Welcome to episode 18 of season two of the Over/Under of Lucha Underground, our gently reworded Best and Worst report about every episode of the best wrestling show on television. If you’d like to read about season one, you can find all of our previous episode reports on our Lucha Underground tag page. For season two, click here.
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PROGRAMMING NOTE: This should catch us up. Look for a writeup of this week’s episode tomorrow!
And now, the Over/Under on Lucha Underground season two, episode 18.
Over: Platonic Pentgon Jr.
Pentagon Jr. got his back broken (or something close to it) by The Monster Matanza Cueto, so he’s been stuck in the Dark Master’s mystical dojo getting … uh, well, we’re not sure. If you remember the previous episode, we saw Pentagon locked in what appeared to be a sex swing, getting sadomasochistically tortured by a vampiric Fester. It wasn’t actually sexual — it was supposed to just look like torture, I think — but they could’ve put Pentagon in a ball-gag and it wouldn’t have changed the scene.
Anyway, this episode opens with Pentagon and Vampiro karate arguing about whether Pentagon has fear. Pentagon, as you might expect, says he has cero miedo. Vampiro believes there is pequeño miedo, and Pentagon is like, ” no, look at my hands right here, cero, and then miedo.” Vamp’s all, “hey bro, you wanna go get Matanza’d again, be my guest,” and Pentagon’s like, “bro, what part of cero miedo did you not understand?”
The “cero” part.
Over: Fame And The Iron Dick
Maybe I’m completely out of my gourd, but I really liked the opener between Mascarita Sagrada and Joey Ryan. It starts with Vampiro complimenting Joey for “putting oil on his walnuts,” and it’s all uphill from there.
The match features two big character-development moments:
1. Famous B as an active participant in Mascarita Sagrada’s matches. So far he’s mostly just stood outside the ring with Brenda in a cool jacket and gotten disappointed when Mascarita lost, but now he’s actually interfering and trying to help. I love that “present my business card” is his big move. He’ll just hop up on the apron and start recruiting the referee to distract him, or even distract Mascarita’s opponent. Also, a huge +1 to “FROM THE COMMERCIALS!” and the ongoing use of 423-GET-FAME graphics whenever the number’s spoken.
2. The in-universe establishment of Joey Ryan’s Super Dick. If you’ve been living under a rock this year, Ryan has a prehensile penis with super strength that can flip up to 11 men at once. He’s also impervious to nut shots, because penile strength, and Mascarita sells pain in his foot after trying to boot Joey in the crotch. It’s great. It almost tops Joey trying to bodyslam a mini, failing, trying again, succeeding and doing muscle poses as the best moment in the match.
Joey wins with a somewhat unnecessary tornado DDT off the second rope to a f*cking mini, and I think we’re finally starting to realize how great a TV character Joey Ryan could be if you just said f*ck it and let him be 100 percent Joey Ryan.
Over: COPS
Speaking of Joey Ryan, he gets a great backstage segment where he’s combing Dario Cueto’s office for evidence, gets chastised by fellow undercover police officer Cortez Castro, and gets discovered by Mr. Cisco. Cisco’s upset about them robbing Cueto without him and decides to snitch, which causes Joey to PULL A GUN ON HIM. They chase him down and arrest him, and if Rusev hadn’t pulled a gun on Dolph Ziggler and gotten superkicked in Countdown, this would easily be the best handgun-related pro wrestling moment of the year.
Over: He’s A Something Something
The first of two title matches for the night is Chavo “Whoops” Guerrero defending his newly won Gift of the Gods Championship against the robo-man he robbed to get the opportunity, They Call Him Cage.
I was expecting this to be a squash, but it was lengthy and competitive and I dug it a lot. It’s one of those rare times when Lucha Underground slows down a little and focuses on telling a deliberate, old-school story in the ring. Chavo’s the crafty veteran in way over his head who has to attack the big man’s leg and keep it incapacitated if he hopes to have a chance. Cage is crazy strong and great at everything, but his temper gets the best of him and he loses focus. Someone like Chavo could eat someone like Cage alive if it weren’t for that whole “righteous indignation at the theft of an ancient Aztec medallion that would’ve gotten him a Money on the Waist title shot” thing.
My favorite part of the match without a doubt is the finish, with Chavo getting confident enough to go for Three Amigos and Cage just OBLITERATING HIM with a series of power moves. Like, absolute annihilation. I’m not talking a Dean Ambrose dive followed by bouncing in the ropes followed by a body hug DDT. I’m talking a vertical suplex counter into a snap powerbomb, followed immediately by a buckle bomb, followed by a f*cking Steiner Screwdriver. I don’t think I’ve ever seen someone in LU get pinned with more authority.
In true Cage fashion, he celebrates the win by announcing that he’s cashing in on Matanza NEXT WEEK. Be careful, man, nobody knows more about cages than Matanza.
Over: KING CUERNO HAS MIL MUERTES DISPLAYED IN HIS HOUSE
I WAS JOKING BUT THIS ACTUALLY HAPPENED. KING CUERNO HAS GONE FULL PSYCHO ON MIL MUERTES AND MOUNTED HIM IN HIS LUCHA LOG CABIN OR WHATEVER.
I can’t type about this without the caps lock on. All I’ll say is that I hope when Catrina re-materializes and gives Mil life again, she accidentally gives it to everything else in the room. I want King Cuerno running away from pissed-off formerly dead birds and a bunch of disembodied boar heads.
Over: TEAM SUPER JERKS
Not sure what to call them, but I’m going with that.
A lot of the night is spent building up Johnny Mundo, Taya, Jack Evans and PJ Black as the new gringo rudo heel faction in town. There’s a great character vignette for Taya where she explains why she’s the perfect woman and beats up World of Luchador guys in a fancy ballroom (?), and an even better followup where Mundo attacks Fenix and takes his place on Black Evans’ squad. They play air guitar and guitar noises actually happen, a la Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure. It’s so perfect. They should’ve sent a poet.
But yeah, Mundo ends up teaming with Evans and Black with Taya at ringside, and the combined up-their-own-assedness of that crew is too much for even the Superfriends Trios Champions. The rudos cheat SO HARD here, including an incredible sequence where the referee gets pulled out of the ring and they go NUCLEAR with nonstop cheapshots, boots to the nuts and thumbs to the eyes. It’s one of the most brilliantly plotted out cheatings ever, and when it doesn’t get them the victory they just keep going. That’s so dope. They’re a grouping of the worst people in the world (and PJ Black), and I love it.
I’m interested to see where this goes — I assume to Team Havoc getting healthy, reuniting and having some dread heels to get their titles back from, but I haven’t read the spoilers — and can’t believe the Superfriends lost already. This is a great, great match that you should seek out immediately.
Oh whoops, here it is. WATCH THIS.
