Tuesday is French Catch Day: Boucard! Demon! James Brown! Apollon! deLasrtesse! Hess!

Daniel Boucard vs Red Demon 2/6/66

MD: This was something. I'm just not sure what. Red Demon, in his ill fitting costume, definitely got an A for effort. He reminded me of a Chris Champion or Brady Boone, one of those guys who had bigger ideas than they had athleticism. He'd land on his feet off of mares and monkey flips, but just barely and never gracefully. He'd bound up to the top rope and somersault off onto Boucard but it looked neither smooth nor entirely painful. I liked his attitude. He kept returning to this attentive position, presumably to throw off and taunt his opponent and the crowd. Every time he landed on his feet early on, he'd charge right back in with a flying headbutt to the gut. When Boucard started to get some offense, he tried to keep him outside the ring. At one point he took a powder when things got too hot. And he had interesting stuff, an armhook takeover or a cavernaria and those flips off the top. He just couldn't really execute any of them well. I liked the layout too with Boucard really struggling until he either wore Demon down or figured out how to solve the puzzle. When he started to hit a few revenge charging headbutts of his own, it was a nice moment, and then a nice callback at the end as he got too overzealous on it and took a nasty bump to the floor (not his first in the match) and couldn't answer the count. Most of all, this made me look forward to was 1968 and the arrival of Kamikaze into our footage.

James Brown/Ray Apollon vs Jack de Lasartesse/Hans Hess 2/11/66

MD: I'd say that this had some of the better hope spots and fighting from underneath we've seen. Really, I thought Brown was excellent here. His shine stuff, the dropkicks and 'ranas and strikes were very good. Watching him land on his feet out of a cravat into a mare perfectly was a breath of fresh air after our masked friend from the last match could barely manage it. He had good fire and the crowd was behind him. Lasartesse and Hess were a very good team, with Lasartesse's reach just a brilliant tool for tag wrestling. When he had Brown in a chinlock and he started to get out, he could reach over to Hess from almost anywhere in the ring, it seemed, and get pulled back to their corner. Long tags too, of course. The heel side were great at cutting off the ring too. Plus, of course, you would have Lasartesse doing an arm trap suplex or swinging bearhug backbreakers (Brown had a great pendulum backbreaker too). 

Apollon was a crowd pleaser but a little of him went too long if you ask me. His primary mode of attack would be to bully his opponent in the corner and hit these swinging hammers to the gut as the fans counted along. In and of itself, it wasn't a bad act but that was the entire act. He'd thereafter seem lost and almost immediately tag out. That meant that Brown would get some revenge shots in, but he was almost always put in a tough situation, even after he'd make a big, valiant tag. It was the right call for the match since the quality was loads higher when Brown was battling against Hess and Lasartesse and I could see Apollon working well as an attraction that fans only saw occasionally, but that's not exactly how this footage works. This was the best we've seen Brown look and next time we see him, against Bibi and Husberg later in the year, he'll even have a proper partner in Jean Corne. Oh, in case anyone was wondering, here it is too, before the match, our first look at the giant Jean Ferre, who got to shake hands with the aforementioned Cheri Bibi. He looked almost unrecognizably young at 19.

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Tuesday is French Catch Day: Apollon! Williams! Amor! Gueret!Bibi! Montreal!Delaporte! de Zarzecki!

Ray Apollon/Eddy Williams vs. Yves Amor/George Gueret, 3/28/65

SR: 2/3 falls match going a bit under 30 minutes. Hey look, it‘s Amor and Gueret. This had one of the stiffest openings in all the project as Amor (looking shaved and quite flabby compared to his 50s appearance) and Gueret just barraged poor Williams with stiff kicks, gut shots and uppercuts while cutting off the ring. It was one of the coldest beatings we‘ve seen so far and it succeeded it creating some hype for the match as Ray Apollon didn‘t even get to tag in during the 1st fall. It settled down a bit, but all 4 of these gentlemen kept forearming and headbutting each other with serious intensity. Ray Apollon was apparently a pretty big star, a big weightlifter who looked like he was made of stone, and whenever he came in he acted nigh invincible. Williams acted as his junior partner, taking beatings and busting out the flip sentons. There was one really intense bit where Yves and Gueret drove Apollon to the corner and he was making a go at one guy while the other literally tried strangling him with the tag rope. I didn‘t mind Apollon acting so tough, and I dug his bearhug and arm work. This went a little long (some parts where guys seemed to be just latching on to leg locks to buy some time) but for heavyweight slugfest it was wholly satisfying.

