What happened: Monster Clown & Murder Clown betrayed Psycho Clown, who was figuratively and literally badly burned. Faby Apache got locked in a room (which turned out not to be so locked.) Aerostar & Super Fly kept the tag titles.
What was good: I liked the ladder match and had not a lot of use for the rest. I realized AAA main events are going to mostly be Psycho Clown getting beat, making a brief comeback, and then getting screwed for the next year straight (after happening for most of the last six months), and it is good that I realized that but not good for wrestling action.
Where can I watch it: It’s on AAA’s channel.Read More
What happened: Dr. Wagner Jr. turned (really more because they booked him as a técnico when he was meant to be a rudo by now than any storyline reason.) Heroes Inmortales was promoted a lot? Garza and Mundo fought leading up to that show. Super Fly got a win, over Aerostar even.
What was good: Nothing, really
Where can I watch it: It’s on AAA’s channel.Read More
The three mid September episodes covered TripleMania, which was previously reviewed as an iPPV (including the Lucha Underground match, which did not air on TV.) All episodes had a few minutes of extra finish.
The September 10th episode included an AAA Rewind feature on TripleMania I. The video quality of the TripleMania I footage looked much better than we have elsewhere. This week also promoted the 09/16 Hard Rock show through the show.
The Copa Antonio Pena match aired on September 10th, followed by interviews with both men to build to their match for Heroes Inmortales. Daga believes all the foreigners don’t respect Mexican lucha libre. Australian Suicide calls Daga a coward for running in and throwing a chair at his head (six sitches), and Daga says he didn’t whine about almost getting his eye knocked out by Suicide because it’s lucha libre. Daga says everyone wanted him to win the TripleMania Cup, and Australian Suicide ruined it for him.
The Pentagon/Mundo title match also aired this week. El Fantasma gets a graphic, as the president of lucha libre in Mexico City, when he’s shown post match (and while he looks on unable to do anything.)
The AAA Rewind on the 09/17 show focuses on Love Machine and his role on the first TripleMania. The Hard Rock video packages are replaced by clips of last week’s Daga/Suicide interviews, to promote Heroes Inmortales.
The not-yet-OGT versus Apaches match is followed by an interview with the Apaches separately discussing the match. Faby & Mary feel they showed how tough they were, and were surprised by their father’s actions. El Apache says it hurt to see his daughters hit and bleeding and he had to act. The Apaches are happy to be reunited, despite what happened.
The main event of this week is the AAA Heavyweight Title match.
AAA Rewind on September 24 starts with Cien Caras, talks about all the people who lost apuesta matches on TripleMania. The last one listed is Joaquin Roldan, and I believe he actually won that match (but did lose his hair.) That’s where they end it – the more recent loses by Cibernetico, Texano and Brian Cage are unmentioned (though Mesias’ losses are left in.)
Starting this week, the Heroes Inmortales promos are hyping Alberto’s involvement in the show (though they still end with Daga/Suicide.) The annual Anontio Pena mass is also mentioned.
The opener is the four way tag title match, and it’s followed by an Aerostar & Drago promo talking about the belts. They’re happy to be champion and defending the match at Heroes Inmortales. They preview the match. Aerostar says Super Fly’s career has gone down since he took his mask. (Laredo Kid’s name doesn’t come up. Garza Jr.’s name is missing from the TripleMania talk, for whatever it’s worth.)
Pagano versus Psycho Clown finishes the TripleMania hype.
What happened: Pagano beat Psycho in a cage match, meaning Hijo del Tirantes would be referee for their mask match. Mary Apache refused El Apache’s request to return back to the rudo side. Garza Jr. replaced Fenix as Fantasma’s partner (who was still promoted for the TripleMania anyway.)
What was good: The three way tag match was the best match, but you wouldn’t miss much if you skipped the show entirely.
Where can I watch it: It’s on AAA’s channel.Read More
What happened: Psycho Clown defeated Pagano for his hair in the main event. The finish and outcome was overshadowed by Dr. Wagner Jr. first trying to cost Psycho Clown the match, then challenging Psycho Clown to a mask match at next year’s TripleMania. Psycho Clown readily accepted.
Texano retained the heavyweight championship by defeating Brian Cage. A post match attack by team Trump suggested Mesias would be the next challenger.
Johnny Mundo defeated Pentagon Jr. to win the Latin American championship when Taya betrayed Pentagon and joined Team Trump.
Aerostar & Drago surprisingly won the tag team titles, with Drago defeating Paul London. Garza Jr. replaced Fenix, who appears to be done in AAA for the moment.
Averno & Chessman versus Mary Apache & Faby Apache ended in no apparent finish. El Apache stopped the rudos when Averno attempted to gain revenge on Faby hitting him with a bottle by doing the same to her. The rudos attacked Apache, and broke a light tube over Faby when she had a visual pinfall. Apache tried to save his daughters, but was attacked by Ricky Marvin. Averno, Chessman and Ricky Marvin are now “O G T” and had new t-shirts, but we never got a good enough shot of those shirts to know what OGT means.
Australian Suicide defeated Daga to win the TripleMania Cup. Daga’s foot was on the ropes, missed by the referee, and he attacked Suicide after the match.
