80s Lucha DVD set, disc 2 (part 3 of 3)

In this final part

Jerry Estrada vs. Ultraman (3/2/84)
Tony Salazar vs. Herodes (3/2/84)
Hijo del Santo, Cachorro Mendoza y Chamaco Valaguez vs. Jerry Estrada, Fuerza Guerrera y Talisman (3/9/84)
Lizmark vs. El Satanico (April 1984)

Jerry Estrada vs. Ultraman (3/2/84): I wanted to do see Jerry Estrada taking crazy bumps and Jerry Estrada took some crazy bumps in the third fall. Before that, there were more neckbreakers here than in a years worth of other lucha matches (and a lot of Jerry selling by yelling.) Ultraman was good here and did the best job possible of selling the shots that led up to the referee stop finish, but it still was a referee stoppage finish out of nowhere. I liked both guys int his match but wanted more out of them.

Tony Salazar vs. Herodes (3/2/84): Thrilled to get the singles match. It’s not really the brawl I thought it’d be for the first most of the first two falls – Tony just outwrestles Herodes for one, and Herodes suddenly remembers he’s much bigger than Tony in the third – but it’s still really solid. It gets great in the third fall, with the intensity picking up. The blood almost didn’t work for me here because there as such an insane amount of it suddenly out of nowhere. Herodes in particular seemed like he just ducked his head into a barrel of red stuff when no one was looking, and I was distracting think of what kind of deep cut he must’ve given himself to do that much damage in such short time. Maybe there were invisible spikes on the floor where Tony bulldogged him. Herodes is so great at selling big when it’s time for it and the crowd roots hard for Tony. “I don’t know, let’s just call it a draw” seemed to be Morales read of the ref’s call of the finish, and I dunno either. It was sure a strange way to end a really good match.

Hijo del Santo, Cachorro Mendoza y Chamaco Valaguez vs. Jerry Estrada, Fuerza Guerrera y Talisman (3/9/84): I could watch 1984 Hijo del Santo feud with 1984 Fuerza Guerrera all day. Young Hijo del Santo is very talented but has some great rudos to work with; they could not have put him in a better situation to look great. This is also one of those matches which causes you to wonder if Fuerza Guerrera might be a HOF guy if there were complete video collections of the 80s (and maybe if they actually did the Octagon/Fuerza mask match in 1991 when it would’ve done huge business.) Everyone was good here but those two guys were stars. This match deserved the money thrown in, but poor Cachorro was getting nailed with coins in the head for a bit. Appreciated the random Misawa promo pre-match and the announcers going on about the Von Erichs come in; this was an intersection of some different universes.

Lizmark vs. El Satanico (April 1984): Wow, what a run of frustrating finishes to end this DVD. I think one might have been technically better than Atlantis/Satanico, but I was more drawn into the first match. (It may have also been because that was the first, this is the last, and now it’ll probably be months before I get to watching this again.) The action was good but the emotion wasn’t there – for me, this is a crowd that cared who won. Or who drew, whatever. Second fall finish actually wasn’t a lot better, with Satanico being destoryed by two piledrivers, then reversing a huracanrana into a powerbomb with feet on the ropes right after; it didn’t quite make sense to me. My big takeaway here was this belt was actually shiny at one point! It was not shiny when the stopped using it.