Smugly reviews all of Lucha Underground (or at least tries to before it becomes hard to find on the internet due to takedowns and capricious copyright holders)

[tbarrie]

5 hours ago, SirSmUgly said:

In fact, around the same time, VGCW did a similar-ish deal with the characters having to collect Dragon Balls to make a wish (I have still never seen Dragon Ball and this is how I found out what the titular thing actually does, by the way).

Is that what Dragon Balls do? I feel kind of ambivalent about knowing that, honestly.

...are they actually dragon testicles? Wait, don't tell me.

5 hours ago, SirSmUgly said:

Striker says what I was thinking as Aerostar comes to the ring: It was probably good for Aerostar that he lost that fifth match in his series against Drago considering that he still has a job and Drago does not! Anyway, here’s his opponent Jack Evans to do handstands and annoy the shit out of me. Evans does some quick jawing at the crowd to get them to treat him as a heel before he and Aerostar do their shitty gymnastics routine. The Estonian judge gives it a 9.8/10, but I think it stinks. When a guy sits perched in the corner for a long-ass time only thirty seconds into the match so that you can take time to set up for a rope-walk rana that your opponent would absolutely block or avoid in kayfabe instead of just sitting there like a doofus waiting for you to finally complete the rana so they can flip to the mat along with you, you have lost the plot! The best thing about this is Evans playing up the heeling (claiming that he invented Lucha Libre, generally stopping to theatrically rile up the crowd, yelling at the ref for a properly-called rope break when Aerostar reaches the ropes). Of course, then he wrestles, so that’s a bummer. I have a deep antipathy toward the ringwork, so let’s just get to the finish: After a throwaway 630 off the railing and onto the floor from Evans in the opening match on the show (*sigh*), the match goes back to the ring, where Aerostar hits a Super Canadian Destroyer (*siiiiiiiiiiigh*) for three. I’m sure a lot of fans love matches like this one, but [Big E voice] NOT ME. That was a flat-out terrible bout, IMO.

I remember watching this match, and thinking halfway through it "Man, I hope they don't have this little douche beat Aerostar". Then I took a step back, and realized that if I was having that reaction, Jack Evans must be pretty good at his job. I've been a fan ever since.

So yeah, I guess I liked the match. But I'm generally softer on flippy nonsense than you are.

4 hours ago, SirSmUgly said:

Marty “the Moth” Martinez is feuding with his own sanity and sense of good taste.

Marty's sanity and sense of good taste seem like they'd be easy to defeat. There's not much to either of them.

Edited July 20 by tbarrie

[zendragon]

Dario's office is kind alike Jerry's apartment in that from time to time its kayfabe location in the temple doesn't seem to match physical reality 

[SirSmUgly]

3 hours ago, tbarrie said:

Is that what Dragon Balls do? I feel kind of ambivalent about knowing that, honestly.

...are they actually dragon testicles? Wait, don't tell me.

If they are, dragon testicles apparently have star-shaped designs imprinted all over them.

From what I could tell from that season (five, IIRC) of VGCW, there are seven Dragon Balls, you can use a special radar to locate them, and when someone has all seven, they can summon a giant dragon god to grant them one wish. Unless Bazza steered me wrong, that's the whole deal with Dragon Ball. 

Quote

I remember watching this match, and thinking halfway through it "Man, I hope they don't have this little douche beat Aerostar". Then I took a step back, and realized that if I was having that reaction, Jack Evans must be pretty good at his job. I've been a fan ever since.

So yeah, I guess I liked the match. But I'm generally softer on flippy nonsense than you are.

Evans's heeling was solid. I just like progression in my matches, not the dopamine hit of seeing someone do a flippy in isolation. 

Plus, I haven't been getting dopamine hits off flippies in isolation since maybe about 2001. 

[tbarrie]

39 minutes ago, SirSmUgly said:

If they are, dragon testicles apparently have star-shaped designs imprinted all over them.

Wouldn't surprise me. Dragons are notoriously fancy creatures.

(Come to think of it, I wasn't even previously aware that Dragon Ball Zeta involved Dragon BallS, plural. I sort of assumed there was at most one.)

39 minutes ago, SirSmUgly said:

Evans's heeling was solid. I just like progression in my matches, not the dopamine hit of seeing someone do a flippy in isolation. 

Plus, I haven't been getting dopamine hits off flippies in isolation since maybe about 2001. 

Fair. Me, I still find seeing people flip around the ring fun. A match isn't going to make it past "decent" in my estimation unless it makes some narrative sense, but I can still turn my brain off and enjoy a silly spectacle match. To a certain extent.

[Curt McGirt]

I just had a video pop up in my Facebook feed of Bucks vs. Swerve/Ospreay and they pulled off the most absurdly flippy fast section that I have literally ever seen in my life. I can see how that would blow people's minds, and I respect it, but after all these years it's like hearing another shredder guitarist. 

[SirSmUgly]

29 minutes ago, Curt McGirt said:

I just had a video pop up in my Facebook feed of Bucks vs. Swerve/Ospreay and they pulled off the most absurdly flippy fast section that I have literally ever seen in my life. I can see how that would blow people's minds, and I respect it, but after all these years it's like hearing another shredder guitarist. 

Though I get sardonic about that stuff myself and dismiss it as "flippies," "gymnastics routines," "Cirque du Soleil," etc., my standing disclaimer is that if a fan primarily watches wrestling for that stuff in isolation or merely enjoys it even if it's not the primary draw for them, of course I don't have any judgments. I'm not trying to gatekeep how people enjoy pro wrestling.

I'm even trying to cut down on my complaints about this sort of thing considering that I'm watching a wrestling show titled Lucha Underground from the mid-New Tens and should expect a lot of isolated complex spots. Well, I'm not trying. I'm trying to try. 

[zendragon]

HE'S GONNA TRY!!!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ldk6HD99BBI

[SirSmUgly]

4 hours ago, zendragon said:

HE'S GONNA TRY!!!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ldk6HD99BBI

I opened the link and listened for fifteen seconds, and I am demanding an apology from you because that made my eardrums want to secede from the rest of my body. 

[SirSmUgly]

Season 1, Show 29: “Fight to the Death” or Matanza Cueto wins – FATALITY

• We speed quickly toward the end of the first season (though I won’t get there until the end of next week with my schedule).

 

• Recap: Mil Muertes is back and ready to murder folks, starting with Fenix; Hernandez awaits his shot at Prince Puma’s LU Championship; Johnny Mundo broke Dario’s window with Alberto El Patrón’s face, but is still a human melatonin supplement as a singles wrestler.

 

• Grimy daytime interstitial: Chavo Guerrero Jr. tries to stop Black Lotus from revenging herself on Matanza Cueto right then and there by telling her to set it up as a match so that she can do it in front of everyone, then assures her that he’s on her side because his grandfather was also there when Matanza killed Lotus’s parents. Chavo’s appeal seems to work.

 

• We open with Aerostar versus Johnny Mundo. Something something already know what I’m gonna say about this match, something something so here’s the finish: Mundo wins with an End of the World. Mundo tries to heel it up in his work with more strikes, but he even overelaborates most of those. This match is fine, I suppose. Aerostar comes close a couple of times and even blocks one End of the World attempt by yanking Mundo down from the ropes before he can launch. However, he gets hit with a release Northern Lights and rotates slowly into position so that Mundo can hit an End of the World on his second attempt.

 

• Adventures in Interviewing with Vampiro: I feel like this Sexy Star/Penta feud has been one of the more interesting ones on this show, but they’ve really slow-played it lately. Anyway, Vampiro interviews Star, who gets prickly when Vampiro asks her if she’s worried about this arm-breaking psycho Penta and what he might do. She thinks he wouldn’t have asked a dude that question, but he reiterates that he’d ask anyone a question about the arm-breaking psycho who is trying to break their arms. I believe him. Then, after asking if Star has heard from Super Fly lately (she has not), he provocatively states that maybe she hasn’t heard from him because he’s recovering from a broken arm that she failed to protect him from. Now that’s equal treatment right there; every babyface, no matter their gender or how hard they try, is thanklessly blamed for anything that goes wrong or any heel plan that gets pulled off by the quasi-heel interviewer.

 

• Other notes from this interview are that Star feels fantastic about managing to beat Penta (Season One, Show Twenty-Four) and she hopes that her victory inspired the ladies out there. Vampiro then lets Star know that Dario Cueto has booked a rematch between Star and Penta, but this time as a Submission Match that probably should end with Star getting her arm snapped at the end of the season and maybe even a Dark Master reveal. Vampiro ends by hyping up how much of a pioneer Star is for lady wrestlers. Nope. But I will say that LU has done a good job of working around her numerous deficiencies as a worker and presenting her as a rootable-for fighting underdog babyface.

 

• Here comes up-and-coming fresh main eventer Booker T. to defend the WCW Championship in the midcard (rather than the main event) of this late 2000 Nitro after weeks of doing jobs. Oops, sorry. I was having flashbacks to my review project from last summer. What I meant to write was this: Here comes up-and-coming fresh main eventer Prince Puma (w/Konnan) to defend the Lucha Underground Championship in the midcard (rather than the main event) of this early 2015 LU episode after weeks of doing jobs. My bad on that one.

 

• I’m not a huge Ricochet guy, but he does enough in the ring that I enjoy that I find him a useful piece of this (or any) roster. For example, he fakes a dive, hits a bunch of backflips, and then perfectly imitates his opponent Hernandez’s strut early in this match. He doesn’t work my favorite style, but he has quite a bit of physical charisma. Puma opens up on Hernandez early before running himself into a clothesline. Vampiro does a nice job on color of criticizing Puma for throwing punches at Hernandez’s head rather than going at the bigger man’s legs; Konnan, relaxed, just tells Puma that Hernandez is poorly conditioned and to endure while Hernandez blows up.

 

• Hernandez hits a nice senton splash in the midst of his heel control segment, then scores a nice overhead double-goozle suplex when Puma attempts a comeback full of thigh-slaps and kicks. Hernandez’s backbreaker only scores two, and his powerbomb (after catching Puma on a crossbody and rocking him like a baby) only gets two more. Hernandez sets Puma up for a Border Toss, but Puma slips out of the back and runs…into a big boot. Hernandez follows up with a Pounce that knocks Puma to the floor. Konnan then gets on the apron and challenges Hernandez on one side while Puma grabs a chair on the other side, waits for Hernandez to turn his attention back to him, and waffles Hernandez right in the head as the challenger attempts a suicide dive.

 

• Vampiro is very, very disappointed in Puma and what he sees as Konnan’s adverse influence on Puma. Puma follows with a handspring plancha to the floor, but Hernandez manages to block a Puma kick attempt, then sets up for another Border Toss and hits it right into the apron’s edge. This match is surprisingly good. I mean, I like Hernandez well enough and I have a bit of time for Puma, but I didn’t expect to be so engaged.

 

• Hernandez tries another Border Toss, this time into the tall metal railing that sits in front of the crowd. Puma nails an insane spot here: He gets out of the back and shoves Hernandez into the railing, then runs at him. Hernandez instinctively boosts Puma up and over him, and Puma catches himself on the railing and then comes off with a corkscrew plancha in damned near one smooth move. And you know the best part about that spot? It was actually earned in the flow of the match and wasn’t just some throwaway high spot where the athleticism involved was the only draw.

 

• Puma dumps Hernandez back in the ring and follows with a springboard 450 that gets about 2.8. It was almost a perfect kickout on Hernandez’s part. Puma signals for his signature 630 Senton Bomb, pulls Hernandez into position, goes up…and crashes and burns. Hernandez grabs Puma and hits a reverse slam for 2.8. That was a good false finish because I thought that maybe I forgot that Hernandez had won the LU title. Hernandez tries another Border Toss (Konnan: “Puma, Puma, he’s done that too many times for you to let him”), and in fact, Puma recognizes the move, rolls off Hernandez’s back, and initiates a sequence that ends with Hernandez blocking a Puma bulldog and landing a powerslam.

 

• Hernandez goes up top to try and finish the match, and he does because he eats Puma’s knees on a top-rope splash and never really gets close to victory again. Puma hits three kicks (with three requisite thigh-slaps that are at least hidden better than Alberto’s are) for 2.9, then goes up top. Hernandez does manage to catch him up there, but Puma headbutts Hernandez to the mat, kicks Hernandez once and then twice as Hernandez charges, and knocks him right into position for a 630 Senton Bomb that ends the match. Excellent bout from these two and a definite surprise for me. I didn’t think the match would be bad, mind you, but I didn’t expect it to be this thrilling.

