MLJ: Recent Uploads: Metro, Satánico, Virus b Mr. México, Ohara, Shigeo Okumura

2006-09-17 @ Arena Coliseo
Metro, Satánico, Virus b Mr. México, Ohara, Shigeo Okumura

Midcard lucha from Arena Coliseo in 2006. With all the matches that are out there, why this one? It's a recent upload, so I figure not many people have seen it for a while. I always think late era tecnico Satanico is worth watching since it's both surreal and vaguely masterful. He was limited here but so smart in how he worked. Moreover, there's a bit of a black hole for Virus between 98 and the start of his current rudo run, so it feels worthwhile to fill in that gap whenever possible.

Ohara was an Ultimo Dragon trainee and is currently in NOAH. Metro is, as best as I can tell, the current Neutron. Mr. Mexico, is of course, the IWRG Niebla unmasked. Metro and Mr. Mexico were practically made for each other. That's a lot of the joy in this match, watching these two goofballs paired up. Mr. Mexico has this stiff sort of charisma that reminds me of Mike Masters or someone, like the bully in a Charles Atlas comic book ad who kicks the sand on the 80-pound weakling before he gets on the juice. There's not a lot subtle about it, but it's sure fun. Metro on the other hand is someone who hits everything cleanly but with a weird awkwardness, the sort of guy who just makes it over the pole, and whose body weight seems distributed poorly, Valiente without the preternatural grace.

So this was pretty good for what it was. A tecnico shine match for the most part with some heat in the middle. Satanico was a lot of fun it, bringing the little leverage moves and tricks to compensate for the fact he's old as hell, just the way he grabs the ropes to stop a whip or yanks his opponent out of the ring after getting tossed himstelf. They're simple little things but not everyone does them:

Even weirder is the fact that that Kemonito was there, I guess for virus or Metro? Look at this and tell me it's not unnerving, horror show, Varsity Club stuff. Get away from Kemonito, Satanico!

For some reason, I find no-face paint Virus doing much more straightforward tecnico offense (and doing it well) a little unnerving too. He's still got the mullet and he definitely matched up well against both Ohara (who was leadable at least) and Okamura. I think it's little question that if we had more of this era easily available, it'd only help Virus' case.

The finish was pretty badly botched, or at least confusing, one of those cases where even if the shoulder wasn't entirely down, you wish the ref would have just counted for the sake of everyone there. At least Satanico got to encourage Kemonito to do an apron splash after the match. I'm just disappointed that there's not a Mr. Mexico vs Metro/Neutron singles match out there.

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CMLL on Galavision Workrate Report, 11/5/11

Virus/Okumura/Yoshihashi vs. Valiente/Sangre Azteca/Dragon Lee:

Man, what a bunch of teases. You have Virus and you have Valiente, on opposite sides, and I don't think they exchanged more than one move. I think Virus did his awesome running pendulum dropkick to him. And that was it. I like Valiente matched up against Okumura. I like Virus matches up with Sangre Azteca or Dragon Lee. But I would have fucking LOVED Virus and Valiente, just...doing shit, against each other. Dragon Lee hits his super cool running dragon rana from the ramp to the ring, but I can't even enjoy it fully because I should be watching an insane amount of super fast Virus/Valiente sequences. Valiente was at his most Super Astro here, too, so it would have been otherworldly. Virus was crazy dickish, and while the match was good, it could have been sooooo much better, just with a slight re-matching.



Marcela vs. Amapola:

Pretty short match from two of the better CMLL ladies, and it was really good, but didn't really have enough time to become an excellent match. A lot of moves had to be kinda brushed off since they were rushing through, so it didn't have as epic a feel as it could have Amapola came out with her hair stuck into her cape, and I thought she had cut her hair into a super stylish bob. But she tricked me. First fall is really fun with some nice engaging matwork that the crowd is actually into, and then a great rana and missle dropkick from Marcela (with Amapola taking them like a champ). 2nd fall sees two really cool overhead backbreaker slams by Marcela, and a cool full nelson (applied with her legs) submission. Amapola takes a great Cassandro corner bump in the 3rd, then does a cool flip dive (landing on Marcela's knee though. Ouch.) and Marcela hits a cool dive off the 2nd turnbuckle to the floor. Both women will def. be bruised after this one. There have been some nasty spills. The ending falls really really flat and was part of what kept the match from being great. Amapola missed an elbow off the top (even though Marcela moved a few seconds before Amapola leapt), then Marcela hits a Wagner Driver, which Amapola kicks out at 2 from, and the ref counts 3. Hard to have a much flatter ending than that.

Still, two good matches make for a nice hour of TV. I'm actually surprised Galavision didn't show the two main event matches from this card, as the star power was WAY bigger in those two matches. Panther/Liger/Rush vs. Peste Negra and Averno/Ephesto/Mephisto vs. Garza/Sombra/Dorada. I probably also would have rather seen those matches on TV, but I'm fine with what we got since they mostly delivered.

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