taped 06/06/10 in Palm Springs. Second episode coming later today; it’s almost like I planned them to show up Fridays.
This didn’t hold up as well when I watched it for the recap. The stuff I didn’t like (the announcing, for one) didn’t get any better than second time and there was choices that didn’t seem to make sense the second time.
It makes sense to have a fast paced trios to open the show, and it was good along those lines, but it was also six guys who were thrown out there with little introduction and disappeared back into the mist. Neutronic turned up in the main event but was not seen the following week, and Mascara Purpura was just seen in passing in a vignette. I know these people. If you’re reading this blog, you probably know these people, but anyone watching lucha for the first time needs it hammered home who these people are and while they should care, and probably shouldn’t be expected to remember them when they disappear for a couple weeks. You’ve got to make people appear to be stars, and stars don’t show up only every other week.
Same vein: there was also the odd choices of who got put over in the first couple of matches. Of the six guys in the opener, Mascara Purpura was treated as a big singles star, Neutronic had a role later in the show, PR Flyer & San Juan Kid are a set team and likely will either hold or challenge for the tag team titles, and yet it was Oriental & Limon who got the wins. Maybe the PR Powers get that win back down the road in the tag team tournament, but you can’t take the long road when kicking something like this off. 52 week contract with the network or not, you don’t have a 52 week contract with the fans, you can’t plan with the idea they’ll be around for a payoff six weeks down the road.
And then the mixed tag ended with Tigresa Caliente going over. Chi Chi got the win, but the vignette the next week set up Tigresa as the star of the duo. I dunno
Main event showcased the different between wrestling for the live crowd and for the TV audience. I don’t know if the rudo gesturing to the crowd for cheers works under any circumstance, but it definitely doesn’t if the crowd is being dubbed over anyway.
I think I’m missing my point here. (Maybe, like the announcers, I’m explaining something until I got distracted halfway thru.) None of this is big stuff. It’s all tweaking stuff, thinks that can be fixed and probably will be fixed with time. The larger point is I don’t think promotions like this have that sort of time. This would’ve been fine as week #13, but you’ve got to have a blowaway premiere, or the momentum built up to it is lost and very hard to get back. This show came off as something I wouldn’t mind watching again, but not something I needed to watch again. It wasn’t a failure, but I wasn’t surprised when half the people didn’t come back the next week.
i think you going to be surprise tonight this is going to get wild my cousin was at the taping for ep 3 he told me there will be none stop fighting in and out the ring in the crowd it get crazy o and awesome kong shows up
Stop lying to me cubs. I follow your blog, and I have no idea who Neutronic is!
And I know Super Nova had a name change, but I have no idea who he was before.
Horrible blog :P
I thought they have a 52 weeks contract with MTV?
It would get better with time. Just like WSX did.
They definitely have a 52 contract. But the hardest thing to do is to get people who aren’t watching your show to watch.
WSX peaked about 20 seconds into the first show. But those first 20 seconds… WOW!
@Rob – Those were a great 20 seconds weren’t they?
I got called out on another message board (this is the only board I post on but someone sent me the link) for “spreading false information about the competition” which I guess must relate to my posts here but I’m lost.
But is it spreading false info to say that I was just befuddled as to why they would push minis, push minis, push minis (as they should have) and then have Chi Chi win that match? How about putting Dorada over. Heck, how about putting any of the people you’re actually trying to build over?
@Kevin K: To be fair I am not the person WSX was aimed at. Much like WWE these days. It’d take a lot to win me over.
FWIW I was probably one of the first people to see the finished WSX product even before it first showed up on TV! Although I am not at liberty to say how here in a public blog.:P
I might be mistaken, but isn’t there like a midget wrestling show?
Lucha minis would make for a fun 1-hour show.
It’s being reported that Carlito is now with LLUSA.
Finally got around to watching the first episode and I really enjoyed it. Way more than I thought I would.
