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Kenny Omega as Akuma

AEW x Street Fighter
by yo go re

...okay, now do the one where he came out dressed as Sans Undertale.

Here comes a new challenger: AEW's Kenny Omega. In this 2019 Fyter Fest crossover, Kenny enters the ring dressed as Shōtōkan master Akuma from Capcom's legendary Street Fighter series.

Every year, a group called "Community Effort Orlando" holds the C.E.O. Fighting Game Championships (their initials, not, like, the head of a business), a videogame tournament with pro wrestling trappings - a ring, announcers, etc. In 2018, New Japan Pro Wrestling's Kenny Omega had the idea to co-sponsor a wrestling show at the event. CEOxNJPW: When Worlds Collide was enough of a success that in 2019, Kenny (now with AEW) proposed another event with CEO, this time called Fyter Fest, to be held as AEW's second official appearance. Since the partnership was about fighting games, and Kenny is a huge fan of the genre, he and his partners in a six-man tag match, the Young Bucks, came to the ring as Street Fighter characters. Since the Bucks were repping Ryu and Ken, Omega opted to be someone related but distinct: Akuma!

Dressing up as videogame characters was Kenny's idea - and he didn't even really get to participate! The Bucks didn't get to see their suits until the day of, but the seamstress who made Kenny's costumes didn't get his outfit sent out in time, meaning that even with the most expedited shipping, it wouldn't arrive until the Monday after the Saturday show. Whoops! Knowing how Akuma dresses, it was probably going to be, what, a dark vest and a necklace? Must have been something more than that, though, or they could have just run out and bought him a blue/black shirt and cut the sleeves off. As it is, he's barechested, with a big red 天 symbol painted on his back.

Kenny Omega has a penchant for changing his ring gear every so often, which is great if you're a toy company looking to sell new variations, but bad if you're a toy company who constantly has to redesign your complicated paint apps. Since he couldn't wear his special Gouki gear, he stuck with what he'd worn while facing Chris Jericho at Double or Nothing the month before; a handy choice for Jazwares, since that allows them to reuse all the work they did for the first Kenny Omega action figure! That means black pants with a white wing on the right thigh and "K•OMEGA" on the left. His kneepads and kickpads have wispy white smoke on a purple background, and there's an Ω painted on his right kneepad and the seat of his pants.

Other than the "immortality" sign on his back, the one concession Omega made to the Akuma idea was dying his hair. It's red, and pulled up into a tiny top-knot at the crown of his head. You really have to lament that he didn't come up with this cosplay idea sooner, so he'd have time to grow his hair out to a length where pulling it up like this would actually look like something.

The figure gets two heads, and because of the hairstyle, they both have to be new - Kenny usually has a rather curly mop [oh, so that's why they call him The Cleaner! --ed.] of hair that falls all over the place, and there's no way to cheat that into this. One of the heads is smiling, the other with his mouth open in a shout, which goes along great with his accessories.

It's usual for Unrivaled figures to come with both fists and open hands, but Kenny also has the advantage of having distinctive hand gestures he uses during a match: while gesturing with his left hand, he raises his right hand in a gun pose and slowly brings it down to point at his opponent. So naturally the figure includes both of those, but also a Fyter Fest-specific pair of palm strikes, for the moment when he and the Bucks did synchronized hadoukens. Thus the angry shout.

Kenny has good articulation, moving with a balljointed head, hinged neck, swivel/hinge shoulders, swivel biceps, double-hinged elbows, swivel/hinge wrists, a balljointed chest and waist, balljointed hips, swivel thighs, double-hinged knees, swivel shins, and swivel/hinge ankles. It's enough to do his standard finisher, the One Winged Angel, though in this case you might prefer his running knee strike - aka the V-Trigger. (Yes, it's named after the Street Fighter V mechanic.) The knee and elbow hinges feel a bit soft, due to the rubber they're made of, but they still hold poses well. Playing with these three AEW x Street Fighter crossover figures has really highlighted how much pectoral hinges would add to the figures: yes, they're needed for a really good hadouken, but they'd make getting into complicated wrestling holds even easier, too. And honestly, as much as we like the chest balljoints, a hinged abdomen would be an improvement, too.

Kenny Omega is, in all honesty, probably the best wrestler alive today. Come on, the guy can make a simple knee strike look like the most violent thing in the world. His athleticism in his matches is only matched by the caliber of his storytelling, and pretty much every single person attached to the industry recognizes it (the one exception being Jim Cornette, who hates Kenny Omega the way Bret Hart hates Goldberg, just without the legitimate reason behind it). And for all his success, he's achieved it all without ever working for the WWE, which puts him in some pretty rare company - even fellow standouts like AJ Styles or Sting eventually got their paychecks signed in Connecticut, but hopefully Kenny can avoid that fate. None of the other Kenny Omega action figures have really caught my eye (due to many of them wearing plastic jackets or whatever), but dress him as Akuma, and I'm there!

-- 08/30/23


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