 

• It's main event time! Poor Fenix. Joe’s Mil’s gonna kill you! Fenix had an all-timer against Mil in that Grave Consequences Match, so I’m suitably hyped for this match. Mil Muertes (w/Catrina, minions in death’s-head masks, very light contact lenses) is met in the aisle by a Fenix suicide dive, but Fenix just bounces off of him. Fenix tries again, but gets punched out of mid-air (and c’mon, Mil, that punch looked great; you didn't have to slap your bicep on contact).

 

• Mil beats the shit out of this guy, though I don’t know if they can top their previous match. They try their best as Fenix bounces around for Mil landing huge chokeslams and shit like that, and it’s definitely entertaining as hell. I also dig Fenix’s fiery comebacks against the monster, which is a situation where his contrived offense is okay, though he barely manages to throw a rope-walk kick and slaps the shit out of his thigh in clear view of the camera even though he pretty much missed the kick. These thigh slaps (and bicep slaps) are so distracting. We need a scale for them. Hold on.

 

• On a thigh-slap scale where “least obvious” is Prince Puma, “most obvious” is Rey Fenix, and dead in the middle is Alberto El Patrón, these thigh slaps score a…Rey Fenix, obviously, since he’s the one doing them. Anyway, Mil shrugs that off and ends up hitting Fenix with an unprotected chair shot while Matt Striker, ever the gamer, suggests that Muertes’s lifebar is still in the green. They toss each other around at ringside, including into the metal railing. Fenix climbs the railing to hit a double-stomp, but we just saw the awesomest possible spot using that railing, so it doesn’t do much for me. The road agents should maybe not repeat big spots on the same show happening in those core “amazing spot” areas of the arena (high guardrail, top of Dario’s office, balcony).

 

• Speaking of the balcony, after slamming Fenix into the commentary table and hitting him with a chair, Mil fireman carries him up to the balcony perch and powerbombs Fenix through the roof of a storage room that I think is caddy corner of Dario’s office. Mil’s skull-masked minions carry Fenix out of that storage room and put him in the ring so that Mil can finish him with a Flatliner and earn the pinfall victory. Striker said something about the ref having discretion on stopping this, so I thought maybe it could only be finished by referee stoppage for a second, but whether via pinfall or ref stoppage, it’s all good. Mil finally gets Catrina to give Fenix a Lick of Death. That’s been coming for more than a few episodes, huh?

 

• Seedy backstage interstitial: Dario Cueto prepares to feed his flunkies to Matanza Cueto. Why didn’t they just split town before this happened? Anyway, Dario tells them to choose one man to sacrifice, and before Bael can do much about it, Castro and Cisco grab him, post him up against the bars of Matanza’s cell, and then are spattered with Bael’s blood as Matanza eats through Bael’s face and maybe into his brain. The whole thing is done in a prolonged discretion shot, so I'm imagining a brain devouring. It’s time for the debut of our newest counter, the Permadeath Count: 1 (Bael). I look forward to adding that fuck Joey Ryan’s name to this list, hopefully.

 

• Good show after the mediocre opener, and surprisingly, it was carried by the wrestling! 3.75 LU-CHA chants out of 5.

Edited July 22 by SirSmUgly

[SirSmUgly]

Season 1, Show 30: “Submit to the Master” or Control (and various objects of power)

• Recap: Will Sexy Star still have two working arms after this show? Is Matanza Cueto going to get seconds at the long pig buffet? I have questions! I want answers!

 

• Seedy backstage interstitial: Dario Cueto seems totally disinterested in Chavo Guerrero Jr.’s return to the Temple until the point at which Chavo says the following: “Black Lotus has come here to kill your brother, and this time, she’s been trained by you-know-who.” Dario’s face registers a whole lot of interest after that sentence. He is unhappy that El Dragon Azteca managed to intercept and train Lotus and interestingly enough says to Chavo, “It was your job to take care of her.” Huh. OK, when did Dario and Chavo make a deal that Chavo was supposed to handle Lotus and get her out of/away from the Temple?

 

• This is intriguing. So, Dario says that Azteca “wouldn’t dare to step foot in this Temple.” I wonder why he wouldn’t. Chavo theorizes that Azteca, who is a magnetic dude, has inspired someone already in the Temple to be his mole, which is how he was able to intercept Lotus before she could move on Matanza. OK, hold on. We know from the flash-forwards in the first two episodes that Azteca eventually helps Puma out and Konnan is nowhere to be seen. I don't remember who the mole is or if there is one at all, but if there is, I'm calling that Konnan's the mole, is found out and literally fed to Matanza, and Puma is left without a mentor until Azteca inserts himself into that role. 

 

• Chavo even admits to Dario that he’s taken a deal from Azteca to protect Lotus in exchange for the erasure of his “debt” incurred from attacking Blue Demon Jr., but of course, “A Guerrero is only truly loyal to the highest bidder.” Dario grins like the Grinch planning to spoil Christmas and offers Chavo cash as a counter-bid, but Chavo instead negotiates for around-the-clock protection from his Mexican opps. Interestingly, after Dario agrees to Chavo's terms, he puts the stacks of cash back in his desk drawer and asks Chavo, “Now that we’ve got that out of the way, why don’t you tell me what you really want?” Chavo responds by chuckling out a chuckle full of malice and evil as the scene ends.

 

• I fucking loved this segment. I have no idea what’s going on and after spending most of the season slow-playing a lot of the elements of this main story, they just ramped things up in this interstitial with tons of intrigue, but man, I am into all of it. Also, Chavo Jr. is one of the best pro wrestling actors ever. He’s genuinely made it onto my list of like ten or twelve favorite wrestlers ever. I’ll watch whatever he’s doing at this point.

 

• Now I guess we have to have a wrestling match, which is kind of a bummer. See, that previous sentence is what Vince Russo wanted me to type about the pro wrestling that he booked, but he sucks something fierce at telling stories or developing characters or doing pretty much anything wrestling-related. What’s the opposite of a bonus? A demerit? Anyway, a demerit to this unfortunately-booked wrestling match is that Jack Evans is a part of it, and no, I don’t want to watch him wrestle Argenis. Go back to whatever discussion Chavo and Dario were having, please.

 

• Speaking of Dario, he steps out of his office and shits on Argenis for being unimportant and Evans for being a oh-fer loser. This matchup sucks, Dario says, and he’s right, so he tries to spice it up by offering one of the seven Aztec medallions as a prize. It’s not going to work, but whatever. Jack Evans (whose entrance tonight inspired Vampiro to explain the etymology of the term gringo) asks the crowd WHO’S BETTA than him, and not one single smark in that Temple crowd yelled back KANYON. Evans does make me laugh by yelling about [HIS] TESTICLES while selling in a Shelly Martinez-like exclamation. Otherwise, this match is passable. Evans scores a nice roll-through into an armbar in there. The rest of it feels clearly choreographed to me. Striker has to bust out an “it doesn’t have to be pretty to be effective” to cover for a supremely shitty spot in which Evans does a contrived springboard off the apron into a terrible-looking rana, to give you an idea of what I’m talking about. Evans manages to duck an Argenis lariat, hook Argenis’s arms, and backslide him with a bridge for three.

 

• Seedy backstage interstitial: Dysfunction Junction has to defend their trios tag titles tonight, and Dario has granted Daivari and Ryck the shot. They just need one more person to join them. Ryck suggests his cousin (but maybe not close friend) Willie Mack, who agrees to join them, but Brian Cage busts in from nowhere and suggests that he’d be a better partner than Mack. To indicate his superiority as a choice, he jumps Mack and kicks the shit out of him. Ryck thinks about getting involved, but Daivari convinces him to let things play out. Ryck sure looks conflicted about it, though, and he especially looks conflicted about Daivari telling him to leave his fallen cousin behind.

 

• Seedy backstage interstitial: Chavo Jr. is a lot like Mac in It’s Always Sunny: always playing all the sides at the same time so that he comes out on top. He finds Black Lotus in the surprisingly well-lit locker room and reports to her that he’s convinced Dario to let her wrestle in the Temple. Is this the ladies' locker room? Do the men get the dingy, poorly-lit one? Anyway, Lotus wants to stay laser-focused on killing Matanza, but Chavo tells her that he’ll handle the part where he finds the key that holds Matanza captive and let him out so that she can finish him off after her debut match tonight.

 

• Lotus isn’t a total idiot; she knows that Chavo is bullshitting her and blocks a sudden Chavo sneak punch, then kicks the shit out of him. Chavo, in pain, yells NOW and signals the two remaining flunkies to rush in and back him up, but Cisco and Cortez fail miserably at attacking Lotus. They at least succeed at distracting her enough so that Chavo can recover, grab a pipe, and lay Lotus out. Then, he reaches into his pocket and pulls out handcuffs. Almost needless to say, the whole episode could just be interstitials at this point, and I’d be fine with that.

 

• Delavar Daivari, Big Ryck, and Brian Cage are quite the odd trio, aren’t they? They get a Lucha Underground Trios Tag Team Championship shot against an even odder trio: the reigning champions Dysfunction Junction (Ivelisse Velez, Angelico, and Son of Havoc). Ivelisse is still on crutches and in a cast, but she hops onto the apron to defend her gold anyway.

 

• What follows is an acceptable trios tag match. Havoc blind tags Angelico as the latter picks up steam on a rope run toward a downed Cage, and their argument with one another causes the babyface shine segment to end abruptly, though Daivari immediately loses control when he tags in. Havoc mostly controls, gets up a head of steam on a rope run…and is blindly tagged back by Angelico. Good spot there. Meanwhile, Ivelisse continues to beg for a tag that she’s not getting on account of her busted ankle. She gives up and decides to go sit at ringside since no one will tag her in. It’s very funny to me that she nudges a whole row of fans over so she can scootch herself into a seat.

 

• The antics of Dysfunction Junction are fantastic. The match is whatever, but Ivelisse yelling invective at her team from the front row cracks me up. Meanwhile, the heels are doing dumb contrived spots like Ryck and Cage trading off during a stalling vertical suplex on Angelico. Whatever, fuck those guys. They’re boring. Get to the finish or at least show more of Ivelisse chewing out her team members and making fans retrieve her crutches for her. She is absolutely killing me right now. She eventually hops on the apron and distracts Daivari, who grabs her. Texano runs out on the other side and takes out Ryck; Daivari releases Ivelisse and goes after him, never seeing the Angelico knee that cracks him in the side of the head. Angelico then hits his over-the-post plancha on Cage at ringside while Havoc quickly goes up and drops an SSP on Daivari for the victory. The good parts of that match were all in the character work, and that mostly in Ivelisse being an energetic whirl of entertaining activity.

 

• Seedy backstage interstitial: Chavo Jr. and the flunkies drag a gagged Black Lotus into Dario’s office; Dario plans to keep her hostage in a cell across from the dreaded Matanza. Locking up a young woman looking to get revenge on the person who killed her parents directly across from the person who killed her parents is such a depraved heel act that even Vince McMahon Jr. is shocked and appalled.

 

• Pentagón Jr. versus Sexy Star in this Submission Match has been built well enough that I want to actually stick around for the match, but otherwise, I’d want to hit fast forward to see the next interstitial that ends the show. Striker has to reinforce the “Sexy Star is luchador(a) Chyna” thing after Vampiro suggests disgust that Penta might break her arm as part of this match by interjecting that she’s a luchador and she’s willing to risk it. Penta, meanwhile, promises for real and for true to finally snap Star’s arm as an offering to his Dark Master. Of course, he’s looking into the crowd as he says this, so she forearms him from behind before he can claim that he is without an inkling of fear.

 

• Penta slaps the shit out Star, which rattles Vampiro. Striker has to be the egalitarian voice of reason. I sort of enjoy this match even though it’s between two wrestlers whom I am not exactly excited to watch in the ring. Star avoids one arm breaker attempt and counters into a front facelock. Striker lists three women as modern-day idols for the kids: Ronda Rousey, Danica Patrick, and Sexy Star. I mean, what a list! If my kid looked up to those three scumbags, they’d be so fucked that I’d proactively lock them in the basement like Dario did Matanza. Jesus.

