It's Sho Time!!!

I was sitting with my wife watching Ninja Warrior who was enjoying watching her favorite competitor, Makoto Nagano. In fact, she has a fan page on a link at the side of this page about the most recent Ninja Warrior winner. Also on the program were Kane and Shane Kosugi. They appeared a few times on the program and Kane even dramatically lost in the final round (he went home literally crying in the rain). That's not to say they're athleticism or ability isn't impressive, but watching the Kosugi brothers made me think that they need their dad to Sho them how it's done. I'm talking the last known Ninja (that I know of), Sho Kosugi.

I grew up on B action movies produced by Cannon films. "Invasion USA", "American Ninja", "Death Wish 3"...these were classics to me. And one of my favorite stars was Sho Kosugi.
Sho had the iron face of a jackyl and the moves of a ...well, ninja. To say he was agile and badass is an understatement. I couldn't find it, but there was one movie where he did a running start and flipped over a concrete wall and landed on his feet atop of a parked car on the other side. He was known for being trained in the actual Ninja arts, not just the pretend stuff. Plus, he had that great name: Sho. Me and my friend would come up with excessively lame ways to use his name to comment on the movie action. "It's Sho Time!", "That Sho'ed him", "Sho'en how it's done", "Sho what!" , I'll Sho you (also a play on the Japanese word Shoyu for Soy Sauce)" were all phrases we used during the action or to punctuate the duller parts of the movie. I made this post so I could remember to Sho my wife what the hype was about, how this guy is great and much better than watching his kids.

So here's the final battle at the end of the classic Revenge of the Ninja (1983). I love how they start the fight on a Tennis Court because at the time I saw a lot of Tennis courts due to my parent's love of that game. It made this movie seem that much more real to me (because ninjas dressed in black in the daytime fighting on rooftops with ninja weapons instead of a gun is sooo realistic!). Also like how the first smoke bomb duds out and everyone act's like it was blinding them. So, for the educational benefit of my wife who has yet to learn the ways of the Sho, all 10 minutes of it, a movie Flashback!