[2017-12-18-Generacion XXI] Demus vs Wotan (Beard vs Hair)

[SPS]

So here's my second ever review as part of The Secret Santo match trade give to me by Lucha enthusiast Rah. I like I've mentioned previously am a casual as casual can be lucha guy as I have never dedicated a ton of time to delve into the style and am only knowledgeable about the most famous names, companies and cross over groups and talents from Japan and North America.

 

So all that aside here we go with this match from a company I've never seen nor heard of featuring guys in a similar boat with me.

 

The arena is a good size and decently filled with a loud and vocal crowd which is great as dead crowds really make me less interested when watching.

 

They are fighting in the crowd as the match starts and my first look at Demus who sports a big beard and face paint is that he looks like Damián 666 (Someone I do know from XPW). Upon pausing and googling him I come to find out he was part of the 'Mini's' division although not a dwarf and was a takeoff of Damian...go figure.

 

Wotan has a Mr. JL looking mask with darker colors that covers his face like a gangbanger's bandanna would and is bleeding as he is thrown by Demus into the boards over some chairs in the crowd. Some nice vicious looking headbutts from Demus on Wotan establishes Demus is in firm control and he grandstands and taunts over Wotan's bloody fallen body.

 

Demus continues now biting and headbutting Wotan, then dragging him back towards the ringside area and tosses him over the railing and grabs a chair which he bashes wildly over Wotan's head. Demus tosses Wotan into the ring and beats on him some more including a nice cannonball into the corner of a seated Wotan that earns Damus a 2 count.

 

We get a few more moments of Demus headbutting and sentoning Waton gaining more 2 counts and arguing and threatening violence towards the referee when he's unable to garner the 3, obviously this Demus is a bit of a wildman nut as if his crazy facepaint doesn't already give that impression.

 

After taking advantage of Demus being distracted by arguing with the referee, Waton gains the upperhand knocking Demus to the floor, he scores some headbutts of his own before asking and receiving a ringside fan's chair and bashing Demus a few times before slinging him over the rail and they are back in the crowd.

 

Now with both men bleeding profusely and Waton's mask now hanging around his chinand neck like a cowboy's bandanna. they brawl in the crowd going back and forth for a few mins before spilling back over the rail to ringside. They exchange some headbutts back and forth from being on their knees on the floor before making it back into the ring.

 

They brawl some more from their knees in the ring exchanging forearms and Demus looks for a pin but only gets another 2, Wotan then gains the upper hand stringing together some offence highlighted by a slingshot from the apron into the ring on a lying prone Demus catching his knees on the top rope and landing a flipping senton that causes Demus to roll out to the floor again.

 

From there Demus doesn't really sell but starts appealing to the crowd to which Waton half halfheartedly mirrors inside the ring until after about 30 seconds of this, Waton takes off and does a tope sucida out onto Demus standing on the floor but overshoots him a bit and Demus doesn't make the catch causing Waton to bounce off the floor and crash into the rail.

 

Demus then no sells the dive and gets up and starts doing the Terry Funk routine of grabbing ringside chairs and tossing a half dozen of them into the ring and starts to wander over to another side of the ring and pulls out a couple sheets of plywood that he slides into the ring as well. As Demus is doing this Waton who is not selling really either and fixing his knees pads on the floor starts appealing to the crowd before finally getting up and heading back into the ring where Demus has already reentered and is setting up chairs.

 

As Waton starts to come through the ropes Demus clobbers him with a chair shot and out of nowhere finally makes good on his earlier threats and smacks the referee with the chair putting the ref on his belly selling on the mat(well at least someone is gonna sell).

 

Demus spends the next min or so setting up chairs in the ring and takes a moment to clobber Waton and the referee again with a chair and then hops up and down appealing to the crowd who respond with a chant so I guess they're enjoying his handy work.

 

Demus sets up about 8 chairs in 2 rows with the seats facing each other but is interrupted when he turns around and gets a loose chair thrown at him by Waton which smashes him in the head and he goes down.

 

Waton appeals the the crowd again and it's rinse a repeat as he again tosses the chair at Demus's head as Demus is laying on the mat.

 

It is here the match for me begins to devolve into clusterfuck levels as Waton first starts moving the chairs Demus has set up as apparently they weren't positioned to his liking. Then he removes 3 or 4 of them as there are too many for his liking as well. Then he starts to fumble with trying to set up the huge flimsy looking 6 X 4' or so plywood sheet which the now recovered ref helps him with as I guess since Demus clobbered him sorta makes some sense.

 

The whole chair contraption fails and almost all of them fold up and collapse and the sheet just falls over as Demus gets up and clobbers Waton and the referee again with a chair. He tries to remedy the whole set up readding the chairs he had set up originally and rests one end on the bottom rope and the sheet of plywood is now set up.

 

Demus and Waton brawl a bit wildly with a chair before Demus gains the upperhand and scoops Waton up for a slam and gingerly places him on the plywood contraption. He scales the rope and leaps off with a splash with Waton rolling out of the way and Demus smashing through the plywood board which blows apart into 4/5 pieces which looked great and sorta saved the whole thing for me a little bit.

 

Waton covers Demus and gets the 3 count and he and the referee celebrate. We get the highlights of the match replayed with some nice camera angles. Cut back the the ring and Demus starts cutting off his beard with a pair of classroom scissors and hands the clippings to Waton, Demus then gives a short speech and then continues cutting off his beard whole Waton celebrates and kisses the clippings which due to his bloody face must've stuck to it a bit so pretty gross.

 

 

So overall opinion this match reminded me of something you would have seen on an ECW card in 1995 with wild brawling and sometimes reckless and botched spots. Demus seemed to play his role well and Waton was okay but both really didn't sell much at the points I though mattered and the whole struggle to set up the finish with that plywood sheet came off as clumsy and contrived and a simple table would've probably cut out all the nonsense and struggle.

 

Overall as a very casual lucha fan I give it **1/4 stars, it had some bright spots with a pretty receptive and noise making crowd and the finish once it got off looked great with Demus crashing through that board despite it's non threatening appearance. Lucha fans more familiar with this promotion and these two would probably like it more than me but it didn't feel like a total waste of time or offensive to sit through and I'd like to see more lucha as there must be talents I'm missing out on due to this blindspot.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Maciej]

I thiiiiink this was from the 12/18/17 G21 show.

[cactus]

While this certainly wasn't the best brawl ever, both guys bleed buckets, brain each other with chair shots and aren't afraid of hurting themselves for the sake of our entertainment. Even the referee eats a few nasty chair shots from an enraged Demus. The finish is tarnished by the board spot botching, but who said brawls had to be pretty?

★★★¼