BRM Reviews the 4/8/2015 Lucha Undergound (I'm losing faith)

[Big Red Machine]

DARIO CUETO MEETS WITH PRINCE PUMA & KONNAN- good.
Dario wants his biggest stars in the trios tournament, so he is ordering Puma to find two partners to face a team of Dario’s own choosing, led by King Cuerno. Also, the main event will be Puma vs. Cuerno, with Cuerno’s two partners at ringside. I really like the booking here because doing this match allows them to not have a trios match as the main event (which we will undoubtedly be getting a lot as this tournament progresses) but still keep the trios tournament as a main event angle.
Wait… it’s a title match?! That’s a lot less interesting and partially undoes everything I mentioned before. Having Cuerno’s pals help him get the win tonight in a non-title match would be a great way to set up a title match between these two guys one their teams are eliminated.

TRIOS TITLES TOURNAMENT FIRST ROUND MATCH: Ivelisse, Son of Havoc, & Angelico vs. Drago, Aerostar, & Fenix- 5.75/10, but disappointing storytelling.
Yes, the action was crazy, though some of it (in particular Angelico clearly wiggling over to get in the way of Fenix’s big dive in a way that not only made the whole thing look like a work, but that also showed that he clearly wasn’t stuck like he was pretending to be) looked bad, and yes, they got over the dissension in the two teams well, but I was very disappointed with the way in which they did it.
First, for the Drago vs. Aerostar stuff, I didn’t like the pin-stealing spot in the beginning. I thought that was something that should have happened on the other team. They know that this match isn’t part of their series, so why does the pin matter that much? I thought that the spot where one guy went to dive onto Angelico but Angelico avoided it and the first guy slammed into the other would have been a much better way to create friction between them (because the guy who got dived on would think that the diver had given up on this match and was trying to hurt him to get an advantage for the final match of their series), but not only did they not focus on this at all (Striker briefly mentioned it, but didn’t sell it as that big of a deal, and structurally it was just used to start off a big sequence of dives rather than used as an important point in the story of the match), but they were actually working together very well afterwards.
As for the other team, while Drago, Aerostar, and Fenix are all babyfaces, the team of Angelico, Son of Havoc, & Ivelisse is the team that I think most people wanted to see win, and that is because they have actually done a good job of fleshing their characters out. Angelico is kind of a douche, but he does cool stuff so you don’t mind seeing him, and he has a bit of charm that definitely counteracts his douchery. Ivelisse has definitely been portrayed as bitchy, but she comes across as tough and brave (which also made me hate her low blow spot on Fenix), so you can’t help but respect her, even if you don’t like her. Son of Havoc has become a full-fledged babyface in his own right, however subtly the turn was done, and he and Ivelisse were good together, so there is this subconscious desire to see them work things out, and a win would help that. We knew that both of these teams would implode, but these guys were the right choice to win because seeing them be able to work together would have almost seemed happy, even if it only lasts for one round.
They are also the team with the most on the line, as Dario basically told them that they all stunk as singles wrestlers, so he is probably contemplating not using them if they don’t do well in this tournament. For this reason, I think that a pin-stealing spot would make a lot more sense for them, since the individual win would mean more to them as individuals as well as a team… but winning as I said above, not losing would also be extremely important to all three as individuals, and thus Ivelisse walking off at the end did not make much sense to me. In fact, we want to see them able to work together, and while I think they did a great job building that up in this match by having them not tag each other willingly, the spot where Ivelisse walked off should have instead been her receiving the hot tag, as it would have been the first willing tag between the three of them all match. While the “babyface team” broke down as things went along, the team of three individuals who dislike each other should have gotten stronger, leading to them winning the match and giving us hope that maybe they’ll work things out and win the whole kitten caboodle.
Also, Fenix really should have been the one to eat the pin, not Drago, because Drago actually has something going on right now.

Striker went on a little rant about how great it was that people kick out of DDTs now even though it would have been a finish thirty years ago that was both pointless and probably would make an old-school wrestler’s head explode.

Sexy Star is facing SUPERFLY tonight? Shouldn’t one of them be facing Pentagon Jr.? This seems really weird.

