“I got fired from my idol gig, but I got to sing and dance at the Saitama Super Arena. Don’t fuck with Itoh Maki. I’m just gonna keep living my best life! You wanna come along with me? Then get on board.”

Maki Itoh

Even among the wild personalities on offer in professional wrestling, Japan’s Maki Itoh is, in all ways, an aberration. She doesn’t look, wrestle, or present herself in a way that any other wrestler does, and while no one would ever mistake her for the best women’s wrestler even in her home promotion of Tokyo Joshi Pro Wrestling (TJPW), she is certainly the most popular, and the one with the largest crossover appeal. Having built an army of, ahem, ‘simps’ (her term, not mine) in Japan, North America, and around the world, Maki is the kind of enigmatic character that only wrestling can produce.

Maki’s gimmick is pretty easy to distill, which is a large part of her appeal. A ‘failed’ and disgraced pop star who brings a demented enthusiasm and a deluge of curse words to her in-ring antics, while enticing fans to their feet as she serenades them with her well-trained musical chops. And then, when the match starts, she becomes ruthless, taking out her frustrations and years of rejection and humiliation out on the unfortunate souls who dare oppose her. If you can imagine former Destiny’s Child singer (or I guess any former member of DC that isn’t named Beyonce) Kelly Rowland destroying some hapless opponent with a pizza cutter, you’d be in the right ballpark.

Maki’s real-life journey to wrestling is more interesting than most. Once a product of the Japanese pop idol system, which seems to apply a ruthless sports-team-like approach to what should be a creative endeavour, Maki was ousted from her original group, LinQ in 2017 and moved for a short time to a different idol group called Tokiwoikiru. Resurfacing later with her wrestling tag partner Mizuki as the Itoh Respect Army, the group had a modestly-selling and pretty catchy single called ‘Setsunairo’ before Maki broke off on her own solo career, though focusing more and more on wrestling, most often in women’s wrestling organization Tokyo Joshi Pro Wrestling and the off-the-wall Dramatic Dream Team (DDT) promotion that brought us talents like Kota Ibushi. Always going against the grain, Maki has augmented her runs in women’s promotions like TJPW with an increasing number of intergender matches against men, both in Japan and in North America. Itoh is never one to approach anything the traditional way.

Maki also has a bit (okay, more than a bit) of an antagonistic relationship with her fans, which only make them like her more. Coming off like an enraged internet influencer or camgirl whipping her followers into shape by calling them ‘simps’ or delightedly showing off the latest English swear word she’s just learned, her fanbase is willing to follow her anywhere she goes. Maki’s Itoh Respect Army is constantly growing and is as ride-or-die as any. Her fans at wrestling shows are often the most vocal in a crowd of deathmatch-loving rabid freaks. They know that like their usual faves, Maki is willing to go to whatever violent ends are needed to get the win, and even if she doesn’t come out victorious, someone’s going down with her. With this persona, Maki has done what so many wrestlers try and fail to do, which is to create a character that fans can get invested in when they win, and can get even more invested in when they lose. For a pro wrestler, that’s priceless.

Itoh comes to the ring singing her own theme song, a reworked version of a song produced for her old idol group Tokiwoikiru called ‘Brooklyn The Hole’ that, like Maki herself, is both impossible to forget and is mildly deranged. Her deceptively adorable demeanour hides a violent and cynical personality bubbling underneath, and it’s this darkness that’s ingratiated Maki to some of the scariest figures in wrestling, including Minoru Suzuki and deathmatch aficionado Nick Gage. 

Partnering with Gage, who is dark enough to have an entire episode of Vice’s Dark Side of the Ring series dedicated to him and his violent and criminal past, Maki both tempers and feeds from his deranged nature. Dubbed ‘Maki Death Kill’ (playing on Gage’s Murder Death Kill catchphrase) they look like an odd couple but like so many of the great wrestling tag teams, complement one another very well. Even with the dark twinge that she brings to her character, Maki’s pop idol getup and (outwardly) sunny demeanour is as opposite to Gage’s ‘the worst guy to be ahead of you in line at 7-11’ attitude as you can get. But when the bell rings, they’re more similar than you’d expect. Like Gage, Maki’s in-ring style can best be described as one of a person with no instinct or interest in self-preservation, sacrificing her own body to inflict pain on her opponents. Her signature moves include a falling unprotected headbutt that never fails to make me cringe, because it legitimately looks like it hurts her worse than the person she’s facing. Maybe that’s as succinct an expression of Maki’s gimmick as exists, and what makes her suited to the violent and unregulated world of deathmatch wrestling.

What intrigues me the most about Maki, and where I think most of her appeal lies, is that she’s unflinchingly resilient. Like all of us, she’s experienced setbacks where even one of them might send a less confident person running in the opposite direction from the entertainment industry. She’s never been the best singer or the best wrestler, or perhaps even in the conversation for either, but she perseveres and continues to draw fans based on an unimpeachable authenticity. With one foot in two worlds – pop idol music and pro wrestling – that reward and encourage falsity and veneers and a carefully controlled public image, Maki is unquestionably herself, haters be damned. She might be the cutest in the world, but she’s right up there with the toughest, too.

Sachin Hingoo’s pop idol group ‘BTS‘ has completely ghosted him. Rude.