ohtani's jacket

Are you kidding me? Zumbido? Virus? Ricky Marvin? An inspired La Fiera? This was great. CMLL always feels so exciting at the beginning of a new season. These guys were rocking the Coliseo. Perfect midcard wrestling with a Zumbido vs. La Fiera throughline that kicked ass.

This was a fun maestros style match. I definitely agree that Japan could have done with a full-time MUGA promotion at this stage.

This was a fun revancha. There was a ton of niggle in each exchange. Week to week lucha TV is some of my favorite stuff to watch, even if it doesn't pump out four star matches. Shocker looked pretty slick throughout, and the Tarzan Boy exchanges continue to look promising. The match ended with a run in from Rey Bucanero and a rudo beatdown on Shocker. Looks like we've got our first feud for 2002. Count me in.

I really enjoyed the matches these two had in 2001. I wasn't expecting this to be as good, especially when Wagner came to the ring with a sledgehammer and some lackey named Black Metal. The match was all right for what it was (wrestling wise), but there was a heavy WWF influence, and they got a bit cute with the mask removals. Not worth watching unless you particularly like Atlantis and Wagner.

This was really good. These guys always had good chemistry together. It's hard to believe the WWF could have a hot TV match like this then fall off a cliff with their Wrestlemania booking.

So Shocker is either a tecnico now or on his way to becoming one. (I can never keep up with how this sort of thing works.) This starts off as a holdover from the Porky vs. Tarzan Boy feud, then transitions into Shocker vs. Tarzan Boy. It will be interesting to see how good Shocker is as a tecnico. I thought he was easily one of the top five rudos in Mexico and arguably the most exciting given how fresh he was. I liked the match Shocker and Tarzan Boy had when Tarzan Boy was still finding his way as tecnico, and I liked their work in this match as well. Barring any bullshit, they could conceivably have a very good match. This was a fairly standard match, but it had several storylines going on at the same time and some nice interactions like Casas vs. Ultimo Guerrero. I was glad to see Casas still pissed at Black Tiger over what he did to Felino. Continuity! Black Tiger has been a maniac during this run. He wants to hurt every opponent he faces. I love it. The usual bullshit to finish, but a fun match all the same. And a pretty great episode.

This was a rare instance of them showing a match in full. It was shot kind of strangely for an Arena Coliseo match and almost felt like a house show match. The first two falls were fairly standard. Antifaz and Zumbido carried over some of their work from Monterrey, and everybody else was solid. The standout was Fiera, who gave an inspired old man performance. If you're a Fiera fan, you should check this out, as he rarely looked this good in the 00s. The match built to an exciting finish with a couple of dives into oblivion. (Safari's one will make you wince.) The finish was the usual BS, but it happened in rhythm, so it wasn't the buzz kill that it would have ordinarily been. Very good match. Hard to see anything topping it from this month.

Say what you will about Tanahashi -- and I think he's deserving of most of the later praise -- he wasn't afraid to get schooled on the mat by Ishikawa then go toe-to-toe with Murakami and get his ass kicked. Match was criminally short.

I was expecting a solid match between these two marred by a barrage of bullshit, and that's pretty much what I got. On a scale of one to ten, the bullshit wasn't as bad as in other matches, but I don't see how this style of main event wrestling was sustainable. When the bullshit and everything else involved with the style begins obligatory, it's time to take things in a different direction. The one thing I like about these Rock vs. Jericho matches is that it pays off Jericho's WWF debut where he interrupted the Rock's mic segment. The rest of the trappings I could do without. There were some neat counters by both men, and I guess the table spot was inventive, but the run-ins, the ref bump, the heel ref, etc. It felt passé for 2002, let alone all these years later.

This was a solid midcard match that continued to stoke the fire between Pierroth and Gran Markus Jr. Los Boricuas were such a fun unit. These aren't my favorite tecnicos, but they had enough flash and enough highspots to make for entertaining foils. The sequences between Blue Demon Jr and Gran Markus were surprisingly good, and Violencia did a great job as the glue man.

This was a decent match. Plenty of Felino and Fuerza took a lead role, which was nice. There was carnage in the third fall when the middle rope broke, and the rudos used it to choke Felino. The doctor called for a stretcher, but the rudos used that as a weapon as well. They finally carried the poor bugger out, only for the rudos to beat on him some more. Atlantis lost his mask, and Casas got a working over as well. Not content with leaving the tecnico team in tatters, Black Tiger wanted to dish out some more hurt after the bout. There's always that little piece of you that hopes this goes somewhere, but I've learned not to get my hopes up.

