BRM Reviews the 8/29/2018 Lucha Underground (extremely disappointing)

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Big Red Machine
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BRM Reviews the 8/29/2018 Lucha Underground (extremely disappointing)

Post by Big Red Machine » Sep 5th, '18, 23:15

THE MALE WORLDWIDE UNDERGROUND MEMBERS GET READY FOR JOHNNY MUNDO’S WEDDING IN THE LOCKER ROOM- The others tell Johnny they have a surprise for him: Joey Mercury (or “Joey Wrestling”) is here! Speaking of surprises, Jack Evans is apparently having a No Mas Match against X.O. Lishus tonight, which was certainly a surprise to me. How the heck does splitting two matches cleanly without any sort of backstage assaults or even a show of hatred on X.O. Lishus’ part lead to an I Quit Match? I mean… Jack’s ranting at the end of their previous match does built to it, but it feels like they skipped several intermediary steps, including the one where we see X.O. Lishus, our babyface, vow revenge. Or even say or do anything at all.
Anyway, to make room for Joey as the new best man, Ricky Mundo has been demoted from best man to ring-bearer. Mundo makes fun of him and calls him a loser. They further humiliate him by taking away his air guitar and giving it to Joey. At this point it seems clear that Ricky is going to go on some sort of murdering spree during the wedding, and while Taya doesn’t deserve it, Johnny and P.J. kind of do (well… maybe not murder, but they are being gigantic douchebags to Ricky).
The others left, then the doll said “hope you’re planning on keeping the vows… Joey.” I do not understand how this sentence fits in. The words all make sense in that order, but what vows does the best man take?

When Striker told us that “tonight, it is a Temple of love,” it made me want to punch him right in his f*cking face.

Guys… Johnny Mundo’s middle initial is E… so the invitation said “John E. Mundo.” I thought that was awesome. Sadly, they did not give us a last name for Taya.

Melissa Santos is apparently still out from being attacked by Catrina last week, so Famous B is once again our ring announcer.

JAKE STRONG vs. DRAGO- 2.5/10
Striker said that Drago was “injected with infected venom” by Kobra Moon when he was brainwashed. The worst part of that is that Striker strikes me as the type of guy who spends most of the week watching the shows that he did commentary on that week and congratulating himself for coming up with this sort of obnoxious crap.
This was pretty much an extended squash, with Strong dominating Drago. He got the win via ankle lock… and then he went over to get Drago’s nun-chucks and held them next to Drago’s ankle while applying the hold. I’m not really sure how that was supposed to make it extra devastating, and it looked really goofy. AeroStar came out to make the save, and barely managed to escape. They’re doing a good job of building Strong up as a monster, but if he’s going to be a heel, why did they take him away from Famous B?

NO MAS MATCH: Jack Evans vs. X.O. Lishus- 6.25/10
The announcers are talking about us having seen a “change in X.O. Lishus,” and said something about Jack messing up Lishus’ teeth… and I have no idea what they’re talking about. When did any of this happen?
They had a pretty good brawl for a while, jumping off of stuff and going all around the building and bringing some great intensity. Then Jack asked X.O. if he wanted to quit and X.O. shouted “F*CK YOU!” so Jack started pounding on him… and the camera just cut away to the announcers. It’s a wrestling show! Why are you not showing me the wrestling match?!
At this point Ivelisse came out for some reason, and immediately got superkicked by Jack because, as Striker rightly pointed out “she stuck her nose where it didn’t belong.” This distraction allowed Lishus to recover and take over the match. He started working Jack’s arm a bit and then locked in a submission hold… and Striker pretty much immediately asked Vampiro “why can’t X.O. Lishus get the submission victory? What is he doing wrong?”
WHY WOULD YOU EVEN SAY THAT?! First of all, the answer is obvious: because Jack Evans is a tough fighter. Obviously he’s not going to give up right away! But, second of all, Striker asking this question shifts the idea of what we are seeing from putting over Jack because he is toughing out this painful submission hold, to burying X.O. Lishus for implying that he doesn’t know how to properly lock the hold in, and taking credit away from Jack for being tough. Again I am forced to ask HOW THE F*CK IS MATT STRIKER STILL EMPLOYED?!
They did some good wrestling before Jack went and grabbed a chair. He hit X.O. with it, then laid him out over it and went to the top rope, intended to break Lishus’ neck with a diving leg drop. This brought out Joey Ryan to protest to Jack that this was going too far. This came off as total BS to me. Joey Ryan is a crooked cop. The only reason Officer Reyes wasn’t murdered after Joey outed him as an undercover cop was because Dario thought it would be more fun to torture him, and Joey knows that. How am I supposed to believe that Joey has a problem with Jack trying to break a dude’s neck in a match where the whole point is to do whatever it takes to your opponent to get him to quit, and doubly so when the guy in question is someone Joey has no connection two other than that they were on opposite sides of a tag team match?
Joey and Ivelisse stopped Jack from jumping and he got shoved off the turnbuckle and X.O. Lishus locked in an armbar and Jack gave up. I HATED this. This whole feels like it went from twenty to a hundred off-screen, and Ivelisse and Joey’s interference on Lishus’ behalf felt horrendously forced. We have literally seen X.O. interact with those two ONCE: a tag team match a few weeks ago when he and Ivelisse teamed up to face Joey and Jack, and not once in that match did anything happen to make you think he was becoming friends with either one of them. If X.O. was going to win this feud (and he should have), HE SHOULD HAVE DONE IT ON HIS OWN.