The setup looks very nice although it would look better in a smaller building with all the fans shoved forward into the direct line of where the cameras will be shooting. Those longshots that pan an empty audience are a killer. For example if you watch the DGUSA PPV that just aired it looks like a full building b/c of the way it was shot. But from being there live I can tell you it was a giant hall and if the camera had panned out it wouldn’t have looked good.
The roster is one of the weaker parts of the show. With bigger stars and better wrestlers this product may stand more of a chance. But as a supermark I can tell you I enjoyed the mixing and matching. Never thought I’d see Mascarita Dorada in the same ring as Kwee Wee.
Loved the opener. Everyone looked good but Purpura stood out. Wasn’t surprised by the PR guys being largely ignored but was surprised that when they got involved there didn’t seem to be many communication issues. Although editing could have covered that up. There was TONS of edits on the show but a lot of them were done well. It’s strange to watch how this show is edited and then watch an AAA show where they’ll do the worst editing in the world.
Mascarita Dorada was a machine. If the audience ever grows he will surely be a huge star.
The show was perfectly paced. Nothing felt rushed. In fact that’s one of the two main things that differentiates this show from WSX’s failure.
1. Pacing. The first match had long entrances and the match got decent time. You’d see something cool and have time for it to sink in. WSX just threw two guys out there with both intros in under 30 seconds, then they’d have a <5 minute match with 10,000 moves. Even if you saw something cool by the time you could turn to tell you friend about it there would be something else happening. Sounds good in theory to provide non-stop action but if nothing sticks with the viewer – what's the point?
2. It feels like a wrestling show. WSX never felt like that. It felt like highlights of cool wrestling moves spliced in between music performances and commercials.
I'm looking forward to the next two shows.
@Rob
They definitely got different marching orders for their show, which is very good for them! When I was talking with MTV (Uno) about lucha before the Masked Warriors show ended up on MTV 2 they were adamant that they wanted “traditional” wrestling. It’s a whole new guard there and I think they have made a great decision in backing off the product.
I had to cringe when I was in the edit bay and they wanted to cut out kicks, punches, set up moves, and just go for the highspots. Lord it hurt!
If you ever saw any of the WSXtra episodes that were on the MTV website or on the DVD set, those matches were untouched by MTV execs or people “above” the wrestling people and are MUCH better matches, since they did not care what we did online. Silly execs.
@Kevin K: You had to have it tough, because you were on the “main channel” of MTV.
LLUSA is on MTV2/3 where there is no pressure to get high ratings. That’s why I think they are going to survive.
@LLL
I agree and I’ve told people since before Masked Warriors ever started airing that I think they’ll last based on what I hear the network’s dedication to them is and that the ratings don’t have to be great.
The whole ratings business is still so bizarre. Do you know that when they figure Hispanic Household ratings, it’s only 1,000-1,300 households in the U.S. from which that rating is determined?
You’d think that in an age when most people are plugged in via cable, internet, or satellite, that the TV biz would come up with a more reasonable way to take a sample.
While the overall Nielsen ratings are from a larger sampling. Not to get all nerdy but (from Wikipedia):
There are only 25,000 total American households that participate in the Nielsen daily metered system. The number of U.S. television households as of 2009 is 114,500,000. As a result, the total number of Nielsen homes only amounts to 0.02183% of the total American television households, meaning that 99.97817% of American households have no input at all into what is actually being watched.
Just seems so strange to me at this day and age.
@Kevin K: I don’t know what can be done to improve the measuring system, without people claiming that their privacy is being invaded. Most people don’t want anyone to know what they are watching or listening to.
I’ve been sampled by phone. They sent me $2 for cooperating and answering the questions.
There have been so many lawsuits against Nielsen and Arbitron alleging racism, that I tend to think they oversample minority HH’s just to avoid the hassle of dealing with Al Sharpton and La Raza.
@LLL yeah, I wasn’t suggesting we get all Big Brother on everyone, just that it seems that on a voluntary basis they could extend that sample. And now this thread has gone way off topic, so I apologize. :-)