Lucha Underground Episode 22: Mask versus Mask Workrate Report

ER: I love the addition of the trios titles. Feels more than appropriate for this fed. The fed seems like it has a good head as far as keeping titles important, so I love the prospect of wild trios title matches.

1. Angelico, Ivelisse & Son of Havoc vs. Aerostar, Drago & Fenix

ER: This may be the first time I've ever said the words "I wish we were getting more tournament wrestling!" Wrestling tournaments are kind of famously lame. Trios tourney is 2 for 2 so far and I'm really loving these tossed together teams with something to prove. Angelico decided he was going to take a bunch of DDTs right on his head, we had an all time great dive train, and one of the most fascinating/stupid/dangerous/WHY spots of all time, with Aerostar standing straight up on Fenix's shoulders, on the middle rope, with Fenix idiotically leaping off to send Aerostar leaping off of him. My brain immediately went to the Sid leg break, or the Gronda leg break, or the Mickey Knuckles leg break, or any other stupid leg break where somebody decided to jump from heights and land on their feet. Stupid stupid stupid. Havoc is now way over with the crowd so kudos to the way they've booked him so far, loved him interrupting Ivelisse's dive with a crazy flip dive of his own. This was all sorts of fun.

PAS: This was a blast, they are clearly taking the WCWSN style of lucha trios match for this fed, which is fine. Guys like Angelico and Fenix who maybe a little questionable in a singles match, are perfect here as they can hit their cool shit and get out of the way, and they all have some cool shit. That dive train was bonkers, the Fenix rope walk Foley elbow was one of the cooler spots of the year. I usually hate feuding tag partners stuff, but this didn't derail the match. Good stuff.

ER: Loved the numerous takes of Puma/Mundo's Predator-style zoomed in flexed arm handshakes.

2. Super Fly vs. Sexy Star

ER: Dario announces the pre-match mask vs. mask stip which is a little weird, as there's no feud between these two and just the prior week they were helping each other. Interesting, because I've never seen an "owner" force two people against each other by making sure one of them loses something important, but dumb because they threw out a gigantic stipulation match with zero build whatsoever. And then we go and get a 4 minute match that ends with no real build. Super Fly looked good in this, his uppercuts looked great and he tried to take Sexy's stuff as plausibly as possible. But then we get a roll up finish with Super Fly apparently not able to kick out of a cradle from a 120 lb. person. I get that this puts over the unpredictability of Cueto, but this is the first mask match of the promotion and really should have been made into a much much bigger deal. Yes, a lot of us knew that Super Fly lost his mask in Mexico already at this point, but I'd wager a lot of viewers did not know this, and maybe had never seen a mask match before. And now their first exposure to a legendary stipulation was a 4 minute match with somebody winning a mask in unconvincing fashion. It worked as a Dario dickhead move. I don't think it worked in any other way.

PAS: This was super dumb. I guess it was a fine bit of character work for Dario, but talk about shitting away a big opportunity. You only have one chance to debut the mask v. mask stipulation and make it a huge deal, and they piss it away on a nothing four minute match that ends in a roll up. Imagine how big a Puma v. Muertes mask match could have been if you built it over a season, or even something like Son of Havoc v. Aerostar. Now they have conditioned their audience to view it as a throw away middle of the show thing. Dumbest booking in this fed so far.

3. Prince Puma vs. King Cuerno

ER: Pretty disappointed with this one. There's a lot of involvement with the seconds and thirds, and any time I have the option of "normal match" or "match with Hernandez and Cage interference" I'll probably usually choose the former. They worked some unique interference or feuding seconds spots, with Puma doing a dive that gets caught by Cuerno's seconds, who toss Puma into a Cuerno neckbreaker. Later on and Mundo hits a wild sideways cannoball over the top taking out some dudes. But I don't know, the whole thing felt pretty disjointed, and Cuerno doesn't seem to be treated as much of a threat anymore which makes me sad.

PAS: I liked this more then Eric, I think it was a mistake to make it a title match, instead it should have just been a set up for next weeks trios, but as the RAW match to set up Survivor Series it was pretty good. I liked all of the interference spots, and Mundo's dive ruled.


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