Once upon a time in a galaxy.. Sike! I’m not trying to get anyone sued here! All jokes aside, today, I’m gonna do my best to give you a history of Stardom’s Oedo Tai. One thing I hope you understand, doing research on this faction was actually really difficult. There is technically almost 10 years of history here, if you go all the way back to the beginning of the Kimura Monster Army. But I am going to focus as best I can on the actual group Oedo Tai. That said, even the last few years of history is hard to come by online. I apologize in advance if it seems like I’m missing things here, but if I did know it wasn’t due to a lack of trying.
The Beginnings of Oedo Tai
Oedo Tai formed in 2015 when The Kimura Monster Army faction, sometimes known as Kimura Monster Gun, (Kyoko Kimura, Kris Wolf, and Hudson Envy) joined forces with Act Yasukawa, Dragonita & Heidi Lovelace following the events of Stardom’s 4th Anniversary show. With Act and Kyoko acting as co-leaders, they rebranded themselves with a bit of a Samurai theme due to Act, who was “The Samurai Spirit” of Stardom.
Over the rest of 2015 and 2016 the line up of Oedo Tai would be in constant change. Act would be out of action most of 2015 due to the Yoshiko shoot incident. She came back to the ring in September of that year, but retired by the end of 2015. She remained on as a manager for the group for the first few months of 2016, but eventually faded away. Kris spent almost all of the first half of 2016 out of action with a concussion that she suffered outside of wrestling. The group has a constant revolving door of foreign wrestlers. Some of those include Heidi Lovelace(Ruby Riott), Nikki Storm(Nikki Cross), Viper(Pipper Niven), and many others. Kagetsu joined the group in the first half of 2016 after spending her first few months in Stardom as a babyface. The one constant throughout this run was Kyoko Kimura.
The Rise of Hana Kimura and the Fall of Oedo Tai
Kyoko set her retirement for January 2017. A few months before that she brought in her daughter, Hana Kimura in Oedo Tai. On the surface Hana is very different from her mother, Kyoko is known for wild brawls and bloody death matches on the other hand Hana looks and acts lot like a pin up model when you first see her. For the few months that followed Kagetsu, Hana, Kris Wolf and others kept the Oedo Tai name going, but the group started to fall apart. Kris took off for some international matches. Kagetsu more or less retired. Hana was left alone.
Hana kept going by herself for a little while. She challenged Kairi Hojo for the Wonder of Stardom title. She was in the Cinderella Tournament. But she wanted some backup. She challenged Mayu Iwatani to the Wonder of Stardom title in June 2017 with an extra stipulation. If Hana won, Mayu would join Oedo Tai. If Mayu won, Oedo Tai would be officially dead. The match ended in a no-contest(very rare in Stardom) when a new and improved Kagetsu returned and attacked Mayu and the referee. She wasn’t going to let Oedo Tai die. Right after this Kris Wolf returned after being out two months. And so the current dancing version of Oedo Tai was born.
Oedo Tai, Love, Betrayal and In-Fighting
On the July 16, 2017 show, Tam Nakano made her first appearance in Stardom. Tam had been wrestling for smaller promotions for about a year at this point. She’s also somewhat known for being a pop singer, model, and actress prior to wrestling. Oedo Tai started recruiting her hard from the second they saw her.
In late July Viper returned to Stardom and Oedo Tai, but things didn’t work out. After losing a tag team match with Kagetsu, Viper accepted an offer from rival stable Queen’s Quest to join them. Oedo Tai did not take this well. Viper and her former teammates battled throughout the 5 Star Grand Prix tournament. As a part of the tournament Hana and Kagetsu faced other. Let’s just say that Hana doesn’t take betrayal lightly and they had a fierce battle. They make up post match, and seeing Kagetsu, Hana, and Kris as one happy family made Tam official join Oedo Tai full time. Dark Tam Nakano is born. P, a toy panda that acts as Tam’s right hand man is revealed to be the groups “producer.” Hana and Tam bond really well. Oedo Tai are a big happy dancing family.
And then Kagetsu brought in Natsu Sumire into Oedo Tai without consulting with her team mates. Natsu was vane even by heel standards. She’s hyper cowardly. She does this with water. She acts like the group’s step mother. Kris Wolf takes it well because Kris is always happy to have friends. Tam takes it badly because she doesn’t feel like the group needs another idol. Hana takes it very badly because it’s a betrayal, and nothing sets off Hana like a betrayal. The group spends a couple of months fighting internally. At this point in time Hana and Kagetsu are tag team champions, but Hana declares that maybe she doesn’t even care about the titles. At the Year-End Climax show in December 2017 Oedo Tai are finally able to come together and they are a big happy dancing family again.
And then Kagetsu runs her mouth and challenges Queen’s Quest to an elimination match at the 7th anniversary show. The last losing member of a team is kicked out of their faction. Queen’s Quest Momo Watanabe and Tam draw the final spots for their team. Tam loses the final fall and is kicked out of Oedo Tai. Mayu Iwanati sees this as an opportunity to start up a group of her own. She drafts Tam into “Stardom’s Army” right after Tam lost the match.
Life After Hana Kimura & a Return to the Darkside
Eventually, in late 2018, Hana Kimura was tired of how Oedo Tai was being run and the way they were doing things, turning on them and taking over the International Army faction of Stardom. Soon, they were re-branded as the Tokyo Cyber Squad. She would lead TCS in many battles against Oedo Tai from September 2018 until early 2020, when the pandemic struck, and her subsequent suicide. During the pandemic, Stardom did it’s best to operate and near the end of the year, we saw a Losing Team Must Disband match between Oedo Tai (Natsuko Tora and Saki Kashima) and the TCS (Jungle Kyona and Konami). During the match, Konami would turn on Kyona and join with Oedo Tai, making sure that the Tokyo Cyber Squad was finished for good.
Ever since, Oedo Tai has regained their momentum and place as -the- heel faction of Stardom. They’ve gained several former members of the TCS, even forcing Fukigen to join them after a match. Yes, Konami won against a clown in a wrestling match.
The rest, as they say, is history. But in this case, history is still being written. Oedo Tai is perhaps the strongest they’ve been in quite some time and the women making up the faction seem to be having the time of their lives. I don’t know what the future holds for these ladies, but I believe the name Oedo Tai is in good hands going forward.