 

• Star wins an obligabrawl and then tries a kneebar back in the ring that Penta should probably be easily able to turn considering his weight advantage. He escapes, and when Star runs at him, he does a move I’ve never seen in my life, I don’t think: He flips her into Tombstone position, then crosses her ankles and bends them backward. This is like the raddest standing submission I’ve ever seen. If you just put together every cool spot Penta has in a highlight package, he’d look like maybe the greatest wrestler ever.

 

• Since that doesn’t earn a submission, Penta flips her into powerslam position, but she flips out and into an armbar that she can’t quite lock in. Striker rightly points out that Star maybe doesn’t have the submission prowess to finish Penta, which is a good kayfabe point, as Star hits two kicks and is popped with a Penta superkick in return. Then, Penta locks a, uh, modified Texas Cloverleaf on Star. Star makes the ropes. Penta lands another superkick, and On a thigh-slap scale where “least obvious” is Prince Puma, “most obvious” is Fenix, and dead in the middle is Alberto El Patrón, these thigh slaps score an…Alberto.

 

• The past couple of shows have spent a lot of time using the raised guardrail for spots. There was one in tonight’s opener that I didn’t mention, there were the Puma and Fenix spots last episode, and now there’s Star hitting a crossbody off the raised railing to Penta on the floor after the match wanders back out there. Star tosses Penta back in the ring, lands a double-leg takedown on a rebounding Penta after shooting him in, and rolls over into a Canadian Maple Leaf half-crab. Or, um, a Mexican Eagle half-crab, actually. At this point, Super Fly slides into the ring and the savvy crowd starts booing before Fly can even move to punch Star in the face. After Fly wears out Star, it doesn’t take much at all for Penta to quickly land a package piledriver and then lock Star in a hurty-looking surfboard with a neck vise for the submission.

 

• Vampiro was not asked to save Star from this arm breaking that Penta prepares to inflict on her in his post-victory celebration, but he does anyway. The crowd is hyped about this faceoff, but Vampiro realizes that maybe he should have just stayed seated, mouths out a frustrated curse toward himself, and storms away from the ring and back toward the locker room without further incident.

 

• Seedy backstage interstitial: Vampiro stands in front of a mirror in the dingy locker room, where is trying to keep the weird face-painted freak that is really who he is lodged deep inside as, cleverly, throwaway comments that Vampiro has made in earlier episodes while on commentary echo in his mind, including one about having to go to therapy so that he’d stop doing crazy things like trying to set Sting on fire, trying to dump Asya and Dale Torborg into coffins, or palling around with the Insane Clown Posse. Vampiro hears voices in his head, they counsel him, they understand, they talk to him, but he really would prefer that they stop. Then he goes full-on Twin Peaks and cracks the mirror with his head like Dale Cooper being possessed by BOB, as in this scene is a direct rip of that scene. And no, I am not bagging on it for being a direct rip of that scene. It’s a striking scene and well re-purposed here.

 

• SEE BRO, SEE, I TOLD YOU A SHOW WITH ALMOST ALL STORY AND MINIMAL WRESTLING COULD WORK, BRO. SEE, BRO, SEE, YOU JUST HAVE TO HAVE A LOT OF VIOLENCE, BRO. THERE WAS NOT ENOUGH SEX IN THIS EPISODE THOUGH, BRO, LIKE WHAT IF PENTA RIPPED SEXY STAR’S TOP OFF BEFORE HE TRIED TO BREAK HER ARM, BRO? LIKE, BRO, THE FELLAS IN THE CROWD WOULD HAVE LOVED THAT, BRO. Oh no, now I hear voices in my head, specifically Vince Russo’s. Let me go find a mirror to bash my skull into. Anyway, excellent show. 4.25 LU-CHA chants out of 5.

[Curt McGirt]

Ah good, we're getting close to the best thing from the entire first season. Yessssss...

[zendragon]

It's interesting you mention Chavo as a great acting wrestler as he's become the go to guy in Hollywood for wrestling post-LU. He's been the wrestling coordinator for GLOW, Young Rock, some netflix show called Love and The Iron Claw

[SirSmUgly]

Season 1, Show 31: “The Desolation of Drago” or Touch Dario, Get Title Shot

• This is the last chance I’ll have to write about LU in the next week, so I sure hope it’s a good episode to break on!

 

• Recap: Chavo Jr. is trying to maneuver his way out of a lot of trouble from his enemies by helping Dario Cueto with Dario’s little Black Lotus problem; Drago was banished from the temple, but he certainly hasn’t forgotten about Dario Cueto. Man, Dario piling up enemies is probably a mistake on his part.

 

• Unsettling sunset interstitial: Drago stands atop the Temple roof, staring out at the setting sun, before pulling a Batman, spreading his wings, and theatrically leaping from the building.

 

• Vampiro cuts off Matt Striker’s typical welcome to apologize to the audience for jumping into the ring and facing off with Penta last week. He’s very sorry and promises never to do it again because he’s committed to being a color commentator who takes his medications, goes to therapy, and leads a quieter, simpler life than he once did back when he spent his days piledriving X-Pac into exploding coffins and crazy shit like that. I do appreciate how supportive Striker is of his buddy on color. Aw. That’s nice.

 

• Dario Cueto is in the ring to announce Ultima Lucha, which will be our season-ending event here in Lucha Underground. Dario’s so excited that he’s going to announce a competition to earn a shot at Prince Puma’s Lucha Underground Championship at that event. He books in a match all the men who have faced Puma for the LU Championship before: Hernandez, Brian Cage, King Cuerno, and Fenix. Now, I know that Dario didn’t forget what Mil did to Fenix a couple weeks ago, and sure enough, Dario chuckles about it and decides, ah well, since Fenix was sent to “an early grave,” he’s out of this number one contendership match.

 

• Still in hype mode, Dario introduces Blue Demon Jr., who he says will also be joining us at Ultima Lucha. Is there any better wrestling attire than a masked luchador in a suit? I think not. Demon joins Dario in the ring. Dario wants to invite Demon to get that big payday at Ultima Lucha, but first he needs to knock off the ring rust against…Chavo Guerrero Jr. (w/Castro and Cisco). Huh. Looks like we’re going to get a proper capper to that feud. Weirdly, Striker mentions something about a “mint-condition cardboard bat,” which is an odd thing to expose openly even if we know they’re not swatting each other with real Louisville Sluggers like they’re Eazy-E.

 

• Dario declares this impromptu match no disqualification, then splits the ring so he can watch the carnage from a safe place. Demon wrestling this match in a suit and dress shoes is great. Hey, neat: I forgot that the commentators can’t see what happens in the interstitials. Vampiro notes that there are only two of the three members of the Crew out there, and of course he does: He doesn’t know that Bael met his death at the bloody gaping maw of Matanza Cueto. I love how consistent this show has been about the commentators only having knowledge of what happens directly in front of them.

 

• Vampiro heels on Demon while he mostly catches a gang beatdown from Chavo and the flunkies. Demon has a couple of comebacks get summarily cut off before he falls to the numbers game and a Chavo frog splash that gets three. Is this the last we see of Blue Demon Jr. in the Temple? Vampiro seems to suggest as much on commentary.

 

• Surreal superhero-ish interstitial: Drago and the way they silhouette him against orange light with his dragon’s wings spread gives me Batman Begins vibes. As someone who suffered through the movie only once, but who thoroughly enjoyed the video game adaptation, maybe I’m thinking of the way the game was lit, maybe? Anyway, Drago seems to be a man on a mission like his name was Mabel.

 

• Seedy backstage interstitial: Chavo Jr. apologizes to a penned-up Black Lotus for doing what he had to do and backstabbing her. Lotus: “You’re a liar.” Chavo, responding with a “duh” in his inimitable way: “I’m a Guerrero.” Lotus promises Chavo that El Dragon Azteca will send all of Mexico after him, but he asserts that what he just did to Blue Demon Jr. will ensure that his Mexican opps think twice before coming after him. He then quite dickishly tells Lotus to enjoy her view before leaving her alone to stare into Matanza’s cell. What a dick! Or more accurately: What a Guerrero!

 

• Drago pretty much Dark Knights his way into Dario’s office and accosts Dario before the maniacal multi-millionaire owner can call for security. Of course, Dario immediately switches up when Drago grabs him by the collar; Dario tries to bargain his way out of trouble, and hey, Drago asks for something totally reasonable: He also got a shot at Puma’s LU Championship a few weeks ago and therefore should be in tonight's former contenders match. Dario admits that Drago’s found a loophole and lets him into the match, but on two conditions. First, he has to win it, or he’s still banished form the Temple, and two, he has to unmask. I would take that second stipulation as a clear sign that Drago is going to win except for one thing: The official title of this show. I have no clue what’s going to happen in that match, and let me tell you, I am loving that I have no clue what’s going to happen in that match. I hope this eventually leads to Drago winning the LU Championship in the final episode of the season, though.

 

• Here's a trios tag match involving the Disciples of Death (w/Catrina), which are the three death-masked dudes who hang out with Mil Muertes: Barrio Negro, Trece, and El Siniestro de la Muerte. Let me take one guess at who the second LU Trios Tag Team Champions will be. The lights flicker as they walk to the ring, which is pretty good. Striker can’t help but vocalize his worry that Siniestro might have a concealed power ring on his person. I don’t hold it against him. Get your nerd references in where you can, dude.

 

• I don’t like that Mascarita Sagrada and Pimpinela Escarlata are back from their beatings at the hands of Dario’s Crew (Season One, Show Fifteen) to job to Mil’s crew, but here they are with a new friend – Bengala – to do the J-O-B. Whichever disciple I’m looking at is flummoxed, totally perplexed in fact, by the wily Pimpinela, who smooches folks and sticks his ass out like prime 1996 Goldust in between wrestling moves. Broadly speaking, I’m a fan of gimmicks in which the wrestler isn’t taken seriously because of it, but actually, they’re super dangerous and hoping that their gimmick causes you to let your guard down. This is what makes Borne Doink work so well and, from a wider view, it’s what was so effective about Goldust (though yes, this ignores all the specific problems with how the WWF presented and talked about that particular gimmick on their own programming).

 

• The babyfaces actually have a nice little shine segment before Sagrada plays babyface in peril. I mean, Mascarita Sagrada is an insane athlete. Is his average-sized compatriot Mascara Sagrada anywhere near as athletic? And if I’m right, Mascarita Sagrada was nearing fifty at the point he was wrestling in LU, yes? Wild stuff. Anyway, the babyfaces attempt a series of comebacks, but they get cut off. Pimpi, who usually is sneaking kisses in on people, gets laid out and lain over the bottom rope, where Catrina steals up and gives him a Lick of Death. Then, the Disciples put Pimpi in Christ pose and flip him out of the crucifix position and into basically what is a crucifix Northern Lights Suplex for three. The disciple who pins Pimpi perches on top of his ribcage like a buzzard snacking on carrion. Boy, there was a lot going on in that match, but I liked it. It was suitably weird.

 

• Seedy backstage interstitial: Johnny Mundo is angry at Dario Cueto for not putting him in the number one contendership match tonight, but Dario surprisingly (both to me and to Mundo) tells Johnny that actually, he’s planning on making sure that Mundo is the champion at Ultima Lucha, which is why Mundo isn’t in the match. Of course, I’d love to know what made Dario flip his position on Mundo, a guy who he hated so much that he signed him to LU just to get Big Ryck and the flunkies to torment him. Mundo’s face tells me that he’d like to know as well.

 

• Way back in the day, when Mundo punched out Dario after that ladder match (Season One, Show Seven), Dario claims that he got over it immediately: “When I said that I wanted us to have a new start, Johnny, I meant it. I’m not one to hold grudges. So you gave me a black eye; who cares? I look great in sunglasses.” Hilarious. Anyway, Dario says that he tried to run Mundo out of the Temple because it was good for business, but Mundo survived, and he respects that. But what really respects is when Mundo tossed Alberto El Patrón through his office window in a violent show of naked aggression (Season One, Show Twenty-Seven); that’s the kind of bloodsport that gets Dario all horny!

 

• That whole incident turned Dario around on Mundo. Now Dario wants Mundo to keep hurting dudes, especially Prince Puma. In fact, next week, Dario puts Mundo in a show-long Iron Man Match against Puma for the LU title next week. One show full of a Mundo match sounds like absolute fucking hell. I am grateful that I’m going to have a week to prepare before I have to endure that.

