MLJ: Atlantida Rising Final: Ultimo Guerrero vs Dos Caras, Jr.

Aired 2006-07-29
taped 2006-07-23 @ Arena Coliseo
Dos Caras Jr. vs Último Guerrero

So with this, we leave 2006 CMLL and head somewhere else for a while. I really wanted to go out on a higher note than being disappointed by Rey in his two big singles matches. This was a Dos Caras, Jr. match, so it can't be that good of a match, but I do think it was effective and a very solid performance by Ultimo Guerrero with super strong layout. There was more that I could have seen in 2006. Just looking at my list of GdI matches that we have online towards the end of 2006, another Santo trios, a chance to see more Black Warrior, to see Leono, more Perros del Mal, some younger Volador, Jr., and a few other guys. There were some big gaps, though, and not quite as many big matches to be built to for the sake of this project. There are a couple I might bounce back to at some point, and I do want to focus on Perro, Jr., later on in the project too so we'll see. For now, though, let's take a look at this mano a mano match.

One of the real joys of this series of matches has been to see Ultimo Guerrero at his prime. I think he was a great rudo both in physical positioning and timing and in having a presence and a character to him. Sometimes, he took the bandit mentality a bit too far and ate up cheers, but I haven't seen that to be the case as we moved into the summer here. Maybe it was just that the crowd was more behind Caras but he was more than willing to do all the stooging necessary here. Caras was a bit of a mess. He had size and the lineage and the crowd, but in general, he'd ham it up at the cost of the emotion of the match. I like crowd interaction twice as much as the next guy but there were places to do it and places not to. Here, the primera was pretty gritty with a lot of mask work from UG before he got cocky and Caras got a quick submission with the armbar. The segunda ended with UG's feet on the ropes after a powerbomb which infuriated the announcers. After that, the tecera probably shouldn't have started with a hammy pose off, especially when a lot of the premise for this match up was how Caras was excited to get in there with UG without his back-up.

That concern aside, I liked this more than either of the title matches I've seen in the last couple of weeks. The stakes weren't there, but past the errant posing there was intensity, and the call backs and moments of anticipation were a lot of fun. There was a real escalation, the sort that allowed for some of those longer selling moments in the tercera. In this match, they felt more earned and meaningful. The 'rana attempt that UG turned into his pinning-with-the-ropes finish for the segunda paid off with a 'rana in the tercera. Likewise the dive that was just teased earlier. They repeated the power bomb spot, with the ropes, this time just for two. They teased a nearfall on Caras being rolled up while complaining to the ref. UG kicked out a giant super powerbomb reversal. Then, after Caras hit the press into the German, only to have UG's foot on the rope, he complained again, was attacked from behind again, but this time, ready for it, blocked a corner roll up and got his hands on the ropes for a revenge three count. Lots of build and parallel spots here which can make up for little execution issues (like Caras barely making the final pin work due to his positioning) or a lack of ring presence from the tecnico.

When people ask what Dos Caras Jr.'s best match in CMLL was, I think this could be a safe choice. There was a decent amount of heat to begin and they worked both hard and smart to end it. Therefore, it makes a good ending point for 2006 for me. Obvious now, many years later, Caras is back in Mexico and making huge waves for AAA. Ultimo Guerrero continued to team with Altantis for another couple of years and really, they've been fueding since, with the mask vs mask match finally on its way. After that, you have to wonder if UG isn't going to be the big rival to Rush that will take CMLL into the new year. All in all, I don't regret going back and watching these matches. The promotion was a pretty fun place in 2006 and I got to really expand my knowledge through watching. Next week, after our Santo vs Panther Monday, we're going to jump forward to right after the last of the Rush vs Shocker series to chronicle Rush vs Negro Casas on the road to their hair match.