POST-MATCH SEGMENT- Ivelisse is hugging X.O. Lishus like they’re best friends or something. Joey Ryan came over, too, but Ivelisse didn’t trust him. She eventually let him celebrate with them, though. This was so weird.

THE GROOMAL PARTY BACKSTAGE- Jack comes crawling by and they tell him to put on his tux. It’s decided that Jack probably isn’t in a condition to attend the wedding, so Ricky Mundo asks if he can have Jack’s spot instead of carrying “these stupid rings.” Johnny Mundo yells at him for calling the rings stupid, asserting that it is not the rings but rather Ricky who is stupid. Johnny, Joey, and P.J. do best friends stuff and Ricky is not allowed to join in. They leave, at which point the doll tells Ricky “time to do the job I asked you to do” and Ricky smiles evilly.

JOHNNY & TAYA’S WEDDING-
The minister for tonight’s wedding will be Famous B. The fact that Famous B got himself registered as a minister so he could charge people money to officiate at weddings does not surprise me one bit.
Taya’s bridesmaids were The Beautiful Brenda and Cheerleader Melissa. I don’t think she has ever interacted with Brenda on screen, but apparently they’re best friends, I guess. Don’t these people have families that should be here? The fans all chanted “MARIPOSA!” at Melissa, because they apparently have to be smarks right now.
We cut backstage to Ricky Mundo, under the doll’s orders, cutting the chain on the lock on the room Matanza is kept in, allowing Matanza to escape. Didn’t Matanza used to also be, like, chained up and down in a big pit?
Famous B asks if there is anyone who has any reason why “these two fine-ass people” should not be wed… and apparently Mr. Cueto has something to say. That something is that, on behalf of the Cueto family, he has supplied “Tacos for everyone.” That was f*cking weird.
For the record: the E. in John E. Mundo stands for Edward, and Taya’s last name is, in fact, Valkyrie. Why wasn’t that on the invitation?
Taya’s speech was as follows:
“Johnny. I love you more than I love fluffy puppies, kneeing people in the face, and beheading giant snake-men. I can’t wait to have you as my tag team partner for life, because together we can never lose. And even without gold around that tight, ripped, sexy waist of yours, you’ll always be the champion of my heart. And tonight, we’re gonna put the “slam” in Slamtown. I love you so much babe.”
A wedding speech for the ages!
Johnny’s speech went thusly:
“Taya, never in my wildest dreams did I imagine that I would meet someone as tan, ripped, and attractive as I am. But then I found you. I love you more than I love my own reflection, and trust me: that’s a lot of love. I always thought the best day of my life would be the day I won the Lucha Underground Championship, but not anymore. Babe, the best day of my life is today. My heart is the most epic muscle in my body, and it belongs to you. And I can’t wait to buy a house with a white picket fence in Slamtown and begin our lives together. You are truly the perfect woman, and I couldn’t be happier than to make you my perfect wife.”
Famous B asks them if they say they do. Famous B calls for the rings. He takes a turn making fun of Ricky Mundo as Ricky brings the rings. Johnny then tells Ricky that “the ring is for the wedding party only, Ricky. Hit the bricks.” At this point Johnny is like the bullies in Carrie and I’m not really going to care if he gets eaten by Matanza or whatever.
They exchanged rings and Famous B rambled on and finally Matanza showed up. He was, like, five seconds behind Ricky in that other segment. I wonder what took him so long. Maybe he ran into someone else backstage and murdered him/her/them?
Matanza runs into the ring and the Worldwide Underground attack him. Taya and CLM just stood there helpless until Mantanza had taken out all of the dudes, then attacked one at a time like a bad AI. Brenda fainting when Matanza looked at her was funny. CLM attacked Matanza with flowers. Let me repeat that: CHEERLEADER MELISSA hit someone with flowers instead of, like, throwing some chops or going for a Kudoh Driver or something like that.
Matanza picked up Famous B’s wheelchair and dumped Famous B out of it. P.J. got chokeslammed through a table. Johnny tried to attack Matanza but got leg-capture suplexed through a table. Ricky Mundo watched all of this with glee. Taya fired up and forearmed Matanza a bunch but he no-sold it and hit her with Wrath of the Gods. He then chokeslammed her onto the cake (the table didn’t break) and then Matanza just left.
This might sound odd, but I found this whole thing anti-climactic. They seemed to have set up for this moment of grand tragedy but then nobody died. There was no sacrifice, no big moment, no anything. Matanza felt like he was just being used as a force of the plot rather than having anything resembling motivation, and he yet he didn’t feel like his usual ultra-destructive force of nature either. He wasn’t some malevolent force and he wasn’t a wandering monster leaving ultimate devastation in his wake. He was just a guy randomly ruining a wedding.


This was an extremely disappointing episode of Lucha Underground.


STUPID ANNOUNCER QUOTES:
1. When Jake Strong lifted Drago up for a Back Suplex, Matt Striker referred to it has Strong having “side control.”
To quote from the first sentence of the Wikipedia article on the subject, “side control (often also called side mount, cross mount or sometimes scarfhold) is a dominant ground grappling position.”
Hold #712: ARM BAR!

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