 

• It’s main event time! Brian Cage, King Cuerno, Hernandez, and Drago convene in the ring to fight for an LU Championship shot at Ultima Lucha. Drago gets a really nice pop as he enters. I’d like to stop here and note one thing that I think LU does really well, which is to level up its wrestlers after they lose. Drago started this show trading wins with Cuerno, ultimately losing a feud to Cuerno, and being portrayed as a clear level beneath Fenix. After losing to Puma, he comes back bathed in red light and looking like a killer. Muertes traded wins with Fenix, lost a Grave Consequences Match to him, and came back even deadlier. Penta lost his first handful of matches, then got a new unseen Dark Master and became a legitimate threat the very next show. Even Mundo seems like more of a threat after losing cleanly to Alberto El Patrón and turning heel. About the only person who hasn’t looked more dangerous after taking losses is the champ himself, Puma.

 

• The match is a Fatal Fourway, so we start out with two dudes wrestling while two other dudes stand around before Cage and Cuerno, who have been partners before, agree to team up, at least initially. Eventually, Cage uses his offensive production to show up Cuerno and challenge him directly. This match isn’t good, but they’re trying to weave a couple of little stories into it. When zendragon at one point wrote something in this therad to the effect of multiman matches being best used sparingly, this match is  one example of why I agree: If they didn’t have so many of these multimans this season, they could have specifically busted them out for situations like this where it makes functional sense to have one. It still wouldn’t be particularly good, probably, but it would at least feel less tired than it does.

 

• That goof Killshot perches on a platform and scouts his opps. I sure hope he observed Drago and Hernandez completely fail to catch Cage on moonsault from the top to the floor and maybe doesn’t trust those two to catch his dives if he ever wrestles them. Cage is a gamer and pops right back up to do the next spot, though, which ends with him eating an Arrow from Hell. Drago splatters Hernandez with a sunset flip powerbomb from the apron to the floor after that. This disparate collection of okay-ish spots is hopefully coming to an end soon, and it sure enough does with Drago getting back at King Cuerno by misting him and hitting that Tail of the Dragon pinning combination for three. Chavo and Drago must be thrilled that they were able to get back at their long-term rivals on this show tonight. Prince Puma meets Drago in the ring and faces off with him. The crowd loves it.

 

• Seedy backstage interstitial: You know who doesn’t love it, though? Dario Cueto. He works his jaw and grinds the enamel from his teeth while peeking at this scene from between his office blinds. That’s when he feels a faint touch on the back of his neck, which means one thing – no one is there when he initially turns around, but suddenly, Catrina appears, seated in his chair and lecturing him  for failing to put Mil Muertes into that Fatal Fourway Match. Dario points out that Mil has never faced Puma for the title, and Catrina retorts in two ways: First, she says that Mil not facing Puma for the title is the only reason that Puma still reigns as champion. Second, she chokes the shit outta this dude for getting in Mil’s way of the title. She only releases the grip around his neck when he gasps out a promise to book Drago/Mil for Drago’s title shot in two weeks. Catrina congratulates Dario on making both a sound booking and a sound business decision and assures him that Mil can beat anyone in the Temple up to and including Matanza Cueto before dissipating into the ether. Dario, sucking wind, grasps the key around his neck that opens Matanza’s cell and probably considers maybe just letting the big guy out to chomp through all Dario’s problems.

 

• I do like that we have a messy road to Ultima Lucha, at least for the next couple weeks. Any combo of Mundo/Puma/Muertes/Drago could end up in the main event, and considering the rate at which Dario makes deals with his wrestlers when they punch or choke him, who can tell which other wrestlers might enter that title picture in the final two months of the season?

 

• I’ll put my final thoughts in a form that the endless chanters in the Temple would probably best understand: CARRIED BY STO-RY *clap clap clapclapclap*. 3.5 LU-CHA chants out of 5.

[zendragon]

I don't know enough Lucha to answer this but is there only one Mascarita Sagrada under the mask? More specifically is it possible we had a different guy playing him on LU than in Mexico?

[SirSmUgly]

22 hours ago, Curt McGirt said:

Ah good, we're getting close to the best thing from the entire first season. Yessssss...

I realized that I don't have a sense of your taste, so I have no idea what to expect. 

22 hours ago, zendragon said:

It's interesting you mention Chavo as a great acting wrestler as he's become the go to guy in Hollywood for wrestling post-LU. He's been the wrestling coordinator for GLOW, Young Rock, some netflix show called Love and The Iron Claw

I knew all of those except for the Netflix show called Love, which I have not seen (I haven't seen Young Rock, either). 

[Curt McGirt]

6 hours ago, SirSmUgly said:

I realized that I don't have a sense of your taste, so I have no idea what to expect.

I'm surprised, and pleased about that. And I'm saying nothing.  

[tbarrie]

On 7/22/2025 at 6:39 PM, zendragon said:

It's interesting you mention Chavo as a great acting wrestler as he's become the go to guy in Hollywood for wrestling post-LU. He's been the wrestling coordinator for GLOW, Young Rock, some netflix show called Love and The Iron Claw

12 hours ago, SirSmUgly said:

I knew all of those except for the Netflix show called Love, which I have not seen (I haven't seen Young Rock, either). 

This is why the Oxford Comma is important. I honestly thought the last item on zendragon's list was a Netflix show called "Love and the Iron Claw".

Which sounds awesome.

[Curt McGirt]

Where the love IS the Iron Claw

C'mon, you know why half the audience went to that movie. 

[SirSmUgly]

Season 1, Show 32: “All Night Long” or Feels Like Endless Mode

• Good news: We’re back!

 

• Bad news: We’re back with an Iron Man All Night Long Match involving Johnny Mundo!

 

• Recap: Here’s what led up to the Iron Man All Night Long Match involving Johnny Mundo!

 

• I’m against Alberto El Patrón intervening to help Prince Puma take the lead or catch up and tie in this match. He’d better wait until the match is over to attack. Considering how this company has booked Puma, I’m probably not getting what I want [Editor's note: No, I am not getting what I want].

 

• The competitors are in the ring at the show opening. Prince Puma seems to be without Konnan tonight. He shakes Johnny Mundo’s hand, who takes it, but also pulls Puma over to talk some shit. Vampiro congratulates himself for seeing Mundo’s heel turn coming; I don’t remember if he actually did or not, but since he’s a quasi-heel commentator, it’s okay if he’s lying.

 

• We get some cautious mat wrestling to start as is common for these matches, in which no one wants to drop the first fall and have to wrestle from behind early. I just watched Rick Rude/Ricky Steamboat Iron Man at Beach Blast 1992, which is still a perfect match, and as a thirty-minute version of this type of match, this 35-ish minute version should be compared against that one for how they manage the clock.

 

• They go from cautious headlock exchanges to a less cautious rope running exchange that includes a Puma headscissors, a whiffed dive to the floor by Mundo, and a spinning crossbody to the floor by Puma that takes advantage of Mundo’s whiff. Here is where our first commercial break exists.

 

• We come back to Puma trying a lazy pinfall and getting reversed at two into a Mundo crucifix pin for another two count. This match has been okay so far. Right as I write this, Puma manages to steal a quick roll-up for the first pinfall [Mundo –  0, Puma – 1]. There is no running clock, so it’s probably five or six minutes in. I don’t like this lack of a running clock, honestly. Mundo sells frustration as Vampiro naturally makes an ice hockey analogy to suggest that an early Puma lead does not mean all is lost for Mundo. Well, the long-term research tells me that the team that scores first in an NHL game wins roughly two-thirds of the time, so yeah, it’s not over, but losing that first fall was kayfabe rough for Mundo.

 

• Mundo quickly loses control of things as he tries to come back, but Puma takes over and scores a couple of two counts. They embark upon a bit of decent counter wrestling; Mundo hits a dropkick that nails a diving Puma in the solar plexus, but he can’t scramble over quickly enough to make a successful pinfall attempt. This match has been perfectly okay so far, which has been a nice surprise.

 

• Puma sells a bit of an arm injury as he charges Mundo, and then in a spot that doesn’t quite work for me, Puma misses a crossbody. So, Mundo tries a quick End of the World, but Puma grabs his leg as he bounces up the ropes and yanks Mundo down into another quick roll-up attempt. Mundo blocks it by holding the ropes and keeps holding, getting a cheap leveraged pin for the three [Mundo –  1, Puma – 1]. The issue isn’t with the wrestlers themselves, but with the referee, who runs over and then clearly stares right at Mundo holding onto the ropes before kneeling to make the pinfall. Marty Elias was on his VINTAGE WCW REF shit there. Even Striker yells THAT’S GONNA COUNT in disbelief [Editor’s note: In the segment after the break, Striker explains that this is a no disqualification match, so that spot was fine on the part of the ref, but I need to pay closer attention maybe because I didn’t realize that it was no DQ. Maybe Striker should have mentioned it right after the pinfall again for the people like me who apparently missed it. Or maybe he mentioned it very often and the fault is with me, the viewer, but I don’t think he did!]. OK, here is where we break for another commercial.

 

• Now we have a running clock all of a sudden – we’ve got 28-ish minutes left – but it disappears after a few seconds. The presentation of this match bums me out a bit. A la Kevin Nash, Mundo frames Puma from behind before hitting a shitty knee. This match continues to be inoffensive. Kind of boring, sure, but inoffensive. They end up on the floor and do a spot centered around a wooden crate that Mundo yanks from under the ring apron (Striker can’t resist saying that at least it's not a little person being dragged out from under the ring, but I would have been fine with Mascarita Sagrada popping out here…not so much Hornswoggle, though).

 

• Anyway, Puma move-steals King Cuerno’s Thrill of the Hunt and dumps Mundo, who crushes the box upon landing, but he comes back with a few pokes to Puma’s abdominals with a crowbar, and now the match is losing me a bit. Mundo hits Puma in the head with a crowbar, which should end the match because Puma is dead now; Mundo merely rolls Puma back in the ring and scores a pinfall [Mundo –  2, Puma – 1]. He should score at least seven or eight just off that move. Mundo follows with a Moonlight Drive for another three count [Mundo –  3, Puma – 1]. Mundo at least pours on the pinfalls; he hits a kick and an End of the World for a third successful pinfall in a short period [Mundo –  4, Puma – 1].

 

• Striker: “You look at your clock at home, you do the math, you see how much time is left…” Uh, how about if you idiots provide me with a clock instead? Mundo cockily takes a water break while Puma sells the crowbar spot with something other than death. Did Triple H ever actually strike someone with the head of a worked sledgehammer? He always simply poked them with real sledgehammers, yeah? If so, this is an example of why. Puma is out here making a comeback after Mundo metaphorically takes his foot off the gas pedal. Dammit, there are still 23 minutes left in this thing.

 

• Mundo hits a neat hanging reverse neckbreaker right before another commercial break to stop said comeback, but then he goes right back to the weapons under the ring and pulls out a ladder. Well, this thing went from “surprisingly okay” to “aggressively sucking” on a dime. They do some ladder spots. Meh. I don’t want to see a bunch of flipsy-doo dives off ladders twenty minutes into a 35-ish minute Iron Man Match. Mundo eats up a handful of minutes to set up a table and a ladder and a bunch of nonsense so that Puma can recover and stop him. They brawl into the crowd. It’s not good. Just do your dumb overelaborated spot and move on. But no, they have a long, annoying struggle over dual table spots. Mundo hits a superkick and, oh yeah:

 

• On a thigh-slap scale where “least obvious” is Prince Puma, “most obvious” is Fenix, and dead in the middle is Alberto El Patrón, these thigh slaps score a…well, Mundo is scoring a Fenix tonight, but Puma is actually scoring an Alberto tonight rather than scoring as he normally does.

 

• Mundo takes some time to hijack the mic at the bandstand and crow about how rad he is and how his lead is practically insurmountable. There’s a guy dressed like Major Bison in the band, faithfully pointed out by Striker (of course), and Mundo exhorts him to start a celebratory song. God, this match sucks ass. Puma climbs up there and eventually KABONGs Mundo with a guitar that practically explodes with confetti upon impact (heh). Puma lands a tackle and both guys dive together onto the tables below, finally, as we go to break.

 

• There were about thirteen minutes left when the clock popped on before the break; we come back to Puma rolling Mundo into the ring and getting three [Mundo –  4, Puma – 2]. Whatever. This match is presently awful. Hurry up and let’s get to the finish. Puma hits a cradle piledriver that looks Thrill of the Hunt-ish to get another sudden pinfall [Mundo –  4, Puma – 3]. This came out of nowhere and does not feel like an earned comeback with a lot of momentum. I mean, broadly Mundo choking again as Alberto alluded to is a reasonable story to tell, but the way they are getting there tonight is not to my taste at all.

