Dia del Muertos, AAA/TripleMania, Traumas/IWRG, El Mago

thecubsfan news

CMLL’s card for TicketMaster Live on Friday (an hour later than usual if you haven’t changed your clock yet)

CMLL (FRI) 10/30/2020 Arena México
1) Átomo & Microman vs Chamuel & El Guapito
2) El Audaz, Espíritu Negro, Rey Cometa vs Dark Magic, Okumura, Vangellys
3) Reyna Isis © vs Lluvia [MEX WOMEN]
first defense
4) Ángel de Oro, Forastero, Niebla Roja vs Negro Casas, Soberano Jr., Titán [Relevos Increíbles]
5) Euforia vs Terrible [Rey del Inframundo]

Maybe the Dia del Muertos set will look really cool. There’s no much here otherwise, and this is certainly not a 250 pesos card. It’s not better than last week’s card.

Euforia & Terrible and even Reyna Isis & Lluvia are interesting matches for people deep in CMLL but neither is likely to get someone to buy the show. Relevos Increibles matches mean little; those guys could have a good match but the stipulation doesn’t hide that it’s just a random match. These are never sold on the opening two matches but there’s not much an effort. Dark Magic has looked like one of the world’s worst professional wrestlers since the restart. Okumura & Vangellys are problematic themselves, but Dark Magic is outstanding in the field of terrible GIF moments. Atomo’s not really good either, but there are not a hundred other micros CMLL could use. CMLL putting together Dark Magic, Okumura, and Vangellys a rudo trio for a major show is an indictment of the CMLL programming department.

There are many recaps of the AAA press conference, but not much new. There would normally be additional post-press conference individual interviews, but that’s not possible right now. (All the questions were written to keep mouths closed, which was a smart move I haven’t seen much and also cut down on the thirty-second preambles.) Record, which tends to have an inside line to AAA, seems positive that TripleMania is a matter of when not if. They’re expecting a 30% capacity, which would be around 6,500 people.

The Marvel/AAA stuff got a ton of attention from the media as a big corporate partnership, though the existing lucha libre fans seem a bit more skeptical of the characters and how it’ll actually work. There’s an additional press conference from Marvel scheduled for Thursday in Monterrey.

Draztick Boy is Draztick Boy no more. He’ll now be wrestling as El Mago, apparently having premiered the new name and look on the Vanguardia show this weekend (which will stream on 11/08). He’s been Draztick Boy for 12 years, but also he’s 28 and it’s rough to be stuck with a “Boy” name forever. I would’ve guessed Draztick Boy as someone AAA might be re-gimmick, but that seems unlikely if he’s invested in creating a new character for himself.

Changing a name is a tough choice because it’ll take time for people to realize El Mago is Draztick Boy and he’d already but up Draztick Boy by working in AAA, Dragon Gate, and US groups. I think the “Boy/Kid” names don’t translate well, especially once a wrestler gets into his 20s, and aren’t as distinctive. It’s the same with the many women who have Lady/Princesa/Reina names; you can tell them apart if you follow them closely, but most of the world does not. “Toxin” is better than “Toxin Boy.” I would’ve guessed Draztick Boy would’ve also just dropped the Boy at some point, or been regimmicked by AAA but that seems unlikely if he’s spent money on a new look.

I was going to say I only have room for one El Mago in my heart but then I remembered I have no heart so it’s OK.

Los Traumas are in the finals of IWRG’s number 1 contenders tag team tournament. Los Traumas may also be out of IWRG for the time being. Mas Lucha points out the Traumas Instagram message, saying they’re not going to be in Castillo del Terror as originally announced or any other IWRG shows. IWRG announced a new poster with Hijo del Alebrije & Emperador Azteca in their spots. There were only a few hours between the two cards announced, but there’s a lot of unhappy Trauma fans in the comments of IWRG announcing the change. IWRG was doing discounted pre-sales on tickets too, so some of that is people expecting to pay for a bigger card.

Trauma II had an incident with a fan a couple of weeks ago that looked like it could turn into something and didn’t, and incidents between the Traumas and the fans are a normal event. I don’t know if that had anything to do with it. There was no chance they were losing the Castillo del Terror match. Maybe they expected to win, but I’m not sure if they’d be told ahead of time. This situation comes up on Mas Lucha’s podcast and they reach the same conclusion: no one knows for sure what is guessing, everyone is guessing it is a money issue, but neither side is confirming that and no one’s reporting it.

Legend had a Lucha Libre Expo with wrestling shows on Sunday. The wrestler show portion of the event has been canceled, citing health conditions not allowing it. Health conditions in Mexico haven’t changed that much in the last couple of weeks; maybe they were hoping something would improve. The convention portion is still currently scheduled. It’s hard to make a health argument why conventions are ok and wrestling shows are not; it really just comes down to wrestling shows being regulated and conventions not.

Hijo del Santo is main eventing a show in Aguascalientes on Thursday. Santo barely wrestles now even in good times, there have been no shows of any note in Aguascalientes since the pandemic started, so this is surprising. There is a logo indicating governmental approval and Santo mentions the show will air on (local) canal 26, so they likely got special approval. That TV channel does have an internet feed, though it was not loading when I checked Wednesday morning. The Thursday show takes place around 7 pm local, 8 pm US CT if looking.

Ovaciones has a long interview with Dr. Wagner Jr. as a preview to appearing on IWRG’s show Sunday. Not much news. He says he’s independent who’s open to working with either CMLL or AAA. Cronistas del Ring interviews Omar Reyes about facing Wagner, working with the police, and a back injury.

Box Y Lucha 3445 talks about Oro’s death among other issues. They’re also selling 10 books of magazines from the late 70s to the early 80s. They’re $326 for a book (around 25 issues) or $2325 for all 10 books. That is US Dollars; it’s about $13 USD per magazine. That’s a little bit more than they were charging back in the day, but they did this again back in 2015 and those did get sold. I’m kind of thinking of getting one but I haven’t even asked about shipping costs yet. My ideal situation is would be to split it with someone in Mexico who could send it off to get scanned and then send the scans to me because I don’t actually care about the physical copies, but I don’t know how to make that happen. Box Y Lucha has indicated plans in the past to make older magazines available digitally, but we have no timeline on when that could be (and, like everything could always change.)

Box Y Lucha also announced its annual holiday awards party is canceled due to the pandemic. I’ve never attended that but the one good thing about the pandemic are holiday parties I no longer am obligated to attend.

There’s a drive-in show in San Luis Potosi on Friday. Motorcycles are welcome, but only two people on a motorcycle.

Ultimo Guerrero, Caristico, Forastero, and Soberano are among those working a Martinez show on Halloween near Dallas. Chicago’s Gringo Loco and Bandolero are listed on the show too. Bandolero is super talented but also infamously not fond of working shows far from home so I was surprised to see his name. Maybe it’s a different Bandolero?

Kriminal Lucha Libre (Toxin) debut show Deluxe on 11/07 Arena San Juan

Fly Star indicated he’s working behind the scenes with this promotion even though he’s retired for the ring and will help out MexaWrestling if ever asked.

Mexico City area luchador Coco Bronce (Enrique Ruiz) passed away Tuesday, reportedly after a battle with COVID-19. He wrestled as La Mancha in the Pavillon Azteca/AWWA promotion in the late 80s.

Bandido posted his memories of Principe Aereo on Instagram.

Hijo de Fishman, Pagano, and Maximo appeared in a music video.

Mas Lucha has a new edition of their En+Carados podcast.

LuchaWorld has the latest Lucha Report.

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