Title change, Mox mystery partner & Bullet Club showdown at NJPW Resurgence

New Japan Pro-Wrestling ran its biggest U.S. show since the start of the pandemic on Saturday night (Aug. 14) in Los Angeles. Resurgence featured some big developments, and thanks to The Forbidden Door several of them featured AEW & Impact stars.

Impact’s Moose was on hand for a battle with Tomohiro Ishii. The Stone Pitbull survived the challenge from the former NFL-er, but Moose said he’ll be back.

After that match, Will Ospreay returned for this first time since being forced to vacate his IWGP World Heavyweight championship due to what he feared could be a career-ending injury. Ospreay won’t compete in this year’s G1 Climax, but he probably figures he doesn’t need the title shot winning that tournament would give him. He’s still carrying around his World title belt, and calling recognized champ Shingo Takagi an “interim” titleholder. It looks like he’ll be hanging around in Cali for a while, too. The high-flying Brit was confronted by Karl Fredericks, Clark Connors & TJP before throwing a bottle at them and escaping into the crowd.

The Elite have moved on from Jon Moxley in AEW, but the feud continued in the NJPW ring. The hook for Mox vs. The Good Brothers was that the former AEW World & IWGP U.S. champ would be bringing a friend as his tag partner. That friend turned out to be a man Moxley faced on Dynamite back in May - Yuji Nagata. Turns out Blue Justice was there to take the pin, doing so after a Magic Killer.

That wasn’t the big takeaway from Karl Anderson & Doc Gallows’ night though. After months of online Bullet Club drama, two of the faction’s current line-up showed up at Resurgence to confront the founding members. Machine Gun & Doc bailed, like the heels they are.

We’ll see what’s next there. What was next for recently crowned IWGP United States champion Lance Archer? A quick end to his second reign at the hands of Hiroshi Tanahashi. Tana became NJPW’s second ever quadruple champ in the process.

New Japan also announced they’ll be back in California for a show in San Jose on Sat., Nov. 13. The card for that won’t be announced until closer to the show, as is the company’s usual practice. But they are promoting quite a few names - including Mox.

Do these happenings have you feeling resurged about New Japan’s U.S. plans?