matches
The Mack beat Cage (4:00, cradle, GOOD)
Mil Muertes beat Son of Havoc (7:08, flatliner, GOOD)
Johnny Mundo [O], Hernandez, Jack Evans, Super Fly beat Alberto el Patron, Aerostar, Sexy Star [X], Drago (9:25, tights pull cradle, GREAT)
developments
The big story of the show was not in any matches, but some segments which surrounded them. The show opened with Pentagon back at the dojo from his personality vignette, asking his (off screen, voice modulated) mentor what he should do next. The mentor encouraged Pentagon, and Pentagon decided his next sacrifice must be Ian Hodgkinson. A sit down interview with Ian – Vampiro to you and me – and Pentagon aired later on. Vamp apologized for getting involved, but Pentagon didn’t seem so interested in that or in naming him mentor. Pentagon instead called Vampiro a coward for backing down and not fighting him, even though Vampiro was once like Pentagon. Vampiro insisted he’s no longer that man, that those days were in his past, but Pentagon insisted Vampiro was just fearful while Pentagon had no fear. Pentagon got in Vampiro’s face before storming off.
As the show was wrapping up, Pentagon came thru the crowd behind the announcers and laid out Vampiro with a kick. Pentagon left, and returned with a can marked Gasoline, dumping the liquid all over Vampiro. Pentagon teased setting Vampiro on fire, but instead warned Vampiro that he had only one more week to accept the challenge, or this would await him. The show ended with Pentagon snuffing the flame.
The rest of the show was not as crazy intense, but issues continue to progress towards Lucha Underground. Catrina confronted Son of Havoc backstage to warn/taunt him about Mil Muertes and was about to lick him when Ivelisse interrupted. Ivelisse threatened Catrina and swung, the lights went out, Catrina disappeared, and Son of Havoc ended up on top of Ivelisse right as Angelico walked in. Angelico asked if they were back together. They are most definitely not. The dysfunctional trios champions, with Ivelisse back on crutches, supported Havoc during his match. Havoc fought Mil at least as well as Drago and Fenix have in recent weeks, but that’s still a losing effort. Catrina made a move on Angelico, which again caused Ivelisse to get involved. Angelico watched that confrontation, and not the Disciples of Death sneaking up on him. That trio laid out Angelico while Catrina got the better of Ivelisse. Son of Havoc made the save for his partners with a big dive, but Mil Muertes finished him when Havoc returned to the ring.
The main event featured four sets of rivals – Alberto/Johnny, Sexy Star/Super Fly, Aerostar/Jack and Drago/Hernandez – with that last one being officially added to Ultima Lucha. It also featured a whole lot of action in the main event, with Aerostar looking impressive early, getting stuck in the ring by the rudos for a long stretch, and then making the tag to his team. Johnny ran from Alberto at almost every chance, though he did break up Alberto’s armbar on Jack with a Fin de Mundo. Johnny also won by rolling thru a Sexy Star cradle and pinning her with a tights pull, so it was a(nother) good day to be Johnny Mundo.
Texano didn’t wrestle on the show, but did appear before the live crowd to explain his actions from last week. In a mostly English language promo, Texano explained he wasn’t a good guy, but he was definitely a Mexican. Texano says he couldn’t be trusted – even by his own brother – but he was loyal to the Mexican people, and he was offended by how Chavo Guerrero disrespected the Mexican wrestlers (even if he still didn’t like them.) Texano challenged Chavo to fight, saying that even if Chavo had one broken leg, he wanted to break the other. Texano got the Crew instead, and Demon making the save. Cisco strangely threw in a chair to Demon, who smacked Texano in the head. The three beat up Texano, as the announcers were generally baffled about what had happened. Striker “speculated” that Demon was angry Texano trying to take his place as representing Mexico and fighting Chavo, though both announcers repeatedly acknowledged this was a strange turn of events. Demon challenged Texano to a match for Ultima Lucha.
To start the show, the Mack/Cage battle was closer than it has been in the past, with Mack having his best singles outing so far. Mack caught Cage with an inside cradle with all of Mack’s weight on top for the surprise win.
A Prince Puma/Mil Muertes face to face confrontation was advertised for next week.
Ultima Lucha lineup So Far
- Alberto el Patron vs Johnny Mundo
- Prince Puma (c) vs Mil Muertes for the Lucha Underground Championship
- Drago vs Hernandez
Demon/Texano was challenged for, but not officially announced. You don’t need 20/20 vision to figure out some other matches coming, but we’ll wait for the show to catch up..
thoughts
One of the better episodes of television they’ve done. There are shows with better matches than the main event and this one didn’t have any payoff like the trios tournament final, but this was so strong as far as building towards an upcoming big show while delivering in every match and skit. I think some of – probably most of us? – thought Pentagon being used to give Sexy Star a rivalry win was not a great use of Pentagon. No one was thinking about Pentagon’s win/loss record against Sexy Star at the end of the show, they were thinking Pentagon is the greatest/scariest man alive. The “old veteran pulled out of retirement to fight one last time” storyline is one of the easiest storylines to do right, and Lucha Underground has done it perfectly. The main event that preceded it gave you a lot of match, and left you wanting to see Alberto finally get his hands on Johnny Mundo. Mil Muertes continues to be an unbeatable machine, on a different level than anyone he faces. He could not look any stronger going into the title match.
The one iffy moment of the show was the Texano segment. The original plan appeared to be Chavo versus Texano (or some variation with Demon involved) at Ultima Lucha, but Chavo really did get hurt last week and they did not believe Chavo was going to be back in time for the show. This also took place closer to the finale than it appears – they’re a little out of order at the moment – which meant everyone who was going to mean something was already penciled in for an Ultima Lucha match and there wasn’t time to make someone new. I’m not sure, haven’t been told, but looking at the playing board, the best options were either turning Demon, or bringing back the Texano/DelAvar feud. We’d seen the latter, might as well try the former.
The announcers calling out the sudden and hard to understand change of perspective of Demon helped the segment (much better than pretending nothing strange was happening), but this still came across so fast and abrupt that it was hard to really care. The whole segment was done as well as it could be given what that they had to get across – Texano did much better in his promo than I would’ve expected, Demon threw himself into the heel character – it was just a big reversal in a short time. The Demon/Chavo vignette last week was a good start to this direction, but there really needed to be 2/3 weeks more of those to prepare it better.
Cage & Mack probably gets overlooked from everything that happened after, but it was a really good match that seemed a lot longer than I have it timed. It was a nice mix with everything else; you can guess that things probably aren’t done between the two, but there wasn’t much you had to absorb and retain. There was a lot going on, adding some simple makes it easier to follow.
This was a nice one. I’m not sure how much it’d mean to people who don’t follow the show, because it’s a lot of building on what’s happened over the last month or more, but it was a great one for people who’ve been watching all along.