Lucha Underground Episode 30: Submit to the Master Review

PAS: Chavo is really good in these vignettes, he and Dario are by far the best actors in it, meanwhile Black Lotus is almost porn level terrible at conveying anything. I may be out on this whole Matanza thing, it doesn't appear to be leading to a wrestling match, instead just backstage movie fights, and this is starting to remind me of midgets blowing up speedboats in 1993 WCW. Dario is a better actor then Cheatum, although he might not be as good as King Curtis.

ER: I also loved Chavo and Dario in this. "Now why don't you tell me what you really want."

1. Jack Evans vs. Argenis

PAS: This had some fun Evans moments, including a couple of nifty ju-jitsu take downs and grappling, but Argenis is the dullest guy on this roster, and nothing he did here made me want to see more of him. Seems like a spot that could be used on almost anyone else in AAA. If rumors are true and he is one of the goblins with Mil Muertes I hope he can do something more interesting with that role

ER: I liked this more than Phil, and while Argenis may have zero charisma to speak of I thought his work in the match was fine. His timing was on when it came to reversing Evans' spots, he threw a real nice low dropkick and hit a nice flip dive, I even liked stuff like a flapjack into kicking Evans below the belt. I thought he and Evans played off each other well and liked how well Evans' flips led to some of his stuff getting reversed (such as the cartwheel into getting suplexed). Also dug the two caught ranas that Argenis turned into powerbombs, one in the ring and the other against the railing on the floor. That one looked nasty. I still have no idea what these Legends of the Hidden Temple medallions are going to be, but Pentagon's sure hasn't done him any favors yet.

ER: I actually loved how long the camera held on Mack/Cage when they caught each other's strikes. It was like the Weathers/Schwarzenegger handshake in Predator, only with eye contact. It was glorious. And yes, Black Lotus' line reading really is porn level as Phil stated. Her pronunciation of "Matanza" sounded like a first week ESL student trying to be sexy. BUT I liked her dozen chest shots on Chavo, although the locker door shots on The Crew looked kinda weak.

2. Son of Havok, Angelico & Ivelisse vs. Delavar Daivari, Cage & Big Ryck

PAS: Match that had some fun moments, but ultimately disappointed. Big Ryck looked great again, and is a bummer he is stuck with Daivari who is getting added to the Killshot/Sexy Star list. I thought the handoff suplex was really cool, and Cage and Ryck as a Road Warriors style killer tag team would be pretty cool, I guess if we kept him out of the ring Davari would be a fine Precious Paul. If you just made Ivelisse and Daivari seconds this would have been a better match. Finish keeps up the dishwater dull Texano v. Daivari feud.

ER: This should have been better but chose to focus more on some angles, and the match didn't get as much time as other trios matches have gotten. Ryck looked good, and I'm with Phil that a big jacked up team with Cage would be fun. The trade off vertical was awesome (and the camera wisely cuts to Ivelisse screaming during the handoff), Ryck throws a nice elbow, Cage is really good at eating Angelico's strikes (combined with Angelico's knees and roundhouse kicks looking nice), I dug Havoc's little evasive cartwheel off the top, but really this match didn't add up to much. Crowd again seemed to care far more about Ivelisse actually sitting with them instead of the match itself.

3. Submission Match: Pentagon Jr. vs. Sexy Star

PAS: Man fuck this match. This was probably even worse then their first match, as instead of Sexy getting a fluke win, Pentagon Jr. has to escape the dominant Sexy Star with the help of interference. Pentagon tried hard, but Sexy Star is bad and not credible, and no amount of smoke and mirrors can make it different. Now Pentagon is going to be stuck feuding with Vampiro who sucked in the ring when he could actually move, can't imagine how bad he will be now.

ER: Blechh. I was dreading this when it was announced last week, dreading it far more when I found out from the program guide that it was a submission match, and then just sad when it turned out to be pretty much exactly what I was dreading. Pentagon has to hold back on all of his offense, Sexy Star no sells moves more than any wrestler in the fed, Pentagon needs help to beat a woman who has been laughed off by other opponents, and Pentagon has to work overtime to make Star's weak offense look painful (he tries, but is not successful). Her one positive attribute is that she's flexible, so she can make Pentagon's cool submissions look ultra nasty. Now that also creates another problem as Pentagon's submissions DO look nasty (That one in a piledriver position while bending her ankles across each other?! AWESOME!), which makes it more absurd when she lasts through all of them, only to almost tap Pentagon with a limp single crab. Super Fly runs in and protects her with an ultra soft power bomb (pretty sure Bubba Ray didn't protect Mae Young this much), then we get a tubby Vampiro staring down Pentagon. You know, Pentagon, the ruthless killer who went after a helpless ring announcer a few weeks ago, but now suddenly doesn't immediately shit down Vampiro's neck. This fed just can't properly build a good rudo. Pentagon's heat after going after Melissa was off the charts, and it's almost as if they've purposely tried to cool him off ever since. Vampiro flips out in front of a mirror afterwards, but it looks less like Captain Willard losing his mind and more like an adult baby play acting "crazy". All of this made me sad.

