Tuesday is French Catch Day: Zarak! Bete Humaine! Di Santo! Mores!

Zarak/La Bete Humaine vs Michel Di Santo/Eddy Mores 9/30/81

MD: Let's just say that this is a rare, rare match that took place on what is undoubtedly one of the most important days of my life. I guess I'm glad Zarak and La Bete were doing their thing on that date somewhere in the world. Couple of real characters here. Zarak was, of course, Dave Larsen, aka Batman, who passed away October of 2024. You have to love just watching him move as he puts theatricality in every step. I have no idea if this is the same La Bete that we saw in 71 and I'm not going to go back to compare/contrast but he's a guy in basically a cowskin costume and mask but one that can, when he is called upon to do so, work the style very naturally. Di Santo is a few years older than we last saw him and I'm not too sure about Eddy Mores except for he's older and dubbed the Captain.

Start and end of this were quite good but I thought it had some issues in the middle. We'll get to those. The best stuff in here was when La Bete was really wrestling. Some very slick exchanges around wristlocks and what not, especially with Mores. He'd generally then fly across the ring with an axe handle or put on a choke before they'd go back to the wrestling. So long as the balance was there, it generally worked and was probably additive overall. Zarak was more prone to picking his spots, laying in a kick or a knee and prancing around in a subdued but affected way. He had some nice, caring interactions with La Bete which again were additive overall. 

When they were in control, it was a bit too choke and grind heavy without enough variety or actual heat. Part of the problem there was the referee who would get in the way and allow for tags when they should have been building heat again or to cut off a comeback without any real narrative gain to it. Just too overbearing overall. Both fall finishes were good though with Zarak and La Bete taking two in a row. Solid ceiling on this one but the floor was just a bit too low maybe. 

SR: I missed La Bete Humaine during the last French mega-watch, so this is actually my first time seeing him. This is in colour so we see that La Bete Humaine has white-brown fur, and kind of looks like a cow, but his head is dark and furry and kind of reminds me of the wolfman. Is he a cow? Does he dress himself in cow fur? That doesn't seem very beastlike. Regardless this is a pretty fun match. La Bete Humaine definitely has the vibe of something that Survival Tobita or Goro Tsurumi would face. But this is a very mannered French match. The two masked monsters bump around for a lot of snappy armdrags, and the two technicos are a lot of fun.  Eddy Mores has a cool vibe with his greying look and being really athletic, Michel de Santo is a bit non-descript but he is as solid as any French technico. They both were fast, technically skilled, and a had a lot of fun comebacks against the monstrous onslaught of La Bete Humaine and Zarak. The two masked men were good as you expect from French heels. La Bete doesn't bring quite as much flavor as you expect, he does like the claw hold a lot which is unique for Catch and he would do these graceful technical arm takedowns into claw holds because it's France, daddy. He even looked quite bumbling like when he throw one of the faces to his own corner accidentally and then was stuck adjusting his mask. Not everyone can be the Anderson brothers. In the end it was a fun match with a lot of cool wrestling and the funny sight of La Bete Humaine will Zarak did his best to maintain his classy swaggering. Technicos looked very good. I wouldn't mind seeing more of either of them here, and I imagine La Bete Humaine might be pretty fun in a singles match so I'll probably have to go back and watch that at some point.