taped 2012-11-16 @ Arena Mexico
Hombre Bala Jr., Pegasso, Super Halcón Jr. vs Hooligan, Raziel, Virus: a fine night for Pegasso – beat Virus twice by himself! I guess he had a little help from the rudos imploding, but Pegasso doesn\’t get many days in the light so this was nice for him. Rudos mostly worked along until the closing minutes of match, which saved the inevitable breakup from clouding over the whole match. (In fact, it felt like they were trying to introduce this feud to an unfamiliar audience; you didn\’t need to know about the other half dozen times this result happened to understand why it happened here.) It still felt like the técnicos were almost totally overshadowed by the rudos, but Hombre Bala got to do Hombre Bala things. It\’s too bad they didn\’t even wait even longer to do that Rayo Tapatios/Gen11 mask match, but it would’ve been a lot better 12 months later.
Diamante vs Mephisto in a lightning match: I can\’t think of an example of CMLL doing this before, so maybe it\’s just a coincidence, but having Mephisto beat Diamante with the same Devil\’s Wings Averno would use later that night for a big near fall is a nice job of foreshadowing (or reinforcing the usual to prepare for the unusual.) On TV, there\’s not the connecting match, so it\’s just a collection of moves and then a finish.
Atlantis, Diamante Azul, La Sombra vs Euforia, Niebla Roja, Último Guerrero: the great new trio loses to the random trio. CMLL is all about the downsides of working together as a unit, it\’s like a corporate philosophy or something. Match was fine for the time but didn\’t have any particular drama or build. It did the formula and not a lot more. Either Niebla Roja is taller than I thought, or Diamante Azul is shorter. Sombra may not be able to do the moves he was able to do when he had 30 less pounds of muscle, or he may just need people to stand a little bit closer next time.