ohtani's jacket

Guy Robin vs. Al Araujo (aired 11/27/59) This was available before, but it's a much better watch now that we're familiar with the workers. Al Araujo is a fantastic worker in the same vein as Ami Sola. These type of workers have been the best revelation about 50s Catch. I haven't been as high on Robin as the others, but he did some cool stuff in this match and showed a different side to him as a worker. Up until now, he's come across as a stooge, but this showed us he could hang with the niftier workers too. It's a crying shame that the TV was so fickle. If this had been ITV, you'd see these guys on TV half a dozen times a year. Rene Ben Chemoul vs. Gilbert Cesca (aired 11/27/59) I need to watch this again. The first time I saw it, I thought it was a masterpiece and one of the best matches of the 50s. This time I was distracted by how many times they whip each other into the turnbuckle instead of dazzling us on the mat. Like I said, I really need to take another look at it. There's a chance that it's not as special as I thought now that we have so much footage to compare it too. On the other hand, Ben Chemoul has been such a disappointment in singles that this is the match to really sink my teeth into and finally figure out whether he was any damn good. And Cesca is so mysterious and enticing. I'm repeating myself here, but I wish they'd shown more of his matches on television. He could be one of the all-time greats, or he could be a guy who rose to the occasion every now and again. How are we to know? I really should have watched this again before posting because I don't have anything worthwhile to say about it. Cheri Bibi & Pierre Bernaert vs. Warnia de Zarzecki & Ami Sola (aired 12/11/59) We get the last 15 minutes of this, which by rights should be the most exciting part, but it seems that Bibi and Bernaret have improved in their villainy. And so end the 50s. To be honest, I thought there was a drop-off in quality from '57-59, but perhaps that's because everything was new and shiny when we began. There seemed to be more variety when it came to which wrestlers were shown on TV, and the wrestling felt like it was taken more seriously. I could be wrong, but the move away from Catch as sport, and the influx of costumed and masked wrestlers, led to a decline in quality. Anyone else care to chime in on this? Am I being too negative? I seem to feel this way a lot about 60s wrestling. Every time I see something from the 60s, I can't help but feel that it's not as good as the footage we have from the 50s. Was there a shift in the way wrestling was presented in the 60s, or would I feel the same if the only available footage was 60s vs. 70s? I wonder.

You have to think some of the British workers qualify. Dynamite Kid is the best teenage worker I've seen, but I'm sure there were others.

I'm not qualified to answer since I'm still discovering Danielson's work, but is it really a fair comparison? Bret's career has been dissected and put through the ringer for the past 25 years or more. Danielson receives very little criticism and there certainly hasn't been much blowback yet. I feel like we need a more complete take on Danielson before comparing him to past greats. (To be fair, there has been some criticism of his work in this thread. I'd like to read more.)

Well, I can't speak for anyone else, but I've read most of the 80s stuff but very little from the 60s and 70s.

Graham! Haven't seen you around here in ages. You're not wrong about BWS. I am up to issue 8 and the art is phenomenal. My mind will explode if I start getting into Argentinian comics right now. I can barely keep up with all of the stuff I'm reading at the moment.

This was much better than the previous week's shenanigans. I swear to God, Shocker thinks he's The Rock. At least that's who I think he's modeling his tecnico act after. If you'd heading to a fight, you'd do worse than to bring Atlantis and Satanico with you. The old heads were excellent in this. I loved how Los Guerreros del Infierno made it clear that they still hate Satanico. Too often that type of thing is ignored in trios matches. Satanico was brilliant in the second fall. It was the best he'd looked in a long time. In fact, discounting the cage match, it was the best he'd looked on TV since 2000. The second fall was magic. It was one of those falls that just sing. The reaction Shocker got when the tecnicos won was the most exciting thing about this face turn thus far. I guess it was the first time to hear him get that sort of reaction from an Arena Mexico crowd. The tecnico section was pumped, and it felt like Shocker was the man of the moment. Of course there was bullshit in the third fall, but the crowd was so loud that it was passable. Borderline great match.