PAS: What a bi-polar fed, they follow up last weeks awesome show with this turd burger. Hopefully that means next week will be good

ER: You can make an argument that last week's episode was the best in company history. At minimum it would be in the conversation. And, having made that argument, you could go on to argue that this episode was among the worst in company history. I don't read tapings results and I avoid spoilers, so maybe some of the things I'm not digging all end up rosy and cozy. I'm skeptical, though.


LUCHA UNDERGROUND EPISODE GUIDE

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MLJ: Guerreros del Infierno B-14: Bestia Salvaje, Emilio Charles Jr., Último Guerrero b Black Warrior, Satánico, Shocker

2001-05-04 @ Arena México
Bestia Salvaje, Emilio Charles Jr., Último Guerrero b Black Warrior, Satánico, Shocker

One of the trickiest parts of doing some of these projects of old matches is that people keep posting things. So far as problems go, this is one that I'm glad to have. I meant to take a week to go through a few more matches on my GdI comp before moving back to something more modern but then I spotted a newly posted singles match between Ultimo Guerrero and Satanico. That reminded me that I really hadn't looked for anything BUT matches with both UG and Rey Bucanero in them, and I should broaded my search just to see what was there. This, from the week before, is what I found, so I'm doubling back to do this one and the singles match, and then I'll figure out something related for Friday.

The Shocker/Satanico alliance is a little weird to me, but it was definitely a thing around here and had been for most of the year. It made sense. They were on the verge of debuting Averno but Satanico needed someone to team with against GdI after they turned on him and Shocker carried at least part of the crowd, even as a rudo. They were certainly in the "babyface" role here, with Warrior relatively non-descript but effective enough as a guy in a mask who wasn't going to turn the crowd.

Charles was very good at what he does. He had great punches and was very solid at rudo control segments, just in being in the right place at the right time and laying in suitable punishment. He was also skilled at stooging and eating offense when the time came. Salvaje seemed like he was maybe a step behind from a few years before but this wasn't the sort of match where he had to eat a lot of quick tecnico offense so it was fine.

These matches are well worth watching for the heat and for the hatred between Ultimo Guerrero and Satanico. CMLL got a year or so out of it and it was a year that didn't feel bloated or inflated, from what I can tell. They probably could have gotten two years out of it. This started violent and ended violent and in some ways was the most "Memphis" CMLL match I can remember seeing.

Guerrero and Satanico went right at it to start the primera. Satanico had rushed the ring and that led to a 3 on 1 for a minute before Shocker came out to even the odds. This was a brief but hard hitting couple of minutes, with brawling around the ring. It ended with Shocker snapping the Reinera on Charles and Salvaje getting hung up dangling in the ropes and legdropped by Black Warrior. It seemed a bit early for that spot back in 2001, but they didn't make it feel contrived at all. It's something that works so much better when there are partners to set it up than in singles matches.

There weren't even breaks between caidas here. The brawling just kept on going, with UG's team getting the advantage by playing the numbers, mainly. Charles drove Black Warrior out and then it was three on two for long enough to shift the momentum and start a very solid beat down with Guerrero biting Satanico, Charles ripping at Warrior's mask, a senton de la muerte on Shocker, a double pancake on Black Warrior, and submissions on Warrior and then Satanico (the latter by UG) following this triple dropkick on Warrior:

Again, the violence continued through the caida shift, with the refs trying to break it up. Then, out of nowhere, they start tossing around an illegal object and use it behind the ref's back, passing it aroudn to avoid detection. I've never seen this before in CMLL (though it could be a staple of either Charles or Salvaje as it'd fit them, sort of). It eventually ended up in what seemed to be a pocket of Guerrero's. Despite taht, Satanico's team came back, with Shocker sticking Salvaje's foot in a chair to trap him. Satanico had one of his great babyface flurries (after putting his straps down, all Memphis-y) with two hart attack clotheslines and some real mask tearing. UG pulled out the object though and nailed him with it for the pin, passing it to Charles after the match in order to keep the ref from seeing it.

I could watch Satanico and Guerrero beat the crap out of eachother over another twenty matches and it's too bad we don't have more. We do have their singles match though, and I'll get to that next.

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