extra 1995 CMLL, part 5

fun times

Corazón De León, El Hijo Del Santo, Último Dragón beat Emilio Charles Jr., Negro Casas, Satánico
(CMLL @ 09/15/1995, 14:55, 2/3, good, Roy Lucier CMLL)

What Happened: There is confetti and balloons because this is Independence Day eve, though it should be because we’re getting Santo & Casas again. Casas is wearing orange trunks and it could not be weirder to see him in something other than black or very occasional white.

Review: Another heated Santo/Casas match, with the two bringing it against each other. Their chemistry is great, and Casas is taking wild bumps to get it over. The crowd is into it too, elevating this entire thing. Corazon de Leon still has moments where he and his opponents are on different pages and the cameras totally miss the foul finish. Dragon gets in a lot of height on a handspring elbow right before it.

Apolo Dantés © beat Corazón De León for the CMLL World Heavyweight Championship
(CMLL @ 09/19/1995, 18:27, 2/3, great, Roy Lucier CMLL)

What Happened: Apolo Dantes is apparently using a Garth Brooks song as entrance music. (This is what Shazam tells me, I don’t know music except to know that’s weird for lucha libre.)

Review: Jericho’s best match I’ve come across from this CMLL year so far. There are still moments of him being out of step, but they’re overcome by the moments where they’re both feeling it. The Jericho suplex to the floor is insane by 1995 standards and would feel crazy in a 2020 match, and then he takes another hard fall a moment later. (Maybe the top rope superplex actually hurt the most though.) Dantes takes big bumps like he does for the bigger guys, but he also has some good offense when he has someone to work with. I can’t totally justify this grade, this was sometimes random violence as the Silver King/Apolo Dantes match. It did feel like it hung together and they got more drama out of the last few minutes.

Miguel Perez Jr. beat Silver King, hair versus hair
(CMLL @ 09/22/1995, 16:21, 2/3, great, Roy Lucier CMLL)

What Happened: This appears to be a three-week build for an Aniversario apuesta. It doesn’t seem to be an issue in crowd interest. Maybe the general Puerto Rico/Mexico feud is causing the crowd care.

Review: This is a brawl featuring running guys into posts early, which is fine for an apuesta match. It feels like it could be something more when Perez pulls out a fancy spot to win the second fall like the two guys would have a great technical match if given the chance. And then the third fall is just that – they throw out the brawl parts and just have what would’ve been their version of a title match when Silver King was champ a few minutes prior. It’s a lot of action, its Silver King looking impressive, it’s Miguel Perez keeping up until he gasses out around Silver King’s tornado DDT. It’s still weird this is an Aniversario main event, but it’s still a pretty strong last half of the match. It would’ve been nice if the finish looked better. Or if Zuniga had realized it was a three count and didn’t shout it about it being only two for a moment. Can’t have everything. I don’t really understand the booking here; it feels like something happened where CMLL was moving on from Silver King far sooner than needed.

Negro Casas beat El Hijo Del Santo
(CMLL @ 09/29/1995, 13:45, 1/2, great, Roy Lucier CMLL)

It really is Santo’s fault Casas beats him up, they were having a nice technical match until Santo posted Casas. The resulting blood drove them both crazy and broke this down into an ugly brawl in the best fashion. Casas & Santo conveyed complete distaste for each other, two guys who couldn’t stand to share the same ring, set out on destroying each by the end of the match. The violence gets over the feud so well. This was already a great reborn feud and feels like an all timer in this video. The referee decisions make no sense at all. Casas should’ve been disqualified two minutes before Santo was, and there’s no great reason to DQ Santo. It also only matters in deciding how high to rank this match; it was a success in every meaningful way.

Pierroth Jr. beat El Boricua mask versus mask
(CMLL @ 09/29, 12:29, 2/3, ok, Manny Kusanagi)

What Happened: Video quality is not good and the sound seems to be a few seconds behind the action.

Review: Pierroth defending the honor of Mexico against Puerto Rico feels like an odd choice. Not as odd as El Boricua repeatedly pulling up Pierroth in a mask versus mask match, the dumbest possible thing a person could do. Pierroth mostly takes move and lays dead on the mat for far too long, since all Boricua can think to do is do a move and pull him up at two. Pierroth is about as sympathetic as a slug. This video on this one is not good, but it sounds like the crowd is still into it anyway, rooting for Pierroth without him giving them much a reason. I was mostly hoping to see an amusing Pierroth fiery tecnico comeback and never really get it. He’s not still trying rudo tactics despite being the cheered guy. He’s just an underdog babyface who sneaks out a couple falls for the win.

Máscara Año 2000, Miguel Perez Jr., Universo 2000 beat Apolo Dantés, Emilio Charles Jr., Pierroth Jr.
(CMLL @ 10/06/1995, 15:44, 2/3, ok, aztecpride004)

This match features Vampiro running in the match in street clothes to attack Miguel Perez for reasons not immediately clear. They had wrestled last week so maybe it was set up but they would never wrestle again; Perez is facing Apolo Dantes in a hair match the next week to wrap up his stint here. Maybe it could’ve been to distract as Emilio Charles got stretchered out, but Emilio is getting strechered out to emphasize Perez’s senton. (Announcers says Charles fractured his rib; he’d wrestle next week. I’m going to watch that match so maybe we’ll find out if he has rib tape.) Beyond my confusion at Vampiro doing Vampiro things, the Perez led rudos pretty much crush the Dantes led rudos. It’s a chaotic brawl, a hard destruction of Dantes before his hair match with Perez, not strong on its own.