 

• Mundo scurries away and forces Puma to chase him around, which is a pretty good strategic spot in kayfabe and is well-worked i n reality, though the payoff isn’t any good because Mundo just gets back in the ring and re-engages instead of Puma finding a clever way to cut off his escape or trick him into re-engaging. Mundo avoids a 630 Senton Bomb and runs away again. Why not just leave the arena in kayfabe? Mundo backs up the stairs, where he is backjumped by Alberto and beaten back toward the ring; *sigh*, so obvious, so unhelpful to Puma.

 

• The clock actually stays on screen this time; at three-and-a-half minutes to go, Puma hits a springboard somersault splash on Mundo after Alberto deposits him back in the ring to tie up the bout [Mundo –  4, Puma – 4]. Alberto cuts a whole-ass promo on the steps in which he promises to get further revenge on Mundo and challenges Puma to a future title match if Puma manages to win or draw this thing.

 

• I knew this match was going to stink, but I was lulled into a false sense of security by the reasonably-worked opening of the match. Once the crowbar came out, I should have just hit fast forward. Is the C-4 the fakest wrestling move ever, or does that “honor” go to the Canadian Destroyer? Or are we just going to give the crown to the Irish Whip, for that matter? Anyway, there’s a C-4 in there, and then Mundo takes the best move of the match, which is a wild bump from the top rope to the mat when Puma escapes a top-rope rana attempt. That’s a wrap for Mundo, who is so hurt by the whiff that Puma puts him in position and scores a 630 Senton Bomb for a pinfall with eight seconds left [Mundo –  4, Puma – 5] and retains the gold shortly after.

 

• That match was aggressively bad, and there wasn’t one seedy backstage interstitial to save the show this time around. -1 LU-CHA chants out of 5.

[SirSmUgly]

Season 1, Show 33: “Death vs. The Drago” or There Is No Escape

• Recap: Catrina’s plan, which was to have Fenix kill Mil Muertes and then resurrect Muertes using her mystical stone while also having Muertes steal a portion of Fenix’s Aztec rebirth powers to become stronger in preparation to win the Lucha Underground Championship, is coming to fruition! Also, that is a batshit crazy plan!

 

• You know the one way that Johnny Mundo using a crowbar on someone would logically work? If he used it on Mil. I would believe that Catrina’s mystical stone is more powerful than a mere crowbar.

 

• Matt Striker and Vampiro build the Ultima Lucha card to start our show. Our first match for that event is signed: Johnny Mundo vs. Alberto El Patrón.

 

• Sexy Star is in the ring, awaiting her frenemy Super Fly. Ooh, it’s time for…

 

• Adventures in Interviewing with Vampiro: This interview functions as a reminder of one of the multiple midcard storylines that were put on pause so that Johnny Mundo could stink it up in an Iron Man Match. Super Fly is aggy about losing his mask to Star, and he wanted her to lose the function of her arm as payback. Of course, he notes that the man who stopped that latter part from happening is his interviewer, Vampiro.

 

• Vampiro merely notes that Fly lost that match straight up, and he's got to live with how it shook out, but Fly thinks that Star should have walked away from the match and the Temple to save his mask. Or you could have walked away yourself, Mr. Heelish Heel. Fly warns Vampiro not to get involved in his rematch with Star and gets burned in return: “Dude, let’s be honest, man. She’s already beaten you and taken your mask, so instead of worrying about what I’m doing, why don’t you put your attention where it needs to be and focus on her?” Man, I wish we got casual shit-talker Vampiro in his WCW run. Fly promises to “put [Star] in her place” in tonight’s match. I enjoyed this.

 

• As for the match, On a thigh-slap scale where “least obvious” is Prince Puma, “most obvious” is Fenix, and dead in the middle is Alberto El Patrón, these thigh slaps score a(n)…Alberto on Fly’s part, though for accuracy’s sake, he’s a bicep slapper instead of a thigh slapper. You know, if the seller whips their head back on a strike, that visual is more effective than all the slapping nonsense in my humble opinion. This match is acceptable enough, I suppose. Star is having a solid night in the ring. Fly, I’m less impressed with. I’m not sure that he’s much good, actually. Maybe the fact that he has one eye painted like 1994 Crush has me making unfortunate singles work connections between the two.

 

• Just as I say that Star is having a decent night, she trips while trying to hit a crossbody from the top to the floor; Fly manages to catch her. Otherwise, though, Star looks way less awkward in the ring than she normally does. Star tries a legdrop and then a bridging vertical suplex to score three, but Fly kicks out at two both times. Fly takes over with a kick to the shin, then lands a double powerbomb and sits out on the second one for three. Fly continues to attack Star after the match and attempts to rip her mask off before tossing her to ringside.

 

• Striker “promises” me a multi-person match for an Aztec medallion. What’s he going to promise next, to come burn my house down? Okay, that’s a little extreme, but you get my point.

 

• Hype video: Drago is pretty rad! He preps to face death itself later tonight.

 

• Here are five wrestlers to have another LU style multi-person match. Hold on, though; Pentagón Jr. (w/threats toward Melissa Santos) is out first. He cuts a promo about how pleasing his Dark Master is more important than winning some stupid medallion and then promises to sacrifice Vampiro’s arm to his Master since Vampiro kept him from breaking Sexy Star’s arm a few weeks back as Super Fly previously discussed (Season One, Show Thirty). Vampiro refuses to get in the ring on account of he’s trying to leave that lifestyle behind, so Penta confronts him at the desk. Vamp tries to beg off, so Penta grabs his shirt, and Vamp finally shoves him away. They go face to face, and what the fuck, am I actually into the possibility of a Penta/Vampiro match? If they made it a bloody brawl, it could be pretty great! True to his words, Penta rolls out because he doesn’t care for Dario Cueto’s silly medallions. Vampiro sits back down at the desk and tries to control the weirdo rage that threatens to overwhelm his carefully medicated sanity. I think it’s awfully nice that Striker hastily kicks it to commercial and then immediately checks on his commentary buddy.

 

• I’m at the point where I think it’s time to blame WCW for making Vampiro seem like he sucked rather than Vampiro himself.

 

• OK, Aerostar, Marty “the Moth” Martinez, Cage, and Willie Mack are left to enter the ring and wrestle for the medallion. Cage is probably going to win this, which would be a bummer with the Moth and Mack in the ring. Mack and Cage go at it while the Moth and Aerostar act like chums, putting their arms around one another to enjoy the fight. Aerostar ends that by taking his arm from around Martinez’s shoulder and using it to roll up the Moth for two. This is a better match than most multi-mans in LU because everyone pairs off and there’s a lot of action going on at all times.

 

• Martinez eventually rids himself of Aerostar and dives over the top rope and onto Mack and Cage at ringside, then declares that he has AZTEC PRIDE. Vampiro, still a bit shaken, thinks the Moth was claiming to have something else: “Aztec Pie? What the hell is that?” I laughed. At one point, Cage fallaway slams Aerostar over the top and into Mack. This is a fun collection of spots and far more watchable than I thought it would be. The next step for LU is making these matches feel like complete narratives, but right now, I’m just glad that they didn’t always have two guys wrestling and two guys selling.

 

• They do actually have a bit of “two guys wrestle, two guys lay around” in the middle of the match, but it’s okay. Martinez is entertaining as hell. What a weirdo, man. I love his jawing at the ref as he attempts a series of pinfalls on Mack (“One-two-tres! I thought that was three!”) and his general strange-looking offense. Mack takes a ton of damage from the Moth and then Cage, but hangs on.

 

• There is a really good spot in here where the Moth and Aerostar team up to try and knock Cage down, but he runs through their double clothesline and hits one of his own. What I liked was Martinez and Aerostar selling that Cage ran through their clothesline with such physicality that it hurt their hands. Cage then takes a wild bump on the apron when Mack hoists him over in an exploder suplex. Mack follows with a Frog Splash from the top to the floor. That was certainly the most spectacular series of spots in the match. The Moth wants to follow, but he takes a long time to flap his wings and gets caught by Aerostar, who lands a rope-walk Frankensteiner and a springboard splash for three. That was a pretty fun TV match and included the bonus of Cage not winning.

 

• Seedy backstage interstitial: Boy, have I missed these. Son of Havoc and Ivelisse shadowbox while Angelico works his legs. Obviously, Ivelisse and Havoc throw harder punches than one would expect from trios champs, and Angelico tries to calm them down. That's when Catrina walks in and informs them that the Disciples of Death will be helping them out by taking their trios titles and allowing them to finally disband so they won't have to deal with one another anymore. Also, we get some horny straight dude fanservice as Catrina teases a Lick of Death on Ivelisse. Or you know, horny bi person fanservice. Or horny lesbian lady fanservice. Basically, if you are sexually interested in both women and cable TV-level erotica, this seedy backstage interstitial was for you!

 

• Of course, Catrina being all sexy is just a diversion so that she can use her mystical Aztec stone to call the Disciples of Death into the room with a spark of electricity; her minions teleport behind Dysfunction Junction and leave them laying, then teleport back out. Mil Muertes joins Catrina by speeding through the astral plane or something. He sure didn’t walk through the door, that’s for sure. Anyway, with one goal achieved for tonight, Mil and Catrina walk toward the ring to achieve their second goal: Destroy Drago and take his place as the contender to Prince Puma’s Lucha Underground Championship at Ultima Lucha.

 

• Drago enters that ring for the main event, but before he can do much more than pose, he is jumped by Hernandez, who whips him with a belt for, uh, taking advantage of the chance to win number one contendership when Hernandez failed to do so. I mean, look at the failings within yourself rather than lashing outward, Hernandez. Though I suppose if he could do that, he wouldn’t be a heel, now would he? Marty Elias way the fuck overacts as he checks to see if Drago can still go. Man, he is an annoying fucking referee. Mil Muertes (w/Catrina) enters the ring, and I can confirm that Muertes is too big for poor Drago. Drago fights and fights, but he can’t hit a back suplex on Mil. Credit to Drago, though, who is a fighter; Mil switches with him, and he fights off a back suplex and uses the ropes to leverage backward into a cutter.

 

• Mil manages to hit a release overhead belly-to-belly when Drago tries to run, however, and begins to assert himself by using his size and strength advantage. Drago tries to get on the move after eating quite a few lariats, and they have an okay exchange that ends in a pretty awesome spear. The spear was good enough to upgrade that exchange from “okay” to “good.” Drago finds himself even more deeply in trouble than he was when he was getting hit with tons of lariats. Muertes scores a handful of two counts before Drago manages to squeeze out of danger on a rope run and kicks a charging Mil to the floor. Drago then goes up top and hits a huge crossbody to Mil on the floor.

 

• Alas, now the match is outside the ring, where Mil Muertes can use the environment to assist in tossing Drago around. It doesn’t take long for Mil to clear the ringside audience out of their chairs so that he can toss Drago into them once vacated. Mil tosses Drago into the ring, but when he hears the crowd chant WE WANT TABLES, he considers it, then tosses Drago back outside and gives these fucking animals what they want, which is a powerbomb of Drago onto the unbreaking announce table. I like the called audible. Of course, the crowd then chants for DRA-GO, so maybe they just like chaos.

 

• I enjoy Drago, but he feels like a third party in this match. Mil and Catrina are way more interesting, and then the crowd actually is the secondary character that has been the most interesting. I feel like this is also Drago’s story and wish that his work came through stronger. Drago actually manages a Dragon’s Tail, but Mil wriggles out of it and clubs away at Drago, then goes right back to work. Drago tries to throw a punch, but Muertes catches it and pulls Drago into a Flatliner for the three and the title shot against Prince Puma. Muertes was very fun in that match. Catrina gives Drago a Lick of Death to put a fine point on the proceedings tonight.

 

• No, wait, Prince Puma (w/Konnan) arrives to face off with Muertes and Catrina as the show ends. That puts a fine point on the proceedings tonight.

 

• I’m bummed about the complete lack of Dario Cueto these last couple episodes (and the general lack of seedy backstage interstitials), but Vampiro did a lot of legwork this week to get the out-of-ring stuff over, the one interstitial we got was good, and the wrestling was much better than I would have guessed. I’m not surprised that Muertes and Drago had a good bout, but the undercard matches definitely surprised me with their quality. Good show! 3.75 LU-CHA chants out of 5.

