Did Catholicism exist before the last council?

For all intents and purposes, the answer is a flat, resounding "NO."

For the man in the white hat, Vatican II was, at its heart, an act of spiritual supercession. And the worship that was offered by the Council Fathers as they met in session for three years cannot in any way be reconciled with what followed. 

From the cover letter of the death warrant he signed on Friday:

For four centuries this Missale Romanum, promulgated by St. Pius V was thus the principal expression of the lex orandi of the Roman Rite, and functioned to maintain the unity of the Church. Without denying the dignity and grandeur of this Rite, the Bishops gathered in ecumenical council asked that it be reformed; their intention was that “the faithful would not assist as strangers and silent spectators in the mystery of faith, but, with a full understanding of the rites and prayers, would participate in the sacred action consciously, piously, and actively”.^[28] St. Paul VI, recalling that the work of adaptation of the Roman Missal had already been initiated by Pius XII, declared that the revision of the Roman Missal, carried out in the light of ancient liturgical sources, had the goal of permitting the Church to raise up, in the variety of languages, “a single and identical prayer,” that expressed her unity.^[29] This unity I intend to re-establish throughout the Church of the Roman Rite.

Take note: the liturgy that was dropped on the Roman Rite in 1970 is the only possible expression of the Faith of the Church following the staggeringly-verbose 21st council. 

That which was celebrated in 1969 cannot, must not, will not be permitted to exist alongside it. It must be slowly strangled out of existence and seminarians kept away from it.

Lex Orandi, Lex Credendi.

Gotta love the foaming condescension:

Your grandparents were passive drones who watched the Mass and didn't really pray.

We know this, even though we didn't ask them or give a rat's steaming piss for their opinions.

Then or now, just so we're clear. 

Your thoughts are equally irrelevant, you sad, easily-led-astray proto-schismatic. The bishops I deign to listen to told me all I need to know.

Love you and pray for me!

The motu propriu and its cover letter is a flat admission that Vatican II inaugurated a new Church. 

Which is fine if you're a giggly cultist who doesn't blink enough over at Where JimJones Is and many other places which share the belief that they are naught but the reigning pope's spiritual appendages.

For me...not so much.

Not so much.

A lot to consider over the next few weeks.