Enmascarado Lotería Cards – Part 7

One final batch of these 80s cards. Ultraman and America Salvaje are the most familiar to me of these. I love the Racer-X knock-off at the end!

Tags: Loteria

Enmascarado Lotería Cards – Part 6

Cobarde is the familiar here, and also one of the coolest masks ever designed in lucha libre  history.

Tags: Loteria

Enmascarado Lotería Cards – Part 5

More forgotten masks with nifty designs in this bunch, although Dick Angelo and Dama Esmascarada are more familiar than many of the others, being well photographed in earlier era’s magazines.

“Dr. Galaxia” just sounds so early 80s sci-fi-ish and has a Flash Gordon aesthetic, so I’m still thinking these are from that time period.

Tags: Loteria

Enmascarado Lotería Cards – Part 4

Today’s grouping is a real who’s-who of WHO THE HELL IS THAT?

Some fantastic designs though. The “Jalisco” mask with landmark architecture is absolutely inspired. The monster mask at the end was likely a rubber Halloween deal grafted onto a cloth mask for functionality. This was done as early as the 60s, it’s not just a modern AAA deal…

Tags: Loteria

Enmascarado Lotería Cards – Part 3

Pioneering high-flyer Lizmark is the biggest name in this barch. “Misterio” is no relation the “Rey Misterios.” I’m wondering if “Mister Kat” is pre or post-Tiger Mask? The “Medusa” design is the coolest thing ever…

Tags: Loteria

Enmascarado Lotería Cards – Part 2

More obscure names here. Olimpico is the only mask I recognize, but this is likely an earlier incarnation of the more recent star.

Tags: Loteria

Enmascarado Lotería Cards – Part 1

Scored several vintage lotería card sheets recently. I’ll put up 10 or so close-up images at a time for the next several weeks.

No reliable way to know when they were done, but I’m guessing from the roster they are sometime in the 1980s. The paper doesn’t feel old enough to be pre-80′s, and on the other hand there’s a distinct lack of the usual suspects from 90s merch — no Octagon, no Konnan, etc.

The batch had some old schoolers like Dick Angelo, but also some 80s standouts like Lizmark and Cobarde. The rest is a mixed batch of by now obscure names, which is why I pounced in this collection.

Let the poorly printed, off-register-color glory commence!

Tags: Loteria

RIP Mike Vraney

Founder of Something Weird Video Mike Vraney has passed away, taken too soon by cancer. An invaluable champion of the obscure, forgotten and neglected genre niches in the VHS era, his catalogs were like textbooks for psychotronica, including hordes of Mexican lucha-hero and horror titles that basically provided my foundation in Mexican cinema.

The compilation tapes Viva Santo and His Pals and Mexican Monsters on the March were my bibles, muses, reference and more often than not the background noise while I was working on the early issues of FPU.

Condolences to the family and everyone at SWV…

Thanks Mike, FPU wouldn’t exist without you.

Tags: Something Weird Video

Now available right here!

We’ve just put some copies up for sale of the recently released Famous Monsters lucha-themed issue, in case in this world of dying print you can’t find it at a newsstand, or even find a newsstand for that matter…

Just $10, while supplies last.

Tags: Famous Monsters of Filmland

A blast from Dia de los Muertos past…

Back in yonder 2006, some of the FPU crew set up an altar at the Hollywood Forever Cemetery’s then rather less gentrified Dia de los Muertos celebration. There had been a spate of death’s in the wrestling world, and we paid tribute to all the masked men (or who had at one time been hooded) gone to that big ring in the sky. Several actors from classic lucha-hero films were included as well.

We had tecnico and rudo calaveras, with a skeletal referee, and votive candles surrounding homage photos of the fallen — all in golden ring with skull turnbuckles. Fortunately, the deaths in the wrestling business have slowed since…

Hope to do this again somewhere, someday. The Hollywood Forever thing has become a bit of a co-opted trendy mob scene, alas, probably somewhat to the chagrin of the Latino families whose altars celebrate the memories of departed family to the delight of party-goers looking to extend Halloween. So we’ll probably look for a more traditional and modest location.

Here’s to the memories of so many great performers…

Tags: Dia de los Muertos