KONNAN, PRINCE PUMA, & JOHNNY MUNDO BACKSTAGE- awesome. This whole thing was SOOOO great. So many possibilities.

SUPERFLY vs. SEXY STAR-
Sexy Star doesn’t have her wings gimmick, and it really makes her seem a lot more generic. Like Hulk Hogan if he just came down to the ring without his t-shirt on instead of wearing it down to the ring and ripping it off.
The match was about to start, but Dario Cueto interrupted it and gave a speech about how he wanted them to show no mercy, so he is going to “give them something to fight for.” So Dario makes this a Mask vs. Mask match.
WHAT THE F*CK?!
Okay… a few things here. The first is obviously that just throwing a Mask vs. Mask match out on TV with no build-up at all, either as hype for the match, angles to get us to want to see it, or as an explanation of what the mask is and why it is important between two people who have no beef with each other whatsoever, and one of whom is only a semi-regular character on the show is just so utterly… Russo-esque. I don’t need to tell you all why this is a terrible idea. But what I will say is that this really bothered me because I think this show is losing some of its character.
Here is Dario, acting like a heel owner in any random promotion, just f*cking with people because he can, and in a way that the heel owner of any other promotion would. Early in Lucha Underground’s run, Dario would have put a bunch of money on the line, which fits in perfectly with the underground fight club feel that made the show so awesome. Money and pride is why people fight here. They’re volunteers, not contracted performers, so Dario shouldn’t be able to order them to put their masks on the line.
The feel of the show was the one of the thing that made Lucha Underground not just different, but made it great. It had an atmosphere about it, but that quickly seems to be fading now, and I am very disappointed.
MASK vs. MASK MATCH: Superfly vs. Sexy Star- 2.25/10
To make things worse, the angle that the announcers are pushing is that this is Dario disrespecting the tradition of Lucha Libre because this Mask vs. Mask match didn’t have a lot of build-up or a personal rivalry… So basically the angle is that Dario is a terrible booker. Why should that make me kayfabe unhappy? (And to make things worse, the same Vampiro who was complaining about this spoke about how much he loved this idea just three minutes later)
For some reason, Sexy Star looked away from her opponent during a standoff, so he kicked her in the head… and for some reason one wrestler kicking another in a completely clean and legal manner in a wrestling match was “not cool” according to Vampiro.
The action in the beginning really didn’t flow well, and that facebuster looked atrocious, but the last minute or two (when they got back in the ring after being on the outside) was good.

Because of the lack of build-up of the importance of masks, the announcers needed to tell us about it as the match was going on. This is bad because one of the worst things you can do in wrestling (and in most forms of storytelling) is start telling everyone that a person/object/outcome is extremely important once the person/object/outcome has already reached/achieved the task/destination/desired outcome, because at that point it feels like you're just pulling it out of your ass because you’ve completely wasted your opportunity to make the audience care about it.
Which of these seems more exciting?
1) A Bond movie where he just goes around doing stuff all over the world. Then at the end he kills some terrorist in the middle of London and grabs some suitcase the terrorist had been carrying around with him and brings it back to MI6 HQ, and M says “Good job Mr. Bond. The nuclear bomb in that suitcase would have killed millions of people, but we’re all safe now, thanks to you”
2) A Bond movie that starts off with M telling Bond that some terrorists have gotten their hands on a suitcase nuke in Russia and are planning on setting it off in London. We need you to stop them. Then Bond goes to Russia to try to stop them, but the terrorist with the nuke escapes him and heads to Japan so Bond has to follow him to Japan. Bond almost catches him there, too, but the terrorist escapes to Buenos Aries. Bond follows him and the same thing happens. Then the same thing happens in St. Louis. Then in Reykjavik, and then in London, Bond finally kills the terrorist before he can set off the bomb.