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MLJ: Atlantida Rising 14: Dos Caras Jr., Dr. Wagner Jr., Lizmark Sr. vs Olímpico, Pierroth, Último Guerrero

aired 2006-07-22
taped 2006-07-16 @ Arena Coliseo
Dos Caras Jr., Dr. Wagner Jr., Lizmark Sr. vs Olímpico, Pierroth, Último Guerrero

I've worked on my context over time. I know way more about lucha than I did six months ago. I know way more about the people in this match. I know way more about CMLL in 2006. Etc. I'm still not watching this in full context. I sort of get the impression that Lizmark, Sr. showing up in a match in 2006 would make most people, in the moment, groan heavily. For me, though, it was a positive surprise because he's sort of a fresh and legendary face, and a good counter to Pierroth. Whether it be good or bad, it'd be a slightly different element at least. Really, Pierroth too, even though I hadn't been too impressed the last time I saw him, which was a year or two later, admittedly. I like the fact that he somehow ended up with the late era Paul Jones gimmick (with the PR twist) as the Commandante.

The match was pretty straightforward. A solid rudo beatdown, with UG, pissed off from his title loss, ambushing Caras as he came out, and Olimpico hiding behind the stage and really ambushing Wagner as he entered. UG was on fire, fighting with the crowd over a sign, going right after Caras' mask, taking it off repeatedly when the ref couldn't see it, just looking like a beast. Pierroth made himself useful by hitting Wagner a few times with his own belt. They finished the tecnicos off with a couple of submissions. Between falls, they kept on Caras while Wagner posed with a fan and a sign in the crowd. What a dick. The segunda kept the beatdown going. I do quite like how in lucha, you can just pick up your opponent and wait until your partner comes over and hits him. Sometimes it gets amusingly awkward as no one's paying attention or in position. GdI variation time as first they hit the leaping body splash (Olimpico version) on Caras and then after UG's catapult, Olimpico hit this awesome running  somersault senton on him as he's being held in the post-catapult position. It looked way better than Tarzan Boy's legdrop.

The comeback came when they went for the body splash again (after the huddle, those overconfident Guerreros), and Caras sidestepped it. Fairly fiery comeback with Wagner posing a lot and kicking the crap out of Olimpico after he ripped up the sign from before. Tecnicos took it with a Wagner power bomb and a really-nice-for-his-age somersault senton followed by a rana from Lizmark onto Olimpico. Tercera was back and forth with some stalling to keep UG and Caras apart, a pose off that was sort of lame, Wagner being Wagner, including hitting his big tope con giro and finally Caras almost hitting the body press on UG only to get fouled by a desperate rudo for the DQ from ref #2 after ref #1 counted the pin. This set up the mano a mano match the following week. Perfectly fine lucha trios match.

I was definitely glad to see Olimpico back. He had been out with an injury apparently and his absence had been felt. I think in some ways he's everything I wanted Marco to be, though he does have the advantage of being a rudo which means he doesn't have to hit as many contrived aerial moves and can be more of an ass in general. He did have a great mix of size, presence, personality, and athleticism, though. For instance, he'll have a great stooging moment of teasing a handshake and forcing a hug to get a cheapshot in one moment, and then eat a big monkey flip or catch a dive the next. He had a ton of zing and agility moving around the ring during sequences but was still quite good at working the crowd and getting in his taunts.

Dos Caras felt almost exactly the opposite. He had the size and a sort of charisma, but it felt like he learned it out of a book or something. He'd do these pose offs that were stiff and empty. Really that summed up his crowd interaction in general. You'd get a spark now and again but most of the time it just felt robotic. There was a definite sense of physical awkwardness in his movements, too. I had the impression when he went to WWE that there really wasn't a buzz to him at all and I can see why. Still, up soon is his singles match with UG, so we'll see what he did there. I know that he turned into a wrestler I quite often like and at the point of writing this, right after his release from wWE, I'm itching to see him back in CMLL. I just don't think he made that transformation in 2006.

On the absolute other end of the charisma scale was Wagner.  I thought he was just an amazing force the first time I saw him. Now that I've seen more of him though, I think a little bit goes a long way. He had a tendency to make whatever match he was in seem less serious and more cartoony in a way that probably worked extremely well with the live crowd but hasn't aged well. It's the stooging when getting hit, or how he focused more on pointing out a sign than helping his partner. It's posing for three times too long before hitting a dive and making his opponent look like an idiot. The first time you see it and how engaged the crowd was, it seemed great. The third or fourth time, it starts to wear thin. I'm still excited when that music hits in a match I'm watching, but the cracks show up very quickly with him, even if they don't completely mar his performances.

