Yesterday was Father’s Day, so lets check out one of the most popular second-generation wrestlers in Lucha Libre and see how he stacks up against his famous daddy.
Dr. Wagner, Jr. is a Luchadore from a famous family of Mexican wrestlers. His father, Dr. Wagner Sr., was a respected warrior from the Golden Age, famous for wearing all white gear even though he was a noted villain and rule-breaker.
I must admit I’m a fan of the all-white look — it’s striking to see those perfectly clean trunks and boots. In a world of garish colors and wild prints, plain white cloth can really stand out. Having no other logo or pattern to distract the eye, the viewer naturally focuses on the wrestler’s flesh, causing our eyes to rest on the man’s muscle, his chest and legs, his tan skin that contrasts with the bright white clothing.
The original Dr. Wagner was injured in a car crash in 1986 on the very day he was supposed to wrestle in a Tag Team match with his son. The crash left him paralyzed and killed his beloved Tag Team partner, Angel Blanco. Dr. Wagner later died in 2004. This left his son to carry on the family tradition, adopting the name “Dr. Wagner” and donning a mask to bring honor to his father’s memory. The younger Dr. Wagner’s brother is also a wrestler — Silver King.
Junior’s opponent today is El Zorro — a famous Rudo (or bad guy) — wearing the blood-red shirt. These men have had a long and stormy relationship, sometimes working together in an effective homosocial partnership, and sometimes trying to destroy each other as bitter rivals. Today is an example of the latter.
As we’ve mentioned in previous articles about Lucha Libre, the most humiliating way to punish a masked wrestler is to tear apart his hood, which Zorro begins to do to Dr. Wagner not long into the match. Being unmasked is the ultimate emasculation for a Luchadore, perhaps worse than tearing down his pants to expose him.
In Mexico, for this humiliation to happen to the son of a legend, a member of a famous wrestling family — for his sacred mask to be torn off would be like an American pushing a member of the Kennedy clan into a mud puddle, or spitting on one of Martin Luther King’s offspring, or giving someone from Billy Graham’s family a punch in the nose.
Dr. Wagner Sr. was known as “El Galeno del Mal” — or the “Evil Doctor.” He was a known bad-ass, respected and feared by Luchadores and fans alike. He didn’t get unmasked (like a bitch) — he was the Real Man performing the unmasking. Even the professional title of “Doctor” was meant to stir up feelings of respect and deference from the fans.
His white costume is perhaps a reference to the clean white scrubs worn by doctors during surgery. His infliction of pain as he applies complex holds on his opponents, the drawing of blood from his victim’s faces, is perhaps a metaphor for surgery gone wrong — the Evil Doctor performing a painful dissection or amputation on the bodies of his patients.
With his mask in tatters, laying helpless on the mat with the discarded paper cups and other garbage, his face a bloody mess, Dr. Wagner Jr. has been totally degraded, defeated, castrated, and subdued. El Zorro begins to taunt and verbally abuse his victim, pointing out that it’s a good thing his father, Doctor Senior, is no longer alive to witness his weakling son’s embarrassing humiliation.
This scene reminds the men in the audience about how we all strive to make our fathers proud. Many boys grow up with the image of their father as a paragon of strength and confidence because the boy is smaller and weaker in comparison, and spend their entire lives trying to match that masculine ideal.
But it’s hard to live up to the god-like, fantastic portrait of our fathers that we forged in our young brains. The hero-worship we felt as boys often causes us to feel inadequate when we fail at a task or our weaknesses are revealed.
When your father truly was a legend, a powerful warrior respected by millions of people, the bar is set much higher. To out-match his father, Dr. Wagner Jr. would need to wrestle infallibly and never lose a fight.
His humiliation in this match reminds us that a man ain’t nothing but a man, that the unbeatable strength we all strive for to impress our fathers is unattainable, that eventually, every man will bite the dust, no matter how hard we try to show our fathers we are as tough or tougher than them.
Meanwhile, El Zorro continues to degrade Dr. Wagner and his famous family, laughing about the damage he inflicted on the mask. He places it in his mouth and chews on it, like a dog tearing up an old rag. If only Dr. Wagner Senior were still around to teach this young show-off some respect!