Rey Misterio won the Lucha Underground trios match.
Art Barr & Joaquin Roldan were added to the Hall of Fame.
What was good (and not good): The tag title match was the best match on the show. The crowd reacted strongest to the main event, though it was technically not much good. The Pentagon/Mundo, heavyweight title, and LU trios match were at best passable good, but also nowhere as near as good imagined. Whether it’s TripleMania booking or (positive) crowd noise not being picked up as well in Arena Ciudad de Mexico, those matches all felt like they’d been better in any other situation. The Daga/Suicide ending of the Copa TripleMania battle royal was good as well.
Having a long term plan is great, and Dr. Wagner Jr. versus Psycho Clown would be a giant match if it occurred. Given AAA’s history, and Dr. Wagner’s lifetime of setting up mask matches and not doing them, it’s very hard to take seriously. The way it was announced also completely obliterated what was just the main event of their show, with AAA trampling over the Pagano/Psycho ending in a hurry to make next year’s match.
I dunno about the short term or long term plan here
Joaquin Roldan appeared not to know he was going into the Hall of Fame, seemed very touched by the moment, and did his best to make it not about him. It was still groan inducing. The list of people who’ve made big contributing to AAA is very long, and only 12 of them are in before Joaquin. Putting yourself in your own Hall of Fame is never a good look, but it’s particularly bad optics after the last fifteen months AAA’s had. It was a poor job of reading the room, as the AAA crowd made it clear they didn’t like the idea. Much like the main event, the way they put Roldan in the Hall of Fame reduced Art Barr to a minor footnote they were racing past to get to the real news, and that’s no way to treat an introduction.
Particularly, putting a promoter in a Hall of Fame for doing such an excellent job moments after Fenix no-showed the tag team title match took some gumption. The situation with Fenix and AAA has clearly been going on since at least the Veracruz taping, and AAA opted to be dishonest about it the entire way. Fenix is a popular guy, but Fenix to Garza wasn’t going to cost them any tickets. It will cost them trust, and that’s why no one’s really going to believe them about Wagner and Psycho until they’re both in the ring next year, and Villano IV or someone else isn’t added to take the pinfall.
The English announcers, particular Matt Striker, seemed better prepped for the show than in times past. Hugo, as usual, came off as if he very little specific knowledge and talked in big generalities to avoid getting trapped on getting those details wrong. Striker knew the history of all the feuds (and even some that weren’t scheduled, like Psycho/Wagner) and came off like he somewhat followed the product. There were a lot of details he got wrong, but that part seemed like progress. The other parts of Striker’s antics were out of control and harmful to the show. Striker and Team Trump were specifically a poor mix; Striker saw the group as an opening for a discussion of his political views and verbally bristled when he got a poor reaction to them, blowing off the finish of the Pentagon/Mundo match because he was so annoyed.
Vampiro replaced Hugo for the Lucha Underground match and was awful. I don’t think he’d mind that review, because he clearly wasn’t trying to be anything but awful. It came off as both Vampiro was being required to do announcing on this show and didn’t want to do it, and also that Vampiro had been drinking or doing something before going out there. (Here’s some highlights.)
The English announcing on these shows have peaked at “below average” and usually been much worse. It’s really hard to understand why AAA continues to bring in English announcer for these shows, because they are actively making matches less enjoyable for people listening in that language. The Spanish announcers did not sound like they were much better tonight, taking time to use offensive language and expose the identity of all the Lucha Underground wrestlers (except Mil Muertes, oddly enough), but maybe that’d just be random noise to the English fans,
At any rate, this whole concept desperately needs to be re-evaluted. If the idea of English announcers it to appeal to English speaking fans, AAA’s been failing and failing repeatedly.
The whole Lucha Underground presentation was also a failure. Five of the six guys were thrown out with no introduction. AAA presented the guys like unknowns being shoved out on a major show, and the fans whistled at them to get off the stage so the real stars could appear. If this was an idea to get Mexican fans to push for Lucha Underground to be shown in Mexico, it was rejected. If this was an appeal to American fans to try TripleMania, they probably went away excited to see these guys back in their normal environment but disinterested in seeing them treated like non-entities in AAA.
The video quality of the show was mostly fine, but the production choices were aggravating. They fell in love with crowd shows, hoping for big reactions, and often cut away from the ring during moves or during pinfalls. Important spots and action were missed during live action repeatedly. There was a loud buzz over the sound system during the later portions of the show, though they got it under control at some points.
This show was overall much better than last year’s shows, but there’s still plenty of issues. I didn’t feel this was a waste of time, simply that it could’ve and should’ve been better
Where can I watch it:It’s still available on iPPV and will start to air on TV a week from Saturday. Given the length of the show (around 3.5 hours), much will be cut or edited.
What’s next?: Heroes Inmortales on 10/04. Mesias/Texano seems like a lock, and matches like Garza/Mundo, Drago/Aerostar vs Cage/Hernandez, and all three Apaches versus Ricky/Chessman/Averno seem plausible. AAA’s clearly planning on actually doing Suicide/Daga sometime soon, and it may even happen this time.Read More