Like I said, another fun match and one that was pretty effective in setting up a singles too.

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MLJ: Atlantida Rising 7: Dos Caras Jr., Heavy Metal, Negro Casas vs Averno, Mephisto, Rey Bucanero

Aired 52MX: 2006-05-27
Taped 2006-05-21 @ Arena Coliseo
Dos Caras Jr., Heavy Metal, Negro Casas vs Averno, Mephisto, Rey Bucanero

One of my basic rules of this project was that I really wanted there to be at least two of Los Guerreros in a match for me to look at it. This is an exception as much for what we don't have as what we do. It was the first part of Rey's turn which is going to be the focus of the next series of matches, so even though he's teamed with Averno and Mephisto and not his usual partners, the fact that we have this and not the later parts of the turn made it worth a look. That I got to see more Metal/Casas and masked Averno, which I haven't seen much of, didn't hurt.

So this was basically a lighter style match that told the story of Rey aligning with the tecnicos over his partners. I think it was an interesting way to do it since Averno and Mephisto weren't the Guerreros, and in fact, if he was in there with his usual partners, he probably wouldn't have been swayed by the tecnicos and the crowd, even if he might have had longer-seated frustrations. It let them draw it out and probably provided some real anticipation of what would happen the following week.

Averno and Mephisto surprised me a bit here. I was expecting something a bit more nefarious from them. I've liked what i had seen in 2013-2014 of Averno without the mask. He seemed like a rudo's rudo and very much the heir to Satanico, in personality and temperment and maybe on some level skill. Here, he and Mephisto were about as goony as they come, between getting in a muscle pose off with Dos Caras and snatching a fallen Heavy Metal away so they could pin him instead of letting Rey hit his back somersault senton. They didn't exactly come across as fearsome. That said, they took all of the tecnico offense quite well and they were believable as obnoxious jerk rudos even if they weren't exactly fire and brimstone.

The tecnicos were there to be fairly flashy and inspire Rey and they served that role competently. Heavy Metal stood out as the real inspirational force, with a solid little opening mat exchange with Rey, a tit for tat: his initial advantage was broken up by Mephisto, frustrating Rey. When Rey managed to do the same back to him, he went for a handshake that was almost taken. Later on, after his rudo partners had further annoyed him Rey and Metal had two other good exchanges, the first ending with the payoff of that handshake and the second with a plancha that took them out of the way for the finish. Both Metal and Caras had nice looking two-on-one exchanges with Averno and Mephisto.

Caras and Casas were pretty much there to goof around. Caras had his pose-off with Averno, but he also ended his two-on-one sequence by flipping Rey up of the ropes to dropkick his partners, after which, he made sure to applaud for Rey. This led to Averno and Mephisto tossing Rey out and, thus distracted, walking into a couple of big moves to lose the first caida. In between falls they tried to do the Guerreros huddle with Rey only to have him walk away and turn right into Caras' own huddle. Late in the match Casas, who was cheerleading the crowd in a Bucanero chant, got the better of Averno in the corner and after stomping him all over, made sure to high five Rey on the other side of the ring before hitting the corner dropkick. Funny stuff.

All of this was definitely goofy but certainly entertaining, and it paid off in the third fall where Rey insisted on wrestling like a tecnico, much to the dismay and ultimate defeat of his partners. Rey did have a fairly natural charisma and the crowd seemed to want this turn, save for the Guerreros fans who didn't seem to know what to make it of it. It's a shame we don't have the match from the next week online because I'd love to see how this played out when he was put in a situation with his usual stable once again. We have plenty of the aftermath of that, though, and that's what I'll be looking at shortly.