Run of the mill stuff. There were a lot of talented guys involved but nobody brought their A game. I expected more from Shocker and Bestia.

Josef Kovacs vs. Gaby Calderon (aired 10/23/59) Yuck. You'd have a hard time convincing me that either of these guys were ever any good. Quasimodo vs. Gilbert Leduc (aired 10/23/59) I've seen this a few times now. The first couple of times you watch it, it's to see the Monster Movie gimmick brought to life, but this time it was all about Leduc's performance. For a straight shooter, he was remarkably good at putting over gimmicked opponents. On the surface, it shouldn't be a strength of his, but he didn't mind selling for the latest Monster of the Month and was pretty good at the theatrics part of pro-wrestling. The Le Bourreau de Bethune bout is more shocking and dramatic, but this was further proof that Leduc was a multi-talented worker. Jose Arroyo vs. Michel Chaisne (aired 11/20/59) This was one of the better bouts in a while. It was a classic face vs. face bout where neither man can gain an advantage and the bout breaks down into a forearm smash contest. That was a pretty standard way of working face vs. face contests in Europe over the years. It was a tried and true way of getting heat for matches that didn't involve heels. It's not something that I ever tire of, but I will say that the lack of a finish here wasn't wholly satisfying. I don't know that 1959 Catch has been as good as the stuff from '57 and '58, however, so you should definitely add it to your watch list.

I finally caught up with David Lapham's most recent work on Stray Bullets. Stray Bullets was one of the comics I bought when I was still collecting comics. I'm glad he's still producing it after all these years. His art and storytelling have improved immensely from the early issues. The most recent arc was bloated compared to the original series, especially given it was a prequel, and the obligatory Amy Racecar issues grated after a while, but when it was good, it was really, really good. I also finished Transmetropolitan. Warren Ellis can be smug at times, and the humour didn't always wash with me, but overall it was an excellent series. And scarily prescient of the Trump administration. I started working through Gene Colan's run on Batman. There aren't any classic stories, but I simply love Colan's artwork. I was enjoying the stories by Gerry Conway and Klaus Janson inking the pencils, but I just reached the point where they changed the writer and inker, and the artwork is nowhere near as good. I began reading Astro City based on the recommendations in this thread and so far I can't get enough of it. I've also started reading the 90s reboot of Starman. And I am continuing to enjoy Ennis' run on Hellblazer. I'm slowly trudging my way through 70s Marvel -- trying to finish Man Thing and Son of Satan. I recently began reading Omega the Unknown. I'm not a huge fan of Steve Gerber, to be perfectly honest (except for his Defenders run), but if you like his take on superhero comic books then Omega is perhaps the best encapsulation of it. I added Conan the Barbarian to the 70s slate. I love Savage Sword of Conan, but I had never checked out the main title. So far, it's enjoyable. Barry Smith tries a bit too hard to be Kirby at times, but I usually enjoy Roy Thomas comic books. Sticking with 70s Marvel, I watched an interview with Byrne today, so suddenly I want to check out his 70s work, which was before my time. Similarly, I've been slowly making my way through Mark Waid's run on The Flash. At first, I couldn't understand what the hype was about as I preferred William Messner-Loebs' run on the title with its quirky cast of supporting characters. However, that arc where Barry Allen returns. That was a great story. So I'm glad I stuck with it. I have also been revisiting the 5 years later era of Legion of Superheroes, which I know a lot of people hate, but I've always loved those types of resets. Giffen's art hasn't aged that well, however. I started reading Squadron Supreme today. I can understand the Watchmen comparisons, but man, how many word bubbles can a guy read before his eyes dry out? I also started reading Chris Claremont and Frank Miller's Wolverine. So 80s. Ninjas! Japan! Yakuza! Plus I've been reading J.M. DeMatteis and Mike Zeck's Captain America, which has been a bit boring, but Zeck's art is nice. Captain America seems like a difficult character to write, to be fair, like Superman or Wonder Woman.

I was really impressed with Takehiro Murahama when I went through the 2000 footage.

Bret was great in all his sitdown interviews from that era. The difference in his promo in ‘97 is that he had to cut live promos in front of a crowd. I’m sure he flubbed his lines a few times doing those sitdown interviews. Is it in Wrestling with Shadows where he can’t get his lines right?

Bret cut great promos in '94-96 as well. I'm pretty sure his rep for promos comes from his Hart Foundation days and his early singles push.