[SirSmUgly]

Season 1, Show 34: “Gold and Guerreros” or If this ep were reviewed in GamePro, it would score dead in the middle for Fun Factor

• I am so glad that we are getting back to…

 

• Recap: …all the fuckery Chavo Guerrero Jr. has gotten into, what with the backstabbing of Blue Demon Jr. and the resultant backlash from Mexicans who respect Demon’s family and Chavo countering that by backstabbing both El Dragon Azteca and Black Lotus by delivering Lotus into the hands of Dario Cueto. Chavo Jr. just seems completely in over his head. If I had an “evil plan scale where ‘least in over their head’ is Catrina, ‘most in over their head’ is Chavo Guerrero Jr., and dead in the middle is Dario Cueto,” well, it’s obvious what Chavo Jr. would be scoring, isn’t it? Also, this ice cold Texano/Daivari feud unfortunately **Howard Finkel voice** MUST CONTINUE. Finally, poor Drago won his way back into the Temple, but lost his title shot to Mil Muertes. How will he rebound?

 

• Seedy backstage interstitial: We are starting this show out in my favorite way – with Dario Cueto-focused plotting! Dario counts his dollars before stashing them away as Chavo Guerrero Jr. comes in. Chavo has one more request from Dario, which Dario pretends to forget until Chavo presses him. That final request is a No DQ Lucha Underground Championship Match against Prince Puma. Actually, beyond that, Chavo has one mini-request, which is for Dario to mitigate the effects of Konnan and Konnan's pimp cane at ringside. I guess Chavo doesn’t trust his flunkies to get the job done (nor should he). Dario decrees that if Konnan gets involved, Chavo will win the title automatically. The evil guys laugh evilly.

 

• Tonight’s house band is very good. It’s the band with M. Bison in it – Mexican Dubweiser. Interestingly, LU is going to burn Drago vs. Hernandez off tonight and not save it for Ultima Lucha [Editor's note: As a seasoned pro wrestling viewer, I should know better than to type something definitive like that before the match even happens].

 

• Delavar Daivari (w/Big Ryck) is in the opener against Texano, which they also aren’t saving for Ultima Lucha. That’s fine with me. This feud has been bad. Put Texano over Daivari and let’s move on from this, please. Texano comes out hot; Daivari scrambles to the floor after a back body drop, where he is pursued by Texano until Big Ryck blocks off Texano’s path. Daivari uses that distraction to catch Texano coming back in the ring, but he rapidly loses control of the match until, again, Ryck alters things by grabbing Texano’s leg on a rope run. We get a shot of Ryck jawing at the crowd and Daivari putting Texano in a leg grapevine. Go back to the first shot; that was more interesting.

 

• Daivari tosses Texano to ringside so that Ryck can get a few boots in before putting Texano in a Figure Four back in the ring. Texano manages to endure the pain and turn the Figure Four, but Daivari simply breaks it and then gets right back to attacking the leg. Ooh, here’s a dropkick to Texano’s leg, and On a thigh-slap scale where “least obvious” is Prince Puma, “most obvious” is Fenix, and dead in the middle is Alberto El Patrón, these thigh slaps score a(n)…Fenix. I mean, the production truck didn’t help him at all. Or for that matter help Texano, who clearly double-slaps on a missile dropkick that cuts off Daivari’s offensive burst.

 

• These two just stand there and chop one another for a bit before Daivari runs into a leg lariat. Both men trade two counts in this mediocre-ass match that hopefully will be over soon. Daivari directs Ryck to grab Texano’s bullrope, but when Daivari pushes him over in Ryck’s direction, Ryck misses with a bullrope-wrapped fist. Texano slaps his thigh, and also there’s a superkick in there, and Ryck goes plummeting off the apron. Then, Texano returns to Daivari and hits a sit-out powerbomb for the win. Not a good match whatsoever, but hopefully we are done with these two having anti-chemistry together.

 

• Seedy backstage interstitial: Konnan contemplates tonight’s title match while Puma pumps iron. And here’s Catrina! She does her Aztec teleport thing right into the weight room and expresses confidence that her man Mil will destroy Puma at Ultima Lucha before Mil teleports in and faces off with Puma…then disappears after the lights flicker. Konnan has watched this whole thing calmly, and as a veteran of the lucha game, he’s totally relaxed. He’s just like, Yo Puma, it’s just mind games, bro, don’t worry about the mystical teleportation powers your opponent apparently wields.

 

• As much as I personally would love cowardly Chavo Guerrero Jr. winning the LU Championship and then desperately cheating, ducking, and dodging to keep it, they needed to get this belt on Mil about at the point where he came back from the dead and beat Fenix.

 

• Seedy backstage interstitial: Konnan is talking to a long-time friend backstage. We don’t see that long-time friend, but Konnan basically says that this friend has been waiting to attack Chavo ever since Chavo did what he did to Blue Demon Jr. Konnan exhorts this friend to finally get Chavo tonight and fulfill the payback that apparently all of Mexico wants to exact on Chavo for attacking the Demon family. Hmm.

 

• Drago is over as a babyface in the Temple, and it’s well-deserved. He’s had a good first season overall here in Lucha Underground. Drago makes his way to the ring to face Hernandez. As with his match against Mil Muertes last week, Drago is undersized, but Hernandez doesn’t have an Aztec stone imbued with the power of a thousand souls like Mil does, so he’s probably got a better shot at winning here.

 

• The match starts with production cutting eighteen times on a corner charge like this is your typical WWE show. I assume that after all the obvious thigh slaps, someone halfway through the post-production process decided to hide some of the looser or more obvious work in this show (Drago slips while flipping out of a Hernandez move attempt at one point), but they went HAM on it here. Seriously, the most notable thing about this match is the strange choices about camera cuts. This match is fine, mind you, and Hernandez’s cocky heeling is always fun to me, and Drago is solid as usual, but I’m not sure that this bout lives up to its potential. I like Drago an awful lot, but as good as he's been overall, his best matches were against King Cuerno. Maybe it’s a sign of how good Prince Puma really is that he had such a good match with Hernandez a few weeks ago. Again, I like Hernandez, but he’s not a guy who typically has matches as good as he did with Puma.

 

• The match does pick up a bit when it goes outside, where Hernandez hits a Border Toss that slams Drago’s back against the apron. That's a wicked spot. Unfortunately, there’s a silly spot with a plant right after that where Hernandez accosts him for his belt. It’s just a bit too goofy for me, and unfortunately, it saps some of the heat from the Border Toss. The planted fan way overacts, and Vampiro’s “Dude, what is that? That’s prison love” as Hernandez bear hugs the guy doesn’t help, either. Anyway, Hernandez whips Drago with the belt, then hangs him by his neck with it and gets disqualified. Alright, they are going to carry this out to Ultima Lucha, in fact. Hernandez, on the house mic after the match: “You dumbass fans do not realize: DRAGONS ARE NOT REAL.” Basically, he doesn’t believe in Drago’s lucha-based, um, dragon…powers? I don’t know.

 

• Chavo Guerrero Jr. shadowboxes in the locker room when the lights flicker and Catrina zippy-zaps behind him and tells him that even if he wins the title, he’s pretty much fucked shortly thereafter at Ultima Lucha. Mil zeeble-zobbles into the room and faces off with Chavo, who pretty much blows him off and expresses supreme confidence in himself. This, of course, enrages Mil. Probably don’t want to do that, Chavo! You might find yourself a part of the Permadeath Count!

 

• I hit pause to finish up that last couple of sentences right at a point where Marty “the Moth” Martinez is leaning forward and trying to slurp a few stray strands of Melissa Santos’s hair. I mean, wow. Melissa actually tries not to crack for a second, manages to avoid corpsing, and then looks suitably creeped out as she ducks away. Hilariously, there’s another shot of her from the side as she resets, and I’m pretty sure that she’s still trying not to crack up. Well, the fun is over, as Alberto El Patrón’s aggressively mid ass comes out here. Patron beats the shit out of this creeper (which, incidentally, is what the crowd has started chanting at the Moth when he appears). Patron laser focuses on Marty’s arm and quickly locks on a cross-arm breaker for the easy squash victory. Patron cuts a post-match promo in which he thanks Johnny Mundo for re-focusing him by tossing him face-first through a window like he was named Marty Jannetty (Season One, Show Twenty-Seven). It goes on much longer than that sentence seems to indicate because Alberto keeps reiterating the same thing a few times.

 

• Vampiro hypes the main event, which isn’t of note except for the fact that Dario has just gotten word to Vampiro about what Vamp calls “the freshest stipulation ever" regarding the Konnan non-interference clause. Hilarious descriptor on Vamp's part.

 

• Speaking of said main event, here’s Chavo Guerrero Jr. (w/Cisco and Cortez) versus Prince Puma (w/Konnan). I know that this match is going to end with someone attacking Chavo, so I’m obviously not going to get into the journey there as much as I otherwise might. I’m just waiting to see what happens at the end. Vampiro is confused about why he hasn’t seen Bael in the past few weeks, which is excellent continuity. Well, about that, Vampiro, Bael was literally eaten by Matanza Cueto (Season One, Show Twenty-Seven). I wonder if he ever will find out what happened to Bael. Melissa Santos announces the stipulation w/r/t Konnan, and whoever is sitting near the house mic cracks me up by yelling WHAT! HE’S A MADMAN! about Dario as a response. This guy has been sitting there the past few shows and yelling stuff occasionally, and it hasn’t been annoying or anything, but this is the first time he’s made me flat-out laugh.

 

• Did you know that Prince Puma and Chavo Jr. are good at wrestling? If not, the opening of this match would indicate as much to any close observer of the pro graps. Unfortunately, it goes off the rails pretty quickly after Chavo fakes that he blew a hammy so that his flunkies can jump Puma, not that he needed to fake an injury since this match is no disqualification. Chavo still sells a hamstring injury even after his flunkies attack the champ, though, so maybe there’s something else to this injury. I’m curious about why Chavo is selling it. He slumps in the corner and watches his flunkies put in some work on Puma in the ring.

 

• Chavo slowly limps toward the corner and climbs the ropes for a Frog Splash as the flunkies hold Puma in place, but Konnan calls Texano out, who runs in and attacks the heels. To understate things, that was a disappointing reveal. Puma follows Texano’s attack with a 630 Senton on Chavo for the win. Konnan, taunting an annoyed Vampiro over at the commentary desk: “Did I prove you wrong again, Vampiro?” Honestly, Konnan vs. Vampiro and Penta vs. Vampiro are somehow two of the hottest feuds in this company for me. Texano promises that he is Mexico and that Mexico is hunting Chavo Jr. over the house mic. Chavo is still selling the leg to the point that I briefly wonder if he actually did blow a hammy.

 

• Seedy backstage interstitial: Chavo continues to work his injury, nursing his leg in the locker room after the show, where Blue Demon Jr. walks in on him. Chavo gets up and prepares to fight, but Demon assures him that unlike Chavo, he doesn’t attack people who are already injured. Chavo taunts Demon for needing Texano to fight his battles and then suggests that Texano “is Mexico, and [Demon] is just some has-been who lives in Miami.” That remark convinces Demon to attack a person who is already injured; Demon goozles Chavo and yells YO SOY MEXICO before storming out. The look on Chavo’s face suggests that he might have got his opps to fight one another just with one cutting remark. Chavo rules. And is evil. But still rules.

 

• This show didn’t have much good wrestling and still probably not enough Dario Cueto, but it was fine, if forgettable. 2.5 LU-CHA chants out of 5.

 

[SirSmUgly]

Season 1, Show 35: “Fuel to the Fire” or Penta the Burninator starring in Dario’s Cool Wrestling Promotion for Attractive Luchadores and Luchadoras

• Recap: We careen wildly toward Ultima Lucha, where Catrina plans to capture a few titles for Mil Muertes and his disciples, and Alberto El Patrón hopefully, mercifully settles his feud with Johnny Mundo. On another note, Willie Mack looks to get back at Brian Cage.