PAS: This was pretty sparse stuff, but it was really hard hitting and violent. Williams is the older brother of Stampede Legend Champaign Jerry Morrow and really takes a beating in the opening fall. It was a very lucha structure, with the rudos taking every bit of the offense and Apollon never even getting to tag in. When he finally does, he throws some big shots and it is pretty much a stand and trade fest. Amor is such a unique looking guy, like a fatter shorter Giant Baba, and he slings it. It doesn't really dip and surge, just kind of worked at a single pace, but it was a fun pace.

MD: It's always good to see Amor and Gueret again. Gueret had shaved his beard which is a shame. Their act had evolved a bit with the team and they leaned even more into the ref distractions, illegal double teams, and cutting off the ring. Amor's striking seemed better than I remembered. I liked Williams a lot here. He was able to do some slick stuff while working well from underneath. It's good too because he was in there for 80% of the match. Apollon, who was past 40 at this point, came off as more of an attraction: an immobile tank with big hammering shots and headbutts. He never stayed in for long. The first fall ended with Williams getting some hope but ultimately cut off due to a cheap shot. The second had a fairly big comeback that culminated in a revenge double team with Apollon holding Amor from the apron as Williams charged in. Then some cutting off and Williams firing back and getting a slam. And then the third was primarily them trying to work over Apollon only for him to come back with a slam. There was a really hot tag to Apollon that they could have built to here and never did. This would have been a lot more effective if they had switched the second and third falls around. Apollon was obviously limited but could probably be channeled within a match to high effect given the right structure and opponent. We'll see him in another tag in 66 vs Lasartesse and I have no idea what that'll look like.

Cheri Bibi vs. Mr. Montreal 4/9/65

MD: We get the last ten minutes or so of this and it's very straightforward and pretty great. Montreal's a strength gimmick. Bibi's an absolute monster. After one King of the Mountain bit and a bump through the ropes by Bibi right towards the start of the footage, they basically just pound on each other for the rest of the time, Montreal with uppercuts, throws, and these deep, contested slams, and Bibi with upppercuts, headbutts, and these killer shots to the gut. The advantage shifts with Montreal charging in to fire away and Bibi going low. It maybe gets a little repetitive once you realize that they were working to the time limit, but it's such a clash of the titans (and one that we've yet to see despite being pretty familiar with both wrestlers by now) that you just sit back and enjoy it.

PAS: Can't help but love this. Two guys standing in front of each other throwing heat and refusing to bend to the wind. Felt like Wahoo vs. Johnny Valentine, which is about as big a compliment as I am going to give for a wrestling match. Loved how Bibi would mix in those nasty bodyshots with the uppercuts and forearms. This was the finish stretch of the match, and I would like to have seen how we got to this point, but I loved what we got. 

Roger Delaporte vs Warnia de Zarzecki, 4/9/65

SR: 1 fall match going about 25 minutes. Hey look, it‘s Warnia de Zarzecki. Haven‘t seen him in a while. And well based on this I‘d wish we‘d see him more. He was outstanding at looked like a wrestlers wrestler. This had the most grappling in any Delaporte singles in a while as they did some super smoth armdrags and headscissors type wrestling. Naturally though, the foul tactics come in, and soon you have de Zarzecki grabbing Delaporte by the  mustache. There were some really nice rope running sequences, including one where Warnia took Delaporte down with a top wristlock which was super simple but executed beautifully. De Zarzecki softens up Delaportes arm a bit and Delaporte threw some cool punch combos in the corner as a response. I was a bit underwhelmed with the finish was I felt like these two had another two falls in them. Really really fun match, though.

MD: I said the Frisuk match was the single Delaporte one to watch but maybe it's this one instead. There are funnier ones. There are ones with higher highs. There are ones with greater heat. If you want to know who this guy was in the ring though, this is a great example of it. In the back third of the match, Delaporte spends about five minutes cringing in the corner and getting his arm whacked only to show it was a ruse all along and get big heat for jumping about and waving his arm around after he took back over. Post match, he tries to boast about his win and gets absolutely clobbered by Zarzecki. At one point, he's tied up in the ropes and Zarzecki's charging in. The ref gets in the way and ends up part of the charge, so Delaporte, after the fact, while still stuck in the ropes, kicks the ref for good measure. That's Delaporte: craven, cringing, cowardly, dangerous, hard-hitting, cruel, spry. I see the criticism being that you have to be in the mood for him, but I'm always in the mood for this. At times, he's an excellent wrestler too though. I really liked the early armbar work here, where Delaporte kept control but where it also kept escalating through escape attempts and cut offs and moving in and out, with the two of them finally moving to big shots. Some of the slugging was just excellent too, especially the little bit on the floor. For a wrestler who was no physical marvel and that was very much the same thing in all of his matches, Delaporte, maybe due to the rigors and difficulty of the style, came off as an extremely complete wrestler.

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