(this got too long: if you don’t want to read, just click here.)
The discussion of Mysterious Luchador Underground Luchador In A White Hoodie continued this morning on Twitter. Chris DeJoseph, as he does from time to time, gave us a clue.
Check out episode 1. #LuchaUnderground https://t.co/sakA3b1jlB
— Chris DeJoseph (@chrisdejoseph) July 30, 2015
We all assumed the guy Dragon Azteca saved in that season opening fight was the not-yet-Prince Puma. We all may have assumed wrong.
Right here, I’d like to point you to a legal video of the first episode to take a look at it yourself. I can’t. I know of no way to actually check out episode 1. The Lucha Underground YouTube show has matches and highlights (like a clipped version of that opening fight), but no full episodes. The full Unimas shows are on uvideos, but not all of them and not episode 1. Last time this came up, when Black Lotus first met Dragon Azteca, I snuck the clip on YouTube so people could rewatch it. I could do that again, but I’m sure it’s not the only moment from the past that’ll be referenced on Ultima Lucha, and there’s just no way to catch up with many old episodes you’ve missed. This is not really my problem, and this is definitely not really DeJoseph’s responsibility (and I’m not meaning to throw this back at him, it’s just an easy example), but it’s an issue.
DeJoseph – I think it was on the Like Father, Like Son podcast- mentioned the show was written with the idea of being binge-watching friendly. Binge watching allows you to do something like wait 8 months for a whole bunch of episodes to air, jump in first episode, and watch them all. There are seasons of TV shows sitting on my DVR just waiting for me to do that, and I think it’d work just as well with this one. Unfortunately, El Rey is not doing a marathon of Lucha Underground episodes to allow people to do that leading to the final. (I asked, in typical annoying fashion, and they didn’t reply.) This seems a shame to me. I hold nothing against the other programming they have, but nothing which airs on that channel couldn’t be skipped for the day and a half it’d take to run all thirty eight hours so far. (In a perfect world, it’s nothing but The Lucha Underground Channel from now until Wednesday.) Instead, they’ll only air the prior two episodes – and then who knows if/when it airs again the week after. The 37 episodes in 37 minutes video is really good, but it’s most useful as a reminder for people who saw most of it already. There’s not as much for people who’ve jumped in; the announcers will definitely tell you what’s happened, but it’s not as good as seeing it.
You really shouldn’t ask people to do things you’re not willing to do yourself. I am willing to run a marathon of Lucha Underground, but no one has entrusted me with the programming department of a cable station quite yet. However, the DMCA hasn’t yet to justifiably take away my internet access, so there are still other methods of getting things done.
I’m running a Lucha Underground marathon here on Taima.TV. It’s been running for a few days just to see if it works (and it seems like it does as long as someone’s in the channel.) I’m going to restart it at the first episode in a few minutes, and it’ll go thru all the other episodes (and repeat) from now until Ultima Lucha part 2. Maybe you’ll watch it all, maybe you’ll just pop in for a few minutes of random episode, but it’ll be there if you want it. The total run time is about 28 hours, so it’ll repeat quite a few times between now and then.
The feed runs until Ultima Lucha starts again, or until the takedown notice. As soon as it goes down, it’s really going down: I’m disappearing the videos once this is over. You still need to watch the show and buy the DVDs when/if they come out, this isn’t meant to compete with any of that. It’s just an opportunity you take one more look back until it all it comes to an end.
This is not the perfect solution for catching up either – it’s a lot closer to being a silly Marty the Moth solution than a Pentagon Jr. killer app – but people who want to see specific episodes might want to try clicking on the episode names. Whatever you’ve watched or will watch, I hope you’re excited for UltimaLucha by the time it airs by next Wednesday. I’m sure it’ll be worth your time.
(Episode 2 is in Spanish, because reasons.)