 

• Seedy dojo interstitial: Pentagón Jr. bows to his Dark Master, who addresses Penta in a voice that is a cross between Dungeon of Doom-era King Curtis Iaukea and Ole Anderson as the Black Scorpion. Penta wants to get Vampiro in the ring so that he can snap the announcer-slash-legend’s arm, and his Dark Master suggests that Penta attack Vampiro’s ego to get Vamp to agree to a match. Penta, however, has a different plan: Make Ian Hodgkinson the sacrifice. Like 2000 Sting, 2015 Penta has realized that apparently Ian and Vampiro being two separate beings in the same body and that either can be a target depending on the context. I mean, Vince Russo tried something with potential back in 2000 WCW, but as with everything else he tried that Lucha Underground also tried, LU was the one to execute it properly.

 

• We hit the commentary desk and, oh no, Vampiro, you’re in danger! Anyway, he updates us on tonight’s proceedings (we're getting something called an Atómicos tag match) before Striker cuts in to talk about how Penta has challenged his partner on color. In fact, Vampiro and Penta had some adventures in interviewing together that I am extremely excited to watch!

 

• Willie Mack is in the ring. Let’s get this dude a win…especially over this bum Brian Cage. Actually, Cage isn’t bad or anything, but he really doesn’t do it for me. I hate to do this to a guy like Willie Mack, but on a thigh-slap scale where “least obvious” is Prince Puma, “most obvious” is Fenix, and dead in the middle is Alberto El Patrón, these thigh slaps score a(n)…Fenix, so much so that I feel like I should consider replacing Fenix’s spot on the scale with Willie Mack.

 

• These are two beefy dudes who also leap around more than one would expect beefy dudes to do, which is fairly entertaining. Cage hits a stalling vertical suplex on Mack that is legitimately the best move I’ve seen him do this whole season. That ruled. If one of them also gorilla press slams the other one, this match will be an unqualified success. Vampiro, about the black-and-yellow clad Mack: “He kinda looks like a big honey bear, a big bumblebee.” That’s the sort of weird neo-Macho-on-color observation that I appreciate from Vampiro.

 

• They throw a bunch of bombs at one another – exploder suplex into the corner buckles from Mack, discus lariat from Cage – before Mack steals the victory with a quick schoolboy on a rope run. That was a fun little opener.

 

• Seedy backstage interstitial: Catrina is teleporting around scaring the shit out of people again. She pokes Son of Havoc on the back of the neck, causing him to turn around, before then teleporting behind him. He is suitably spooked. She heralds the coming attempt of the Disciples of Death to take Dysfunction Junction's trios titles as well as heralding Mil Muertes’s meeting in the ring with Havoc later tonight. Ivelisse cuts in on this creepfest, and I feel like I should bring back the BITCH COUNT for Ivelisse’s promos. She’s not quite as big a fan of calling people BITCH as Shane Douglas was in, you guessed it, 2000 WCW, but she still stands out in that category. Before Ivelisse can wrap her hands around Catrina’s neck, Catrina teleports out and Ivelisse falls into – and on top of – Havoc. They stare somewhat intimately into one another’s eyes until Angelico, who missed this whole ordeal, walks in and destroys the mood by saying, “Oh God, please don’t tell me you two are getting back together.” Havoc and Ivelisse look at him and tell him to shut up at the exact same time. Heh.

 

• Anyway, Catrina is an agent of controlled chaos. Just the worst possible enemy to have in the Temple. I’m genuinely sad that there was never a chance for Catrina to steal the urn from Paul Bearer and then embed her mystical Aztec stone in it, causing her to be the one in control of the Undertaker and forcing Bearer to reveal that the scarred Kane is still alive before having Kane strike back against both Mil Muertes and the controlled zombie Undertaker while Bearer tries to retrieve the urn and cleanse it of the stone and the dark mystical powers that Catrina has imbued it with. I mean, come on. I would give all the money in my pocket to see that feud. We need some sort of quantum computer that can look into a universe where Catrina and Mil worked in WWE, Bearer lived past 58, and Kane wasn’t revealed until 2015 (and was instead portrayed by Drew Hankinson). I would watch the hell out of that alternate universe’s version of this very storyline. You know that it would be so bad that it was great!

 

• Matt Striker pimps Patron/Mundo and Puma/Muertes at Ultima Lucha, then kicks it over to…

 

• Adventures in Interviewing with Vampiro: Vampiro starts the interview by begging off and apologizing to Pentagón Jr. and the fans for getting physically involved with Penta in the ring a few weeks ago. Penta’s body language is hilarious. He’s leaning back in his chair in a way that screams Nah, fuck this dude and his apologies. Vamp gets right to it and asks who his Dark Master is, though when Penta doesn’t answer, Vamp takes it in stride and says he expected not to get an answer to that query. Vamp moves on and asks Penta why he likes violence so much, which is when Penta strikes: He says that actually, they’re both a lot alike in that they loved inflicting violence and pain, but now Vampiro is an out-of-shape, dusty-ass coward (I added some of that description for effect, but that’s basically what Penta says). The word “coward” specifically sets Vampiro off, who gives real “I can stop smoking crack whenever I want” energy with his response, reproduced here: “Don’t you ever say that to me again! Don’t get confused: a coward, I am not! Don’t push me, man, ‘cuz I’ll jump right now, if you wanna throw down, I’ll kick your ass so quick, you won’t even know what happened! But I’m not like that anymore! You get it? My time has come and gone, dawg.” He proclaims that he’s a better man now. Come on, man.

 

• Penta, of course, keeps pushing Vampiro toward a complete loss of control. He calls out Vampiro’s begging off as proof that he is indeed a coward, then tosses his chair aside and screams his catchphrase right up in Vamp’s grill before walking away. Vampiro looks murderous in a shot that is reminiscent of one of those Stanley Kubrick shots where a character leers into the camera with extreme malice or barely-contained mania (or both). Real A Clockwork Orange/The Shining vibes in that parting shot of Vampiro. The producers of this show sure do enjoy their classic films.

 

• This is probably needless to reiterate, but the interviews and interstitials have been fantastic so far tonight.

 

• Penta’s an excellent promo, and he’s not even speaking in a language that I fluently understand! He’s high up on my “promo guys who are great even if my monolingual ass doesn’t understand them” list.

 

• Mil Muertes (w/Catrina) is going to put a hurting on Son of Havoc (w/Angelico and Ivelisse). Havoc is game early, using his speed and agility advantage to manage a diving crossbody for all of a one-count. Havoc tries a handspring elbow, but gets snagged out of midair and tossed to the floor, where Mil clears a section of the audience and tosses the guy into the chairs at ringside. He then clears the commentary desk and powerbombs Havoc onto the tough table, which doesn’t even consider giving for a single, solitary second.

 

• Mil continues to destroy this guy, tossing him into any and everything around the ringside area, before putting Havoc back in the ring. Havoc is able to duck a Muertes charge that spills Mil to ringside and then hit a desperation suicide dive that really feels much less desperate when he walks over to celebrate with some fans in the crowd. Back in the ring, Havoc’s standing moonsault only earns one; Havoc takes a lot of time to go up top and leaps right into a goozle. He flips out of a Mil chokeslam attempt, but all of his rope-running machinations end up with him running into a straight right hand from Mil.

 

• The dominant Muertes puts Havoc up top and gnaws on his forehead. Havoc punches his way out of trouble, front suplexes Mil to the mat, and then fires off with a shooting star press that Muertes rolls away from. Meanwhile, Catrina decides to hit on Angelico. Ivelisse hobbles over and cuts her off. They double-goozle one another, but Catrina beat the hell out Dario Cueto and has no problems breaking Ivelisse's goozle and choking Ivelisse out. The Disciples of Death, meanwhile, have appeared behind Angelico and start beating him down, so Havoc diverts from fighting Mil to dive onto them at ringside. However, when he slides back into the ring, he eats a Muertes lariat and gets speared, downed with a Flatliner by Mil, and licked by Catrina in short order. That was another fun match, especially because all of the jibber-jabber and flim-flam that led to the finish.

 

• Texano Jr. continues his babyface turn by saying that he’s a complete prick, but a nationalistic one who will always stand up for his country. Real Hulkster vibes, in other words. Texano is a real Mexican, beatin' up Chavo Jr. who is less than a man. Texano promises to injure Chavo’s other leg at Ultima Lucha, but is jumped from behind by Cisco and Cortez. Blue Demon Jr. runs to the ring; Cisco and Cortez scurry away. Of course, the flunkies slide Demon a chair and Demon cracks Texano in the head with it. Commentary, not having seen last week’s final seedy backstage interstitial, is confused (as is the crowd, which also hasn’t seen it at this point). Striker speculates on why Demon is wearing out the bloodied Texano with a kendo stick, but all he has to do is wait for Demon to grab a mic and declare that he, not Texano, is Mexico. Demon further declares that he, not Chavo Jr., will fight Texano at Ultima Lucha.

 

• I must say once again that I love the division between what commentary knows (everything that happens in the arena or in interviews Vampiro conducted) and what they have no way of knowing (the seedy interstitials that only the home viewer is privy to). Lucha Underground practically runs on dramatic irony, and I think part of the fun of watching this show on television is the anticipation of seeing how an on-screen character will react to an event that they don’t yet know happened even if we do. For example, I was even more excited to see Vampiro interview Penta after the opening interstitial showed Penta and his Dark Master plotting to goad Vampiro into willingly becoming Penta’s next sacrifice. For that matter, I’m excited to see if Penta has bit off more than he can chew because Penta doesn’t know how volatile Vampiro is or that Vamp literally smashed a mirror with his head Twin Peaks-style when the division between Ian and Vampiro was at least briefly erased after their first confrontation. Because these shows are loaded with dramatic irony, there’s an uncommon amount of tension in a lot of the confrontations that happen in the ring, or maybe more accurately a different type of tension than usually exists in pro wrestling matches because of how loaded these confrontations often are with all that irony. It leads to such a unique dramatic feel for a pro wrestling show.

 

• OK, our main event is an Atómicos tag between Team Alberto (Alberto El Patrón, Sexy Star, Aerostar, and Drago) and Team Johnny (Johnny Mundo, Hernandez, Jack Evans, and Super Fly). I suppose this is just a four-on-four match to one fall. In a funny opening spot, Mundo circles Patron, then decides that discretion is the better  part of valor. He tries to quickly tag in Hernandez and Fly, but they hastily hop off the apron. Evans, though, is preening with his back to the ring and gets blind tagged. Evans gets in the ring, yells C’MON PATRON, does a backflip, and is immediately slapped in the face. That was all solid comedy right there.

 

• I forgot until just now that Aerostar and Jack Evans have each won one of Dario's Aztec medallions. Striker and Vampiro awkwardly riff while promoting Vampiro’s then-new publication, and I honestly was unsure of whether this was a complete riff or whether Vampiro had a book on Amazon. It looks like maybe he was collaborating on a comic book around this time according to Slam Wrestling.

 

• The match! Yes, I forgot about this while I was looking for info about whatever Vampiro was promoting. After the opening comedy spots that I found delightful, it’s a lot of running and attacks without tags and dives and group dives and all the contrived stuff you get from multi-man matches in this style. After a series of dives where everyone ends up on top of everyone else at ringside, Aerostar ends up enduring as the FIP before hot tagging Star. Star actually manages to hold her own until Hernandez hops in and hits her with a backbreaker, which is when people just jump in without tagging and the match breaks down again.

 

• This bout isn’t really my deal. Let me just tell you the finish: Evans survives an awfully long time in Alberto’s cross-arm breaker so that Mundo can scramble up the ropes and break it with an End of the World. Mundo then continues on and rolls up Star with a giant grab of her pantaloons for three. That match wasn’t very good, but what comes next is!

 

• As Striker and Vampiro close the show at ringside, Penta steaks up through the crowd and kicks Vampiro right in the fucking ear from behind. That was amazing. I thought the kick was even more violent than his follow-up chair shots. He lays Vampiro out, then grabs a house mic and promises his Dark Master that he will destroy Vampiro as sacrifice, and then – OH, COME ON, this guy Penta is absolutely calling back to 2000 WCW! He grabs a tank of gasoline and pours its contents on Vampiro as though he were 2000 Vampiro attacking 2000 Sting.  I suppose Vampiro probably used gasoline elsewhere in his wrestling career, but for this American fan who doesn’t follow lucha but definitely followed WCW, Penta is 2000 Vampiro and Vampiro is 2000 Sting in this feud, and they’re matching some of the actual events that happened between Vamp and Sting in 2000 here in 2015 Lucha Underground. Penta says that he will burn Vampiro up, and also maybe Vampiro’s family, if Vamp doesn’t accept his challenge for Ultima Lucha. This absolutely ruled. What a great way to end this show.

