LA PARKA! Rey Misterio Jr! PSICOSIS! ULtimo Dragon! HEAVY METAL! and its all one match folks! and Jericho vs Halloween! and other stuff I saw and heard this week!
Howdy!
Welcome to Death Valley Driver #9! Unbelievably (for me anyway), I'm
almost caught up- tapewise. So the cycle begins again!:) Where is that
Lacy fella?!?:)
- I got a fantabulous Extreme Southwest (tm-jdw((So THERE!:))) handheld
from Tim (the benevolent tapesmaster and lover of all things
Psichodelico-esque:)) from 6/2/96. The Main Event RULED! It's a four
corners match between Rey Misterio Jr/Perro Aguayo vs Ultimo Dragon/La
Parka vs Psicosis/Heavy Metal vs Cibernetico/Pierroth Jr, with a single
elimination rule- so instead of both guys being out after one gets
pinned, you can stay in it after your partner is eliminated. This
stipulation pays major dividends by the time its all whittled down.
LaParka carries the first half of the match, as his 300% wild ring work
is quickly catching up to his wild attire. Ultimo Dragon and Rey are
tagged in at the same time but refuse to go tecnico a tecnico (thus
fueling my enthusiasm about the HogWild match even more). LaParka and
Rey end up in together and they go at it about as fast as Lucha Libre can
get, but with the great non-slams replacing the slams that would end each
sequence, with a mountain of spinning flying headscissors into standing
switches and reversals that kept this veiwer from blinking in fear of
missing any of it. After this, there is a highlight for each wrestler
with Ultimo doing an inring Asai moonsault, Heavy Metal running up the
ropes, and Psicosis doing an INSANE over-the-turnbuckle bump, so
everybody is on full throttle (except for Cibernetico- who doesn't do
highlights or anything really). Perro Aguayo gets into the act with a
great old style tope. Pierroth Jr then starts to no-sell everything by
Misterio, and eventhough I hate no-selling as much as a rightminded
wrestling fan will hate the career of Lex Luger, Misterio makes the best
of it by doing goofy Lucha selling of a hurt hand after each knife-edge
chop. After electrifying the proceedings, highlighting it with the lucha
staple flying chair shot after a fabulously intricate lucha rope running
sequence and catching the big Ass springboard tope from Misterio (after
Psicosis ducks out of the way), La Parka is eliminated. I'm guessing
this was a good thing, because the man had to be tired after working his
ass off for that long. The match then becomes the Misterio/Psicosis show
as everybody is eliminated and these two are the last two standing.
They proceed to add to the New Luchadores of AAA Legend by cranking out
one of the most beautiful matches these two have had and make a great
match even better. The gist of this was that it was every spot from Bash
at the Beach distilled into a ten span added to other spots that FREAKED
ME OUT. The ending was... HEY! HEY! That would be telling!
Also on this tape was luchadore extraordinaire- Chris Jericho! Now this
was fun! The match itself consisted of Jericho, the very solid Leon Negro
and Angel Mensajero (who I've never seen before up) against Halloween,
Enfermo Jr, and Viernes 13th. I really want to really like Halloween.
He'll go the extra mile, he's a GREAT second and he has stolen the best
stuff from Fuerza Guerrera. He can do everything but wrestle. Anyway,
it was great to watch Halloween sucker the naive Canadian into the Fuerza
Guerrera Ican't-believe-you-won't-hug-me-I'm-your-bestest-friend-on-earth
spot, my personal all-time favorite rudo gimmick. Jericho hits the mat
real well, going native on the low impact armdrags and selling the
bizarre leglocks and abdominal stretch variations that permeate Lucha
Libre, but Jericho never really goes hogwild like he could have. Things
get extreme as Los Pandilleros hit the ring and kick the crap out of the
tecnicos. More interesting than great.
The first match on the tape was Los X-men and Thunderbird (and, yes, he
rules sometimes:)) against Deprador, Negro Azteca, AMNESIA!!!, and
Genghis Khan. Deprador is a strange luchadore. He is very technically
capable as a rudo, very traveled (I saw him in the Michinoku Pro Match I
ever saw), and has one of the wildest outfits in wrestling, but just
never quite can make it out of the first match. The other three rudos I
couldn't tell apart from one another, though I've seen Negro Azteca a few
times and I think he is the one sans the mask. The match starts off well
with Thunderbird doing some nifty highflying. He is older and has the
Plan 9 from Outer Space outfit on. Amnesia, I'm guessing, tries an El
Hijo Del Santo one inch from the ringpost tope and I guess he landed
wrong because he isn't seen again. Los X-men hit a batch of cool topes in
the second Caida with the best being Wolverine doing the Shiryu
somersault tope (3/4 shiryus:)) This year with all these hand helds
being available and after seeing seven or eight of them, I think these
young punks- Los X-men- are the most improved and they are beginning to
approach the Power Raiders level of goofiness-drenched awesomeness.
Damian 666 vs Mascara Sagrada Jr rounds out the cast.:)
- I watched a batch of 80's WWF sent to me by Tall Paul, the Stud With It
All (or something like that!:)) It had a batch of Bulldogs, Rougeaus and
Quebecers matches and the Quebecers win hands down, when it comes to
great wrestlers that made the best of super idiot booking in the WWF. I
mean HELL! they made a Bushwhackers match interesting. The most
promising match on this tape is the Survivor's Series match which is
ruined by the end by cretin booking. The Match has the Brainbusters, the
Rougeaus, the British Buldogs, the Rockers, the Young Stallions- some of
the best tagteams of the 80's who are, of course, eliminated to make room
for the important steriod fest of a Demolition/Powers of Pain final. The
Conquistadors are the third last to knocked out. Who do I punch?
- A-Number one in the what the f*ck department is the Takada/Abdullah the
Butcher match announced by Tokyo Pro this week. Does Takada need money or
something? Is he Abdullah's son-in-law? Did they offer ole Nobuhiku a
lifetime supply of ribs from Abdullah's restaurant or something? ME
DON'T WANT TAPE!
- The Juventud/Misterio match was pretty great on Saturday night. Is it
me, or is Rey actually getting adept at selling in subtle ways? I love
this UWFi thigh kicking stuff that Juventud is getting into. When is the
Takaiwa vs Juventud match? I would be stoked. I'm guessing this dream
team of Rey and Juventud starts after Rey drops the belt to Malenko at
Havoc, setting up a kinda cool sounding Malenko/Waltman feud and
explaining the loss to our boy Alex.
Next Week: I dunno. I've watched all the tapes I currently have.
Something, I assure you!:)
NANIWA~!
Dean Rasmussen, SATOgenerian
