A whole lot has already happened in the world of Lucha Underground this year, even with the weekly television show taking an extended hiatus in the middle of the current season three. Two of the company’s biggest stars, Pentagon Jr. and Fénix, parted ways with AAA, which is a company that is extensively tied to Lucha Underground.
Things got ugly when the real-life brothers changed their ring names (due to AAA holding the trademarks on them), and then AAA not only immediately tried to trademark their NEW names, but threatened legal action against a promotion that was advertising them under those new names.
Several big stars have left AAA over the past year, due to lots of various bad blood, and many have begun working with Konnan’s new The Crash promotion. Konnan and AAA are … not on good terms. While AAA and Impact Wrestling have a new partnership that may involve Lucha Underground talent, Lucha Underground is aware that they need to retain some of their home-grown (in the States, anyway) talent for a potential season four, and beyond.
The Wrestling Observer Newsletter reports that Pentagon — who is now going by Penta El 0M, which just flows right off the tongue — recently sat down with Vampiro and Lucha Underground executive producer Eric Van Wagenen about remaining with Lucha Underground. He is still under contract to LU, but they’re concerned about him working for The Crash in Mexico. He was reportedly offered a new contract, with a guarantee he would be the top star in the company and would make $1,500 per match, but he would need to stop working for Crash, CMLL, Impact (which is weird given recent news) or any other company that Konnan is involved with.
The Observer speculates that this might be the same sort of offer that LU will present to other contracted wrestlers who work for The Crash, a list that includes Fénix, Brian Cage, Sexy Star, and Jeff Cobb. Van Wagenen also recently stated publicly that any of the talent that has left AAA — Pentagon, Fénix, Sexy Star, Daga, etc. — will be welcome to come back for season four.
The big takeaway from this (other than BOY IT SURE SOUNDS LIKE THERE’S GOING TO BE A SEASON FOUR) is that Lucha Underground seems quite willing to sweeten deals for their wrestlers, even though they’re all already under contract. That’s certainly great news for the talent, and might be good news for the health of the company as well.
