[2000-02-25-CMLL] El Satanico vs Tarzan Boy (Hair vs Hair)

[Microstatistics]

The greatness of El Satanico, in his 50s carries a mediocre opponent to a very good match with his offense, selling and by adding little touches to the match. ****

[soup23]

Oh man am I hyped for this one. Jade almost trips on the way to the ring. Tarzan Boy has lips all over him. Satanico has some brutal strikes, front suplexes and a unique pin to win the first fall. Olimpico and Bucanero go nuts at each other into the seats in front of people and with trash and drinks flying all around them. The Arena Mexico crowd wants nothing to do with TB which I thought could happen. He gets Satanico in the pendulum submission to take the second fall. TB misses a huge moonsault at the beginning of the third fall. Satanico does great escaping from the submission and then hits a fat ass senton on the outside. He is so proud of himself. This does him in as he is gloating like crazy allowing TB to get a big victory roll and win the match to a huge pop this time. I loved that finish. Not an absolute classic but a ton to like in this match and after all the shit TB has been through, the finish felt deserving. Satanico afterwards looks a little embarrassed but doesn’t attack TB taking the high road. Satanico takes his hair cut like a man. ****

[Loss]

I liked this ok, but I was pretty disappointed overall. The match didn't reach the violent level that the build promised, and Satanico didn't face the deserved level of retribution. I don't think Tarzan Boy has sucked throughout this feud, but his performance in this match I think did, and as a result, this match really came across more ordinary than it should have when the violence of the build up really demanded a classic. Satanico was Satanico, but this really felt like just another good weekly match instead of the climax of a great feud. ***

[Tim Evans]

It's funny that this has been such a blood feud yet this match had no blood. Tarzan boy's entrance ruled. Then the match started. I won't say this was bad because it wasn't but it was disappointing. Tarzan needed to just destroy Satanico in two falls. Instead, the match was back and forth with a roll up in the third fall. Didn't feel the hate from Tarzan.

[ohtani's jacket]

Here we go! I'm psyched. Satanico's Phantom of the Opera entrance was amazing. Just when you thought the lucha GOAT couldn't get any greater he produces one of the finer Arena Mexico entrances in living memory. Tarzan Boy has lipstick kisses on his torso and upper body. He stops to give us the Rick Martel view of his six pack and I wonder if his valet gave him a kiss on the pecker for good luck. That seems to be the implication. Tarzan Boy seems like he's on a hiding to nothing in the intros. He's busy posing while Satanico is limbering up. And sure enough, Satanico wrestles a perfect fall in the primera caida. Olimpico launching himself at Bucanero was another amazing moment. It's rare that you see seconds fight like that and never as wild and out of control as that was. In true CMLL fashion, I didn't realise that Bucanero had tripped Tarzan Boy until the replay. In real time it looked like Tarzan Boy had slipped and that the rudo crowd were riding him. Olimpico's reaction was awesome. I loved the way Satanico's head jerked when he saw the fight break out.

 

The rudo fans got on Tarzan Boy's case during this match. You can't really blame them since it was at the cathedral where Satanico had fought so many wars. The smaller, less vocal tecnico contingent popped for him. Satanico was amazing in this match. Every time the camera was on him he was selling beautifully or doing something great, and always in the right measure. Such a masterful performer. To lose that way in such amateur fashion was galling. Watch Satanico during the post-match. He is filthy with himself. While he's getting his head shaved you can see him replaying the finish in his mind and working through what he should have done differently.

 

I thought this was tremendous. It was never going to be like Satanico vs. Dandy or that AAA match against Morgan. That was Satanico versus fellow all-time greats. For a match against a young talent like Tarzan Boy this exceeded my expectations. Folks have been arguing that there wasn't enough blood and that Satanico didn't suffer any sort of retribution, but losing hurt more than any cut ever could. It was the ultimate humiliation especially given how dominant he'd been in the feud. I actually thought it was a brilliant payoff to the beatings he gave Tarzan Boy night after night. I don't think it elevated Tarzan Boy in any way but it was beautiful and poetic and Satanico sold it like only he can. Another one for the Satanico GOAT scrapbook. Tremendous.