Scenario 2 is a well-built story that explains why the suitcase is so important, then has our hero try multiple times to get it and fail before finally succeeding just in the nick of time. Scenario one is a guy doing stuff, then killing a dude and taking his suitcase with no reason for us to care about any of it… and then, at the end they tell us that our hero has just saved millions of lives, but we don’t care because the time for caring has passed, and at that point it feels like they’re just pulling the importance of the suitcase out of their asses after the fact. And that is exactly what this lack of build made the announcers sound like they were doing here, explaining to us for the first time why we should care about the competitors masks after the mask match had already begun.
For a great example of what I mean, Vampiro told us that Sexy Star’s mask (or the identity thereof and what it represents etc. etc.) “saved her from suicide.” THAT SOME F*CKING HEAVY SH*T RIGHT THERE! That’s the sort of backstory that tells us so much about Sexy Star: who she is, how she has suffered, and what her mask means to her… and thus what it might mean for her to lose it. And yet it has never ever been brought up before.
When Superfly lost, Matt Striker talked about “the human element” and about how we should feel so bad for Superfly and his family because he must now unmask… except that we know nothing about him whatsoever, to the point where it’s entirely possible that he has never said a single word on Lucha Underground. We have absolutely no idea how this will affect him and his family, and thus it is nearly impossible for us to feel for him.
And the worst part is that this stuff is the sort of thing Lucha Underground is supposed to be GREAT at. The thing that it seemed so great at early on… but now it feels like it has totally lost that.

Oh… and the camerawork in the beginning of the match: Yes, it’s just a standing side headlock and they can be boring, but it’s even more boring to look at the announcers, so why would you cut away from the action in the ring?

SUPERFLY UNMASKS- who could possibly give a f*ck about this nobody unmasking with no build! Stop wasting time that could go to the well-built main event!
PENTAGON JR. ATTACKS THEM AND BREAKS SUPERFLY’S ARM- not so good, but that was mostly because it didn’t feel like he hit Sexy Star with anywhere near enough force to really put her down, and in the camera angle they used you could actually see her just sitting on the outside looking pathetic- almost like she was crying under her mask or something-rather than getting up and making the save, which really annoyed me. How about we use a camera angle that doesn’t make our babyface look like crap? Or let the heel actually lay her out with a big move?
This whole story has just been told SOOO poorly. Superfly and Sexy Star are just best pals out of nowhere, are forced into a completely random mask match just so Pentagon Jr. can break Superfly’s arm which renders his unmasking utterly pointless?

LUCHA UNDERGROUND TITLE MATCH: Prince Puma(c) (w/Johnny Mundo & Hernandez) vs. King Cuerno (w/El Texano Jr. & Cage)- 2/10
Puma does King Cuerno’s gimmick of wearing a pelt to the ring. That’s pretty douchy for a babyface.
The heel team feels really generic (like they just threw together the three top heels they have), especially when you compare it to the earlier segment about the babyface team.
As for the match itself, I didn’t like it at all. It was short, Prince Puma’s selling was very bad, and there was way too much interference (especially that big triple-team move at the beginning. How did that not warrant a DQ?!)
In addition, Mundo appeared to really hurt both himself and King Cuerno on his dive, so I hope they’re okay.

POST-MATCH ANGLE AND SCHMOZ- decent.
Prince Puma doesn’t like Hernandez. Cage jumps them from behind. Mundo saves Puma. Then we get a schmoz.


A very disappointing episode of Lucha Underground. They have recently started rushing through things WAY too quickly, and that was readily apparent on this show.

For those wondering, I would have had Prince Puma vs. King Cuerno be non-title and go on second- have the heels interfere a lot behind the ref’s back until Johnny Mundo can take it no more and runs in to attack King Cuerno, causing Prince Puma to lose by DQ. This can lead to King Cuerno getting a title shot later on, and also sets up segments where Konnan uses this as proof that Mundo is untrustworthy (and tries to push Hernandez as an alternative ally), while Prince Puma says that Mundo saved him from injury and is therefore trustworthy.

For the main event, I would have Pentagon Jr. take on Superfly and have Pentagon Jr. win the match and then break Superfly’s arm, with Sexy Star being a few moments too late to make the save this time. You still get to the same place, but you haven’t totally killed both Mask vs. Mask and the unique feel that Lucha Underground had.