gate match at Kobe World. You’ll remember that Homare was on the losing side of the opening contest this evening. 

Since losing his hair at Golden Coliseum, Homare has wrestled 22 matches for Dragongate. He’s been on the losing side of 17 of those matches. He has not won on TV since then, including losing last month at Korakuen Hall, both nights of the June Korakuen shows, and all three Hokkaido dates. They could not have booked him worse in the build to a title match. There’s no possible justification for him to get this match other than the fact that he ran to the ring and asked for it. He doesn’t even have the upperhand on Tanaka in 1-on-1 contests. They had one singles match, an opening round King of Gate contest last November, and Tanaka beat him in 8:52. 

Homare split after the match was made official for World, which caused Tanaka to turn his attention to his D’Courage partner, Yuki Yoshioka. Tanaka announced that this was the end of the road for D’Courage and that he’d be starting his own unit in the near future. 

D’Courage, which lasted for four-and-a-half years, will go down as one of the oddest, yet most historically significant units in the history of the promotion. That being said, their time has passed, and I’m glad that they’re giving Tanaka his own unit going forward. 

KOTA MINOURA, JASON LEE, & MADOKA KIKUTA DEF. ISHIN, KAI, & YOSHIKI KATO 

No match has better exemplified the shortcomings of Gajadokuro as a unit than this one, because this match, which pitted all of the members of the unit against one another, was quite great. 

As a conglomerate, this unit has been torture for their entire existence. They bring out the worst in one another. Kikuta is not interesting next to KAI who is not interesting next to ISHIN who is not interesting next to Minoura & Lee who are not interesting next to Kato. It’s been a vicious experience to watch six guys, all of whom can be incredible, do some of the least interesting work in their careers. Gajadokuro will go down as a career lowpoint for all of them. I wish they would do away with the unit, repackage these guys, and shake up the ideology of the heel unit, but it seems like we’re a long way away from that. This match at least served as a reminder that all of these guys are still great in the right environment. 

It was nice seeing ISHIN, in particular, have his “game face” on for this bout. He’s excellent at being a wacky buffoon, but he’s been a wacky buffoon a lot lately. I knew as soon as he hit his gorgeous Tope ISHIN dive early in this match that we were getting a serious version of him in this match, which was a welcomed surprise. 

The bulk of this match was built around Kota Minoura and his ongoing issues with the unit. This boiled over in the climax of the match with Minoura fighting off a huge onslaught of offense from ISHIN and Kato in an effort to secure a triumphant victory. I loved the finish, which saw Minoura connect with a jumping knee to ISHIN, which was shrugged off. This forced Minoura to deliver a second, more devastating knee, and then the Golden Rose for the win. 

Not only did I really enjoy the in-ring action, but this match felt “lighter”, for lack of a better term, than most recent Gajadokuro main event matches. Having every member in the match prevented any outside interference, which is both a sad and hilarious realization. **** 

After the match, Minoura and ISHIN shook hands, seemingly putting their issue to bed. This gave Kikuta the opportunity to clock Minoura from behind. The group began battering Minoura while Kikuta held Jason Lee captive in the corner. ISHIN grabbed a metal sheet from the floor and brought it back into the ring. Right before he sent it crashing into Minoura’s skull, Lee broke free from the corner and intercepted ISHIN’s attack. Right when it looked like he was going to attack ISHIN, he turned and sent the metal sheet into the head of his tag partner, Minoura. This was all expected, but all incredibly well done. 

After the dust settled with the heel unit, El Cielo came out and made his intentions known, not for his rival Yoshiki Kato, but for Dream Gate Champion Kikuta. Kzy then came out, and it was decided that Kzy and Cielo would wrestle a #1 contenders match next month with the winner getting a main event match at World against Kikuta. 

Final Thoughts

The second night of Rainbow Gate in Korakuen Hall was the best Dragongate show in months. I found it to be more enjoyable than their big April outing with Golden Coliseum. I have found that for most of this year, especially after February with Big Boss Shimizu’s injury and Yuki Yoshioka’s defeat in his Dream Gate match against Madoka Kikuta, that this company has operated in a directionless manner. Every bit of footage that’s aired on Dragongate Network has largely been irrelevant because Dragongate has felt like a company going through the motions this year. While the new directions may not feel earned, they at least feel like new directions. Factor in that with two great multi-mans and Tanaka vs. Doi, which I have down as the second best Dragongate match of the year, and for the first time in a long time, I can give a Dragongate show a thumbs up. 

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Reviewing AAW and Dragongate for Voices of Wrestling. Lucharesu historian. @_InYourCase on Twitter.

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