[Laney]

This match was a giant let down. The feud has been greatly with a lot of hatred and then culminates in this match that doesn't feel special at all. Everything is just basic here with no hatred or feeling that anything is at stake. The 2/3 falls didn't help much with this as you had your short throwaway second fall that felt pointless with Satanico getting absolutely no offense. I give Satanico credit for doing a good job of selling disappointment with his hair being cut and showing respect to Tarzan Boy to properly end the feud.

 

This is a perfectly fine tv match, but a terribly disappointing climax to an otherwise great feud.

 

***1/4

[Moonsault Marvin]

After the great build, this was a major disappointment. I was expecting a bite the cut, bloodbath brawl, but instead, it was a straight match. Tarzan Boy and Satanico both performed well, but it didn't end up the A-level match it should have been.

[AstroBoy]

Fine match with a satisfying ending instead of a classic match with a cathartic ending. I get the points from defenders and detractors of this and think it's somewhere in the middle. If I look at it as a standalone match it's a good match that hits the spot well enough. Of course it falls down against the lofty standards set by its own buildup, but hey. . . that doesn't take anything away from the ride there. The brawl between the first two falls was absolutely awesome, by the way. I was astonished no fan got seriously involved in that fracas.

[goc]

I liked this but do feel it was disappointing due to how short it was and that they really didn't get violent enough to feel like a good payoff to the feud. I wish I knew more Spanish because I know enough to know they were talking about the crowd booing Tarzan Boy on commentary but not enough to truly understand what they were saying about it. It was definitely an interesting dynamic as Tarzan Boy was getting booed while on offense but got a loud pop when he won. Definitely a younger/female fan vs older male fan split reaction going on for Tarzan Boy which probably was made a lot worse with him having to go against a legend like Satanico.

[Childs]

This was deeply underwhelming, considering the build. Yes, Satanico looked good and yes, humiliation was probably a more fitting comeuppance for him than a bloody beatdown. But what a flimsy fucking match after two months of hot confrontations. They didn't build much drama in any of the falls, including the third. I was just annoyed when it ended.

[Grimmas]

This was pretty good, ****'s probably.

 

Satanico just did every little action so well like crawling away from a submission hold. The crowd was hot and the hair cutting was great.

[Stiva]

It's probably harsh to call Tarzan Boy a 'broomstick' but this is a total Satanico heel performance, encompassing the grand and subtle. Young Tarzan sells the beatdown pretty well (I love how he sells the early slaps) but every single motion from Satanico is filled with pure bastardry and malice. I agree with what others have said, that this needed to be a more violent affair to stand in line with the angles that built to it and that it was far too short. The second fall is a good example; it starts with an urgent Tarzan Boy flurry and then just...ends. Satanico gets his comeuppance after months of being a bastard but yeah, this was disappointing on a larger scale, even if the work within was fine and, in Satanico's case, excellent.

[klhare]

This was decent by itself, but considering how much blood and violence there was in the build, it was disappointing. One of those matches where, there's nothing wrong with the match itself, but it still doesn't deliver what I want it to. 

[cactus]

I'm not usually much of a lucha guy, but I enjoyed this a lot. I don't think it's fair to label this as a total Satanico carryjob, as Tarzan Boy brought plenty to the table with his incredibly smackable facials and he bumped like crazy for Satanico's stuff. Speaking of Satanico's stuff, Satanico really put a hurting on Tarzan Boy. He bitchslaps him around the ring and Tarzan Boy eating Satanico's goardbusters looked nasty. I can see how some people would be disappointed at the lack of violence and blood if they had followed this program, but I still had a lot of fun with this enjoying it in a vacuum. ★★★¾ 

[Chess Knight]

This had intense drama, great fundamental work and an appropriately good Satanico performance but was a pretty deflating hair match. I was a little worried it would be, but I at least expected the match to be bloody, and expected Satanico to get the real asskicking he deserved after tormenting Tarzan Boy for weeks. Olimpico and Bucanero scrap in the audience between the first and second falls and I asked myself “why are they having a more violent apuestas match than the people in the ring?” I also really have no earthly clue why this needed to both have three falls and also be only like ten minutes long. The first two falls felt essentially meaningless since they were basically even at the beginning of fall 3. Maybe a “good match,” in that the work was actually really good (it is Satanico) and the heat was on, but in context an unfortunately large let down.