Jose Arroyo vs. Georges Gueret (aired 10/15/59) I love Gueret, and Arroyo has been a strong babyface foil for the heels, but you could tell by the finish that this wasn't as hot as previous Arroyo bouts. Zarak vs. Jean-Pierre Lecompte (aired 10/15/77) This was better than I expected. I thought it would be Dave Smith-Larsen playing silly buggers, but Lecompte took the fight to him, and they had some fun exchanges. A shame it only went 10 minutes.

I'll always remember him as Sancho.

Finished Jim Starlin's Captain Marvel & Warlock runs. They're good, but I wouldn't really rate them alongside my favorite stuff from the 70s. I can understand the appeal if you like cosmic superhero stories. I liked Starlin's work on Strange Tales best. What really impressed me was the Death of Captain Marvel graphic novel. That was a beautiful piece of work and deeply moving. Definitely up there with Dark Phoenix Saga, Miller's Daredevil, and the other great works of the era.

I didn't realize that Taue had cancer. Total stomach removal.

Andre Bollet vs. Iska Khan (aired 10/2/59) It's strange that Bollet was off TV for so long. My opinion of him has pretty much plummeted since those early appearances. His stalling and antics did very little for me in this match. It might have been different if it was the first time to see it or if I was in the mood for it. What I did like about this were the actual wrestling parts. Isha Khan was a generic Asian wrestler with generic Asian offense, similar to the Hawaiian guys in the States, but the one thing I like about those workers is when they unleash a barrage of strikes. They're no great shakes on the mat, but once they get a bit of go forward, they can be entertaining. I really liked the way Bollet sold Khan's strikes. He could have hammed it up and played to the gallery, but instead his selling was subtle and sophisticated. And his own offense was tight. I adored the finish as well as the post-match. They trashed the shit out of that bouquet. This was miles better than Bollet's later performances. I imagine Matt and the other Segunda Caida guys will like those bouts more than I did, but I think we can agree that this is definitely a signature bout.

I liked bits and pieces of it. It grew more frustrating once the serial killer arc concluded. I wasn't fond of his prose either.

How about Robert Gastel and Karl von Chenok? Roger Delaporte & Paul Villars vs. Yves Amor & Georges Gueret (aired 9/5/59) This was far more entertaining than the previous Delaportes tag, largely because Amor and Gueret were much better opponents than Said and Minisini. I stopped worry about whether Delaporte was a face, a heel, or a quasi-face, and enjoyed the amazing chemistry he had with Georges Gueret. It looks like Delaporte lost some weight around this period and was including a few more wrestling moves in his bout. Does anyone else think he looks smaller? This had Couderc roaring with laughter at the beginning then turned into the kind of vicious brawl that only heels are capable of. Lots of beard pulling.

Cheri Bibi/Pierre Bernaert vs. Ami Sola/Jo Labat (aired 8/6/59) Bibi wouldn't be my first pick for a guy I want to see on television now that we know how scarce televised catch is about to become. But I guess I've gone from being happy to see any and all catch there is to being greedy about what I want to see. Bibi appears quite frequently from here on out, either because the gimmick was popular or because the promoters had pull. Interestingly, it appears that Bernaert was his original partner. Usually, you watch these type of matches for the heel antics, but this match was all about the faces. Sola and Labat were outstanding workers. They'll probably get lost in the shuffle when it comes to evaluating all of these European workers, but personally I'd take them over any of the personalities we've seen so far. I especially like Sola. He's everything you'd want from a face. Bibi and Bernaert were pretty much the opposite. There was nothing outstanding about them as heels. Their bag of tricks was pretty much the standard catch heel tropes. Bernaert was more interesting than Bibi, but didn't have the killer edge that would have made him a mesmerizing heel. Fortunately, they didn't need to be any more than average because of how good the faces were. The match was a good piece of business. It's not a match that will stand out to people who only have the time/interest to cherry pick the best stuff, but seeing Sola and Labat again was immensely valuable to me. Johnny Stein vs. Michel Allary (aired 8/21/59) This was classic pro-wrestling. You could have run this match anywhere on the continent and it would have gotten over. Hell, you could have run it in the States or pretty much anywhere in the world. It was exactly what you'd expect from a bruising German hardman and a young French heavyweight. Stein did an excellent job of beating the crap out of Allary. Allary was a bit raw and some of his timing was off on his comebacks, but it didn't really matter because Stein had the crowd eating out of his hand. Which wasn't hard because the crowd really wanted to eat from his hand. It's often the crowd that makes matches like these. This crowd was both delighted and delightful. Interesting to see Allary get his heat back by attacking Stein with a towel. That's a spot we saw quite a lot in earlier footage. This was nothing really special about this as catch, but it was an entertaining wrestling match.