 

• No Dario, no problem. I wonder if his actor was filming something else for this latest batch of shows and was thus unavailable. Anyway, any LU show that calls back to something Vince Russo did while also proving that in fact Russo’s broad ideas were solid and that the difference between Russo and LU’s bookers is that the latter are talented gets at least a bonus partial LU-CHA chant from me: 4.5 LU-CHA chants out of 5.

 

Edited August 3 by SirSmUgly

[SirSmUgly]

Season 1, Show 36: “The Beginning of the End” or Immortal Kombat

• Our Permadeath Count still sits at one, but I’m expecting it to tick upward in the final few episodes of this first season.

 

• Recap: Dario Cueto has seven ancient Aztec medallions that he’s offering up. What will happen when someone collects all seven? Meanwhile, Sexy Star, Super Fly, Pentagón Jr., and Vampiro are mired in feuds with one another that have cascaded from Penta ditching Chavo Guerrero Jr. and finding a newer, darker, meaner master to follow. I guess you could technically blame Chavo for this, huh? Or Konnan for smuggling these guys across the border, but nah, it seems like Chavo is the guy to blame here in LU for a surprising amount of the bad stuff that happens.

 

• Seedy backstage interstitial: Dario Cueto seemingly monologues about the four remaining medallions in his possession. Three have been claimed, but four are left. As Dario says, if one collects them all, one can become on par with the Aztec gods, but what he actually means if I recall correctly is that if one collects them, they insert them into a belt that acts as a Money in the Bank briefcase. Anyway, we see that this monologue is a pitch to Penta to compete for a medallion. Penta is preoccupied with ruining Vampiro’s life and destroying Vampiro’s sanity right now, so he refuses. Dario even decides to maybe just give a medallion to Penta in appreciation for Penta’s willingness to snap arms and set people alight, but Penta speaks for his Dark Master in saying that they have bigger concerns. He even lets Dario know that if his Dark Master wants these medallions, Penta will just come into the office, snap Dario’s arm, and take them. Goddam, that's cold!

 

• Dario wants this violent nutbar to please take a medallion, no arm snapping needed, and in fact starts to bargain with Penta over what it will take for this guy to accept one of these golden disks of amazing Aztec Money in the Bank power. Penta, of course, wants to beat the shit out of Vampiro and snap his arm. He goes off to do so; as he leaves, Dario asks when he’ll get to meet Penta’s Dark Master. Penta says that his Dark Master will reveal himself after Penta has proven that he is the best arm-snapping disciple that he can be. Penta cut a dope promo there, and I say that having read the whole thing in subtitles. I really wish I had learned Spanish at some point.

 

• Vampiro seems okay again over at the commentary desk. Neither he nor Striker talks about that wild attack that Penta perpetrated upon Vamp last week. Instead, we get through the intro without incident and kick it to the ring, where Bengala stands awaiting his opponent for one of the Aztec medallions. As a reminder, Jack Evans, Aerostar, and Fenix possess three of them already, though Fenix hasn’t been seen for weeks after Mil Muertes powered up and beat the shit out of him.

 

• Anyway, Bengala’s opponent is Delavar Daivari (w/Big Ryck). Yuck. Bengala does some lucha stuff, including your typical "bouncing three times on the top rope before doing an arm drag" deal. I can accept rope walking moves like this if you give me an at least barely plausible reason – the Undertaker holding his opponent in zombie thrall, for example – but I’m finding that I’m just not gelling with the general bouncy aspects of lucha style even after nearly a whole season of watching it. It’s just not for me, man. Lucha brawls are incredible, though. Striker, on cue, notes that if you’re not used to the style, it can be jarring. I will give Bengala love for not slapping his thigh on a superkick, though. It looked great because he stuck that boot in there, no sound effects needed.

 

• Criticism aside, Bengala is actually pretty fun, and by the point at which he hits a suicide dive on Ryck at ringside, the crowd is entirely behind him. Daivari takes over in the ring and calls Ryck onto the apron to help him, but Ryck swings a forearm and hits Daivari in a spot that looked awful because by the time Bengala managed a go-behind and switched places with Daivari, Ryck still hadn’t swung.  If this were a real fight, he would have had plenty of time to see this and wouldn’t have swung. Alas, he had a spot to complete, and it looked fucking awful. Bengala follows with a back suplex and a bridge for three. Fellas, is Daivari a shitty pro wrestler? I’m beginning to think that he is.

 

• We go back to the desk, where Vampiro suddenly steps away from the desk as Striker promotes a Prince Puma/Mil Muertes faceoff for later in the show. Vamp gets in the ring holding a house mic as we go to break. We come back to Vampiro struggling to consider the challenge that Pentagón Jr. has put before him, and the unhelpful fucking animals in the crowd chant ONE MORE MATCH at him. No! He’s trying to avoid one more match for his own safety and well-being! Vampiro says that Penta attacking him last week and pouring gasoline on him is something reminds him of himself. That is, of course, because Vampiro poured gasoline on Sting in 2000, and, of course, Sting had previously said that Vampiro reminds him of himself. Something something history repeating. This is the point at which Penta cuts in on this promo.

 

• Penta doesn’t want to hear all this bullshit about how much Vampiro loves lucha libre, but oh, Vamp's a changed man now. He wants an answer to his challenge to Vamp for Ultima Lucha or it’s torch-and-gas time! Of course, the complete reprobates in the crowd chant YOU STILL GOT IT at Vamp and then transition into chanting Penta’s name because they are as violence-loving as Dario Cueto is. Maybe more! Penta is really working hard on mocking “Ian” to get a response. Vampiro says that Ian Hodgkinson won’t face Penta at Ultima Lucha, but that Ian's unstable persona Vampiro is up for one more fight! Penta tries to attack, but Vampiro counters with a goozle and a chokeslam. Then he goes to stand in the crowd while they chant his name and go absolutely banana. May I impress upon you how much this segment and this feud as a whole has absolutely fucking ruled, dear reader?

 

• Seedy backstage interstitial: Sexy Star is getting suited up before her match tonight; she pulls equipment out of her gold designer bag (?!), where she finds Super Fly’s mask still stashed since she won it from him (Season One, Show Twenty-Two). She has a flashback to all the nonsense that has happened as a result of Dario Cueto hating it when babyfaces are friendly toward one another, then shakes her head sadly, puts the mask down, and leaves the locker room.

 

• Aw, Matt Striker is so proud of Vampiro as Vampiro sits back down at the desk. I have to say that Striker constantly being supportive of his desk partner is low-key one of the most heartwarming things on this whole show. Vampiro is out of Macho-saying-funny-things-on-commentary mode and is into Macho-agitating-to-get-back-in-the-ring mode at this point.

 

• We’ve got another Aztec medallion match up next: King Cuerno faces Killshot. They’d better not put Swerve’s sorry ass over Cuerno. Cuerno slaps the shit out of Killshot to start, but when he shoots Killshot in, the latter does a bunch of flips to then hit a dropkick. This dude Killshot hits a weak forearm, then does a dumb gunshot taunt before landing a kick with a thigh slap for emphasis. And of course, on a thigh-slap scale where “least obvious” is Prince Puma, “most obvious” is Fenix, and dead in the middle is Alberto El Patrón, these thigh slaps score a(n)…Fenix. There are many reasons that I don’t watch AEW, but the biggest one is that they’re a company running with Moxley, Swerve, Hangman, and MJF as four of their main event guys. Good god, that might be the least watchable set of main eventers in the history of big-time professional wrestling on cable/streaming. I don’t know. Who was Southwest running with on top in the short time that they were on USA? Actually, dying days AWA on ESPN might have had a competitively bad set of top-line stars. Then again, wasn’t Larry Zbyszko there most of that time? Larry Z. is far better on his worst day than any of the dudes headlining AEW today. Even post-Flair WCW in 1991 still had Sting and Luger.

 

• I can’t believe that I’m going to be subjected to multiple seasons of Killshot. God, that AR Fox feud might make me temporarily hate pro wrestling. Cuerno does his best, using his much better taunt where he draws a bow and arrow and then locking on a nice surfboard to earn a submission victory and a medallion. When Killshot was on offense, that match sucked.

 

• Our final match is yet another meeting between Super Fly and Sexy Star, which is a shame as Star needs to work with someone who understands how to make her look more fluid and hide her weaknesses, and Fly is not that dude. This is our final Aztec medallion match of the night, by the way, and it ends in like a minute after Star transitions from a headscissors into an armbar and gets a quick tapout. Huh. I’m glad that this was short for two reasons: One, they don’t work all that well together, and two, Star needed a dominant win if she’s going to be positioned as an upper-midard talent.

 

• Oh boy, here comes Marty “the Moth” Martinez. He has the nerve rip away Melissa Santos’s microphone at ringside for his own use. He gets in the ring and creeps on Sexy Star (“Can I call you Sexy?” “If you don’t mind, I would like to see that sweet **ostentatiously looks at her ass**…medallion.”). THIS GUY SUCKS. KILL HIM, SEXY STAR. Martinez challenges her to an immediate fight for her medallion, and she accepts. Marty doesn’t understand that Sexy Star won’t quit even though he hits body slams and shoulderblocks and even locks on a Figure Four in the middle of the ring. Star is able to turn the hold to break it, then spins her way out of a slam attempt and into another armbar for yet another tapout victory. YEAH! I don’t even like Sexy Star, but she’s booked so well that I find myself rooting for her!

 

• Matt Striker runs down the Ultima Lucha card, which honestly doesn’t look that great to me. Puma/Mil will probably be a good match, the trios tag title will be okay, and I’m very excited for Penta/Vampiro on the strength of what might be the best feud this whole season. It’s that or Fenix/Mil. The rest of it doesn’t look great, especially not that Texano/Blue Demon Jr. bout.

 

• Dario Cueto is in the ring garnering an EL JEFE chant before getting WHAT-ed by that same chanting crowd because these complete degenerates who attend these tapings are one of the worst wrestling crowds in history. I was watching some JCP the other day and decided that the best wrestling crowds (at least stateside) have a higher proportion of women who love soap operas in them. Ric Flair almost dropping a knee on Baby Doll before Magnum TA led some babyfaces out to save her in the nick of time got such an emotional response from the crowd, and I believe that’s because the women in particular were completely emotionally invested in things based on the pitch of the crowd's yelling and shrieking. They weren’t trying to get themselves over with a chant or ironically indicate their place or status within wrestling nerd culture like men often do in modern wrestling crowds. They were genuinely invested in the drama. The problem with the Temple crowds is that there are too many men in them who love chanting shit and consciously being a part of the show and not enough women who become a part of the show by actually caring about the characters and stories in front of them.

 

• But, much like Taz(z), I digress. Dario mediates a faceoff between Prince Puma (w/o Konnan…hmmm) and Mil Muertes (w/o Catrina…hmmmmmmmmm). Striker says that Dario only wanted the competitors and not their managers in the ring, which takes some of the mystery away. Before he said that, I was wondering if Catrina had kidnapped Konnan and teleported him directly into Matanza’s cell so that Black Lotus could watch Matanza have dinner or something.

 

• Dario is such a goof. As Puma and Mil face off, Dario interjects: “I can cut the tension with a machete, HEH HEH!” That laugh at his own quip was so silly. There is no way to capture it in writing. Anyway, Catrina walks down the stairs, distracting Puma so that the Disciples of Death can jump the champ from behind. Konnan comes down and fights off two of the disciples with his reinforced pimp cane, but the other disciple gets a hold of it and knocks Konnan down. Puma grabs Catrina, but gets jumped by Mil. Catrina knocks out Konnan with her mystical stone; the Disciples of Death roll Konnan into a coffin and wheel him out while Mil holds Puma in place; once Konnan is halfway down the aisle, Mil lands a Flatliner before grabbing the LU Championship belt and posing with it.

 

• I didn’t expect to write this at all, but here goes: The Vampiro/Penta feud is a major anchor for these latest shows and vastly improves their quality. 4 LU-CHA chants out of 5.

[zendragon]

Cage and Mack had a pair of matches in AEW so good that Tony K signed Mack to a contract.

[just drew]

Smelly, not for nothing, but I cannot get a handle on your taste in wrestling. You don't like lucha, you don't like AEW. I'm asking in good faith; what DO you like?