This was a nice match. Not as stellar as it looked on paper, but one of the better matches from the new season. The focus here was on the beef between Wagner, Panther, and their trios partner, Black Warrior. The trio were still champions at this point, but Black Warrior had turned tecnico. Wagner and Panther bring the trios belts to the ring to remind Black Warrior where he came from. It ends with a beatdown, as you can imagine. Unfortunately, it's not a very inspired one. The match picks up when Felino and Casas lift the tempo, but I was disappointed that they didn't play off their recent heat with Black Tiger. Casas and Tiger square off in the third fall, but it comes as a pairing rather than a foil for the Wagner vs. Warrior storyline. You'd think Felino would be chomping at the bit to get his hands on Black Tiger after the stretcher job, but he pairs off with Panther instead. It's an excellent match-up, but I can't but feel that they missed a beat by not ratcheting up the Casas brothers vs. Black Tiger at the same time as introducing Wagner vs. Warrior. On the plus side, the match was shown in full, the falls were clean, and the action was great once the tecnicos made their comeback. Afterward, the old rudo fan with the cowbell did a dance in front of Casas. Negro was not impressed.

I really like matches between these two. It doesn't matter how good the matches are. There was pretty much nothing good in Japanese men's wrestling at this point, at least these guys found a way to make their matches compelling. I usually dislike Mutoh, but his injuries forced him into a minimalist approach and I admire his commitment towards that style. His selling may be spotty, but you can't accuse him of half-arsing it, which is a worse crime than no selling. Personally, I'd much rather watch 00s Kawada work this type of minimalist style than try to recapture the glories of the past. People raved about Mutoh's matches at the time because they were starved for anything good. Then people came along and shat on the matches because they didn't live up to what had come before. If you go back and watch the matches in context, it's plain to see that they really were bright spots in a shitty time for wrestling.

This was a letdown given how hot the previous weeks had been. The scene shifted from Arena Coliseo to Arena Mexico, and suddenly there was a focus on shenanigans. That type of shit was inescapable, I suppose, given the landscape of wrestling at the time, but it ruined this chapter of the feud. There were some cool spots in the segunda caida before the bullshit took over. I really hope the booking doesn't make a farce out of this feud.

The rudos came to the ring as Los Talibanes but still used Backstreet Boys. Typical CMLL. This was slow going. Fiera couldn't get anything cooking with the rudos, which was disappointing. Safari and Antifaz did Safari and Antifaz things, but the highlight of the match was a Three Stooges spot that saw Emilio interact playfully with the rudo fan who's at every show.

Adding the Villanos into the mix with the Boricuas was a nice idea, but this match is really just an excuse for Pierroth to finally signal a beatdown of Gran Markus Jr, which he does with a great punch to the face. The Boricuas beat Gran Markus Jr like a dog, and Pierroth cuts a promo.

There are basically two types of wrestlers for me, the type of wrestler I'll only watch against the right opponent and the type of wrestler I'll watch against anyone. You can probably guess which type of wrestler Tenryu is. This was everything you could want out of a Tenryu match. Tenryu beats the shit out of Kojima. Kojima is sick of beating beat on and strikes back. Tenryu beats the crap out of him some more. Any variation on that would have been a waste of time.

This was all right. Folks tend to go gaga for inter-promotional matches, but this wasn't all that different from other matches we've seen where Liger visits a rival promotion. He pretty much drew on the work he was doing in Osaka Pro, for example. The difference was that Kikuchi was an outstanding opponent. When you think of Kikuchi, you generally think of the beatings he took from Jumbo and Fuchi, and all of the times he was stretched like a pretzel. What impressed me here were his rabid attacks on offense. The Liger vs. Kikuchi exchanges delivered in spades, and I liked the Liger vs. Kanemaru exchanges as well. The problem, for me, was Inoue. Liger getting stuck with the weaker, younger partner is such a tired cliche in Japanese wrestling. When it's done well, you can point to it as a classic archetype, but to me, he just looked like a goofy ass, Ohtani wannabe, and a liability. In fact, his work was so bad, I'm even more impressed with the carry job Liger did the year before in the BOSJ. Inoue eating the pin was boring and predictable, but these matches are always slaves to hierarchy. Makes you wonder why Liger brought the kid with him when he was such a liability.

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.