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MLJ: Atlantida Rising 2: Dos Caras Jr., Negro Casas, Último Dragón vs Olímpico, Rey Bucanero, Tarzan Boy

Aired 2006-04-08
Taped 2006-04-02
Dos Caras Jr., Negro Casas, Último Dragón vs Olímpico, Rey Bucanero, Tarzan Boy

Jumping into 2006 proper, I don't see a steady amount of matches easily available before April. One problem in watching these as opposed to Rush vs Shocker or even something like Marco vs Universo, is that I have no real sense what these matches are heading towards. I know there's a title match or two in here, but in general, I'm looking at these in a vacuum. Hopefully, just in the act of watching, I'll have some sense of where, if anywhere, everything is going. Certainly the matches in Fall 2005 around Leyenda de Plata, didn't feel like an endpoint but instead like another step on some larger road.

This was a fun match. It let me see some more tecnico Casas, some broken down Ultimo Dragon in Mexico and my first real look at Dos Caras, Jr. Just looking at the matches I have on tap for this, I have a lot of Rey Bucanero. I know a few years earlier, he was ranked very highly on DVDVR 500s and what not, though I don't really see him on later WKOs. So far, I have no feel for him at all, but i'm hoping to pick one up as I go. He turned tecnico fairly early into the matches T'm watching, so it should be interesting. Tarzan Boy is another guy I don't have a great sense of. Olimpico I've seen once or twice and his shtick is based on his size (I think Niebla Roja sort of plays his role in the group now), but he made a great foil for Casas in this match.

In general, this was the Casas show, which was actually quite nice to see as I'd been slightly underwhelmed by what I saw of him as a tecnico during this era. Some of that was just him being the third guy on a tecnico side and not given as much to do. Here though, he shined. Past an early, fairly engaging bit of matwork with Tarzan Boy, he was paired off with Olimpico throughout the match and it was all a ton of fun, with the best stuff found in the tercera caida, both in the form of comedy (for example, Dos Caras lifted Casas back into the ring when he seemed reluctant to face off against Olimpico and it was all pretty funny) and through character work in the face of a much larger foe. Multiple times Casas tried to rapid fire chop Olimpico only to have it no-sold, followed by him being swatted around the ring, until he gave up and hit a well-placed ddt. Right towards the end, Olimpico had him in the corner and I swear Casas did the most hard-boiled, dickish thing in the world. While getting pummeled (and selling it big), he managed this little flexing motion to taunt the guy beating the hell out of him like he was some 1940s gumshoe taking a beating by the mobster's goons and mouthing off to them to show that they couldn't get to him no matter what they did. In 2014, I swear sometimes he even directs the camera people from inside the ring before a spot. Negro Casas is an endless bounty of little moments. It paid off well too within the narrative as he ultimately overcame goliath and took the last fall of the match by submitting Olimpico.

This was sort of Los Guerreros Del Atlantida B-Team but they still worked well together for the most part. They stared things off with the huddle and after a fairly back and forth opening stretch with some good moments of fighting back out of adversity by Casas and Dragon, they took over by tossing Dragon and Casas so they could focus on Caras. There was a sort of silly flub where Olimpico picked up Dragon in a bearhug so he could get chopped by Tarzan Boy, but Tarzan Boy was way out of position. In general, though, Tarzan Boy did fine with his exchanges with Caras and played to the crowd fairly well, but he still sort of felt like the Paul Roma of the group. I need to see more of him before making any real judgment. Their biggest move was probably to end the primera caida, a nice looking double team set up for the Rey's Castigo.

On the tecnicos side, Dragon could still do some of his trademark spots/strikes, and there's just something special about the Asai Moonsault in this setting in 2006. It felt both important and iconic. It probably didn't hurt that it followed a crazy monkey flip bump by Rey over the top. I have a feeling that it was things like that which made him so highly rated earlier in the decade. Caras, on the other hand, didn't show me a heck of a lot. He had something in the way of size, and had one sort of nice kick to the throat that was set up by a Casas anklelock and in itself set up a beautiful La Casita to end the segunda caida. The tercera caida ended pretty soundly after said bump/moonsault, with the tecnicos making short work of the rudos in a 2 on 2 setting. This would fall more on the fun side of things, but it was great to see Casas in such a featured role instead of just filling out a side. Just as important, the Guerreros definitely kept a sense of identity even without Atlantis or UG there.

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